Rumba and The Test by Anya Kamenetz

Anya Kamentz's book, The Test, is really good. It's something that parents and teachers and anyone who cares about parents, students or teachers in the U.S. should read. She does a nice job of covering the background of testing as it is today and offers some good options for how to handle the current situation. But, she missed the Rumba option.

The Rumba option is my name for an assessment scenario that is possible today that she didn't write about. I came up with the name, Rumba, by including the first letters of the names of the four scenarios she did mention: Robot, Unicorn, Monkey, Butterfly and adding a fifth element - Accessibility. I like calling the scenario a name usually associated with a dance which is what assessment of learning is like a lot of the time. The Rumba is also a human activity, not a thing or real or imagined animal. And, it can be fun which is what teaching and learning can be when done well.

It's important to focus on the addition of Accessibility which is where more education eyes need to be focused. Education and assessment both need to be more accessible for more students, and using open education resources housed in or delivered with a learning management system that includes all of the reporting features to satisfy all of the people that need to know is the best option for making education and assessment accessible.  Game builders aren't so likely to make their games as accessible as they need to be, and I just don't trust them to be the best stewards of our children's education records. Games will likely be available in English and Spanish and probably Chinese, but will they work with screen readers, and will they be capable of being translated on the fly into all of the languages a good LMS can handle?

The LMS model I'm envisioning includes portfolios - that's been included in my scenario for a few years. It includes project based learning, maker stuff, and authentic teacher created formative assessments. It can include standardized tests, but I don't think they'll be necessary, and I'd be more than happy if they weren't included. The investment required to make this model work will primarily be investment in teacher and administrator training because there are good proven open source options readily available. I'd rather my tax dollars go to build the capacity of the teachers in my community than into the coffers of the makers of standardized tests. So, Let's Rumba !

OER, LMSs and Platforms

In January, I suggested that promoting the use of OER with LMSs would benefit both OER and LMSs.  I've been in Twitter and email exchanges lately with people who don't distinguish between LMSs (learning management systems) and 'platforms.' The term Platform these days tends to refer to a whole bunch of different things. Including LMSs in with all of the other things that are included in the term platform isn't going to serve the promotion of OER. Doing so is similar to what David Wiley refers to as "theory neutrality." Wiley says, "Software vendors and standards bodies describe their learning object related work as being “instructional theory neutral.” Were this the case all would be well in learning object land. Problematically, a more accurate description of their products is “instructional theory agnostic,” or in other words, “we don't know if you're employing an instructional theory or not, and we don't care.” As stated above, it is very likely that the combination of learning objects in the absence of any instructional theory will result in larger structures that fail to be instructionally useful."

Putting LMSs in the same category as platforms is a weak attempt at being all inclusive; my point in suggesting that OER and LMSs will benefit each other is to highlight what LMSs will do for teachers who use them in concert with OER. A LMS "delivers and manages instructional content, identifies and assesses individual and organizational learning or training goals, tracks the progress towards meeting those goals, and collects and presents data for supervising the learning process of the organization as a whole.^[4] A learning management system delivers content but also handles registering for courses, course administration, skills gap analysis, tracking, and reporting.^[5]  Platforms don't necessarily do those things above, and doing all of those things with OER is what needs to happen in order for teachers and the institutions they're a part of to adopt OER more often.

Teaching is still largely done as a function within a larger system, and rightly so. Teaching and learning are community activities. Sure, teaching and learning can happen and often does happen as part of a one to one relationship, but it's that relationship within the context of a larger institution that gives the larger meaning to the teaching and learning. Learning happens in colleges that are part of a university; learning happens in classrooms in schools that are part of a district that are part of a state system of education. The LMS serves as the mechanism that defines the learning in the larger context. If OER is to be more relevant in schools of all kinds it needs to be explicitly and intentionally connected to the larger systems of the institutions. It's OK and even preferable to use the term LMS. The quicker that happens the better.

Let Teachers Control Assessment of Learning

I’m on the same side as Anthony Cody in supporting teachers in the classroom and thwarting  corporate control of U.S. Public Education,  especially when it comes to assessment. I don’t want assessment of learning to be defined as the external monitoring of the work inside the classroom. I agree with Cody that teachers are the ones who need to be making judgments about what students learn, how they learn it, and how learning is assessed. I want teachers to control the teaching and learning tools used in the classroom. So, that’s why I want teachers to learn how to use the tools available to them to use for instruction and assessment. I don’t want something that teachers don’t drive being forced on them by corporations and those who want to ‘disrupt’ our public education.

When I suggested in a recent blog post that I didn’t think he was fully informed, yet, about the possibilities of CBE and its various other names - standards based grading, student learning outcome reporting, and etc., I think (based on the flurry of tweets in the hours just after I posted) he thought I was siding with Bill Gates, Tom Vander Ark, Clayton Christensen, Michael Horn, and the other business people who are trying to get their hands on the very limited amount of money available for public education. I’m not. I’m on Anthony’s side.

Using a learning management system (LMS) for instruction and teacher created assessments is not something that has been done by very many K12 public school teachers in the U.S. It's not taught in most schools of teacher preparation and not something that most large public school systems promote. I get it; state departments of education and school district bureaucrats are all about control and not so much about authentic teaching and learning. I was an Open School elementary teacher in the Minneapolis Public Schools for sixteen years. Most of those years I also served as a teacher lead on the district technology advisory committee (back when they actually included teachers in planning about technology.) I also served as a building union steward for many of those years and did my fair share of butting heads with the district on contract issues, especially when it came to allowing teachers to choose what kind of professional development they would do and how they would do it.

I want teachers to be the best users of all tools that can be used for instruction and assessment of learning. Learning managements systems were not practical for most public schools until devices and wifi became as ubiquitous and as inexpensive as they are today and will continue to be in the future. Now, it’s time for teacher preparation schools, and district administrators, and education bloggers to work to support teachers in using all of the tools that are available. We can’t pretend that current technology is not a wonderfully powerful teaching tool. It’s unfortunate that we as a society have taken as long as we have to come to understand that. But, free open source learning management systems are available now. Free, digital open education resources will soon be as ubiquitous as public libraries. Teachers need to know how to use them. Let’s not let the disruptive business people take charge of instruction and assessment tools.

Keeping track of who knows what is still a crucial part of education. Let’s not let the disruptive business people take control of our necessary record keeping.   That means that teachers need to do it. It’s very possible and might even make teaching fun again for public school teachers.

CBE and it's Possibilities

Anthony Cody doesn't like the Competency Based Education ideas of Tom Vander Ark and Clayton Christensen, and neither do I. But, Competency Based Education doesn't need to be done the way Vander Ark is proposing. It can be done in a way that Cody supports; although, he doesn't really say much about what he does support in his recent blog post which was reprinted by Valerie Strauss in the Washington Post.  I don't think Anthony Cody is fully informed, yet, about the possibilities of CBE and its various other names - standards based grading, student learning outcome reporting, and others.

Cody likes authentic work, driven by the teachers, not by some external body; so do I. I've been pushing for that for many years. I was an Open School teacher for the sixteen years I taught in the Minneapolis Public Schools. Where I differ from Cody is in the use of technology. I don't see technology as the bad guy. I see technology as a way for teachers to connect with more kids in more ways. And, I see technology as a way to record learning activities and report about those learning activities. Public school teachers need to report - to the kids, to the parents, to the principal, to the district, to the state. Using current technology makes that a whole lot easier than using the technology of paper and copiers and chalk and mimeographs. Using current technology makes it possible for teachers to report about the learning activities of the students according to a set of defined competencies, or not. Those competencies can be defined any way by anybody. Getting agreement on what needs to be learned by when is a discussion that has been happening for a very long time and will be continuing for a very long time. I wrote about how I think CBE could be done using Moodle's new feature set in my previous post. 

I've written several blog posts supporting portfolios, and challenging Vander Ark and Christensen.  Go to the little search box (on my screen it's in the upper left corner) and type in - 'portfolio' or 'Vander Ark' or 'Christensen' to see the many posts I've written previously that mention them.

Let's not make technology or reporting on learning activities the bad guy.  I'm not even sure that Vander Ark and Christensen are bad guys.  They're definitely businessmen, though, and not teachers. There's a difference between a teacher's perspective and a businessman's, and when one is not fully informed about the possibilities one can end up looking like something other than a good guy.

CBE and Student Learning Outcomes in Moodle

Moodle.org announced today that the prototypes for the Competency Based Education feature targeted for Moodle 3.1 are available now. The Competency Based Education feature includes the ability to report on specific student learning outcomes. Here's what that means for K12  (I'll write about what I think that means for Higher Ed in another post to come.)

A teacher in a 3rd grade science classroom can create a learning activity for her class and align that learning activity with a specific state standard. In fact, all student learning activities could be aligned by the teacher in the classroom with a state standard. Teachers, of course, would still be free to teach things that can't be aligned to a state standard, but that list won't be very long for most teachers.  

Now, here's what that means in the broader picture. If all teachers in a district are aligning the learning activities of their students with state standards and an assessment of those learning activities appears in their Moodle learning management system, then how the students are doing relative to standards is a report that's available whenever anyone wants to run the report. That assessment can be a quiz, a score on a submitted assignment, or the teacher's more subjective evaluation of a performance of some kind by the student. When teachers record their assessments of a student's work or performance that record becomes available to all who have permission to access those records. So, a principal could run a report and see how all 3rd graders were doing on science standards, or math standards. The report would be based on learning activities created by the teacher, or that the teacher had chosen for or with the student. The report would be in real time, up to date as of the time the principal runs the report, or the teacher runs the report, or someone from the district office runs the report.  Students, also, will be able to run reports on how well they're doing on the state standards, or IB requirements, or whatever set of standards or competencies they and their teachers choose to track.

This will profoundly alter assessment of learning. Learning will be assessed at the level of teacher and student. If a district wants all of its teachers to assess a set of specific standards on a set of activities or questions, they can do it as often as they want to do it. Outside testing agencies won't be necessary, but schools could choose to use 'standardized' tests if they want. The learning activities will be assessed against the standards. The student could even choose the learning activity and propose it as fulfilling their mastery of the standard. The choice could be left up to the teacher and the student to decide. If the principal, or someone at the district, or someone at the state wants to check to see if that activity meets the standards, the artifact of the student learning and the teachers comments and assessment will be available. This is real student choice and voice in learning. This changes lots.

OER and the Learning Management System

In its recent publication, OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES Advancing Widespread Adoption to Improve Instruction and Learning, The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation stated that they're looking for ways to "facilitate their understanding of how to successfully scale OER and communicate its benefits." My suggestion to increase the percentages listed on the OER Dashboard on page 31 which are indicators of successes with OER is to focus on the use of OER with Learning Management Systems.

Few people want to be champions for LMSs in either higher ed or K-12, for lots of good reasons, but the LMS is the key to making OER more useful in both K-12 and higher ed. One of the reasons, I think, that LMSs have such a poor standing with all levels of education is that they haven't previously had OER. OER is the key ingredient to make LMSs really useful in either K-12 or higher ed. Without OER, LMSs can be an appendage or obstacle to teaching and learning. And, without an LMS, OER is often something that is harder to use than what we've always used previously - the textbook.

An open textbook can be fitted into a learning management system quite easily and practically. When the textbook is housed in a LMS, it is more easily available to students, teaching notes can be included, assessments are included, and reports aligning student learning outcomes can be created for all of the various potentially interested parties. The most exciting part is the fact that OER makes the content in a learning management system something that is alive, flexible, and well suited to the collaborative process that is teaching and learning.

The OER Business Model

     I was really pleased to see Sarah Hinchliff Pearson's Medium article, Open for Business:
A look at how platforms and creators build successful endeavors around open digital content. Sarah is attempting to answer the question that my sister-in-law asked me at this year's Thanksgiving dinner which was - "How do you make money doing that?" That came after she had asked, "so, what are you doing for work these days?" In between the first and second question I had said, "I'm creating a digital curriculum for Minnesota 3rd grade science, which will be free for any teacher in Minnesota to use; the curriculum will eventually be free for any teacher anywhere to use." The entity responsible for this new, free, open, digital curriculum is the Minnesota Partnership for Collaborative Curriculum.

   Now, here's the thing that I don't think Sarah quite nailed down, yet. It's the act of creating the curriculum in a particular form that will be useful to Minnesota 3rd grade teachers that generates revenue for me, and not the content which is created. I'm getting paid for doing something; the content I'm using is already free and Creative Commons licensed or in the public domain. I'm getting paid for collecting this content and putting it in a particular digital format that makes it easier for teachers to use. That digital format will include notes for the teacher about how to set up lessons and learning activities - some of those notes will be based on my experience as a teacher of 3rd grade science using digital curriculum. Other notes will be the notes that others have written based on their experience using the curriculum. In many cases, I'm taking content that is designed to be printed out on paper and converting it to content that is digital and that can be uploaded to a learning management system. 

    In addition to providing the teaching notes, I'm aligning the activities and content to the Minnesota Science Standards and creating assessments that work in learning management systems. The value I'm adding is the notes, the alignment and the assessments. When I'm done, that's it; I won't get paid any more money for doing the act of creating those notes and assessments. I won't get any royalty payments or accrue any percentage of profit from the continued sale of the content because the content isn't going to be sold; it's going to be free to anyone that wants to use it. All of the schools in Minnesota who use this curriculum will save any money that they otherwise would have paid for science curriculum. I'm not sure exactly how much money all of the schools in Minnesota are currently spending for 3rd grade science curriculum, but whatever the amount is, it can now be spent on something else.

  

   Those savings are important, but they're not the really big value that Minnesota schools will accrue. The big value will be the community of teaching and learning that gets created in the process of sharing notes and stories about how the lessons worked. The curriculum I curate is just a beginning. It will be revised and improved upon, I hope, every time another teacher uses it. Sarah does acknowledge that creating community is a crucial aspect to Open Education Resources, and I do think that there's a likelihood that the community might need more work from me, but it won't be for doing the same thing for which I'm being paid now. This is, indeed, a new kind of business model; it's very different than the models of creating or curating or providing learning content that have been in place for at least the past century in most of the world.

  

   The new business model is about creating specific value. That value needs to be replicable by others. That replication doesn't create monetary compensation for the 'original' creator/curator/collector. In order to keep getting paid creators need to keep creating new things that are of value to others and replicable by others. The new 'things' may be the act of coaching others how to use the content more effectively, but that, too, if done right will only produce compensation for a short time. Good creators keep working themselves out of jobs. But, the good news for me is that there is no shortage of needs in the world for new creations, especially when we're talking about the education of our children.