The future of books flickr photo by Johan Larsson shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license

Select Readings and Thoughts on Teaching and Learning in the Digital Age

Another milestone of sorts seems to have been achieved with hitting issue number 60. I am not entirely sure that I envisioned getting to that number when I started this experiment. Considering I have taken the summers off, for better or worse, I guess I feel a certain degree of accomplishment. I suppose 75 would be the next serious marker.

I find myself a bit torn in curating this week’s list of suggested readings. I could easily have added a couple more but have grown to think that more very quickly becomes overkill. So I have been deliberately trying to limit myself from just adding all kinds of links. Although if anyone reading this thinks otherwise be sure to let me know.

Another thing I have been contemplating recently is how much crafting this thing has been influencing my own personal learning. Consequently, I want to invite anyone and everyone that does read this to share links and articles that you may have found on your Internet travels. I love including them but the invitation is more about sharing the opportunity as much as the resource. You may not have the time or inclination to make a whole newsletter but some thoughts on something you read and found really interesting is probably not out of reach.

All three of these are on some level are about democratic community, thin as that thread might be. I definitely have a pick for “If you read only one article…” this week. The third selection “The Grief of Accepting New Ideas” is not only important but immediately beneficial, although I probably liked “I’m Nowhere In-between” best. Of course, reading them all is a good idea too.

Still waiting for the lamb that went missing at the end of March so that April can kickstart spring. Here is hoping the weather may break soon.

Here are three+ curated articles about education, technology, and evolutions in teaching.

Chinese jaywalkers are identified and shamed by facial recognition, and now they’ll get warnings over text message – BoingBoing –  Cory Doctorow (2-minute read)

I found this courtesy of Doug Belshaw and it has got to be the longest title to an article I have ever mentioned. The title is ironically long, given how short the actual article is to read. Still, this is the kind of terrifying development that haunts me. Granted China is not an exactly a free democratic state but this effort strengthens a couple of my fundamental claims.

First claim, “If it can be done, it will be done.” Unfortunately, I find this to be a truism whether or not it is a good thing. The fact that this kind of facial recognition technology exists is dubious enough to me but it the minute it became so it was always only a matter of time before we found it used in this Minority Report fashion. I’m sure that the citizens of Shenzhen had little or no say in the implementation of this program. In fact, click the link about social credit for some more eye-opening insights.

Second claim, “If you are not doing anything wrong, you don’t have anything to worry about is a stupid argument.” That tired self-righteous justification is how people allow their privacy and freedom to slowly be eroded without clear thought or necessary resistance. To think that abuses will not occur after passively accepting invasive surveillance efforts is naive at best. As we have already seen recently in stark relief, data can very quickly and easily be weaponized and used against people that provide it. The Chinese may not have a choice but I hope that we still do. After all, these are the lengths being gone to for jaywaliking!

I’m Nowhere In-between: Why we need ‘seriously uncool’ criticism in education – Long View on Education –  Benjamin Doxtdator (9-minute read)

Benjamin Doxtdator is one of those educators I feature often in this newsletter. His writing is both excellent and intelligent. It challenges and interrogates in the way that education does at its best. Plus, his keen interest in power and social justice is razor sharp. He may not be for everyone but rarely do I read something that he has written where I do not finish feeling impressed and inspired.

I will also say that I am ready to join him the great ‘Nowhere In-between.’ Far too often educators of all stripes eschew ‘seriously uncool criticism’ for expedience, fashion, flawed certainty, even laziness, just to mention a few reasons. Yet we do at our own peril. Blind acceptance is rarely good for anyone. If educators abdicate genuine academic inquiry, as messy and conflicted as it can be, what separates us from caretakers. This is not to denigrate caretakers in any way, teaching involves caretaking to be sure, but that is not it’s only concern.

There are so many good strands in here to think about, the reductionism of institutions, the seduction of skills agendas, the myth of apolitical scientific progress, and more. Yet, I recognize that far fewer people get excited about these ideas than those that get swept into the latest educational fad. I suppose simple acknowledgment would be a lot more valuable than excitement or outright ignorance. Everyone arrives at any topic with a different story and at a different point. Yet, I kind of believe that looking critically at pedagogy is part of a teacher’s job description. I am just not sure that is a universally shared belief.

The Grief of Accepting New Ideas – Association for Middle Level Education –  Rick Wormeli (11-minute read)

I like a lot of what Rick Wormeli has to say generally. His work on grades is really worth investigating. This article is filled with a lot of really insightful discussion on the idea at the center of the title. In fact, this is the kind of piece I wish more educators would read thoughtfully. In fact, my favorite part of this whole piece is the conclusion. Education, like life, is rife with a lot of dubious ideas but some compassion can go a long way.

I have long said that one of the reasons why change in education can be really slow and difficult is that the profession of teaching, at its core, always comes down to values. I am not sure that is recognized with the degree of prominence it should be. Wormeli articulates this notion in a clear and rather elegant way. He does it in a way I wish that I had written.

Another thing I have long thought and occasionally said is that there is a lot that we can learn an awful lot by looking closely at what we feel compelled to resist as educators. The resistance impulse is important and a genuine place for personal learning. I would even suggest it is necessary for being a reflective practitioner. Sometimes reasons for resistance are sound, sometimes not so much. Wormeli touches on that too. What he does not really address is from where the new ideas hail and who exactly is peddling them, which I would say is a bit of a blindspot but perhaps another piece altogether.

The future of books flickr photo by Johan Larsson shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license

Select Readings and Thoughts on Teaching and Learning in the Digital Age

While I had designs on getting this pout a bit early this week, given that its a holiday weekend and all, those plans ran aground pretty quickly. So hopefully this finds you well and enjoying some spring-like weather somewhere.

I am still culling through a smattering of articles from the last few weeks while ensuring that some more timely stuff is included. Believe it or not it is kind of fun. It is always a short memory walk for me, reflecting on the pieces I thought were interesting upon discovery.

This week is a mixed bag but definitely still deeply in the shadow of the Facebook and Cambridge Analytica scandal. The reverberations of that story breaking are seriously sparking a rethink of a whole lot of things. Of course, there is not a lot that is new but the stakes seem to be getting bigger and creepier with every similar story.

All three of these are short articles, so I don't really have a "If you read only one article..." pick. They are all worth your time. I suppose the last one,"Beware the smart toaster: 18 tips for surviving the surveillance age" is perhaps the most practical in terms of things that you can do given the circumstances we find ourselves.

Hope you have enjoyed the holiday weekend, however you liked. Maybe, just maybe, spring has finally sprung and warmer days are ahead.

Here are three+ curated articles about education, technology, and evolutions in teaching.

How the “industrial era schools” myth is a barrier to helping educationtoday - Sherman Dorn - blog -  Sherman Dorn (5-minute read)

As an education historian and professor, Dorn makes truly some compelling statements about how much bad history is used as a stick to beat the field and teachers in particular. There is a lot to admire in his levelheaded analysis, brief as it may be. I am definitely with him on the idea "neither historians nor anyone else can definitively claim nothing has changed in a system such as schooling."

The problem as Dorn implies so well is that the history of schooling in this country is both profoundly complex and complicated. It all reminds me a bit of the concept of backward or downward compatibility in the telecommunications industry. In order for new standards and technology to be integrated smoothly, old standards cannot simply be abandoned. They have to remain operable. Imagine if landline phones just stopped working the minute mobile phone technology was introduced. Change is always hard and often slow in highly developed, long-standing systems. And American schooling has existed a lot longer than telecommunications of any kind.

Where Dorn discusses the persistence of certain practices, about halfway through the post, is worth reading on its own. Yet, "Weak understanding of education history is actively harmful to improving schools," might be the most profound statement of all. Anyone that says schools are still stuck in the Industrial Age not only has a weak understanding but is simply "making stuff up" to support an instantly dubious agenda if you ask me.

This Is So Much Bigger Than Facebook - The Atlantic -  Ethan Zuckerman (9-minute read)

We may be on the verge of a serious reckoning with regards to social media and the Internet on the whole. This piece highlights how the Facebook and Cambridge Analytica problem is merely symptom of a much larger problem. It is the business model of the platforms not bad actors that are "based on collecting this demographic and psychographic information and selling the ability to target ads to people using this data about them." Still, believe it or not, I remain hopeful.

I especially like the paragraph in the middle of this piece where Zuckerman comes clean on what his publication, The Atlantic is doing. That kind of candidness is at least refreshing. If you have any doubts about just how big the problem is have a look at this Doc Searls blogpost "Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica problems are nothing compared to what’s coming for all of online publishing." This makes the contention that all of us Internet users have been coerced into a bargain where we have had no negotiating power all the more true.

It is always hard to change the rules when their are forces making serious money leveraging existing circumstances. This is why I am often immediately dismissive of industries-should-regulate-themselves narratives. Too often it is in direct conflict with the notion if-it-can-be-done-it-will-be-done. Someone, bad actor or simply curious, will do it eventually. We humans are a flawed bunch. My hope is that this Facebook story is big enough and long enough to provoke recognition of just how flawed we can be as well as some genuine change.

Beware the smart toaster: 18 tips for surviving the surveillance age - The Guardian -  Alex Hern and Arwa Mahdawi (7-minute read)

While we may be on the verge of a reckoning, we certainly are not there yet. That is where this article from The Guardian comes in awfully handy. Considering just how little leverage we have had in the Internet bargain, here are some tips on how to take at least some power back from the uneven negotiation.

I have to admit that I often shudder at the mention of the phrase "best practices." It is too often a soft start to some thinly veiled coercive behavior modification from someone who is interested in changing a culture, education's appropriation of corporate gobbledygook. In this case, these best practices actually might benefit you should you adopt them.

I particularly like the numbers 2, 16, 17, and 18. A variation on number 2, if you have started buying into the Internet of things, make sure that you can turn the devices off whenever you are not using them. If you can't maybe its not worth owning. I also suggest one that is not in the list. Get an email address that is essentially for registrations and garbage that you don't really use for anything else. Then routinely go in and wipe it clean. Hopefully, you will find some of these helpful. I knew some of these already but some were genuinely new to me too.