What do the arts, brain research, and creativity have to do with the emerging face of education? EVERYTHING!

THESE ARE MY NOTES FROM THE NECC KEYNOTE PANEL PRESENTATION ON TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 2007, FACILITATED BY ANDREW ZOLLI. MY COMMENTS AND REFLECTIONS ARE IN ALL CAPS. I AM LIVE BLOGGING THIS, SO CLICK "REFRESH" EVERY 10 MINUTES OR SO FOR UPDATES. WHEN THE SESSION IS OVER I'LL WRITE "END OF NOTES" IN THE BLOG POST TEXT BODY.

Opening comments from Don Knezek on what education must be
- globalization of education (the impact that has on your students)
- creativity and innovation (and the implications of that for the

Message Sunday from the new ISTE President:
- Focus more on the learning, less on technology
- embrace global connections for learners
- become advocates for change and innovation

New NETS-S released yesterday
- what is different now than in 1998
- globalization indicators are more prevalent
- how do we communicate, share and generate knowledge?
- there is a real globalization of education as well
- look at the curriculum: Arabic and Chinese are more important today in the perceptions of people in the U.S. than in 1998

Teaching is a flat-world enterprise
- online tutoring and academic coaching shows thems
- The Philippines and Jamaica are asking ISTE to help them prepare their teachers for global education
- teacher shortages are a continuing and growing problem
- countries that have been exporting workers for years are now wanting to prepare teachers for export to the U.S. and other countries

Around the world teachers are asking, what is the role of ICT in global education
- others around the world are very willing to learn outside their boundaries

In 1998 the mindset was to produce highly competent and technology literate students will be enough
- now we know that is not enough to thrive economically as a nation
- many reasons for this: economic competitiveness, more
- today's world demands competence and technology literacy like never
- also requires creative thinking to innovate
- but not all students need this, right? Think again.
- how many new employees does George Lucas, Google, or ISTE need that can't be creatively and innovate?
- if we keep doing things the way we've always done them....
- our context and learning landscape has changed....
- the demands on our students are different

NETS refresh: you told us that the requirement of creativity and innovation is most important

Challenge 1: Learn all you can about education around the world
2: competence paired with technology literacy is not sufficient (creativity and innovation demand more of your students, of you, and of ISTE)
3: We had best get ready to work, learn and recruit in a flat, multicultural world
4: Engage ISTE and challenge us to embrace these new realities for your benefit and most importantly the benefit of all young learners

[MY THOUGHT: THIS IS TO BENEFIT ALL LEARNERS, NOT JUST YOUNG LEARNERS! WE'RE ALL POTENTIAL LEARNERS. BEING A LEARNER IS AN ATTITUDE AND A CHOICE, NOT A CHARACTERISTIC OF DEMOGRAPHICS]

Carole Colburne: ISTE outstanding teacher award winner
- project skill: students researched what it would be like to be a senior citizen in today's society
- brought senior citizens into our classroom, kids served as mentors for adults, one participate was 93 years old! (She said she came... and drove herself... because there is so much to learn, and she wants to keep on learning!)
- this award adds value and credibility to what I do as a teacher
- teachers will hopefully see their own capacity to teach and learn like this

Charlene Chausis, Tech coordinator
- 2007 award winner for outstanding leader
- my role is professional development for technology integration
- not in the classroom very often
- kids doing "live from ancient Greece" podcasts in summer school
- in limited amount of time, kids knew this would be on the web and showcased if it was good enough
- kids wanted to work through their breaks, come after school, put forward their maximum effort
- when kids realized they had an authentic audience, the kids got really energized and excited

And now comments from Andrew Zolli
- one of the great things I've learned at this conference, if you put your email address in front of 4000
- picture of neon sign for a nude bar, sign says "GET YOUR LAPTOP SERVICED HERE"

We are going to have a fantastic conversation about what it takes to unlock the profound creative potential that lies within all of us, and the role technology plays in this process
- our speakers today:

Elizabeth Streb, Choreographer. For more than 20 years, Elizabeth Streb has asked questions that challenge many widely accepted assumptions about dance. Her investigation of movement through the study of science and the human body has led her to make formal choices which vary from traditional norms. Aesthetics of grace, the use or camouflage of gravity, the presence or absence of transitions, treatment of gender, the nature of spatial and temporal dimensions as well as the use of sound in theatrical presentations have been primary areas of exploration.

Michael McCauley, Creative Director. As Vice President and Creative Director of a major Chicago-based Communications agency, Michael is called upon time and again to present fresh, experiential, human solutions for clients from Target to Oprah. Drawing on the ideas put forth in Rolf Jensen's, "Dream Society," his voice adds a dimension of "what's next" and perspective on why the ability to create, tell stories, and "think biggest" matters.

Mary Cullinane, Technology Architect. A former teacher and high school administrator, Mary is the chief technology architect of the Philadelphia School of the Future Project. She has compiled hours of research about the ways that students learn, the tools/structures that best support that learning, and the critical competencies needed to become a true global citizen in the 21st century.

Dr. Francesc Pedro, OECD/CERI. Dr. Pedro is the senior analyst at the Paris, France-based Center for Educational Research and Innovation (CERI), a division of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). In his role with CERI, he oversees global research projects including New Millennium Learners and Systemic Innovation in Education. His areas of expertise include research-based perspectives on how myriad countries are addressing the evolving learning styles of their digital natives, and the ways in which educational innovations are developed and evaluated.

Opening comments by Mary Cullinane about the Philadelphia School of the Future Project
our project is fundamentally about encouraging educational artists

Our pronciples:
1- learning first, technology later (not even second)
2- focus on the power and concepts of language: what are the ways we can use language to create an environment
3- be comfortable "not knowing"

the principal is called "the chief learner"

this is an opportunity to have creativity in our present "age of accountability"

Opening comments by Dr. Francesc Pedro
- some of the main questions we are asking about innovation potential of OECD countries (30 richest countries in the world) at CERI
- how innovative are countries?
- can we compare innovation between countries?
- first graph showing % of 15 years old using a computer connected to the Internet at their homes
-- in U.S. this shows over 80%
-- next dot shows amount of computer use in high school: for the U.S. this graph shows a wide disparity, especially when compared internationally to other countries

Does it really matter to use a computer
- in OECD every 3 years, we carry out some int'l examinations, many focusing on maths, sciences, and literacy
- we have found it is extremely important to have access to a computer
- graph shows pupils having access to a computer at home they have 20% better scores in school

[MY THOUGHT: THIS APPEARS TO BE PURELY A CORRELATIONAL RESULT, AND CAUSATION IS NOT SUGGESTED BY THE DATA. WHAT IF WE CONTROL FOR INCOME? ARE THESE JUST THE RICHER KIDS WHO ARE SCORING BETTER? THERE IS LOTS OF DATA AND RESEARCH SUPPORTING THE VIEW THAT ACADEMIC ACHEIVEMENT IS STRONGLY CORRELATED TO FAMILY INCOME.]

What is more important?
- frequency of school use, correlating this with math scores
- turns out to have negative correlation in math: the more computers are used in schools, the lower

KEY QUESTION IS NOT IF COMPUTERS ARE USED, BUT HOW COMPUTERS ARE USED]

Comments by Michael McCauley
- I work in face to face marketing (like teaching)
- you have a tremendous potential to have a positive impact on someone's life

- seek out your cathedrals
- that is a technique I used with teams I work with

I have to have a deep faith in the concept, the technology and the team
- if I"m not confident we can pull it off, we're not going to get it done

As creative director my role is to INSPIRE
- when you do this, others come to you with ideas
- the cathedral is that golden thing....

[I WISH HE HAD ELABORATED MORE ON THE CATHEDRAL IDEA AND METAPHOR.]

Comments by Elizabeth Streb:

I had a teacher who told me when I was young: pay attention to what you
- it was action and movement for me
- first notion I had was that humans can fly
- the questions started to be how long do you have to stay in the air?

next question: hanging on to the belief that I could fly..
- I invented a place, it is in New York, called "Slam"
- where do people want to go anymore, what is the alchemy
- Jane Jacobs quote about "jumping joy of life"
- we invented a whole lot of inventions
- we embrace failure and not knowing
- vid

devise a ....

[SHE IS FLIPPING THROUGH THE SLIDES TOO FAST, I HOPE WE CAN GET A COPY OF HER PRESO]

embrace assumption-busting
- lots of questions I've collected over the years

I am searching for what is a true move, what is a real move
- this action would hit you in the gut, you would know it was a real story
- Richochet

when you leave here don't just go through the door, that is So boring!

flying can be an infinite panoply of ideas
- how can we learn
- how can we agree to not know
- discovery is a process of going in with a good clean question, and then ignoring everything you knew or thought you know about that idea
- our artists work in public together, not in private

addition of popcorn and cotton candy was key
- started in a garage

Comments by Michael McCauley:
creativity can be a very dirty business, you have to be able to fall down, sometimes you break things

trying to build the alchemy of a creative team, how are you doing?
- it is a gut feeling
- if you are in a situation where that flow state happens
- sometimes you have to take people out
- sometimes you have to bring people in: a poet, a singer, creative outsiders can energize the group
- every day is different, you just go

Elizabeth Streb
- we allow complete sovereignty
- kids know when they come in they can do whatever they want
- there is a thin line between when that play time ends and the class begins
- there is a signal, not a big bell ringing, it is the teacher on the mat
- we are beta testing this, like a petri dish

What makes teachers innovators, what does your research show?

Dr. Francesc Pedro
- our research is in biotech, health, science
- we came out with theory of the four
- education innovation can be the result of the action of 4 different powers...
1- our ability to include doers and users in the process of generating innovation (the users are the learners, we should enlarge our concept of users of educational innovators)
2- our ability to network (sometimes taken for granted in education)
3- modularity: ability to work on a modular basis, be part of a system and acting autonomously and scale up innovation when needed
4- technology: something unique in education, we miss the connection between educational technology, science and research
- teachers consider themselves as artisans
- what is the place we assign to research,

All of you are talking about risk, empowerment and courage
- what have you all seen in terms of bureaucratic impediments

Mary:
- there is no bureaucracy in Philadelphia Public schools [joke]
- imagine if innovation was flowing downstream in school
- yet we are constantly swimming upstream, and that is why we get so tired when we do that
- we have tried to lesson some of the bureaucratic requirements, but still do it in a framework where people can look at

Microsoft gave human capital to this project, not money
- trying to push

Michael
- right now all bets are off
- corporate world is thirsting for innovation
- face to face marketing is about interaction with the consumer

Example of a thought: someone who was a marathon runner and hit the wall at mile 20, but she heard someone playing the Rocky theme on an outside stereo at that moment. That made the difference.
- what if we could create a concert experience for every runner at mile 20
- that become a hero's welcome for these marathan runners
- we weren't prepared for the joyful outpouring we received, esp for paraplegic runners
- one man went 26 miles on the skateboard
- when he heard the Rocky theme he raised his hand, and our team just went crazy
- I tell my team that is why we are here and what we are here to do: make an indelible mark on the life of another human being

Francesc
- we released a report to try and demystify some things
- question: at what age do you start learning a foreign language
- our research shows you should start learning a foreign language as soon as possible
- 2nd myth is the idea that in some educational systems (esp Europe) the need to separate boys from girls
-- some people think brains work differently for males v females
-- there is no evidence based on research that demonstrate that
-- we need to research more

Story by Andrew about cognitive neuroscience
- did all my grad work in cognitive neuroscience
- formative experience
- when babies are born, they don't know geographically where they will be born
- not all languages make the same differences, English has categorical difference between "buh" and "puh"
- in languages like Thai, they have five letters of difference between those sounds
- English speakers don't recognize those as categorical differences
- Brown University researchers: took 5 day old infants
-- played all the sounds between "buh" and "puh"
-- babies were communicating through a pacifier, they suck faster and their heart rate goes up
-- turns out all babies could
-- by the time those kids were 7 years old, they had lost 80% of their capacity to hear and learn those differences
-- punchline: they called this ability of bablies to respond "the hyper-sensitive sucking reflex"
- that may also apply to some other people you know....
- that is scientific data that supports some of the ideas we are talking about

Mary, you work in Microsoft, what is the culture like and the permissions you are given to be so innovative?

Mary
- meeting 22,000 of the most type A people I'd ever met
- individuals were expected to be self-critical
- you were constantly questioning "HOW CAN I GET BETTER"
- 2nd opportunity: We had time to think (I wish we'd had that in our school)
- we were actually encouraged to think, we had gathering spaces, you'd be asked "what are you doing" and we'd respond "we're thinking!"
- that was a lot of fun, we didn't have to justify that we weren't actively doing something
- that was a unique experience
- we didn't have "open source offices" [GRIN]
- we had flexible spaces
- there was a fundamental building practice that Bill Gates used, everyone had an office and they look very similar
- everyone also has access to shared gathering places

What resource, person, tool would you like people to know about?

Michael:
- read "A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future" (Daniel Pink)
- read "The Dream Society: How the Coming Shift from Information to Imagination Will Transform Your Business" (Rolf Jensen)

Visit our website about our report "Understanding the Brain"

Elizabeth's advice

Visit the Slam webiste and visit us in person

One of my teacher said go into a bookstore and read every title in every section you are interested in, and then choose a book
- it is phenomenal what just reading the titles will do

Mary's thought:

remember the world "motive"
- obstacles, interests, trends, what do they value, what is their environment?

Andrew's comment: go to "ask a Ninja dot com"
- shows what can be done with a laptop and creativity

END OF NOTES

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