These are my notes from Angela Maiers‘ opening keynote at the Iowa 1 to 1 Institute on April 7, 2010. MY THOUGHTS AND REFLECTIONS ARE IN ALL CAPS. Angela’s slides are available via SlideShare.
Today in schools we are doing what airline pilots due: taking a precious cargo from one location to another
– going to a place that is hard to imagine
– taking off and landing can be hard
Recently I heard Ben Sherwood, author o the book “THe Survivor’s Club: The Secrets and Science that Could Save Your Life” speak
– 90-95% of individuals on planes who witness an emergency (like a wing on fire) didn’t take action
– they couldn’t move
– that is the “normalcy vice”
– the brain can wrap itself around something so “out of normal” (their comfort zone) that the brain loops and tries to
– 5% of passengers DO react, and Ben calls these folks “the survivor’s club”
– this happens in multiple contexts
Ben has looked for years for a DNA gene for survivors, for environments which are disrruptive
With the right training and awareness, with “the window shades up” in our lives: we CAN respond appropriately
– NOT see the disruption and fail to change
5% took action
Begin the journey with “shades up”
– in many of our schools we have believed that to survive, we needed to keep the shades down
– in many schools you wouldn’t know anything about the “amazing ride” happening with the outside world
So we need to begin to by looking at the Window
– using Gary’s Social Media Count
In the past life was contained, finite, more controlled, more predictable
– how many of your feel unprepared to lead students
Do you understand the “normalcy bias” in our educational context?
I have been studying people who are not just surviving in this situation, the are THRIVING
– to help us and our students do this, it is going to take another level of fluency
It is not about getting ON the web, it is about being OF the web
Remember the old days of the web: web 1.0?
– it was a big digital library
– it was a read-only experience
– very little interaction
– it was just a bigger library
This is a PEOPLE revolution, not a technology revolution
– we are social beings
Web 2.0: new technologies emerged
– we can take notes as we are reading a text at the same time
– technologies driven by human needs
– that is web 2.0
– we love web 2.0
THERE IS A BIG DISCONNNECT HERE WITH SCHOOLS, OF COURSE. SCHOOLS DO NOT LOVE WEB 2.0. MANY SCHOOL LEADERS AND TEACHERS FEAR WEB 2.0
We were so empowered by web 2.0 that it caused an unanticipated problem
– there is so much written, shared and created: even the most literate and tech-saavy find themselves drowning in a world of information
This is addictive: we find good stuff online, we want to find more
In the next 70 days, the rates of growth on the web will double again, because of how excited we all are
Question to the audience: How do I keep up?
– How do I find the information I need?
I am going to speak of this next phase of the revolution (not yet here) as web 3.0
– it is a response from the people, who are saying “we want a better web”
– we don’t just want random information, because we can’t handle it
– we have to organize and structure it better
So if people who publish things add a tag to it
Web 3.0 seeks to offer a solution to info-whelm by giving human beings more control over information that matters to them
– it is doing this through some extraordinary technologies
Search of the future is NOT a frustrating, wring your hands experience
Now showing wordle of different web 3.0 definitions (I used CropForFree and PixelPipe on my iPhone to capture and upload this during our session)
so data is linked and structured into meta-data
– goal of the semantic web is to bring meaning to human beings
– we need patterns and structures, to make sense of isolated, disconnected bits of information
Can now crowdsource the information
– it takes responsibility on the side of human beings to tag things
Every image you save on the web is being “profiled” by Google, Amazon, Yahoo, etc.
– sites that have recommendations for you based on its tracking of your behaviors
Now the social circle of Google
– social circle
Your profile exists already on Google
– information will find YOU in the future
– you need to be in charge of your profile online
twine as an example
– small, customized search engines
Values in a Strengths-Based Society
– emergentbydeign.com
Tags now are values-based, the source is us…
– this is the search of the future
Example: Klout
probably 95% of people looking at Twitter now realize lots is happening
– Oprah has helped it go mainstream
People on the outside have difficulty understanding Twitter because they are not currently taking advantage of the power of the network
– less than 1% of the population today are truly web literate
I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW THE SOURCE FOR THAT STATISTIC. I ALSO SUSPECT THIS IS TRUE, BUT WOULD LIKE TO KNOW THE STUDY / SOURCE.
Twitter is NOT about random, isolated bits of information
pound signs (HASH TAGS) are the lifelines of Twitter
– it becomes an information reservoir
– an incredible information sharing portal
Experience I had recently in San Antonio presenting at ASCD
– 80,000 global participants through Twitter were talking about sessions they attended at ASCD in person and virtually
– when so many people are sharing content, we can virtually attend
– I did this for the South by Southwest conference
– best part of the conference happens not in the sessions but outside as we discuss and analyze the ideas
Hashtags permit meta-analysis of content
The people part of the network is key
– you have to know how to act in a network
– the community sometimes puts you on lists you don’t even know you are on
I act as myself, and others decide how to categorize or save ideas / people
Twitter example: Listorious
– finding the right people for your PLN is far more difficult and important to your fluency on the web: human beings are your #1 survival tool today
Survival strategy is NOT just giving students a 1:1 laptop
We need to uncover “the hidden curriculum”
– it can be a mess, even a nightmare
– FLUENCY aconymp, it is more than literacy
– it is about becoming a different kind of person, in a different environment
F – filter
L – learn
U – unlearn
E – engage
N – network
T – trust
(This is slide 26 of Angela’s SlideShare)
Clay Shirky points out how many people don’t have a too much information (TMI) issue, but rather filter failure
No one can be an expert in this world
I ACTUALLY DISAGREE WITH THIS. WE DO HAVE EXPERTS. BUT WE MUST BE FLEXIBLE IN OUR WILLIGNESS TO MOVE FROM EXPERT LEARNER TO NOVICE LEARNER, DEPENDING ON THE CONTEXT.
Alvin Toffler wrote years ago about the importance of being willing to unlearn
– don’t stop asking questions
– keep listening
– be willing to unlearn
Engagement is NOT an option
– this isn’t just about teaching kids to be a critical reader and a critical consumer
– that is what we test now
I was on a call last night with Tony Wager who wrote “The Global Achievement Gap”
– the real measurement of literacy today is contribution
key for engagement: you have to be engaging yourself
– that is different than entertaining or selling yourself
Seth Godin talks about sharing your gifts without an expectation of reciprocity
Early in my PLN life, I asked over 400 members (60% of them at the time) to give me 1 rule about being successful
We have a huge bias against sharing content and ideas today on the web
– that is the normalcy bias
– we have to open the shades
If we don’t put ourselves and our work out there….
It is not about putting out perfect work
– it is about putting yourself in the raw out there..
– it is about writing consistently every day and putting yourself out there
– showing you are willing to fail in public
– that takes an entirely different kind of fluency
I AM NOT SURE IF IT TAKES FLUENCY OR JUST A WILLINGESS TO TAKE RISKS AND BE VULNERABLE….
Communities have been critical for survival throughout the centuries of our evolution
Showing Tweetreach
– example of one of my Tweets yesterday reached 32,927 people via 50 Tweets
WOW. HADN’T SEEN THIS. LOVE HOW REAL-TIME THIS IS.
I THINK IT’S HARD FOR MANY EDUCATORS TO MAKE THE CONNECTION BETWEEN TWITTER USE AND CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES, TASKS AND LEARNING, HOWEVER….
Trust is so key and pivotal
– when we shut the world out, and give kids the message that the world is bad, you can’t trust people, you can’t trust information
– you are taking survival tools away from kids
– you are not giving them a chance to practice how to be a trustworthy person
Trust online is not mandated, it is earned
– the web right now is calculating your trustworthiness
The curriculum that will get you there is emotional work, requires passion, courage
– understanding your gifts, and understanding gifts others have
Helping students understand the world needs their contribution
New book I’m reading now by Seth Godin: Lynchpin
– saying to the world: passion is a choice
Brings us back to the definition of teachers as pilots
– the world needs your contribution
– share it!
We can take kids to amazing places but not without this curriculum and fluency
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Comments
4 responses to “Fluency 3.0 by Angela Maiers #i11i”
Thanks for sharing your notes. The presentation looks interesting. Wish I could have seen it.
In your opinion, How does fluency in the social web sense relate to fluency in the language sense?
I think Angela’s main point in her presentation was that fluency has been and is continuing to be redefined by social and digital media. To be fluent and literate in today’s society means to not only be an adept consumer of digital texts (including multimedia) but also an adept producer.