Badges....so worth it

I wanted to share something about badges. Today I received my first couple badges from this online Blended Learning Designer course that I am participating in. Wow...I am loving it so far. I am impressed at the structure of this Blended Learning Designer course offered by BlendKit2015  and it is still only module 1. I am trying to participate fully and I have earned three badges. There are several websites that help track your online badges, this one is called Credly. I would love to follow the structure of badging to recognize completeness in my of PD workshops. Blendkit is using a structure of 6 different topic areas with four different ways to earn a badge within that topic. The areas include info stream contribution, blogging, reading and DYI. So a participant can earn 4 badges in each topic area. If you collect at least one badge from each topic area than you qualify for the course completion badge. 

Below is a screenshot of my Credly homepage. It shows the three designer badges I have earned from my effort earlier this week. I am hoping to complete all 7 badges and earn the overall completion badge. 

To blend or not to blend...

Image from: common:wikipedia.com

I am up late again. My wife and kids have gone to sleep and I am up on my computer, not watching TV, but rather reading. Reading about blended learning and the power in can have on learning. This is something that I am drawn to on a daily basis. 

I have experience as a high school physics teacher. I had the privilege to teach before and after having one to one devices in the hands of my students. I currently work as a tech integration specialist in Belton School District and support our learning in the 21st century in a larger one to one environment. What that means to me is that I know our students can have access to their learning anytime, anywhere. What that also means is are we transforming the learning experience in our schools? 

After reading the chapter one from #BlendKit2015  I became impressed with the notion about quality blended learning courses. For the longest time I felt that we were blending our learning by simply granting access to students to devices, but it is so much more than that. An area that we could spend hours and days on would be course and curriculum design and development. Teachers need to have time to time ask the questions for their courses as mentioned in the chapter:

“What’s the best mix of traditional, live, teacher-led presentation and synchronous or asynchronous, technology-driven methods of teaching?” It is important to determine your role as a teacher in the learning process. Should it be one that is primarily directive or facilitative? Also, decide the importance of interaction amongst the students. These questions may be answered differently depending on the teaching/learning context. In any event, blended learning lends itself to learner-centered, teacher-guided (as opposed to teacher-directed), interactive, and student-collaborative learning."

https://blended.online.ucf.edu/blendkit-course-blendkit-reader-chapter-1/ 

I think as a teacher sometimes we forget to step away from the microscope and see the collection films to ask those guiding questions and re-plan our path. These questions about the purpose of the learning needs to be established before we should just do the same old activity that we had done before. 

After understanding blended learning through this reading I ask myself these questions:

1. How can blended learning should support the learning experience?
2. What strategies should I use in a particular learning experience? 
3. What is the learning experience principal? What learning tools will support that principal?

By asking these questions I believe you will focus more on learning and less on tech tools. The process of learning will include blended components and this will transform your experience. 

Best time to plant a tree...

There is an old Chinese proverb that says, "The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago; the second best is now."

Well it is finally now and I am going to begin keeping a philosophical, personal, educational, technical, professional and whatever other sparks of innovation hit me on some idle Tuesday.

Tonight it is the inspiration for starting this post.  I recently connected with other EdTech leaders in the #kcedu area. Wow, they are on fire and seem to always motivate me to want to be more engaged and be a better leader.  After joining a powerful professional development day with Excelsior Springs, lead by Michelle Nobel, I had the privilege to connect with these same tweet peeps (tweeps), on a new platform, Voxer. 

Voxer is simple,  think of a walkie talkie, that records and collects your talks. Then think, a walkie talkie that can broadcast to multiple people. Then add the ability to text and send pictures. Then you have Voxer. 

At first I was reluctant that I would find it beneficial to carry on short conversations with anyone. But I am having some of the deepest philosophical and enriching conversations with my tweeps around educational topics like, personalized learning and one to one. I love that I can hear the voice of my colleagues, and hear their authentic tone and meaning. It is more than a tweet, its a connection. 

So, when is the best time to start Voxer or Twitter or a blog post....now.