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It is not commonly understood that curriculum is a compromise. Richard Olsen

In a recent post, I wrote about the idea that a PLN, whether professional or personal learn network, as actually being something that you do, a verb, rather than something done, a noun, I think that the same argument can be applied to the notion of curriculum. Too often when we discuss ‘curriculum’ it is as something stagnant, something finished, something complete, a document held in the hand. However, treating it in this way misses something, denies the reality that it is something that is constantly developing, growing, adapting, changing and evolving.

One of the reasons that we see curriculum as being something stagnant is that often the changes can occur over long periods of time so we do not consider it as something constant. For example, in my time teaching, I have seen three significant curriculum shifts. Firstly the transition from CSFII to VELS. This was significant because it moved subject based assessment to also recognising various interdisciplinary strands of learning. Associated with this, there was also a move from grading students in an individual manner to assessing them in relation to a continuum. The second transition is from VELS, a state based curriculum document, to the Australian Curriculum, a nation wide initiative. What is interesting is that although each evolution brought about significant change, after a period of transition, a mystical sense of inertia kicks in.

One of the reasons that curriculum changes is because the world changes. In a recent post about whether everyone should learn to code, +Richard Olsen made the suggestion that curriculum is a form of future prediction, that is, it is “designed to predict need.” This being the case, curriculum does need to keep on evolving, because once the current set of needs are met then a new set of needs emerges.

I remember hearing David Howes from ACARA present about the National Curriculum a few years ago. One of the things that stood out was what he said about how the cross-curriculum priorities. Howes explained that indigenous histories and culture, Australia’s engagement with Asia and sustainability were chosen as priorities because they were contemporary issues faced by students today. What was significant though was that Howes’ stated that there will come a time in a few years when when these priorities will need to be revised. For if they are implemented properly, then they will no longer be an issue in society. Therefore, there will come a time when a new set of priorities will need to be devised.

This is what much of the debate the 21st Century learning is about. Too often we get caught up with the present and fail to grasp the coming future. Although many of the skills, such as collaboration and problem solving, are needed today, it is a technologically and socially rich tomorrow which they are truly derived for. The problem is that it is so much easier to respond to today, rather than worry about tomorrow.

So far I have discussed the epic seismic eruptions associated with curriculum, however there is also the flip side to all of this, those tectonic shifts in the plates which more than often go unseen. I think that the worst thing that we can do when reflecting on curriculum is to consider such documents as the Australian Curriculum as being the same thing for each and every person. This completely denies any sense of subjectivity associated with the creation of knowledge and understanding.

For example, I remember a few years ago there was an effort to align what was being done in Middle Years English with some of the changes to VCE. One such change was the introduction of contexts, such as imagined landscapes or encountering conflict, as a focus, rather than a particular text, as had previously been done. What was interesting is how everyone saw this change differently. For some it was simply a way of looking at a particular text, while for others there was no central text, rather it was about approaching the context from a wide range of perspectives. Added to this, even once an agreed approach is achieved, it is then further moulded and adapted as new teaches take to it. As I stated elsewhere, the process is often far more instrumental than the actual outcome.

+Richard Olsen sums this whole process up, suggesting that “it is not commonly understood that curriculum is a compromise.” Whether it be compromising on what is included or compromising on how it is implemented, curriculum is always in a constant state of choice and reflection – and that is ok.

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One Size Doesn’t Fit All

I was faced with a new challenge the other day. With the choice of the new professional learning communities the group that I was allocated to was given an additional challenge, that we would in fact be leaderless, that we would work collaboratively to develop a focus and go from there. Initially, I was apprehensive, as I had concerns about where technology had been heading – the group was meant to focus on using technology to engage. However, what was interesting was the group did manage to develop a voice of its own, a collective voice, with everyone adding their own question and concern. This got me thinking again about +Dan Donahoo‘s keynote at ICTEV13 Conference that a community is not about everyone doing the same thing, rather it is about recognising the place of everyone in the village. 

This led me to reflect upon a bigger problem that has developed in the past few years, the mix and match of different technological devices and platforms. The school I work at has an array of devices, including Windows netbooks, desktop computers, Windows 8 tablets and iPads for leadership. With this assortment comes the issue that some things open on one device, but not another. Although my answer was Google Drive, as I have discussed elsewhere, however the majority of teachers have taken to using Dropbox as their solution of choice. I think what is significant about this choice is not whether the use of Dropbox is more useful than Google Drive, rather that there has been a lack of discussion and consultation. The reality is that I can live with any answer. However, when the community is not consulted, does the answer even matter? Is there a bigger issue at play? Does one size fit all?

In the end, to come back to Donahoo’s message, often the process is far more important than the actual outcome. Maybe that is what community as curriculum is, about a constantly evolving dialogue where everyone’s thoughts and opinions are given due diligence. Something easier said than done at times, but maybe that is the challenge.

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So, it is Week 4 of ‘Rhizomatic Learning’ and the focus is whether ‘books are making us stupid?’. The questions posed are what the medium of print done to learning? What are the implications of this objective distance? How does it impact what we believe is valid in our society both inside learning and outside of it?
 
In a recent post, I posed the question, ‘What’s so Digital about Literacy Anyway?’ One of my concerns was that in all of the reading practises that I have been a part of, digital texts are too often frowned upon, a poor distant relative to the exemplary printed text. The argument usually stated to me is that it just isn’t the same to read a text on a screen as it is to feel the texture of the paper, to flick the pages. It just isn’t organic. It is not how it is done. I couldn’t agree more, it is not how it is done, it is different, but just because it is different, does that make mean that it is better or worse?
 
This brings me to my other concern, that of ‘reading’. One of the things that I think is often overlooked in the whole process is the place of the response. Whenever we read we respond, the only question is whether we are willing to engage with that inner voice. So often students are indoctrinated from a young age that reading is what is important, that dedicating regular time to the cause is somehow what makes someone a good reader. I feel that although reading is important, responding is great. This may be as simple as asking a question spurred on by a book or sharing a quick summary with someone else.
 
What I find sad is that this denial of  digital literacy as a part of ‘reading’ denies such a powerful opportunity to respond to the text and take action. What I love about reading something an ebook or a blog post is that there are various ways in which I can capture my thinking and then collate it afterwards. Whether this be collecting my highlights and digital notes or using a social bookmarking tool like Diigo to capture annotations and ideas. On top of this, it is so easy to then share these ideas and pieces of information to a blog or a tweet.
Now, I am not saying that books make us stupid, but prioritising one medium over another is stupid. In the end, anything that limits the conversation is nonsensical, for as +Doug Belshaw pointed out in his ebook The Essential Elements of Digital Literacies, “I would argue that literacy is inherently a social phenomenon. In fact, I’d argue that, in isolation, an individual cannot be literate at all”
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So, it is Week 3 of ‘Rhizomatic Learning’ and the focus is embracing uncertainty. The questions posed are How do we make embrace uncertainty in learning? How do we keep people encouraged about learning if there is no finite achievable goal? How do we teach when there are no answers, but only more questions?
 
One of the many things that struck out from my first day back at school was the statement that, “a student’s perception is their reality”. The argument being made was that how you present yourself in the beginning has an effect on the rest of the year. This sort of thinking often leads to people donning a tie, graduate teachers trying to be sterner than they would like and teachers creating overly structured lessons all in the attempt to start the year off on the right foot.
 
The big problem with all of this is that we take such measures in the attempt to control everything around us. We presume that if we wear a tie, if we keep a few students in at lunchtime, if we develop some lessons where students are kept busy the whole time, that it will create the right perception, that school is about rules and power, with the teachers being their enforcer. However, what is overlooked in all of this is that it denies that the uncertainty involved in someone’s perception. 

For example, a young female teacher who smiles a little too often happens to teach next to the rather strict and stern male teacher. This chance situation often leaves the young teacher being perceived as a pushover. Whereas, if that same teacher taught next to a similar such teacher to herself, then the perception of her would be totally different. Although we can do many things to influence how we are perceived, there are still many factors that are outside our grasp. The reality is that we cannot control someone else’s perception and that is ok.
 
Associated with this effort to control perception is the effort to control learning. Seemingly dictated by the curriculum, it is so easy to structure learning for students, rather than with students. As +Richard Olsen pointed out on Twitter, “it is not commonly understood that curriculum is a compromise.” A part of this ‘compromise’ is actually opening learning up to students, not simply ‘compromising’ as teachers. Sadly, a part of this compromise often leads to teachers sticking to areas where they feel comfortable – working to their strengths you may say – rather than opening learning up to the students. Even though so many claim to be life-long learners, this is too often merely lip service, rather than embraced. Classrooms are proclaimed to be student centred, however class agreements are often created as a token gesture, only to be never seen again.
 
This all reminds me of a post from +George Couros the other about everything happening for a reason. Couros talks about how he was feeling unhappy in his career, so he decided to change his mindset by wearing a tie to school. What was significant about George’s change was that it was not about changing others, rather it was about changing himself. So often we try to lock down and control the world around us in the classroom, when the only thing that we can truly change and control is ourselves.

This year I have entered the classroom with a new vigour. Instead of starting with my curriculum fully planned, I have opened it up to the students. Although I had an idea of what we could do, it was only as a starting point to be refined by the contributions of the students. So instead of beginning the first lesson outlining what students will learn, I began the question, ‘what do you want out of this subject?’ After that I provided an outline of the areas that students would be assessed against and a suggestion of what I thought that we could do. After reflecting on the responses from the students and opening it up to the class, we then created an overview of the units of study of the semester. I must admit that one of the benefits that I have this year is that I am the only teacher of my subjects, therefore my class and I do not have fit in with somebody else. However, why is it that the need to ‘fit in’ means that differentiation is so often subdued.

I am not particularly sure that I have really addressed the questions at the beginning, but I would like to think that I have at least touched upon the heart of the problem, that how we deal with uncertainty often starts with the foundation for learning which we put in place in the classroom. That is the only reality worth talking about.
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There has been a lot of debate in Week Two of Rhizomatic Learning revolving around ‘enforcing independence’. Although some of the debate has been about the choice of words and other such technicalities, a lot of the discussion has emanated from the contradictory nature of forcing something that focuses on freedom and choice. I myself have already posted about the matter, in which I suggested that the only way that this could be possible is within a situation where the learning is their own servant and master. After some great feedback from those in the course, it was pointed out to me that education is full of impossible ideals that we never quite meet. Something I myself have posted about elsewhere. What our focus should really be is about using such prompts as the mantra that guides us, rather than the hard and fast rule that drives us. So instead I have changed tack. Here then are a list of thoughts and ideas that may not achieve ‘enforced independence’, but definitely work towards that goal:
 
  • Students must make a choice and live with the consequences, with ambivalence not an option. I have written a bit about choice. I think that instead of being forced towards a particular style or method, it is better to look at each option and make the best choice that we can, aware of the consequences of such decisions.
  • Everyone is learning something. Joe Mazza uses the term ‘Lead Learner’ to replace teacher and although there is a bit of conjecture about whether that means principal or all staff, I think that it is important to get rid of the term ‘teacher’, as in my eyes, it rarely achieves much good.
  • Students and learning are at the centre, not the teacher and instruction. In a fantastic little book by +Mark Barnes called ‘5-minute Teacher‘. He suggests in his closing remarks that if you simply start seeing students at the centre then you are already on the right track.
  • Creativity must not be assessed, rather it is should be reflected upon. In a fantastic post by +Amy Burvall, she outlines how we should approach creativitiy. Rather than assessing it with a rubric and putting constraints on the task, Burvall asks for five ‘tions’ from her students: attribtion, explanation, reflection, no hesitation and no self-deprecation.
  • Rubrics are best co-created. This is a fantastic task for getting student emmersed in a task and taking more ownership over their learning. A fantastic resource that I have found to support this is BIE’s ‘Rubric for Rubrics‘.
  • Feedback should be a two way process. Too often when we talk about feedback, it is about what feedback is being provided a the students. However, if everyone is seen as a learner, than feedback from the students is just as, if not more, important. Feedback, then, should always be an open dialogue.
  • Subjects should be the mediator, not the motivator, of learning. Although many schools are structured around ‘subjects’ and pushing thought a certain content, we should always have an eye on how each skill or tool may be utilised across the board and even more importantly, the world outside of the school.
  • Be open to change. The worst classes I have administered have been when I have decided prior to learning what we will do and being unwilling to adjust to each and every situation. It is so important to adjust to the needs of each and every learner, whether this be in the form of instruction, support or simply what is offered. Although you may have a plan attached to an intention, it is also just as important to go with the flow and respond to the moment, for that is what you are in.
  • Start with a space. In a great post from +Luis López-Cano, he outlines the importance of space on controlling the learning that is even possible. Just as it is important to recognise the choices that we make, it is also just as important to recognise the constraints that may restrict us. In recognising such things, we are better able to stretch them to get the most out of them or even break them.
 
It is important to remember that these are guides not rules – suggestions, thoughts, beginnings, a starting point to a more independent form of learning. To treat such ideas as rules can miss the point and as John Spencer and Tom Panarese pointed out in their post ’12 Half-Truths Pundits Say to Teachers’, it is easy to get caught up in the fervour of change and the realities and restraints of the everyday classroom. 
 
In the end, this list is best understood as a list of ideals to spur me forward, each and every day, to be the best that I can be and support those under my care. Do I embody them each of them everyday, no. Not because I don’t want to, but rather because life has its own way of things at times. However, such ideals are what help me continually break free from what John Goh describes, as our ‘default value’. That idea laid as a foundation during our formative years.
 
Are there any suggestions that you would add to my list? Any tools and strategies to add to a learner’s toolbox? Would love your thoughts and ideas.
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So, it is Week 2 of ‘Rhizomatic Learning’ and the focus is enforcing independence. The questions posed are how do we create a learning environment where people must be responsible? How do we assure ourselves that learners will self-assess and self-remediate?
 
Whenever we talk about student-centred learning this discussion usually revolves around creating authentic situations through which students can take responsibility of their actions. However, what is not often spoken about is how to enforce this learning. It is usually assumed that if you provide the right situation to grow – fertilized garden bed with plenty of sun and water – then growth is guaranteed. What is significant about words like ‘enforce’, ‘must’ and ‘assure’ is that the choice to not participate, to refuse, is taken out of the equation. The very term ‘enforce independence’ seems antithetical, contradictory.
 
Now I am not sure how to ‘enforce’ such independence, but I will at least plant the seed as to what I feel that it isn’t. Independent learning is not: structured around word counts, based on grades and dictated by due dates. What it is though is: supported, driven by interests, responding to what needs to be responded to and feed by ideas of the wider learning community.
 
What is interesting about ideas of self-assessing and self-remediating is that they call for some sort of measuring stick, some prior model of success. Maybe the answer to enforcing independence is that students create and assess their own learning. In this scenario, the learner is facilitator and assessor. Where they create their own narratives, their own successes, their own continual feedback. What might be termed, ‘education without teachers’. 
 
Not exactly sure what this would exactly look like, but maybe giving it all too much detail misses the point.
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I recently started my first MOOC focusing on Rhizomatic Learning and the topic for Week 1 was ‘Cheating as Learning’. After seeing Michael Petroni’s film adaptation of Markus Zuzak’s The Book Thief today and it got me wondering, is seeing the film before reading the book cheating? Does the book come first or are they both completely different?
 
It is usually argued that the book has primacy. Why else would the film be described as an ‘adaptation’? The very term suggests that the book has some sort of pride of place, that it is the thing that is changed for a new medium. However, what is often denied is the place of the adapted text to be a text-in-itself. For example, can you watch the film Tomb Raider without having played the game? Can you listen to Cedric Gervais’ remix of Lana Del Rey’s “Summertime Sadness”, without listening to the original album version? What is the place of the adapted when considering adaptations?
After discussing the film and Zuzak’s text with my wife, I got wondering about the notion of historical fiction. The film included many significant historical events, such as Kristallnacht, the burning of the books and the bombing of Germany. This got me thinking, is history itself the ‘original’ text in all of this? Should the film really say “Based on Markus Zuzak’s novel The Book Thief, which in turn was adapted from history”. The problem with this is that it then prioritises history, but whose history is it? Whose perspective is it from? What evidence is this understanding based upon?
In the end, it may well be cheating to see an adaptation before reading the print version, however it is better to consider such texts as merely a collection of traces whose true origins are forever lost. Although we may feel that we know or understand a text the more we look into it, really we just get more and more caught up in the mire.
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When we think back through our learning, there are always those aha moments, those situations, that have a lasting impact. Such moments come in many shapes and sizes, maybe an odd passage in a book or a random video seen online. So often though they have an impact that is far beyond their intended purpose. A recent moment that has had such an effect on me was +Alec Couros‘ simple suggestion made during an interview with the +Ed Tech Crew that everything can be a resource online. By approaching resources in this way, our understanding moves away from being an actual object, lets say a textbook, to a resource as being a way of seeing something. In this sense, a resource stops being a noun, something named, ordered and categorised, and instead becomes a verb, a way of approaching something, interpreting it, questioning it. In much the same way, PLNs can be thought of in much the same way. 

 
So often we limit ourselves by seeing PLN’s as something made – contained and organised – rather than something continually evolving, changing growing and adapting. As I have suggested previously, 
PLN’s often form themselves organically. PLN’s are rhizomic. There is no central root system. There is only one connection leading to another. Whitby best sums it up by calling it a ‘mindset’, a way of being.
This ‘way of being’ also goes far beyond the usual digital connections. Just as Couros suggests that everything can be a resource, we can say the same about all the different links in our lives. I believe that everyone in our lives has a point of knowledge to share, if recognised.
 

Listening to ALL Voices

The other day my wife and I went and visited her grandparents. As is the usual, I ended up chatting with her grandfather about anything and everything. I love these conversations as no matter how many chats we have, there is not a time when I learn something new from him about such topics as farming, fire fighting and the family history. Whether it be about communicating during a fire or the way that the various properties were divided. Although many of these situations do not impact me directly, the problem solving and reasoning behind them does. Solutions for today can so often be found in adapting and extending ideas from the past.
 
A part of this is limiting ourselves by failing to recognise the connections in our lives and what they may have to offer. One way in which we restrict these connections is by deciding what it is we want to know, before we have even asked the question. With this comes a decision who will best provide this answer. Fine that if we have a question about how to create a character for a story, the best person to ask may be an author. This does not really give voice to those divergent thinkers, those may not be professional writers, but people with a passion for writing and creativity. Sometimes the best answers I get from my PLN are from those who I didn’t expect. Is their opinion any less valuable?
 
Another good example where perspective and divergent thinking is so important is in education. Christopher Pyne, the Australian Minister for Education, recently made the statement that “everyone has been to school, everyone is an expert on education in one way or another.” Now I’m not sure that I agree that everyone is an ‘expert’, however, I do think that Pyne is on to something. Although not everyone is an expert, everyone does have an opinion and something to add to the discussion. In my view, education is much better from incorporating wider range of voices and perspectives.
+Miguel Guhlin sums up this problem in a great post about mandated technology in schools. Guhlin calls for a infinite plurality. That is, rather than collective uniformity, where everyone does this or uses that, it is about developing common practises from a range of diverse perspectives. In closing, he moves his discussion from technology to PLN’s.

I’d hate for my PLN to all be the same person with one message. Better than strict adherence to one technology over another, a plurality of diversity that builds relationships among diverse partners to achieve common goals.

When Guhlin talks about plurality in regards to PLN, it is about capturing a range of perspectives with the focus being the goals that we may share. I think that it sometimes misses the point to base your PLN upon people that we like or those who we get along with. To build upon +Tom Whitbys point that “PLN’s accept people for their ideas, not the titles.” I think that PLN’s accept ideas, not people or personalities. The bigger challenge is how we actually recognise such differences in a meaningful way.
 

Nurturing the PLN

I think that something that is often overlooked in regards to a PLN is that it is not something that we build, rather a PLN is something that we grow and nurture. Being something organic, its success often depends upon the way we treat it. For example, if you simply plant something and leave it to the elements, then you cannot be surprised if it does not take. However, if you choose where to setup your garden bed, lay some straw, water regularly and add some nutrients, then you are providing more opportunity for things to grow and prosper, to flower and  reproduce. I think that a PLN is much the same.
 
One of the difficult problems with any discussion about PLN’s is that people are often encouraged to connect with others. What is often overlooked though is that connections are not a one way transaction. They are reciprocal in nature. Too often connecting is seen as a way of getting an answer, an resource, a piece of information.  However, if no one is willing to offer an answer, then the whole system falls apart. 
 
There are a number of ways in which a PLN can be nurtured. This includes engaging in dialogue, posting comments, as well as sharing ideas and resources. But the most important thing that we can do, whether it be in person or online, is to listen and simply be there.
 

Connecting is a Mindset, not just a Thing Done

I have read quite a few people who have suggested blogging as their ‘goal’ for 2014. This sums up the greatest conundrum associated with being connected. Often people associate being connected with doing this or that. Creating a twitter account, joining a Google+ group or blogging more. I am not saying that these things are not important, but they in part miss the point. In the end, you don’t measure the success of a blog by the amount of hits it gets, nor do you measure a PLN by the number of followers someone has on Twitter. Being connected is a mindset, a way of being and a way of doing, not something static, that is a thing done and complete.

What are the areas that you are passionate about, have an expertise in, have an opinion on, know something about? How are you sharing this with others? In what ways are you nurturing your PLN?
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This is my response to the task for Week One of the Rhizomatic Learning Course on P2PU focusing on the topic of ‘cheating on learning‘…

There is a call from a certain group at the moment in Australian education about better recognising Western traditions in Australia’s history and society. A certain bias that is being brought to bare by the new Liberal Government. See for example Tony Taylor’s article in The Age. One of the things that this got me thinking about is the forgotten history, the voices denied air, subordinated, all in the attempt to create a stable tradition. In Kevin Donnelly’s case, this Anglo tradition is based on place of Christianity in our culture. Yet when you dig deep it could be argued that it was not ‘Christianity’ that laid the foundations of much of this great nations, rather it was those who had to resort to doing whatever it was they needed to do to survive, whether it be stealing a loaf of bread or pinching a pocket watch. The consequence of which was to be sent to a place the other side of the world.

Having just finished reading Kate Grenville’s The Secret River, a novel which provides a frank portrayal of life in the new colony and out in the frontier country, I can’t help but be reminded about cheating as an essential weapon for survival. When all is at stake, stealing is a way of carving out a new beginning. Whether it be syphoning wood from rich merchants to sell to provide for others or claiming land to plant crops and clear land, stealing is often the basis for getting by. What is fascinating is that over time such acts as the appropriation of land become common place. What was once ‘stealing’ is eventually seen as ‘normal’, whether that be because the power structures evolve or simply because those who suffered the ill-deed can only be stolen from once.

What is interesting is that on top of these often forgotten histories are a set of traditions created seemingly in denial of the past. I am currently reading James Boyce’s book 1835: The Founding of Melbourne and the Conquest of Australia. The book explores all the different influences associated with the development of Melbourne, from the founding of the project to the treaty with the local native people. One of the things that struck me was that many of the founding fathers actually sent in ex-convicts to clear the land, to establish some sort of settlement, before actually going in themselves. In this situation, those who initially squatted and settled had little respect for the rules of the colony. Often it was the rules dictated by the empire that brought them to the place that they were, a long way from ‘home’. Such settlers cared more about doing what needed to be done to survive, rather than what was right and appropriate. Eventually the investors of the Port Phillip Association came in and took control, moving from a focus on settlement and survival to one of gain and investment.

The irony about all of this is that stealing comes first, while traditions follow afterwards. Like an artist who roughly sketches the inital drawing with pencil, only to go over it at a later date with something more defined and set. However, even if these first lines are erased, a trace often remains. An indent in the surface. A reminder of the first beginning.

To come back to education, this all leaves me thinking about those learners who are using stealing in the classroom today – collaborating, sharing, hacking – what foundation are they laying? What are the new traditions that will emerge from these seemingly humble beginnings? What legacy are they creating?