Reflect on your 2018 connections-based learning

It is so important to reflect.

I don't have a great memory. I can enter a room and be clueless as to why I came. And yet I remember stories from decades ago as if they were yesterday. Building tree forts. Ducking behind the fence as my buddy threw lawn darts at me. Getting stitches. Why do I remember those things: because I have reviewed them over and over. I have reflected on them. Sure, as I tell the stories to my own kids, some of the details have evolved. (the darts really did happen, though). But without reflection, the ideas grow cold. With that in mind, here are a few of the more memorable CBL experiences I had this year.

This was a great year of connections-based learning for me and my students. I remember the first week of school, I connected my students with Saul Mwame, a Sustainable Development Goals activist from Tanzania. I really had no definite purpose for this other than connection. Sure I thought he could shed some light on the lack of electricity in Tanzania. But it was the connection that was important.

Months after that first semester class is done, I see the ripple effects of that connection in my last semester's students' tweet supporting Saul's goals.

@SaulMwame
Nothing can stop you, can it? :) Made my day reading this article, makes you certain that sometimes people have bigger problems than you.
"Nothing can stop me but me. I dream that one day I will establish an aerospace university in my country": https://t.co/8cah9BOGwe

— Nana Okamoto (@pancakes_honey) May 28, 2018

How can I stop connecting my students when passionate purposeful flames are fanned. I can't.

And what an honour it was for me to connect with champions of gender equality around the world as I prepared to speak at the Qatar Leadership Conference 2017. I couldn't have done it without connections. It speaks to the crucial nature of the CBL #CoOperate focus:

#ExploreTheField, #ThinkCritically, #BetterTogether, and #WorkOutLoud.

See this post for details on that experience: #CBLchat and #TeachSDGs.

Another highlight for me this year was to watch what mentorship can do as we connect our students with the right guides. Microsoft Vancouver approached me to find some students that would be interested in connecting to utilize the MS Vancouver Garage resources: both tools and personnel. This gave students a chance to really press into the CBL #CoCreate Focus:

#BuildSkills, #InnovatePurposefully, #CollectFeedback, and #MeetTheNeed

The human element is huge in these instances. If I asked students to educate themselves in coding and design through YouTube they would not have gotten as far as they did with a human connection. We went through the CBL #CoDesign focus to not only tease out our direction, but guide our work.

#CoConstructGoals, #EmpathizeNeeds, #ProposeAction, #PlanCollaboration

Such great progress was achieved between the time we spent time to #CoConstructGoals to the proof of concept demonstrated at the BC Tech Summit. Here is one students' goals at the beginning of the connection:

And here is a video of the product demonstrated at the BC Tech Summit:

What a difference a connection can make!

The CBL #CollaborationLens is a way to guide your connections. If you have no idea to what I am referring, you have got to check this out: Connections-based Learning.

What has been your memorable connections-based learning this year? I would love to see your tweets, hear your stories, listen to your Voxes (join the: CBL Voxer Community!!) and read your reflection posts!

#CBL leads to #Individualization, #Differentiation, and #Personalization

Donning a #ConnectionLens is only the start of an educator's connections-based learning journey. Educators around the world are connecting. They are using connection platforms. They are breaking down the walls of their classrooms. But that is not enough.

I have made a case that connecting our classes opens the door for students to develop empathy. It provides students with up-to-the-minute knowledge. But if they don't do anything with the empathy that they have developed, if they don't do anything with the knowledge that they have gained, if they don't respond to a connection, a vital part of connections-based learning is lost.

That is why my favourite part of the CBL experience is asking students what we are going to do in response to hearing from our learning partner:

"Now that we know what we know, what are we going to do about it? 

What are we going to MAKE about it?"

This returns the onus of learning back to the students and opens the door to individualization, differentiation, and personalization.

Individualization

Individualization is matching the speed of the learning with the students. If the learning outcome is based on connection, the typical teacher-imposed-timeline for concept attainment is thrown out the window. The teacher truly becomes the guide on the side as students develop their response to the connection. Students can take time to pause, follow a rabbit trail, delve into a topic of interest deeply, or dare I say skip over parts that don't interest them.

In connections-based learning, students #CoConstructGoals right at the beginning of the CBL. It is the responsibility of the educator to construct those goals with the student as they #CoDesign the connection response. Learning outcomes were considered as the learning partner was established. It is way too late to be establishing learning outcomes while students #CoOperate. They need their autonomy. They need time ... and check-ins to help them along their path.

But Robinson, we have deadlines. We have report cards. The semester ends for goodness sake!! Yes, but student learning never does. Might I direct you to our CBL with Karishma Bhagani, creator of the low cost water purifier. The end of the semester did not end the learning for my students. Or what about our CBL with the Dominican Republic? Second semester classes were working with first semester classes to build and send the solar lanterns to the Dominican Republic, Macedonia, and Kenya. The course was over for some and yet the work, and the learning, never stopped. Semesters should not dictate the learning timeline; students should.

Differentiation

As a guide on the side, the teacher is tasked with being the linchpin to support groups and individuals as they pursue their response to the connection. Each response is individual to the student. In no way can the teacher take over. It doesn't make any sense in this context. Differentiation, tailoring the instruction for the learner, is the only way that this can work. Learners may need to be connected with other experts to accomplish their goals. Learners may need to be guided to where they can attain needed skills. Let me assure you, as learners develop their own responses to a connection, they will be all over the map. As students developed their response to their connection with the Dominican Republic students, students went off in all kinds of directions. And I wouldn't have it any other way!

Personalization

Personalization is where students drive their own buses. They pursue their own interests. As students make a connection with a learning partner, they are encouraged to respond in their own way. This "freeing up the student" allows the learners to follow their own path to a response. The door is opened for innovation, creating, campaigning, advertising, and fundraising.

I love it when a student enthusiastically follows their own path but I believe a connection opens student's eyes to consider others as they do it. The connection is needed to keep the personalization from becoming completely insular. How can our students consider the needs of the class, community, and globe as they follow their path?  This is where a sharing the Sustainable Development Goals can guide the students as they inquire and innovate. There are so many possibilities, so many needs, exposure to the SDGs expands the horizons of the students as they consider their response to a connection.

As educators, it is our delight when students find their passion and follow their interests. My desire is to see more and more educators allowing for more and more students to do just that. As we seek to connect with learning partners in the community and around the world, and allow our students to respond, we naturally encourage individualization, differentiation, and personalization. How do you see this playing out in your classroom?

Teamwork makes the dream work | #CBL Collaboration Lens

My son loves the dudes.  I've mentioned the love-hate relationship I have with the bottle flipping epidemic before.  I have Dude Perfect to thank for that.  But it's not just the flipping.  It's the trick shots, and the videos, and the making anything into a competition.  It's the cap flips and the 30 foot 3 pointers.  It's making me loony.  But I can't help myself.  I gotta keep taking those shots.

Dude perfect represents something to me, though: teamwork.

If it was just Tyler Toney, taking the shots, it wouldn't have caught on.  It's the synergy.  It's the team.  It's buddies working together to work against each other to make something happen.  I love the Dude Perfect team.  They are real with their strengths and weaknesses.  They capitalize on both.  And they make something special together: something motivating, something engaging, something inspiring.

Something to get me to make a 2-story no-look cap flip.

Think about the last time you worked on something as a team.  Did it go well?  Were you happy with the product, the process, the experience?  Did you feel as though you had come to an understanding with your teammates?  Or did you decide to never work with them again?

Working in groups happens day in and day out in school. From long term group projects to 30 second think-pair-shares, students are often working in groups.  But how often do we as educators give students tools to help them do groupwork effectively?  We can't simply throw students together and hope for the best.

Teamwork is a skill.  After a semester of developing teamwork skills, the teamwork I see at the end of the semester is different than the teamwork I see at the beginning.  Students seem happier with the team.  They seem more effective.  They seem to come up with better responses.

Strategize a Collaboration Plan

No one goes into a partnership without first discussing the terms.  How can we ask our students to do just that?  A collaboration plan is crucial as students embark on Connections-based Learning.  In the CBL Design process, students reflect on the collaboration at the beginning of the process.  This was crucial as we responded to the dire conditions in the bateyes we heard from Eladio, Dennis and the students from The Community For Learning school in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.  The students had empathized the needs, co-constructed learning goals with me, and developed a proposal to address light poverty.  The next step was to establish how the team would function.

Answering questions such as what strengths do we bring to the group, what non-negotiables do we have, and how do we see the work load divided must take place to guide the collaboration.  Using our OneNote Class Notebook collaboration space, students ironed out some group parameters by answering some guiding questions.

They then signed the plan, demonstrating that they were committed to these ideas.  Opportunities for guided collaboration must continue throughout the CBL.  Having digital and actual time and space for collaboration is crucial for developing teamwork.  Whether it's brainstorming questions for Skype chats:

or gathering a list of materials to create 3D printed lanterns

collaboration is entered into by the students, but monitored and guided by the teacher.  Finally, it should be reflected upon by each student, as they bookend their learning.

When teamwork skills are built, there is no telling what students can do.  I am amazed at what these students created to address light poverty in the Dominican Republic as they worked together.  And I love the sentiment above: 

"we can accomplish anything if we put our minds to it"

See previous CBL Design Posts:

- Empathize Local and Global Needs

- Co-construct Learning Goals

- Dare to Dream

Thanks for walking with us as we attempt to tackle light poverty.  Support us in further attempts by visiting our My Class Needs page.

How to Tackle Light Poverty

On November 21st, 2016, I wrote a post called Doing Something Beyond Ourselves.  In it, I outlined an idea that I wanted to press into: meaningful making in connections-based learning.  Provoked by a connection, the natural response is to ask "what are we going to do/make about it?"  Admitting my own lack of electronics skill, I went about making connections to facilitate my students to get involved with battling light poverty.  We went through the whole CBL process as we connected with collaborators in New Brunswick and the Dominican Republic: design, network, create, and celebrate.

What follows is what my students created in response to our connection with students in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic and the Engineering Brightness group with Ian Fogarty in Riverview, New Brunswick.  I am very proud of where the students got to: prototyping, fundraising, light building, connecting with other schools.  It was a pleasure to work with these students.

When a connection is made, the possibilities blow open wide.

I encourage you to look at these student "Artifacts of Learning" posts, see what they have accomplished, hear what they have learned, and comment on their thoughts.

Lantern Housing Design

became

These students prototyped their own light, designing and 3D printing the lantern housing.  They created top and bottom, ready to add the light components.

Gavin's Post  Liam's Post  Owen's Post

Fundraising

became

Janna's Post  Angie's Post  Sabrina's Post

These students connected with other schools to raise money and awareness for light poverty.  Right now schools around our district are getting involved and raising money to help the cause of light poverty.  Other students put on a Photo Booth to raise money.  They created a video to advertise the event.

Social Media Campaign

Marwa's Post  Jayden's Post  Alyah's Post Ashiana's Post

Electricity Production Design

became

These students developed an innovative technology to use kinetic energy to charge the lights.  These shake-able lights could be carried around by a person or an animal to charge and then used at night.  In these posts is a video that asks for future students to continue working on the idea.

Alhan's Post  Josh's Post  Ben's Post  Zac's Post

CBL Historians

These students created a video to curate the activities and learning that was happening with the teams.

Ella's Post  Clare's Post  Ria's Post

Lantern Production

became

These students were able to re-create the Engineering Brightness New Brunswick students' design and make a fully functioning light.

Kaleb's Post  Olivia's Post  Evan's Post

These students all helped in other capacities to tackle light poverty: creating Powerpoints, participating in Skype chats, supporting other teams, finding other methods of creating lights, and bringing an awareness to light poverty.

Ghazal's Post  Brynne's Post  Zachary's Post  

Alan's Post  Jack's Post  Maria's Post  

Thanks for walking with us as we attempt to tackle light poverty!  Support us in further attempts by visiting our My Class Needs page:

Dare to Dream | #CBL Collaboration Lens

1.3 billion people don't have access to sustainable lighting.  The immediate danger isn't the carcinogenic nature of kerosene lamps: people are dying in fires due to flame based light use at night.  My Science 9 students got to hear firsthand of the conditions in areas dealing with light poverty.  In a Skype chat with Eladio, Dennis and their students from The Community For Learning School in the Dominican Republic, we heard about the conditions in the bateyes.  These workers in the sugar cane fields live with little to no electricity; accessing safe light at night is one of the many struggles with which they deal.

In Doing something beyond ourselves I share my dream of meaningful making with Connections-based Learning. Connections-based learning is an approach to teaching and learning that leverages the connected world.  After making a connection, the most natural response is to ask "how can we help?".  We design the learning experience by first seeking out needs.  I share how we sought the needs in the Dominican Republic bateyes in Empathizing the Local and Global Needs. The students and I then created learning goals together (See: Co-construct Learning Goals) as we sought to meet those needs.  The next step in CBL Design is to develop a response to achieve those goals.  At this stage, students dream what they propose to do and to make.

Dream a CBL Proposal

Time must be given for students to dream up a response to the need and to flesh out what their response could look like.  Through the inspiration of a real need, brainstorming sessions, and group discussions, students develop their plans.  We used OneNote Class Notebook to collaborate and share ideas.  We also Skyped with Ian Fogarty and his students and learned about Engineering Brightness, an association of teachers hoping to address light poverty by STEM based making.  I then ask students to make a polished document or blog post that outlines their proposal.  Finally, students share their proposals to the rest of the class to further refine, get help for ideas, or to combine ideas.  For me, proposal day is just as important as when students share their final products.

Engineering Brightness Student Proposals

"Create a more efficient source of light for countries that have light poverty using electromagnets" - Alhan's Proposal

"Make a solar powered light but also teach them how to make it so they can fix it if they brake it and also they can make even more if they need them so they are self sufficient" - Liam's Proposal

"one of our goals, would be for Kaleb to start creating a model of our light source in his Industry and Design 10 course, to give us an idea of what it would look like. We could get help from outside sources of the school, with the connections that we have made from the Skype calls, or even with a new source." - Olivia's Proposal

"Fundraise enough money to supply Alhan's group to make shakable lights and be able to teach our friends in the Dominican Republic to make lights as well" - Ashiana's Proposal

"We could do a bake sale and possibly pair up with another group and maybe work with Citadel Middle School and their leadership team to raise money at their school. - Clare's Proposal

"Raise awareness about the light poverty in the Dominican, and also raise $1000 dollars towards buying/making lights to send to the Dominican Republic" - Sabrina's Proposal

"Our plan is to make a power point on everything that has happened during this project and what other people are doing. To also try and spread awareness for light poverty." - Brynne's Proposal

"We were thinking about working with solar power, because it’s safer and easier to charge the light, we also thought that it’s really interesting and trying new stuff. We are now connecting with a company called Liter of Light to get some ideas" - Maria's Proposal

The above links are just a few of the proposals students shared out to the rest of the class.  Each student works out loud sharing their proposals to allow for meaningful commenting.  I encourage you to take a look at the proposals and make a meaningful comment.

It has been amazing to watch these students' dreams become a reality.  As they connect, design, build, and campaign, they must work as a team.  Part of the CBL design is to plan to work together.  I will share how we do that in a post: Teamwork makes the dream work.

Thanks for walking with us as we attempt to make a difference in light poverty.

See previous CBL Design Posts:
- Empathize Local and Global Needs
- Co-construct Learning Goals

Consider partnering with us as we fight light poverty in the Dominican Republic

Co-construct Learning Goals | #CBL Collaboration Lens

Bottle Flipping is sequestered to the back deck in the Robinson household.  If you don't know what I am talking about, see this Dude Perfect video:

It is all the rage.  I see it at soccer practices.  At breakfast.  In my class.  In the car.  I am not sure, but I think it actually can cause parental madness.

But I can't ban it all together.  To see someone work to perfect something must be pondered as an educator.  It is the equivalent of kids developing their skateboarding skills, practicing that ollie over and over and over again until they get it just right.  It causes me to ask myself what causes this drive.  And how can I utilize this for learning.  When we tap into students' own drive, learning is transformed from blowing on embers to managing a blaze.

This is the second in a series of posts that look at the Connections-based Learning Collaboration Lens.  In the previous post we examined what it means to empathize local and global needs.  Now that my students have discovered needs that they want to address in response to the Dominican Republic provocation, the next step is to bring out students' own learning goals.  Here is where bottle flipping meets school.  Can we tap into students' own interests while guiding them in meaningful directions? Can we construct learning goals together?

Co-construct Learning Goals

In our Engineering Brightness CBL, the students were asked to ponder the connection.  An answer to the light poverty in the Dominican Republic is a natural response.  Hearing about the need for safe efficient light sources leads to students to consider how they can help.  In our case, after brainstorming and discussing the Dominican Republic connection, the students were to write down their goals for learning.

I comment on these goals encouraging students to elaborate, press into, or try a different direction for their goals.  Often students have ideas on what they want to do, but I encourage them to develop what they want to learn.  As I do this, I keep in mind my own goals for this CBL.  In this case, my goals stem from the competencies that I selected from the new British Columbia curriculum.  They look like this:

Students also get to make their own rubric that looks at the focuses of the  CBL Collaboration Lens, considering ideas such as Design, Network, Create, and Celebrate as they construct their learning goals. Later, this rubric will be used to self-assess after the students receive meaningful feedback on their digital portfolios.

You might notice that below each rubric strand is a place for evidence.  When I ask the students to do a final evaluation, they need to add evidence that supports how they assess themselves.  I take a copy of these Co-construction sheets and then give them back to the students.  They can use these sheets to guide them as they develop their proposal and carry on with their work.  Will their own goals engage them as much as bottle flipping?  Time will tell.

The proposals the students came up with are amazing.  I am going to outline them in the next post: Dream a Proposal | #CBL Collaboration Lens.  Here is a little taste of what one group came up with:

Consider partnering with us as we fight light poverty in the Dominican Republic