Who Died and Left You In Charge? In our public elementary school located in the heart of the barrio of Pilsen, we have started a dual immersion program. According to cognitive science there are benefits to learning more than one language. With a focus on looking at the psycho-social-cultural well being of our latino children, it makes sense for them to maintain thier first langauge which connects them with their parents, elders, and culture. We do not need children losing thier first language and risk suffering further alienation that can lead to deviant behavior. When we look at the direction of where the school should go, we have to seriously listen to the community, the silent majority who are immigrants and who's first language is Spanish. Sorry, my fellow educators, we are GUESTS! Even though I am a Chicano, I am a guest in Pilsen. My academic history is a list of parochial schools and private universities (exception being Cal State LA.) Due the fact that I can speak the King's Engish without an accent ( which is supposed to be a plus in our society), the detractors may say my voice lacks authority on this touchy issue because I am not from Pilsen. True, just as most of the detractors of such a program. Lets cut to the chase. Lets be honest and ask the question, Dear parents, do you want your children to be academically literate in both Spanish and English? Please raise your hands. When our parents signup in Kindergarten, they sign the papers authorizing such services. The question for us as educators, is whether we can all step up to the plate. This entails more collaboration and the need for one another's support during the school day. This means myself included!
7:03:08 AM  #  comment []

Klog to Learn-Do..

Michel Ickx wrote about Networks of Learning for the Knowledge Board last year.

Students are putting together, themselves, the material which will enable them to learn and to create true operative and ad hoc knowledge. [Phil: Sounds like klogging, doesn't it?] ... In our workshops for networking and collaborative work we go one step further. We reintegrate knowledge and action as we go. we call it "Learn-Do". ... The scope is to create ad hoc knowledge in order to control new processes oriented to more creative objectives, selected and agreed by the team.

You remember more of what you do than what you see or hear. 

You get rapid feedback on how well you learned and the quality of knowledge work.

Now, if the group of students develops its own knowledge and puts it into practice, isn't the group the best judge? Shouldn´t it decide which level of excellency has been attained or not? And also the level of performance of its members? Shouldn´t those members express, in all transparency, their level of preparation and success, without the need of judges or "experts", since they did not learn from those masters? This leds us to develop a group C.V., or [base "]Multi-CV[per thou].

A group curriculum vitae! What a brilliant idea!

Some implications:

• Rethink the design of "skills" databases in job boards and performance reviews.
• Rethink what we teach kids to include skills for collaborative learning.  
• Remove obstacles to self organization.
• Devalue and amortize archived knowledge faster. Manuals, documentation, curricula.
• eLearning services must push curriculum development and grading to the students.
• Merge education and action into one process.
• Make Learn-Do a continuous activity.  

Learn-Do. A process for klogging.  

[a klog apart klogs]

[a klog apart]
6:44:17 AM  #  comment []