New Culture of Teaching: Alan November

Closing the Gap Conference
Keynote Speaker- Alan November

3 Job Skills
1. Dealing with an overwhelming amount of information and being able to sift through to find what's useful and needed.
2. Global communication- being able to complete things that you can't finish on your own, working with people not in the same room
3. Self-directed- being able to work on your own efficiently without a boss.

2 Tech Tools
1. Skype
2. Screen casting tool (Jing)

Teachers should have access to any website with the complete trust that they will make the right decision. Only in the US are websites blocked.

Record people  (that children are familiar with) reading books aloud to encourage reading. Use Skype to create a 'grandparent network'.

Build a video library of tutorials made BY students, FOR students that spans the entire curriculum. Over time, show different cases/ method. Students need to see other students homework more than the teacher does. The role of the teacher is now more important than ever: all content goes through and mist be approved by teacher. Ttt

We have underestimated students willingness to work harder than the teacher. Homework is not purposeful work.

Search Google using site extensions like .gov, .k13.il.us, to limit results from quality sites. Site:

Students are going to publish content on the Internet anyway. Why not be a role model for how to publish appropriate content? They're posting crap on the Internet because they've never been taught otherwise.

The majority of students have inaccurate notes. We don't have time to check for quality.

Google and Gates are paying Khan to cover the entire American curriculum. If students can get every lecture ever needed on their phone/laptop, we no longer need to lecture. Homework becomes classwork and there is no homework. Homework needs immediate feedback or it does no good. 

We are blocking the most powerful tool ever invented for learning because of our fear of lack of control.

With Wolfram-Alpha, we no longer have to focus on mechanics. We can spend time on application.

Live demonstration of polleverywhere.com

Video of Eric Mazoir: Students at Harvard can get high scores on tests without understanding anything. This is our American curriculum. Even if NCLB completely succeeded, the nation would fail.

Students should read, write, and reflect before the lecture.

In the classroom 'flip', everyone wins. But we won't actually do it because of tradition. Students need immediate feedback and they cam get that now with clickers. We can know what kids are thinking! Students need to learn logic, reasoning, and how to think. They no longer need the teacher for transfer of knowledge. We've bought billions of dollars of technology but we haven't changed the process of learning. Who owns the learning in your classroom?

Use Google Docs to take collaborative notes. One person can't take better notes than three people working together.

Teach students to deal with content, not block it.