Kaulbach's Modern World

I love librarians, I always have. I am old enough to remember a time when research was done without the internet. I literally drove to New York City in order to use the public library resources for a paper on the Hungarian Revolution and discovered the incredible world of library science. The staff there seemed to be of the category of super heroes and I contemplated joining their ranks instead of pursuing a career in teaching.  Ever since then I have spent many hours in libraries, with librarians. In fact, it isn't the reason I married my husband, but it is true, his mom is a librarian. It is my daughter's last day of school here in New Mexico and it is bitter sweet.  I had to withdraw her and check in with the librarian in order to close the account without overdue books. I was immediately drawn to the lighted candles on her desk. The project is so simple and sweet, I snapped a photo and stayed to swap praises for new takes on literary enchantments. The ligh...

link to published article link to article- part one In this time when school securities are threatened by unmitigated attacks, technology in education serves to open campuses between distant communities. A recent pen pal project entered a second phase of practice with letter writing and Skype. It has served to distract us from tragedy and fears of being able to engage in meaningful, safe dialogue. Last week Flatdaddy and I facilitated a follow up session with the classroom to classroom Skype between New Mexico and Vermont .  Our first chat gave students an opportunity to see the face of their pen pal.  Each class enjoyed watching each other hear ideas and evidence pulled from past letters and visually seeing each other respond to questions comparing culture and geography. Our follow up chat would give students three minutes to converse with a penpal. Management was discussed and planned ahead of time with the decision to model a structured conversat...

link to published article I just read an interesting blog on  surviving teaching  by Cool Cat Teacher, Vicki Davis and John Kuhn's viral hit, The Exhaustion of the American Teacher .  Teacher burnout is a perennial problem. It is impossible to survive with idealism, purpose and dignity intact amid changing mandates, recessions, and media inflamed paranoia about American public education. Public schools do not advertise or lobby for their best practices and public school teachers tend to receive less praise, less attention the longer they stay in teaching. I guess this is why I feel so fortunate to not only survive twenty years of service in education but to look forward to my start in 2013 as happy and idealistic.  I am returning from a mini sabbatical in New Mexico to teach at my Vermont public high school and I have never felt so alive. A sabbatical is a true gift. I have been thinking of the spirit of giving this holiday season and I ...

link to published article- mentoring Today celebrates a major breakthrough for me and Flatdaddy !  We successfully connected a Vermont public school with a New Mexico public school via Skype.  This is amazing for a number of reasons. First , our Vermont school seems to have more liberty with use of technology than New Mexico- for that I am grateful. But with perseverance and patience, the New Mexico school system gave approval for the video chat and once in place it went smoothly.  It is now a successful model for other classrooms to follow for improving student conversation, discussion and writing. We brought two schools in two different regions towards a common practice. Second - We are both teachers who view technology as a medium for connecting students' to regional similarities and differences that they can not extrapolate from reading alone.  It is painfully sad to observe high school students who make a common, nonchalant error in thinking that ...

Flatdaddy just received approval to pursue  and to institute a one to one ipad program for each student.  I am out here in New Mexico persistently hoping to convince tech support in two different schools within the same district to allow access to Skype or Facetime.  I made this request in August, it is November and still no attempt to install it has been made.  I visited the computer labs and discovered that the computers do not even have web cameras.  And school wifi for personal devices is prohibited.  We live in different worlds. Flatdaddy's recent visit gave us an opportunity to meld the best of both worlds.  His gentle demeanor set a tone of assurance for the administrators who were reluctant to be assertive on behalf of teachers hoping to install programs on their computers.  One administrator was excited and nervous about allowing a video chat in an elementary classroom.  Do students need permission slips? Do they need parental appro...

Link to published article http://theeducatorsroom.com/2012/11/blended-classroom-learning-virtual-and-real-classrooms/- (Draft) The spear whistled through the air, but the aim was low. The huge tail swished and contemptuously flipped it aside. Then the black form dropped into the foaming waters. "Missed," Cico groaned. He retrieved his line slowly... "Are you sorry you missed?" I asked as we slid our feet into the cool water. "No," Cico said, "it's just a game."   (Bless Me Ultima, Rudolpho Anaya) As a life time gamer of Four Square, Monopoly, backgammon, Scrabble, I am hard pressed to define gaming by today's standards. As an educator who relies on games as incentives for inquiry I have ignored digital game technologies. I awoke to realize that just as the number of books children access is a predictor of reading ability so too is gaming a predictor of digital literacy.  I have fallen in to the very literacy gap that I fear exists for ...

link to published article and related    link to published article Many nights ago, my daughter (KF) sighed and said to her dad,"it's been such a long time since I was able to lay my head on your shoulder." She snuggled against him while he held her tight and finished the bedtime story. Flat Daddy flew out to New Mexico to present at a tech conference and to see KF for the first time in person in over six weeks. Flatdaddy is my husband's Facetime nickname. Being that we are both teachers I couldn't help but compare our temporary separation and online communication to the blended classroom.  For all teachers worried about online learning as a destructive opponent of classroom teachers, there is no replacement for the real deal. But it has me questioning the following: what can technology provide for students that couldn't be there otherwise, what can teachers provide that a computer will never replace? When real daddy arrived in October we took a day toget...

published links: E Literacy Changes Everything                   gaming                   gaming dialogue The majority of homework in elementary schools and high schools tends to be practice or preparation leaving less than 30% for integration, interpretation opportunities ( Brozo, 2010 ). The Common Core  is shifting assessment from a focus on skills and gains of knowledge to information analysis, critical evaluation, and expression of new understanding (CCSSI; www.corestandards.org). This means our standard practices in education are not necessarily preparing students for the Common Core.  Instead of causing great alarm this lead me to reexamine isolated practices in our literacy program that could be improved to promote information analysis and new understanding.   Review of our fall diagnostic testing allowed me to isolate inference questions as a common miscue.  5...

Screenleap        is a fantastic tool for distance learning. Flatdaddy needed to share  Haiku learning platform with me. Using Screenleap, he talked me through the tutorial as I watched him navigate his own screen from my laptop here in New Mexico.  This tech to tech connection gave me the impression that screenleap could be a useful conferencing tool to use with my own students absent from class. Students who attend ski academy, who move temporarily, who hunt for weeks at a time would not have to have the excuse of losing a classroom connection.  Does this excuse students from meeting daily in the classroom?  I think it makes a class of students reliant on each other if what they are missing is truly interactive. This is why I teach lessons that revolve around situation gaming both online and offline. Admittedly, I can improve how I actually blend the learning environments. image courtesy of Wikipedia.  Scribblenaut was introduced to m...

My colleague, Jim, is a guidance counselor at my school.  From him I learned a few simple lessons about education.  I came to him with concern for a student who was unable to come to class on time or finish classwork. This student was refusing to learn or to pass.  Jim came to the classroom door and asked the student for a hall meeting.  The three of us stood there, Jim led the short conversation with three question, "Are you coming in late? Can you pass if you do the minimum in class? Do you want to graduate?"   That student mumbled yes and yes and yes.  Jim said, Now repeat for Ms. Kaulbach what you will promise to do."   The student looked at me, and repeated that he would come on time, he could do the classwork and that he wanted to pass. Jim looked him in the eye and reminded him that he said this in his own words, the responsibility was his and he would let himself down if he didn't do these three things. The student did graduate, he was on t...