Summer 2017 Learning Series: Non-Educational Books To Read...Over and Over

For the next several weeks I’ll be sharing posts that you can use for your summer learning. School may be out for many but the learning we do as educators can last even outside the classroom. These posts will take us through several different ways of extending your learning. We started with Twitter chats and how you can participate in real time or whenever you want. Then we examined some ideas on how to get the most out of any conference you attend this summer or beyond. Today move to some non-educational books that you can use to grow as a learner and a professional. Then I’ll give you some ideas on how to better engage parents this upcoming school year. Finally we will finish the series by looking at some new and exciting tools to try in your classroom. Each post will offer up some basic information along with several learning challenges you can undertake. Happy Learning!

Spending lots of time on airplanes and in airports means I have a great deal of time on my hands. If I’m not prepping for a keynote, working on a presentation or compiling some data I’m reading. I keep a constant supply of books at arms length and believe it or not most of them aren’t educational books. I do find time to read content or theory but I find more and more it’s the non-educational books provide more to my learning because it causes me to reflect on how the subject matter c0uld apply to the work I am doing with administrators and teachers.

There are lots of great list of educational summer reading. This one from ASCD is full of texts I find on my own bookshelf. Here is another one. And another one. Some have lots of value others are just there to push books.

The thing to remember is, just like in the classroom, read what provides value to you. If educational books are your thing, awesome. If you are looking for a good beach read to escape, even better. Whatever you read, do it often. Reading is the foundation of learning and we all should be doing it more.

Here are 5 books that I’ve read recently that have seemingly no connection to education but have had influence on my work and my thinking as an educator and learner.

Everybody Lies: Big Data, New Data, and What the Internet Can Tell Us About Who We Really Are-This book from Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, a former data scientist at Google writes about how data, specifically Google Trends can tell us a lot about who we are as people and a society. Comparing the answers given to popular surveys Seth concludes that what we say to our friends and ourselves and what we ask Google are two totally different things. Using that data he can predict presidential elections, relationship habits and more. I have been using many of the data points here to talk to administrators about the use of social media and how data can skew what we know about the world.

Psyched Up: How the Science of Mental Preparation Can Help You Succeed-This was my most recent read and a great one. Daniel McGinn takes us through all the research around getting prepared for major events in our lives. Giving examples from sports, performance arts, medicine and more we learn that there is scientific evidence to suggest that pep talks don’t work, listening to music while you run or work is about the worst thing you can do and how to overcome a fear or speaking or presenting. I found I was doing a lot of things wrong in my own life and especially with my kids. We have to believe we will do well and data suggests, we will.

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right-Suggested to me by a good friend I was skeptical of this one at first. I have tried and failed about 1000 times to get organized and this seemed like another one of these books to tell me what I was doing wrong and how to do it better. And while it was that kind of book, it wasn’t my methods, it was my mindset. Since I’ve read it (twice now in 6 months) I find myself taking lots away each time to help me be more productive and how to shift my mindset on how I am organized. A quick and easy read.

Confessions of an Advertising Man-This one might be the most unusual book on my list but it is hands down my favorite I’ve read in a very long time. With chapters like “How To Start An Advertising Agency” and “How To Get Your First Client” it might not seem like there is anything to learn here unless you want to be in Mad Men. But seriously, if you are interested at all in creativity and leadership, you need this book. First published in 1963 it has long been considered the bible for ad agencies. However for me it was eye opening to see how someone who was once called the most creative man on the planet sought out talent, organized teams and was hyper-focused on tasks at hand. I have already read this one again and constantly keep coming back to parts of it to use in my work with administrators.

Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy- Sheryl Sandberg is the COO of Facebook and already an accomplished author. In this book she opens up about the sudden death of her husband and how she found herself a single mother of two children. But she writes of resiliency and how when things don’t always go the way we plan we need to be ready with option b, or c, or whatever. She blends personal story with research on how we all deal with adversity and how it’s a strength we can all build.

Summer 2017 Learning Series-3 Rules For Attending Any Conference

For the next several weeks I’ll be sharing posts that you can use for your summer learning. School may be out for many but the learning we do as educators can last even outside the classroom. These posts will take us through several different ways of extending your learning. We started with Twitter chats and how you can participate in real time or whenever you want. Next we will examine some ideas on how to get the most out of any conference you attend this summer or beyond. We will then move to some non-educational books that you can use to grow as a learner and a professional. Then I’ll give you some ideas on how to better engage parents this upcoming school year. Finally we will finish the series by looking at some new and exciting tools to try in your classroom. Each post will offer up some basic information along with several learning challenges you can undertake. Happy Learning!

As the end of June approaches that means the annual ISTE (International Society for Technology In Education) Conference is around the corner. ISTE is one of my favorite conferences because I get to catch up face-to-face with those I haven't seen in the past year, I get to learn with some incredible educators and I get to see the latest gadgets and must haves for the classroom.

If you are a social media user or a blog reader you may have seen several posts related to getting more out of ISTE. Many who attend have loads of great ideas to maximizing the impact you have while you are in attendance. Before many conferences, there is advice about how to follow the conference hashtag or to drink lots of water because you’ll do lots of walking. All the advice you hear is great and definitely worth a follow.

But I want to go deeper. When I go to conferences, either as a presenter or a participant, I challenge myself and my audiences each day to get the most out of the conference experience. Many will save all year long to attend or travel a great distance. How can we make the most of the conference learning, but still remembering our purpose to extend the learning for others?

I think there are 3 things to remember, not only for ISTE, but for any conference or learning event you attend.

Put Your Thinking Cap On And Push The Boundaries Of Your Thinking
It is easy to attend conferences like ISTE or any conference and only go to the sessions lead by our friends or go to sessions where we already know a lot about a specific topic. While there isn't anything wrong with that, are you doing the most with your conference experience? Push yourself. I am still a skeptic of flipped classrooms. So I make a point to attend at least one session where it’s discussed so I can widen my perspective. Try to find those gems of sessions that you might just walking away thanking yourself for attending. Make a point to attend at least one session where you disagree or are a skeptic about the topic. Go in with an open mind and make the most of your experience.

Reflect, Often
Because you are going to challenge yourself and your thinking, it will be important for you to reflect on your learning. Review your notes at the end of each day and write down your thoughts. I love Evernote for this. I can compile everything there (notes, drawings, pictures and handouts) and have it on all my devices. Many conferences are also creating shared Google Docs so that anyone can add in their thoughts and reflections collectively. It’s also a good idea at the end of the day, when you are exhausted and walking back to your hotel to just take some time and think. What did you see that challenged you? What do you still have questions about? How can you take what you learned and apply it to your students?

Don't Be A Hoarder, Share Your Learning
Think about if you shared what you learned with 5 people and those 5 people shared with 5 and so on. The learning becomes so much more valuable. Find many ways to share both at the conference (social media is great for that) and when you get back to your school/district. Did you go as a member of team? Have your team take 5 mins and share all the resources with those that couldn't attend. Flying solo? Post your Evernote notebooks to Twitter or to your blog. How ever you decide to share, just be sure to share!

Summer Challenge

1. Do you have a blog? If you do awesome! If you don’t take attending a conference as an opportunity to start one. Make a post (or your first post) about the top 3 takeaways from the conference. Add in your reflection about how you want to grow from here. 
2. Did everyone from your school attend the conference? Probably not. Arrange a #CoffeeEDU where you can invite colleagues for a coffee or a lunch and share what you learned. Discuss what you saw and how you can begin to implement what you learned. 
3. Do you have something to share? Of course you do! Begin thinking about how you can add your voice to the conference next year. Brainstorm session ideas and write them down. Was there something that you went to that you can improve upon or add your own spin? Then you have them ready when the Call for Proposals opens up next year. Presenting and sharing with audiences is a great way to grow yourself and others. 

Summer 2017 Learning Series-Making The Most Of Twitter Chats

For the next several weeks I’ll be sharing posts that you can use for your summer learning. School may be out for many but the learning we do as educators can last even outside the classroom. To start we will look in-depth at Twitter chats and how you can participate in real time or whenever you want. Next we will examine some ideas on how to get the most out of any conference you attend this summer or beyond. We will then move to some non-educational books that you can use to grow as a learner and a professional. Then I’ll give you some ideas on how to better engage parents this upcoming school year. Finally we will finish the series by looking at some new and exciting tools to try in your classroom. Each post will offer up some basic information along with several learning challenges you can undertake. Happy Learning!

Making The Most Of Twitter Chats

If you remember back to my post on hashtags we talked about how hashtags can be great sources of learning. When you begin to look at hashtags you will find some end it "chat." That means there is an actual Twitter chat that goes along with that hashtag. 

What is a Twitter chat? 
In it's simplest form, it’s a set time where folks get together and all post using the same hashtag. Most times there are moderators and set questions. Each chat works a little differently. But the basics are all the same. 

As one of the founders of #edchat I get a lot of questions about the what, where, when and why. So here is everything you need to know (or wanted to know) about #edchat and chats in general. 

The History of #Edchat
#edchat started out of a series of conversations between myself, Tom Whtiby and Shelly Terrell. Tom is a bit of an instigator and likes to push people's thinking about various topics in education. One day he was asking several of these thought-provoking questions and he was getting comments from all angles. He turned to Shelly and I for help. Afterwards, he suggested we needed a hashtag to make sure we didn't miss anything. Shelly suggested a weekly format where anyone could participate and I suggested we have the community vote on what we would talk about. And thus, #edchat was born. We had our first real chat in July 2009. And we have had one every week (except for a break at Christmas) ever since!

The Basics
To participate users need only add #edchat (or another chat hashtgag) to their tweets. We have organized chats every Tuesday. The main chat is at 7pm EDT and lasts an hour. Polls are posted by me (@web20classroom) on Sunday afternoons and voting ends Tuesday afternoons. The highest vote getter is our topic for the week. For other chats the moderators or participants will post the the topic and all the questions ahead of time. 

Following Along
You will need a way to follow the conversations. Many folks use a third-party Twitter client like Tweetdeck or Hootsuite and have a column set up to search for #edchat so they see all the tweets during the conversation. Others use a service specifically for chatting like Tweetchat to follow the chats. These work every well and will auto include the hashtag when tweeting, which can be handy. Another awesome service is the Twitter Chat Dashboard from Participate. But more on that in a moment. 

Afterwards
The archive is usually posted by the next day and it includes all the tweets during the hour time span. Archives of all chats are up here and are viewable any time. (To be honest, I usually have to go back to the archive to read up on everything that happened.) Archives are a great after the chat. Don’t just tweet and not read the archive. You can’t see all the great ideas and resources that are shared when you are chatting. So the archives are there for you to go back to and grab those when you need to. 

Advice
You can't follow every conversation during #edchat or any chat really. We average about 200-300 active participants a week and over 500 tweets for the hour. (Most of the time those numbers are much, much higher.) So, following everything is nearly an impossibility. We recommend tossing out an idea or two and see who latches on. Or just engage with someone(s). Everyone, for the most part, who comes to #edchat is open minded and wants to discuss what the topic is and offer up their thoughts on it. So push someone's thinking or better yet, have yours pushed back. 

Summer Challenge

1. Head over to the Official Twitter Chats Calendar at Participate. There you will find 100’s of chats, broken down by day and time and a description. Before you participate in the chat, check out the archives of these chats. What have they been talking about? Is there anything interesting to you and your learning?  It’s a good idea to do some investigative work ahead of time. 
2. Find a Chat to participate in. The beauty of using Participate is you can jump in right there from the calendar. Once it’s the day and time of the chat join the conversation. 
3. Visit the archive of the chat you participate in or other chats that may interest you. Look at past topics and questions. What did they talk about? Can you find anyone new to follow? What resources were shared that you could use in your classroom next year? 

Fast chats not your thing? Looking for something more laid back? Slow chats are gaining in popularity. The concept is the same. There is a hashtag that everyone follows and uses in their tweets. But instead of everyone getting together at the same time folks participate when they can. No need to have a special Twitter client or anything. Just send your tweet when you feel like adding to the conversation. Slow chats are great for busy folks who still want to learn but don’t have the time to take part in the real-time chats. Book talks, reflection questions, planning for next year are just a handful of the ideas for a slow chat. Don’t find one you like? Start your own!


Twitter chats and hashtags hold a tremendous amount of learning that you can’t really find anywhere else. There are so many topics and ideas that anyone can find something that can help with their learning this summer. Take some time and take part in a real-time or slow chat!