July 14 Meeting Notes

Present: Paul, Grace, Karen, Julie, Nance, Felicia, Kate, Ken, Gina, and Patsy

We began the meeting by reviewing the notes from our previous meeting (July 11) beginning with the comments on purpose/goal. We agreed that Marcie’s statement re: the overarching purpose – “to get technology more integrated into our inservice work” contains all of the other goals identified during the TappedIn and face-to-face discussion.

Goals
Some of the underlying goals that we identified include:
 * Organize and prepare so that we are set-up to respond to technology queries intelligently
 * Enable on-site tcs to help teachers use/integrate technology into their writing program
 * Offer professional development services in a manner that fits with our on-site consulting in terms of principles and practice

We talked specifically about how we might accomplish this goal and what we wanted to do in the coming school year (2005-2006). Among the ideas considered were:
 * “hire” a tc(s) who specializes in technology and can support other tcs on-site
 * $ is available through the TI grant to make this possible
 * A person who is available to work with the tc community on Fridays
 * A person who is available to support other tcs on-site
 * Design questions the tcs can ask their teachers about technology
 * Have tcs brainstorm a list
 * Tcs need some grounding in technology to know what to ask
 * Include questions about what(equipment, hardware/software) needs to be in the building so that teachers can use Nicenet (and other Internet platforms) [Please change the language, if not correct.]
 * Teachers need to be able to see how this (technology, computer use) will serve them
 * Writing Project affiliated schools in Nicenet – create an umbrella grouping
 * Use of technology/computers needs to be documented so others can look at it/learn from it
 * How do we as a site get up to speed?
 * Set up Nicenet class, blog for tcs to post to before Friday meetings so that Friday meetings are enhanced by online conversation

Marrying Principles with Practices

 * Discussion of “marrying WP principles/practices with technology”
 * Distinction between practices and principles – are we talking about marrying the principles or the practices? Or both?
 * What are some of the principles
 * That what we do in pd comes out of our classrooms, teachers teaching teachers
 * Process is as valued as product
 * What are some of the practices
 * Writing-to-learn strategies: Text-on-text, Free writing, Writing Workshop, Choice. Reflection
 * The marriage of technology and practices raises issues/questions of:
 * Safe environment – does writing on a blog (public space) constitute writing in a safe environment?
 * Online composing means that you are already publishing, what does that do for low stakes writing?
 * If you think of the technology (computer-mediated text) as a genre, then it is a question of finding ways to read or write in that genre.
 * Low-stakes online writing and high stakes online writing – what determines what is low and what is high stakes when writing online? Audience? Medium (e-mail, chat room, blog, webpage, Nicenet – conference board)

What we accomplished

 * Set a goal for next year
 * Identified 3 audiences for WP technology pd
 * Identified planning groups for 2 retreats
 * Established dates for 2 retreats

We agreed that we needed to limit our goal to integrating internet communication and WP practices and reframed our overarching purpose to: marrying online discourse and WP practices. In order to do that we proposed to work with three distinct groups, offering them a retreat and follow-up workshops, on-site services as indicated:

1. Group 1:  Teachers and tcs not ready to develop work for their classrooms, people who still need to play with the technology and to become comfortable with online discourse in various forms.

a. Retreat for this group (10/21 – 10/22) will involve learning to read blogs, becoming part of the blog sphere, learning to write on blogs and finding topics to blog about

b. Look at Nancy Brodsky’s blog and other blog rolls

c. Respond/post to other bloggers

d. Kate, Jule, and Paul will plan and lead this retreat.

2. Group 2:  Teachers and tcs who are using blogs (and other online communication platforms) and are ready to use it with their students. We mix people who are doing blogs with those who are ready to use blogs because people thinking about it need to talk to those with experience and ask practical questions of them.

a. Retreat for this group (9/23 – 9/24) to begin to work out the modules that will be shared with the larger membership during the school year. Participants may work in teams to develop and plan these modules during the retreat

b. Schedule involves 2 days of meeting and planning – retreat (Friday evening, Saturday all day) followed by 1 month of working together. After which group comes back for a day to share what they’ve developed and then begin presenting in the spring as part of the First Saturdays events.

c. Paul, Julie, Kate, Ken and Felicia will plan and lead this retreat. A planning meeting is scheduled for Sunday, August 28th, beginning at 1 pm at Paul’s or a book store – place to be announced.

d. Participants for this retreat will include (among others to be recruited): Ken and Lona, Grace and the tech teacher at ICE, Rachel Posner, Gina and a teacher at a Monroe Campus school, Julie, Seth, Paul, Felicia, Patsy (I-Search module)

3. Techies (region and school-based teachers with technology background) who need to learn the WP practices and principles.

a. Work with this group is not to begin until spring

b. Identify participants using a nomination process

c. 10 week invitational course – WP Tech Boot Camp idea

Paying Teachers to Blog
We also did not want to lose the idea of paying teachers to blog. We need to consider the expectations for these blogs and questions such as: what qualifies as good low stakes writing on a blog? How do professors look at discussion threads on Blackboard? Who would we pay to keep teaching journals on a blog?
 * Teachers who are blogging in support of our other initiatives, such as NRI, NTI? (Would these be teachers in group 1?)
 * A collaborative NYCWP teaching journal - 5 teachers from different backgrounds (subject areas)/ grades

Create a blog space joining all 3 groups.

Technology Advisory Committee
Another purpose or goal for this year for the Technology Advisory Committee would be as Ken stated, to get folks who are providing workshops and professional development in line with each other. The Technology Advisory Committee will receive $1,000 for the year to meet once a month (2 hour meetings – some face-to-face, some online) to monitor and coordinate the technology work. Members of the Technology Advisory Committee will include everyone present today - Paul, Grace, Karen, Julie, Nance, Felicia, Kate, Ken, Gina, Patsy – and others who are interested and have participated in past NYCWP technology activities.

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