Community+Advocate+Outline

Outline for Community Advocates

As I mentioned in our meeting today, lets outline some ideas that we can use as the base of our work as community advocates.

Our primary goals are:

1. Develop a sense of community/connection between the schools within the network Alan - What kind of product could result from this connection? I get the best effort from my team when the end result is a product that can be used in the classroom or that supports the mission of the school. Can each of us on this committee "adopt" a couple of schools to have as "sharing partners." We could commit to sharing one good idea/product/project each month. Hoping this would expand as people find this productive.

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David - Exactly. the results of building a community is to provide a series of products that can be used to support teacher and mission alike.I really like the idea of having "sharing partners". This could be divided by region. We should codify what it is that we focus on and ensure that we are addressing the same issues. ======

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Having each of us share one idea a month would be a great start. That would be at least two ideas a week since there are 11 of us. If we did this by posting the idea on a communal blog ([]) with examples and perhaps a rubric that explains how to accomplish the idea. We need to come up a name for the blog. Within the blog we will also need to determine what pages we will want displayed and the content hosted. One page should list all community advocates and your twitter and emails so that people across the network can get in touch with you. ======

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I would also suggest that perhaps we have a monthly pod(vod)cast where we invite on of our teachers from the network to explain a particular project that may have been really good at reaching across the network. ======  2. Introduce ideas and support a network of learners that focuses on spreading new ideas and resources around how new media can enhance PBL. This may include how new technologies or learning theories can support/advance PBL. How about sharing a monthly web 2.0 or technology trick and getting feedback? David - I am planning on starting off with a weekly newsletter. that could be a part of the newsletter. This could also be sent out via twitter on a daily/weekly basis and have a hashtag for it. 3. Offer opportunities for learning, connecting and sharing in and out of the network 4. Model how Echo can be used to support each other across the network - Use the sharing space in our group to share resources. I will post the documents I am going to use for my session at the Leadership Summit to start. David - Glad to hear. Thanks for doing that.

While these are three things I had in mind, if you have something up your sleeve that you think is better, I am all ears. Also, please feel free to edit anything that is already written.

If and when you do edit, please indicate who you are and use a different color so we can tell who wrote what.

Thank you and I am looking forward to working with all of you as we move forward.

**Focus**
 * 1) Offer opportunities for teachers to connect and collaborate on projects
 * 2) Create synchronous/asynchronous professional development opportunities
 * 3) Determine the best ways to ensure that a sense of community across the network is reaching all schools/teachers/admins

**Ideas**
David Bill - **Foursquare project** - have schools connect via Foursquare. Create badges for particular places in the school or keys unlocked. I imagine it could be used as a platform for a interactive game where students must solve puzzles/discipline based question that lead the students to a particular location. If the correct location is found, the students would get credit. And if a student becomes the mayor for a location, he/she could get a reward. Also we could have badges that could be received for a certain number of correct answers. This could be done across the network and students would have to research and learn about locations that were at other schools. (this is just the beginning of the idea but i think it has some potential - what do you think?)

**Outcomes**
 * 1) Critical Friends - project sharing
 * 2) Personal Learning Community - sharing resources, lessons learned by using groups, blogging
 * 3) PD sessions through webinars, screenshots and screen casts posted in groups.
 * 4) A email newsletter focused on best practices/ways to connect/classes looking for collaboration (weekly)

**Roles** <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Please indicate what roles you would be willing to play. Are there particular jobs or responsibilities that you would like to focus on?
 * 1) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">David Bill - develop, organize and lead learning events; moderate groups; compose newsletter
 * 2) <span style="background-color: transparent; color: #000000; display: block; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: #ff00ff; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;">Suggestion by Sue Bloom, Reflective practice. IS it possible that we share our experiences through an online reflective journal? I would like to experiment with reflective blogging or experiences of the day...maybe an ongoing group journal logging at a specific web location that documents our thoughts, frustrations, ideas, best practices written from our affective domain. I love this idea. I have wanted to do this since we opened but need someone to hold me accountable. What we are doing in unique and it would be great to have a blog to see what others are experiencing. <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #000000; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;">David - <span style="background-color: #ffffff; color: #0000ff; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline;"> Great idea Sue. I had created a blog but have not started using it yet b/c I wanted to get us up and running first. This space can be the home for our reflection as well as ideas as we attempt to bring the network together as we move forward with suggestions on how to make PBL more powerful.