World Studies: Technology Integration at Mountain View High School

Carson Rietveld invited me into her 9th grade World Studies class on September 16, 2016.  She has been teaching for four years at Mountain View High School.*  The class is furnished with four rows of desks facing the front whiteboard; the teacher’s desk is in the far corner. Music is playing as students enter the room.  Student work, historical posters, and sayings dot the walls above the white boards (e.g., “I want to live in a society where people are judged by what they do for others).

Rietveld, wearing a long flowered dress that reaches her ankles, welcomes the 14- and 15 year old students by name as they come in. Students put their backpacks on the floor near a side whiteboard and bring their tablet or laptop to their desk. The high school policy is Bring-Your-Own-Device (BYOD).**  I ask a student why do all backpacks go on the floor and he tells me that students rooting through their backpacks during a lesson distracts both the student and teacher from what is being taught. Thus, the rule.

The 27 students sit at their desks, take out their devices, surf the Internet, and talk to one another. Bell rings to begin class. Music stops. School announcements come on the public address box in the room. Many students listen and some whisper to one another or continue looking at their device. After announcements end, Rietveld directs students’ attention to front whiteboard with a slide showing the agenda for “Happy Friday Fresh Friends.”

*Mindfulness exercise
*Partner presentation practice
*Roman Republic presentation
*Whole class discussion
EQ: what makes a good presentation?
EQ: how much influence did the average citizen have in the Roman Republic?

(EQ refers to Essential Question. See here)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teacher goes over the agenda and asks students to close lids of  their computers.  They do. The first agenda item is a mindfulness exercise. A video comes on with a soft, soothing voice asking everyone to “ground themselves in the now.”  The voice asks viewers to close their eyes—I look around the room and all students’ eyes are closed—and the soothing voice asks viewers to concentrate on relaxing their toes, ankles, legs then “shifting awareness” up through the entire torso to their head. Teacher participates with students.  Rietveld tells me that she now has her students doing up to three minutes of the daily exercise.

Rietveld segues to next activity, listed as “Partner Presentation Practice” which will give students a chance to practice getting at the substance of the lesson, the relationship between the Roman Republic and democracy. Students will be making presentations and the teacher wants students to practice getting at the essential point they wish to make in their presentation and the argument (including evidence) that will support that essential point.

To get students to practice this task, Rietveld asks them to take two minutes to find a photo of the cutest cat or dog they can find on the Internet. Then write a paragraph why their photo is the cutest and afterwards turn to their partner and explain why—what features of the pet make it the cutest, etc.

After a few moments, she says ,“20 seconds left to finish.” Teacher has a stopwatch in her hand and uses it to announce time. Then she says press “submit” wherever you are in the paragraph so I can see what you have written (Rietveld uses Pear Deck and has access to each student’s work).

“Now present the animal to your partner, “ Rietveld says. “What kind of animal did you pick? Why did you pick this animal? Explain why you think it is the cutest.”

After two minutes, teacher asks the listening partner to present their “cutest” pet photo.

I look across the classroom and all pairs and trios appear involved in task.

After time is up, teacher asks each partner to write down “ a thoughtful idea they did well.”

“OK,” Rietveld says, “let’s go over your awesome thoughts—I see partners making eye contact and directing the other person back to photo. Give multiple reasons and focus on different features. Talk slowly.”
She then asks students to open up their computers and write down they could have done better. What mistake did partner make. I see nearly all students clicking away on their devices. But some are talking and seemingly off-task. Teacher says: “OK, guys, self-regulate, self-regulate. Don’t have photo of pet on screen; it will be distracting. Get rid of it,” she says.

After waiting a few minutes, Rietveld segues to next activity of small group work to give practice to students in presenting their answers to the “essential question”: Based on what you have read, “How democratic do you think was the Roman Republic.”

Students have been thinking about this question and have made posters with illustrations and text to state their answer to the question when they present to the entire class.

Rietveld directs students to get into small groups after designating the different roles that students will perform in the group they are in. Teacher points to one side of room and says that these students are “time-keepers”; another side are “facilitators”, in the middle are “resource managers”, and in the rear are “harmonizers”—specific roles that apparently students are familiar with. Then she directs that each member of a group will present their answer to the “essential question: “How democratic do you think was the Roman Republic.”

After presenting in their small group, each student will resume their role as the next student presents answer to question. Students rearrange themselves, move desks and chairs as they settle into their groups to present to one another their answer to the question:

Using the stopwatch, Rietveld announces how much time is left.  After ending  the task, she then asks students to critique presenter, that is, what one thing the presenter did well; what one thing that can be improved. Then she announces that the next student is to present. Students circulate their posters and present for another two minutes.

Looking around the class, I see all small groups engaged in listening to presenter and showing their posters. Teacher walks around listening to each group. One group looked off-task to her so Rietveld goes over and asks presenter—“What is one piece of evidence in your poster about Roman Republic being democratic?”

For the next six minutes presenters in the small groups shift from one student to another with the teacher announcing when the two minutes are up. In each instance, Rietveld asks group to go around their circle and tell the presenter one thing they did well and one thing they can improve upon.

After stop-watch alarm rings, the teacher brings the activity to a close. She asks students to close their computers and segues to the final task of the period, The Four Corners Discussion of a slide flashed onto the whiteboard: “The Roman Republic a True Democracy.”

She tells class that each student should consider whether they strongly agree, somewhat agree, strongly disagree or somewhat disagree with the statement and then “vote with your feet.” After waiting a few moments, Rietveld directs students to go to a corner of the room for strongly agree, another corner for those who strongly disagree, etc.

Teacher looks where students are. Most are either in one of two corners expressing  disagreement or agreement with statement. Rietveld asks entire class, “why there is disagreement among you about statement. Some students in one corner call out and say that not everyone could vote—women and slaves; teacher pushes back and asks for evidence; student give example and teacher probes again. Then another student in an opposite corner gives evidence of democratic practices. Students around her nod their heads.

“Why don’t we totally agree,” teacher asks? A few students say there is evidence on both sides. Another student says that there is a lot of “subjectivity on what is a true democracy,” a peer adds that the conflict is over differing values that students have about democracy and which ones are most important.

Then the bell rings ending the period. Rietveld asks students to return desks to their original position.  They do. She wishes them “a safe weekend.” Students go to pick up their backpacks lying on the floor near the wall and leave the room. World Studies is over for this class.

___________________________

* Part of the Mountain View-Los Altos High School District, Mountain View High School has  just over 1800 students (2015) and its demography is mostly students of color (in percentages, Asian 26, Latino 21,  African American 2, multiracial 2, and 47 white). The percentage of students eligible for free-and-reduced price lunches (the poverty indicator) is 18 percent. Eleven percent of students are learning disabled and just over 10 percent of students are English language learners.

Academically, 94 percent of the students graduate high school and nearly all enter higher education. The school offers 35 Honors and Advanced Placement (AP) courses across the curriculum. Of those students taking AP courses, 84 percent have gotten 3 or higher, the benchmark for getting college credit. The school earned the distinction of California Distinguished High School in 1994 and 2003. In 200 and 2013, MVHS received a full 6-year accreditation from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC). Newsweek ranks MVHS among the top 1% of high schools nationwide. The gap in achievement between minorities and white remains large, however, and has not shrunk in recent years. The per-pupil expenditure at the high school is just under $15,000 (2014). Statistics come from here and mvhs_sarc_15_16

**BYOD began two years ago in the District.

Teaching Algebra II: Technology Integration

I observed an Algebra 2 class at Hacienda (pseudonym), a Northern California high school, on September 9, 2016. The high school has over 1900 students, mostly minority (Asian and Latino). About 20 percent of the students are eligible for free and reduced lunch–a measure of poverty used in U.S. public schools. Over 98 percent graduate and a very high percentage of those graduates enter college. About one-third of students take Advanced Placement exams with well over 80 percent qualifying for college credit. Less than 10 percent of students are English Language Learners and just over that percentage have been identified with disabilities. This is a high school that prides itself on academic and sports achievements and is recognized in the region, state, and nation as first-rate.

Beverly Young (pseudonym) is a veteran teacher of 22 years at Hacienda.  A slim woman of average height, wearing black slacks, white blouse with a beige sweater, she has been department head and very involved in coordinating the math curriculum at the school. Since 2008, she has embraced different technologies for the efficiency they brought to her in making out quizzes and tests and their help in connecting to students. She has been using an iPad with educational apps particularly Doceri for her math lessons since the tablet appeared.

The 50-minute lesson on Friday morning went swiftly by as the fast-paced, organized teacher taught about factoring quadratic equations. Announcements about upcoming quiz are posted on bulletin board next to whiteboard: “9/14—9/15, Quiz 4.1 to 4.2” –and upcoming test—“9/21—9/22, Test on 4.1 to 4.4.” The numbers refer to textbook sections.

There are 26 students in the room sitting at five rows of three desks next to one another, all facing the whiteboard. Young, carrying her iPad with her as she walks around, uses a remote to post slides and videos on the whiteboard during the lesson.

For the first five minutes, Young shows a video about the Rio Paralympics. As students watch the brief video, Young, holding her iPad, walks around recording who is present and then stamping homework that students had laid out on their desks. I look around the class; they were watching intently athletes with disabilities who perform extraordinary feats.

Two minutes later, school announcements appear as a video on the whiteboard. Hacienda students prepare the daily announcements. A student anchors the announcements showing clips prepared by other students for different daily and weekly school activities (e.g., upcoming mini-bike racing event in Quad). In most schools where I observe classes, announcements are on the public address system and generally students ignore them as they drone on. I looked around and saw that all but a few of the students watched each announcement.

After announcements end, Young turns to the lesson for the day. The slide on the whiteboard is the objective for the day: “Factoring and Solving x²+bx+c=0.” She asks if there are any questions on the homework. No hands go up. Young then passes out handout for the day and directs students to go to Google Classroom on their devices (I see those students sitting near me have a mix of different laptops and tablets). She then asks students to go to Socrative, a software program, and gives instructions how they should login. She walks up and down aisles to see what is on students’ screens. After all students have logged in, she clicks on a short video that explains factoring quadratic equations by using an example of jellyfish.

Young explains what the key terms are, the different variables described in video and then applies it to factoring. She gives examples of binominals and asks questions as she goes along. She encourages students to talk to one another if they are stuck. She walks up and down aisles with iPad in hand as students answer. She then reviews binominals and moves to trinominals. “Now, look at polynominals.“ One student asks for clarification of terms. Young clarifies and asks: “You guys understand?” A few heads nod.

(For readers who wish to delve into the details of this lesson’s content, the teacher has made a five minute YouTube video for students that explains the content of this lesson.)

Young moves to next set of slides about “x intercepts” and examples of “distribution.” She then asks: Why do we do factoring? A few students answer. Young explains what the key points are and the differences between factoring and solving an equation. She asks students more questions, encouraging them to talk to one another to figure out answers.

The teacher segues back to a Socrative slide and to a question that she wants student to answer.

Young encourages students to help one another—as she circulates in the room. “If you don’t remember, write it down. It’s OK.” She checks her tablet to see what each student is doing and says aloud—“I see two guys who got it right—I am waiting for 15 of you guys to finish—talk to one another.” A few minutes later, looking at her tablet, she says—“most of you got it. I will give you another minute—I am waiting on eight more here.”

She talks to individual students answering questions and complimenting students as she traverses the aisles.

“Looks like most of you have the idea,” she says.

I scan the class and all students have eyes on screen, and are clicking away or whispering to a neighbor what appears to be an answer to the teacher’s question.

“Now you guys work on the second question.” She chats easily with students—“do you have answer here?” she asks all the while checking the iPad she carries around.

She then directs class to go to next question. “Do it and give me an answer for this—it’s a little tricky. You are more than welcome to ask one another.”

One student asked a question and then the teacher used the student question to correct misconception about solving a quadratic equation. Young answers the student and refers back to jellyfish video.

In scanning the class, all students look engaged. “If you guys have an answer like this—pointing to what she wrote on the whiteboard, then you got it wrong. Here’s a little hint—[could not catch what teacher says]. I’ll give you another 50 seconds—I just want to see what you guys remember”

Again, checking her iPad she can see each student’s work and can help student in real time as she cruises through the classroom.

“Now let’s go to fun stuff.”  After she posts slide from her iPad on the whiteboard on how to factor trinominals, Young explains each problem.

Young sees that some students are confused so she starts over. She continues to work on the numbered problems appearing on the slide, explaining what she is doing at each step. Then, she asks students to factor particular parts of equations. She checks her iPad and says: “I hear guys having an answer already—that’s great!”

“When is a 9 equal to zero or a plus nine equal to zero—now can you answer no. 8?” Students talk to one another, as I scan the room. Young circulates and listens to different students to further explain if they are stuck.

She asks: “Are we ready?” Teacher walks students through how she solves problem on whiteboard using the iPad. She then asks whether students know the difference between factoring and solving. One student says yes. She then asks students to jot down their answers to central question of the lesson —she walks around and talks with students as they click away.

The teacher ends class a few minutes before bell rings and then talks to different students, answering their questions. Other students begin packing up their things to await the end of the class. Bell rings.

Cartoons on the Pluses and Minuses of Technology

Living in Silicon Valley as I do and seeing every-day technologies around me in people walking, eyes down, looking at their smart phones, electric autos, and driver-less cars, so much is taken for granted. The cornucopia of technology runneth over. Yet it is never too late to poke at the pomposity and “irrational exuberance” that accompanies such love for the next new thing. So this month’s cartoons does that. Enjoy !

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teaching Advanced Placement Composition: Technology Integration

Room 409 at Los Altos High School in the south San Francisco Bay area is one of the most spacious for an academic subject —nearly the size of two regular classrooms–I have ever seen in the many schools I have visited over the years. I marveled at its carpeting, recliner chairs near the teacher’s desk and horseshoe arrangement of 3- and 4-desk clusters facing a table in the center of the room where Michael Moul, a 12 year veteran teacher, presides over his AP class.

Well over six feet tall, the stocky and goateed Moul is wearing a blue shirt, and dark slacks. He looks out on the 32 students in the room. He is also faculty adviser for the Talon, the school newspaper. Twelve desktop computers sit on the ledge below a wall and tall windows in the rear and side of the room that Talon staff use.

Los Altos High School is a Bring-Your-Own-Device school. * The high school district adopted BYOD two years ago for its three schools after teacher- and administrator-initiated pilot projects established that well over half of the students had laptops or tablets they could use for their classes and enough teachers were sufficiently skilled to integrate the hardware and software into their daily lessons. For students who lack a device, forget theirs, or if one dies suddenly in school, students can easily get a device elsewhere in the school. Teachers decide how to weave technologies into their lessons; there is no district prescribed one-best-way for teachers to follow.

The lesson I observed on September 6, 2016 is the final part of a four and a half week unit on the Narrative Essay that began with the first day of school on August 15th.. In this unit, Moul spent the first two weeks of the semester on building community in the class, setting norms for small group work, and reading excerpts from Machiavelli, George Orwell, James Baldwin and others. Students then analyzed the structures of the essays they read. Moul also uses Socratic Seminars during the unit to have students discuss various writers’ essays and reflect on their own writing before beginning their assigned narrative essay (see here).

Moul’s 50-minute lesson (the class meets four times a week on a modified block schedule) begins a moment after the tardy chime sounds. There are 32 students in the class sitting at clusters of three and four desks facing the front white-board. Today’s lesson is divided into four parts.

1. Since there was a national holiday on Monday, Moul asks the students to close the lids of their devices and then begins with a question: what “good news” do they want to share with class? For a few minutes he listens to what students call out about their long weekend: “it is a four day week,” one says, for example. Then he reviews the assignment of writing two drafts about a story they read and how this AP class differs from Honors English class in the number of drafts they will do. More drafts, more revising, he says, is crucial to writing essays. On Friday, the class had looked at the first draft of a student-written “model” essay entitled “The Vulture” (see here).

2. He segues to the next part of the lesson where he tells students to read the second draft of the student’s essay, make comments and then re-read the first draft and make comments on what changes they see between the two.

Students open lids of their tablets and laptops and proceed to read and type in comments for the second draft. From my perch in the back of the class sitting at a student desk, I see that every student appears to be on task. Moul walks up and down aisles between clusters of desks pausing to see what students are jotting down on their screens and stopping to answer student questions.

After about 10 minutes, he asks students to re-read first draft—“I’ll give you 7-8 minutes”—and asks them to put in their notes the differences they see between the two drafts.

3. Watching the wall clock, Moul asks students to stop and to form their groups. Here is where the clusters of three and four desks closely set together become a venue for small group discussion. Moul reminds students to turn their desks to face one another since eye contact is important in looking at group members and not have one’s eyes glued to screen.

In this small group activity, students discuss what they saw as differences between the two drafts of “The Vulture.” I scan the groups and note that all are engaged in talking to one another. I see no student off-task. Moul continues to walk around and listen in to different groups’ exchanges. “In a few moments,” he says, “we will start chit-chatting.”

After a one-minute warning, the teacher ends this activity and asks students to turn around their desks to face front where he is sitting.

4. The final activity is a whole group discussion of the differences between the two drafts and what students saw as improvements in the second draft. About one-fourth of the students raised their hands to respond to teacher’s request for thoughts in this 12 minute activity. After he called on a few students and they spoke—Moul, sitting at a small desk in the center of the classroom horseshoe said, “let me call on people on this side now.” After students comments, the teacher would offer his opinion of the second draft, saying, for example, “I didn’t see much in the conclusion; there needs to be a balance between narrative and exposition.” When one student comments on use of dialogue within a narrative, Moul points out how dialogue helps the flow of the essay.

I scan the class and see that most students turn to listen to one another during the whole group discussion.

Chime sounds to end the period. Moul says “wait” and students sit as he goes on to remind class that their draft is to be turned in Thursday, two days hence—school is on modified block schedule. Teacher releases students and says: “have a great couple of days.”

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* The high school has over 1900 students (2015) and its demography is mostly students of color (in percentages, Latino 28, Asian 21, African American 2, multiracial 2, and 45 white). The percentage of students eligible for free-and-reduced price lunches (the poverty indicator) is 22 percent. Fourteen percent of students are learning disabled and just over four percent of students are English language learners.

Academically, 99 percent of the students graduate high school and nearly all enter higher education. The school offers 20 AP courses—37 percent of the student body take at least one AP course and of those students taking AP tests– 83 percent have gotten 3 or higher, the benchmark for getting college credit. LAHS has been rated repeatedly as one of the top high schools (52nd out of over 1330 in the state and 339h in the nation’s 26,000 high schools). The gap in achievement between minorities and white remains large, however, and has not shrunk in recent years. The per-pupil expenditure at the high school is just under $15,000 (2014). See here, here, here, here, and here.

 

 

Determining Success of Technology Integration in Classrooms, Schools, and Districts (Part 4)

 

I ended my last post by writing that attaining the top stage of popular models of technology integration was often equated with “success.” I stated that it was “unfortunate.”

Why?

The top stage in each model (and similar ones) implies that when the teacher has reached this apex of implementation, students are thoroughly engaged in learning tasks and the classroom has become a site of active student learning—the unspoken goal of process-driven cheerleaders of student-centered classrooms. In effect, those teachers who have reached the top rung of the ladder have fully implemented technology to produce the highest levels of student involvement in learning content and skills. Implicitly, that top rung becomes the gold standard of effective teaching in integrating technologies into classroom lessons. And that is unfortunate.

What many smart people ignore or forget is that describing exemplars of technology integration is not synonymous with student-centered teaching. And student-centered teaching is not the same as “success” in student learning. This bias toward one form of teaching leading to student “success”–however defined–is historic (see here).

After all, should K-12 teacher practices change when they reach the apex of the models for integrating technology into their lessons? Certainly, the technologies themselves do not require such a fundamental change from teacher-centered to student-centered. Evidence of technology use in Europe, Asia, and the Americas  (see JECR PDF) have pointed out how powerful devices often end up being used to support teacher-centered instruction.

What’s missing from the assumption that student-centered learning is the same as “successful” technology integration is that reaching the final stage in these models says little about whether students have actually learned anything from the content- and skill-driven classroom lessons they have experienced. Advocates of these technology integration models assume that engagement—the process of hooking children and youth into learning—will move teachers to become student-centered and that shift in practice will yield gains in academic achievement.  Maybe.

I say “maybe” because there is a prior crucial step that needs elaboration and documentation before anyone can determine what students have learned.  Although existing models of technology integration believe that engagement and student-centered classroom practices will produce gains in academic achievement, the book I am now researching will not test this underlying assumption. In my research, thus far, I focus on whether exemplary teachers, schools, and districts in integrating technologies into daily practices have altered what occurs daily in classrooms.

Why focus on changes in classroom teaching and not student outcomes? My answer goes back to the central issue of putting new technologies into daily practice. The all-important implementation question–too often overlooked, ignored, or forgotten by champions of new technologies–remains: have teachers altered their classroom practices as a consequence of using new technologies? Without such changes in teaching practices, then student learning and outcomes can hardly be expected to improve. That statement is a fundamental belief in establishing and operating any formal school, past and present. Thus, without changes in daily classroom practice, any gains in student academic achievement could not be attributed to what happens in classrooms. Improved measures of student achievement might then be the result of changes in student demography, school leadership, shifts in organizational culture or other factors–not what teachers were doing everyday with students. In my research, then, I am concentrating on determining to what degree teachers have altered how they teach as a consequence of integrating new technologies into their lessons.

Far too little research has been done in answering this question about changes in teaching practices. So in researching and writing this book, I, too, focus on the process of classroom change and not yet how much and to what degree students have learned from these lessons. Once changes in classroom practices can be documented then, and only then, can one begin to research how much and to what degree students have learned content and skills. As you have probably guessed by now, that would be another book, not the one I will be writing.

 

Stages of Technology Integration in Classrooms (Part 3)

Technology integration is not a binary choice: you either do it or you don’t. Anyone who has taught, observed classrooms and thought about what it means to include electronic devices and software into daily lessons knows that technology integration, like raising a child, learning to drive or cultivating a garden, is a process–not an either/or outcome. One goes through various stages in learning how to raise a child, drive a car, grow a garden. In each instance, a “good” child, driving well, a fruitful garden is the desired but not predictable outcome.

A host of researchers and enthusiasts have written extensively about the different phases a teacher, school, and district goes through in integrating technology into their daily operations. Most of the literature seldom mentions that such movement through increasingly complicated stages is really phases of putting a new idea or practice into action. The labels for the levels of classroom practice vary–novice to expert, traditional to innovative, entry-level to transformational.

Writers and professional associations have described how individuals and organization stumble or glide from one phase to another before smoothly using electronic devices to reach larger ends. And it is the ends (e.g., content, skills, attitudes) that have to be kept in sight for those who want teachers to arrive at the top (or last) stage. Buried in that final implementation stage is a view of “good” technology integration and, implicitly, “good” teaching. Often obscured but still there, these notions of what are “good” teaching and learning are embedded in that last stage. Figuring out those ends and what values are concealed within them is difficult but revealing in the biases that model-builders and users have.

As with arriving at a definition (see last post), I have examined many such conceptual frameworks that lay out a series of steps going from a beginner to an expert (across frameworks the names for each step vary). Most often mentioned are the Apple Classroom of Tomorrow (ACOT) and the SAMR models. Many implementation frameworks in use are variations of these two.

The ACOT model.

The earliest stage model came from the demonstration project Apple launched in the mid-1980s when the company placed in five elementary and secondary classrooms across the country, a desktop computer for each student and teachers—the earliest 1:1 classrooms. Moreover, each classroom had a printer, laser disc, videotape player, modem, CD-ROM drivers and software packages. The project grew over the years to 32 teachers in ACOT schools in four states. [i]

One of the longer initiatives ever undertaken in creating technology-rich classrooms—ACOT lasted nearly a decade—researchers drew from observations and interviews with teachers and students a host of findings one of which was the process that teachers went through in integrating technology into daily lessons.

That five-stage process that ACOT teachers traversed went from Entry where teachers coped with classroom discipline problems, managed software, technical breakdowns and physical re-arrangement of rooms to Adoption where beginners’ issues were resolved. The next stage of implementing technology in the classroom, Adaptation, occurred when teachers figured out ways to use the devices and software to their advantage in teaching—finding new ways of monitoring student work, grading tests, creating new materials, and tailoring content and skills to individual students. At this stage, teachers had fully integrated the technology into traditional classroom practice.

The Appropriation phase comes next when teachers have shifted in their attitudes toward using technology in the classroom. At this point, the teacher uses the technology seamlessly in doing lessons. New classroom habits and ways of thinking about devices and software occur. The authors of Teaching with Technology say: “Appropriation is the turning point for teachers…. It leads to the next stage, invention, where new teaching approaches promote the basics yet open the possibility of a new set of student competencies.” [ii]

In the Invention stage, teachers try out new ways of teaching (e.g., project-based learning, team teaching, individualized lessons) and new ways of connecting to students and other teachers (e.g., students providing technical assistance to other students and teachers, collaboration among students). As the authors summed up: “Reaching the invention stage … was a slow and arduous process for most teachers.” In short, at this stage of implementing technology, ACOT researchers believed that teachers would replace their traditional teacher-centered practices. The majority of teachers, however, never made it to this stage. [iii]

The SAMR model.

Developed by Ruben Puentedura, SAMR stands for: Subsitution, Augmentation, Modification, Redefinition. The four rungs of the implementation ladder go from the lowest, replacing an existing tool (e.g., overhead projector) with an electronic device (e.g., interactive whiteboard) but displaying no change in the pedagogy or lesson content to the next rung where the lesson is modified through use of new technology (e.g., study the concept of the speed of light by using a computer simulation). The third rung of the ladder of putting technology into practice is where the teacher modifies the lesson and “allows for significant task redesign” (e.g., students show their understanding of content in class by recording audio and then saving it as a sound file) and, finally, to the top of the ladder, redefinition, where the technology “allows for the creation of new tasks previously inconceivable.” Examples here would be students creating a movie or podcast and putting it on the Internet to get comments or students writing posts for a class blog on the web about the history of the Great Depression. At this final stage of technology integration, student engagement is highest. The SAMR model assumes that high student engagement leads to gains in student academic achievement. Thus, the SAMR model implicitly promises improved student achievement.

More popular with practitioners and consultants marketing professional development in the U.S. and abroad than among researchers, this implementation model is context-free, hierarchical, and unanchored in the research literature on integrating technology. While some researchers have criticized it extensively, it remains popular among teachers and technology coordinators. [iv]

Both ACOT and SAMR involve what teachers know of subject-matter content, insights into their own teaching, and what they know about using technology. This interplay between content, pedagogy, and technology has led to another popular model among technology coordinators, practitioners, and researchers in the field.

Not a stage model of implementation, these domains of “Content Knowledge, Pedagogical Content Knowledge, and Technological Knowledge”, like intersecting circles in a Venn, overlap. The resulting clumsy acronym is TPACK for Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge. TPACK slides easily into SAMR adding to what teachers are expected to know and do in moving from one stage to another. Like the other models, TPACK also has come in for extensive criticism.[v]

These models—and there are others as well—seek to move teacher use of technology in daily lessons from the primitive to the sophisticated, from exchanging pencil-and-paper for word processing, from redesigning classroom activities through available software to engaging students in learning. The top stages of these implementation models reject traditional modes of teaching and implicitly lean toward a preferred manner of instruction—student-centered. [vi]

Too often, however, the top rung of the ladder—where putting technology integration into creating active learning tasks for students–becomes a proxy for success. Either “Invention” in the ACOT model or “Redefinition” in SAMR becomes surrogates for judging teacher success in not only effectively integrating their use of technology but also in improving student outcomes. And that is unfortunate.

The next and final post explains why I say “unfortunate.”

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[i] Judith Sandholtz, Cathy Ringstaff, and David Dwyer, Teaching with Technology : Creating Student-Centered Classrooms (New York: Teachers College Press, 1997). See p. 187 for number of ACOT teachers, schools, and states.

[ii] Ibid., p. 43.

[iii] Ibid., p. 47.

[iv] For a description of SAMR, see Ruben Puentadura’s presentation at: http://www.hippasus.com/rrpweblog/archives/2014/06/29/LearningTechnologySAMRModel.pdf

For a short video on SAMR, see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBce25r8vto

Critics include Erica Hamilton, et. al., “The Substitution Augmentation Modification Redefinition (SAMR) Model: a Critical Review and Suggestions for its Use,” Tech Trends, 2016, 60(5), pp. 433-441; Jonas Linderoth, “Open Letter to Dr. Ruben Puentadura, October 17, 2013 at

http://spelvetenskap.blogspot.com/2013/10/open-letter-to-dr-ruben-puentedura.html

I did a Google search for “SAMR model” and got 245,000 hits; “ACOT model” received just over 63,000 entries. September 4, 2016.
[v] Punya Mishra and Matthew Koehler, “Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: A Framework for Teacher Knowledge,” Teachers College Record, 2006, 108(6), pp. 1017-1054. For criticism of TPACK, see Leanna Archambault and Joshua Barnett, “Revisiting Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge: Exploring the TPACK Framework,” Computers & Education, 2010, 55, pp. 1656-1662; Scott Bulfin, et. al., “Stepping Back from TPACK,” Learning with New Media, March 19, 2013 at: http://newmediaresearch.educ.monash.edu.au/lnm/stepping-back-from-tpack/

A Google search for “TPACK model” on September 4, 2016 produced just under 90, 000 hits.

[vi] The summary of ACOT research and practice is in: Judith Sandholtz, Cathy Ringstaff, and David Dwyer, Teaching with Technology : Creating Student-Centered Classrooms (New York: Teachers College Press, 1997). The sub-title captures the intent of the model. The SAMR model highlights increasing student engagement at each rung of the ladder. Among advocates of student-centered classrooms, engagement is a synonym for “active learning,” a principle undergirding student-centeredness in teaching. While increasing active student involvement at each stage beyond Substitution, Ruben Puentadura has not stated directly his preference for student-centeredness as a goal. I have found no direct statements on his seeking student-centered instruction. Those curriculum specialists, teachers, technology coordinators and independent consultants who have picked up and ran with SAMR, however, have indeed seen the model as a strategy for teachers to alter their classroom practices—with qualifications and amendments–and embrace student-centered instruction.

See, for example, Cathy Grochowski, “Interactive Technology: What’s SAMR Got To Do With It?” June 1, 2016 at: http://edblog.smarttech.com/2016/06/11471/

Jennifer Roberts, “Turning SAMR into TECH: What Models Are Good For,” November 30, 2013 at: http://www.litandtech.com/2013/11/turning-samr-into-tech-what-models-are.html

Kathy Schrock, “SAMR and Bloom’s,” (no date) at: http://www.schrockguide.net/samr.html

 

 

Defining Technology Integration (Part 2)

Current definitions of technology integration are a conceptual swamp. Some definitions focus on the technology itself and student access to the devices and software. Some concentrate on the technologies as tools to help teachers and students reach curricular and instructional goals. Some mix a definition with what constitutes success or effective use of devices and software. Some include the various stages of technology integration from simple to complex. And some include in their definitions a one-best-way of integrating technology to advance an instructional method such as student-centered learning. Thus, a conceptual swamp sucks in unknowing enthusiasts and fervent true believers into endless arguing over exactly what is technology integration. [i]

To avoid such a swamp and get into semantic arguments in identifying teachers and schools where a high degree integrated devices in daily practices had occurred, I relied upon informal definitions frequently used by practitioners.

From what practitioners identified as “best cases” of technology integration, I learned that varied indicators came into play when I asked for exemplars. These indicators helped create a grounded definition of technology integration in identifying districts, schools and teachers:

* District had provided wide access to devices and established infrastructure for use . System administrators and cadre of teachers had fought insistently for student access to hardware (e.g., tablets, laptops, interactive whiteboards) and software (e.g., the latest programs in language arts, math, history, and science) either through 1:1 programs for the entire schools, mobile carts, etc.

*District established structures for how schools can improve learning and reach desired outcomes through technology. District administrators and groups of teachers had established formal ways for monitoring academic student progress, created teacher-initiated professional development, launched on-site coaching of teachers and daily mentoring of students, and provided easily accessible assistance when glitches in devices or technological infrastructure occurred. They sought to use technology to achieve content and skill goals.

* Particular schools and teacher leaders had requested repeatedly personal devices and classroom computers for their students. Small teacher-initiated projects–homegrown, so to speak–flowered and gained support of district administrators. Evidence came from sign-up lists for computer carts, volunteering to have pilot 1:1 computer projects in their classrooms and purchase orders from specific teachers and departments.

* Certain teachers and principals came regularly to professional development workshops on computer use in lessons. Voluntary attendance at one or more of these sessions indicated motivation and growing expertise.

* Students had used devices frequently in lessons. Evidence of use came from teacher self-reports, principal observations, student comments to teachers and administrators and word-of-mouth among teachers and administrators in schools.

Note that in all of these conversations, no district administrator, principal, or teacher ever asked me what I meant by “technology integration.” Some or all of the above indicators repeatedly came up in our discussions. I leaned heavily upon the above signs of use and less upon a formal definition (see above) in identifying candidates to study.

I wanted a definition that would fit what I had gleaned from administrators and teachers about how they informally concluded what schools and which teachers were exemplars of technology integration. I wanted a definition that got past the issue of access to glittering new machines and Gee Whiz applications. I wanted a definition that focused on classroom and school use aimed toward achieving teacher and district curricular and instructional goals. I wanted a definition that put hardware and software in the background, not the foreground. I wanted a definition grounded in what I heard and saw in classrooms, schools, and districts.

Of the scores of formal definitions in the literature I have sorted through, I looked for one that would be clear and make sense to experts, professionals, parents, and taxpayers. Only a few met that standard. [ii]

I did fashion one that avoided the conceptual morass of defining technology integration and matched the “best cases” that superintendents, technology coordinators, and teachers had selected for me to observe.[iii]

“Technology integration is the routine and transparent use in learning, teaching, and assessment of computers, smartphones and tablets, digital cameras, social media platforms, networks, software applications and the Internet aimed at helping students reach the district’s and teacher’s curricular and instructional goals.”*

If this definition succeeds in putting technology in the background, not the foreground, then the next step in my research is to elaborate how such a process unfolds in classrooms, schools, and districts by examining the various stages teachers go through in integrating technology before moving to assessments of how successful (or not) the technology integration works.

____________________________________________

*Thanks to reader Seb Schmoller for adding to this definition

[i] Examples of the different definitions mentioned in text can be found at:

http://www.definitions.net/definition/Technology%20integration

 

https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2003/tech_schools/chapter7.asp

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technology_integration

 

http://www.education4site.org/blog/2011/what-do-we-really-mean-by-technology-integration/

 

http://members.tripod.com/sjbrooks_young/techint.pdf

 

http://fcit.usf.edu/matrix/matrix.php

 

http://jan.ucc.nau.edu/~coesyl-p/principle3-article2.pdf

[ii] Rodney Earle, “The Integration of Instructional Technology into Public Education: Promises and Challenges,” Education Technology Magazine, 2002, 42(1), pp. 5-13. His definition of integration concentrates on the teaching, not hardware or software:

“Computer technology is merely one possibility in the selection of media and the delivery mode—part of the instructional design process —not the end but merely one of several means to the end.”

Khe Foon Hew and Thomas Brush, “Integrating Technology into K-12 Teaching and Learning,” Education Tech Research Development, 2007, 55, pp. 223-252. Their definition is:

“[T]echnology integration is thus viewed as the use of computing devices such as desktop computers, laptops, handheld computers, software, or Internet in K-12 schools for instructional purposes.

[iii] I took a definition originally in Edutopia and revised it to make clear that the integration of technology in daily lessons is harnessed to achieving curricular and instructional goals of the teacher, school, and district. The devices and software are not front-and-center but routinely used in lessons.  I then stripped away language that connected usage of technologies to “success” or preferred ways of teaching. (No author) “What is Successful Technology Integration, “ Edutopia, November 5, 2007 at: http://www.edutopia.org/technology-integration-guide-description

 

How I Am Researching Technology Integration in Classrooms and Schools (Part 1)

Beginning last spring, I began publishing posts of classrooms  in which I observed lessons (see here and here). These posts were one part of a larger  research project on technology integration (see here). 

Two questions have guided the case study design of the project:

1. How have classroom, school, and district exemplars of technology integration been fully implemented and put into classroom practice?
2. Have these exemplars made a difference in teaching practice?

 In this and subsequent posts I will detail the methodology I use, what I mean by technology integration and describe models commonly used to determine its extent in schools.

The following posts are drafts that will be revised since I will be visiting more teachers and schools this fall.  I welcome comments from readers who wish to take issue, suggest revisions, and recommend changes.

How I Got Started

In fall 2015, I wrote to district superintendents and heads of charter management organizations explaining why I was writing about instances of technology integration in their schools. At no point did these administrators ask me to define “technology integration” or even ask about the phrase; all seemed to know what I meant. In nearly all instances, the superintendent, school site administrator, technology coordinator, and CMO head invited me into the district. Administrators supplied me with lists of principals and teachers to contact. Again, neither my contacts nor I defined the phrase “technology integration” in conversations. They already had a sense of what the phrase meant.

I contacted individual teachers explaining how I got their names, what I was doing, and asked for their participation. More than half agreed. Because of health issues, I did not start the project until January 2016. For four months I visited schools and classrooms, observed lessons and interviewed staff. I resumed observations this fall and hope to complete all observations by December 2016.

In visiting classrooms, I interviewed teachers before and after the lessons I observed in their classrooms. During the observation, I took notes every few minutes about what both teacher and students were doing. I used a protocol to describe class activities while commenting separately about what both teacher and students were doing. I had used this observation protocol in previous studies. The point of the description and commentary was to capture what happened in the classroom, not determine the degree of teacher effectiveness. I avoided evaluative judgments about the worth of the lesson or teacher activities.

The major advantage of this approach is being in the room and picking up non-verbal and verbal asides of what is going on every few minutes as well as noting classroom conditions that often go unnoticed.  I, as an experienced teacher familiar with schooling historically and the common moves that occur in lessons, can also assess the relationship between the teacher and students that other observers using different protocols or videos may miss or exclude. Teachers know that I will not judge their performance.

The major disadvantage of this way of observing lessons is the subjectivity and biases I bring to documenting lessons. So I work hard at separating what I see from what I interpret. I document classroom conditions from student and teacher desk arrangements through what is on bulletin boards, photos and pictures on walls, and whiteboards and which, if any, electronic devices are available in the room. I describe, without judging, teacher and student activities and behaviors. But biases, as in other approaches researching classroom life, remain.

After observing classes, I sit down and have half-hour to 45-minute interviews at times convenient to teachers. After jotting down their history in the district, the school, and other experiences, I turned to the lessons and asked questions about what teachers’ goals were and whether they believed those goals were reached. Then, I asked about the different activities I observed during the lesson. One key question was whether the lesson I observed was representative or not of how the teacher usually teaches.

In answering these questions, teachers gave me reasons they did (or did not do) something in lessons.  In most instances, individual teachers told me why they did what they did, thus, communicating a map of their beliefs and assumptions about teaching, learning, and the content they teach. In all of the give-and-take of these discussions with teachers I made no judgment about the success or failure of different activities or the lesson itself.

I then drafted a description of the lesson and sent it to the teacher to correct any factual errors I made in describing the lesson. The teacher returned the draft with corrections.[i]

To provide context for the classrooms I observed, I collected documents and used school and teacher websites to describe what occurred within each school and district in integrating devices and software into teachers’ daily lessons.

All of these sources intersected and overlapped permitting me to assess the degree to which technology integration occurred. Defining what the concept of “technology integration,” however, was elusive and required much work. Even though when I used the phrase it triggered nods from teachers and administrators as if we all shared the same meaning of the phrase.  I still had to come up with a working definition of the concept that would permit me to capture more precisely what I saw in classrooms, schools, and districts.

________________________________________________

[i] The protocol is straightforward and subjective. I write out in longhand or type on my laptop what teachers and students do during the lesson. Each sheet of paper or laptop screen is divided into a wide column and a narrow column. In the wide column I record every few minutes what the teacher is doing, what students are doing, and teacher-directed segues from one activity to another. In the narrow column, I comment on what I see.

 

Subsequent posts will deal with defining technology integration, common models describing its stages, and determining success of technology integration.

“Truthful Hyperbole”

*My history teacher is so old, she lived through the Civil War.

*My dog is so ugly, he saw himself in a mirror and ran away.

*My teacher is so mean, she eats first graders for lunch.

*My sister uses so much makeup, she needs a paintbrush to put it on with (see here)

Yes, these statements are hyperbole. They are exaggerations. Stand-up comics use hyperbole often in the one-liners they deliver and the shaggy dog stories they tell. It is also a rhetorical move seeking to make a point through overstating. Awareness of exaggerated statements has risen dramatically in the 2016 campaign for the U.S. presidency. Republican nominee Donald Trump acknowledges that he exaggerates to make a point. In Art of the Deal (1987), Trump said:

I play to people’s fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That’s why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It’s an innocent form of exaggeration — and a very effective form of promotion.

Journalist Tony Schwartz ghost-wrote Art of the Deal and reveals how the phrase “truthful hyperbole” originated with Trump thirty years ago in developing New York City real estate projects.

So the phrase “truthful hyperbole” has entered the presidential campaign leaving most of us unclear on what is fact and what is fiction. Of course, in previous presidential campaigns, other candidates have made exaggerated claims but now journalists and pundits have enjoyed a Trumpian cornucopia.

To be direct, “truthful hyperbole” is as oxymoronic as “accurate exaggeration.” While in the next two months campaign talks, presidential debates, and TV ads will surely add to the list of examples of “truthful hyperbole,” such exaggeration surrounding school technologies contains many examples (I was going to write a “gazillion” but did not want to add to the list).

“Truthful Hyperbole” in Computers in Schools 

Remember MOOCs?

Massive Open Online Courses beginning in 2012 were going to “revolutionize” universities making degrees accessible to anyone with an Internet connection (see here and here). Well, the obituaries have already appeared less than five years later (see here and here). Surely, MOOCs still exist–the truthful part–although the hyperbole has been cremated.

Remember the introduction of iPads?

As one headline put it in 2012: How the iPad is Transforming the Classroom.

Or an online newspaper article from the San Jose Mercury News:

As teachers, administrators, parents and students continue to argue about how best to incorporate digital technology into the classroom, Apple (AAPL) strode into the center of the debate Thursday with a promise to transform the classroom the same way it changed music with iTunes and the iPod.

Then there is the commonly used word “transformation” to describe what will happen with the onslaught of technologies in classrooms.   It is “truthful hyperbole” in action.

For computer technologies:  Among ourselves, we educators and policymakers discuss the transformation of schools, recognizing how great the changes in these institutions need to be.  Unfortunately the public does not like the term “transformation,” probably for the same reason many people dislike the idea of transforming the health care system.  The public fears that something familiar and important will be lost as institutions are transformed.  In fact, we know that the United States faces greater risks if our schools fail to improve fast enough than if they change too slowly.

Computers, the Internet, online courses, smart phones, cameras, interactive whiteboards, and other digital tools play an important role in improving and, yes, transforming schools.  The role of technology in schools will increase, and as we use these new tools wisely, they help make schools more effective and engaging. (2012)

For online learning: What does stand to happen in K-12 education is a transformation, where the schools of tomorrow look radically different from schools of today as a result of disruptive changes in subsystems beneath them, i.e. classes, after-school services, etc. Schools may become community hubs where students come to collaborate, work online, get mentoring, tutoring, and individualized help – a stark contrast from the whole group instructional model of today where whiteboards and desks reign supreme. (2016)

For adaptive or “personalized” learning: How Computer Technology Will Transform Schools of the Future (2014)

And for Artificial Intelligence:

Most discussions about artificial intelligence are characterised by hyperbole and hysteria. Though some of the world’s most prominent and successful thinkers regularly forecast that AI will either solve all our problems or destroy us or our society, and the press frequently reports on how AI will threaten jobs and raise inequality….

And on and on. The hyperbole attached to the use of technologies in classrooms are exaggerations anchored in magical thinking, not fact. When it comes to hyperbole, the “truthful” part is a casualty of rhetorical overkill.

Algorithms in Use: Evaluating Teachers and “Personalizing” Learning (Part 2)

In Part 1, I made the point that consumer-driven or educationally-oriented algorithms for all of their mathematical exactness and appearance of objectivity in regression equations contain different values among which programmers judge some to be more important than others.  In making value choices (like everyone else, programmers are constrained by space, time, and resources), decisions get made that have consequences for both teachers and students. In this post, I look first at those algorithms used to judge teachers’ effectiveness (or lack of it) and then I turn to “personalized learning” algorithms customized for individual students.

Washington, D.C.’s IMPACT program of teacher evaluation

Much has been written about the program that Chancellor Michelle Rhee created during her short tenure (2007-2010) leading the District of Columbia public schools (see here and here). Under Rhee, IMPACT,  a new system of teacher evaluation has been put into practice. The system is anchored in The “Teaching and Learning Framework,”  that D.C. teachers call the “nine commandments” of good teaching.

1. Lead well-organized, objective-driven lessons.

2. Explain content clearly.

3. Engage students at all learning levels in rigorous work.

4. Provide students with multiple ways to engage with content.

5. Check for student understanding.

6. Respond to student misunderstandings.

7. Develop higher-level understanding through effective questioning.

8. Maximize instructional time.

9. Build a supportive, learning-focused classroom community.

IMPACT uses multiple measures to judge the quality of teaching. At first, 50 percent of an annual evaluation was based upon student test scores; 35 percent based on judgments of instructional expertise (see “nine commandments”) drawn from five classroom observations by the principal and “master educators,” and 15 percent based on other measures. Note that policymakers initially decided on these percentages out of thin air. Using these multiple measures, IMPACT has awarded 600 teachers (out of 4,000) bonuses ranging from $3000 to $25,000 and fired nearly 300 teachers judged as “ineffective” in its initial years of full operation. For those teachers with insufficient student test data, different performance measures were used. Such a new system caused much controversy in and out of the city’s schools (see here and here)

Since then, changes have occurred. In 2012, the 50 percent of a teacher’s evaluation based on student test scores had been lowered to 35 percent (why this number? No one says) and the number of classroom observations had been reduced. More policy changes have occurred since then (e.g., “master educator” observations have been abolished and now principals do all observations; student surveys of teachers added). All of these additions and subtractions to IMPACT mean that the algorithms used to judge teachers have had to be tweaked, that is, altered because some variables in the regression equation were deemed more (or less) important than others. These policy changes, of course, are value choices. For a technical report published in 2013 that reviewed IMPACT, see here.

And the content of the algorithms have remained secret. An email exchange between the overseer of the algorithm in the D.C. schools and a teacher (who gave her emails to a local blogger) in 2010-2011 reveal the secrecy surrounding the tinkering with such algorithms (see here). District officials have not yet revealed in plain language the complex algorithms to teachers, journalists, or the general public. That value judgments are made time and again in these mathematical equations is clear. As are judgements in the regression equations used to “personalize learning.”

Personalized Learning algorithms

“The consumerist path of least resistance in America takes you to Amazon for books, Uber for transportation, Starbucks for coffee, and Pandora for songs. Facebook’s ‘Trending’ list shows you the news, while Yelp ratings lead you to a nearby burger. The illusion of choice amid such plenty is easy to sustain, but it’s largely false; you’re being herded by algorithms from purchase to purchase.”

Mario Bustillos, This Brand Could be Your Life, June 28, 2016

Bustillos had no reason to look at “personalized learning” in making her case that consumers are “herded by algorithms from purchase to purchase.” Had she inquired into it, however, she would have seen the quiet work of algorithms constructing “playlists” of lessons for individual students and controlling students’ movement from one online lesson to another absent any teacher hand-prints on the skills and content being taught. Even though the rhetoric of “personalized learning” mythologizes the instructional materials and learning as student-centered, algorithms (mostly proprietary and unavailable for inspection) written by programmers making choices about what students should learn next are in control. “Personalized learning” is student-centered in its reliance on lessons tailored to ability and performance differences among students. And the work of teachers is student-centered in coaching, instructing, and individualizing their attention as well as monitoring small groups working together. All of that is important, to be sure. But the degree to which students are making choices out of their interests and strengths in a subject area, such as math, they have little discretion. Algorithms rule (see here, here, and here).

Deeply embedded in these algorithms are theories of learning that seldom are made explicit. For example, adaptive or “personalized learning” are contemporary, high-tech versions of old-style mastery learning. Mastery learning, then and now, is driven by behavioral theories of learning. The savaging of “behaviorism” by cognitive psychologists and other social scientists in the past few decades has clearly given the theory a bad name. Nonetheless, behaviorism and its varied off-shoots drive contemporary affection for “personalized learning” as it did for “mastery learning” a half-century ago (see here and here). I state this as a fact, not a criticism.

With advances in compiling and analyzing masses of data by powerful computers, the age of the algorithm is here. As consumers, these rules govern choices we make in buying material goods and, as this post claims, in evaluating teachers and “personalized learning.”