 Learning Landscapes Seminar The Knowledge Building Center: A Foundational Element of the Virtual Learning Commons David V. Loertscher Professor, San Jose State University

School Libraries and Computer Labs: Transform into a Learning Commons The Learning Commons Physical Space Experimental Learning’ Center Virtual Space Open Commons

The Major Switch No Website School Library Web Site Virtual Learning Commons

 A giant conversation  A collaborative workspace  A place of experimentation  Knowledge Building Centers as its foundational elements

KBC Characteristic: Easy to Build and Use  Google Sites; Moodle; Wiki; Blog; Google Aps Education

KBC Characteristic: Collaborative Inquiry  Everyone working, building, contributing, developing, solving…  Classroom teachers, students, teacher librarians, teacher technologists, other specialists, experts, parents

KBC Characteristic: Personal Expertise and Collaborative Intelligence What We Know What I Know

KBC Characteristic: 21 st Century Skills Drive Content Understanding Content Deep Understanding 21 st Century Skills

KBC Characteristic: Specialists at the Center of Teaching and Learning Classroom Teacher and Students Teacher Librarian Teacher Technologists Experts Other Specialists Parents

KBC Uses  Single-class explorations  Cross-class inquiry  Cross-district, community, state, world inquiry  School projects/initiatives  Professional development  Professional learning communities

Kamiliah Jackson’s VLC Documented Evidence Loertscher and Koechlin

The Parade of KBCs Loertscher and Koechlin

Marzano’s iObservation Model Marzano, Robert, Peggy Schooling, Michael Toth/ Creating an Aligned System to Develop Great Teachers Within the Federal Race to The Top Initiative Solution Tree, 2010 (Based on Marzano’s The Art and Science of Teaching )

Sound Instructional Design  UBD (Wiggins and McTighe)  Think Models (Loertscher/Koechlin/Zwaan)  The best technologies that boost learning  Co-Teaching by classroom teachers, teacher technologists, teacher librarians, and other specialists.

End with: The Big Think  Why?  What it is.  Activity 1: What I know; What we know about content  Activity 2: How I learned this; How we learned this  Conclusion: So what? What’s Next?  Activity 3 (with adults) What they learned; How they learned it. So what? What’s next?  Help: Nin strategies for Big Think Activities from: Loertscher/Koechlin/Zwaan. The Big Think (LMCsource.com)  Important: Have administrators participate!

Who is Assessing? Student’s View Classroom Teacher’s View Administrator’s View Parent’s View Specialist’s View

What’s Ahead? Make Connections  State / Provincial / National Documents and Initiatives:  Ontario and Alberta documents  Common Core Standards: U.S. National Governor’s Conference  State initiatives such as Ohio’s Learning Commons

More Connections:  Tune to great ideas through great professional books:  Will Richardson’s 3 rd ed. of Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms. Corwin Press, 2010  Bernie Trilling and Charles Fadel’s 21 st century Skills: Learning for Life in our Times. Josey Bass, 2009  Robert Marzano, ed. On Excellence in Teaching. Solution Tree,  Alan November’s Empowering Students with Technology. Corwin, 2009

Even More Connections  Create your own personal learning network  Joyce Valenza’s blog and ning  David Warlick’s blog  The Blue Skunk blog by Doug Johnson  ISTE Sig Webinars  Free Technology for Teachers – Richard Byrne  Schoollearningcommons.pbworks.com