Connected Learning at Mount Greylock High School

For the past eight months we’ve been implementing a Digital Media and Learning program at Mount Greylock High School. This new role is ideal in that it allows me to listen to teachers and students, then build ways for Connected Learning to amplify and augment their work. The nascent DML Lab has been implementing ideas both through a Tech Exploratory and with individual teachers, starting the organic needs that arise from the classes. The DML Lab is great in that it combines Jim Gee and Michael Levine’s Digital Teacher Corps with MacArthur/UC Irvine-backed Connected Learning. Best of all, it starts with questions and inquiry.

Thus far, we’ve completed projects in Physics, Science 8, English, Digital Citizenship, and other fields. We’ve also played with varying and various degrees of technology: MaKey MaKey, Fold.It, Scratch, http://hackety.com/, https://ifttt.com/, and Mozilla projects such as Popcorn, Thimble, and Hackasraus.

And, we’ve done some great live demos. Our OpenPath team (Jared Lamenzo, Ilona Parkansky, Shawn Van Every, and I) recently won our second round of funding from the Mozilla Foundation  and NSF to write some code. The first iteration of OpenPath uses WebRTC for real-time communication and co-learning around location. We demoed the first product with Pat Blackman’s and my Tech Exploratory, and shared insights and vision on how location-based learning, curation, and co-creation can take place in non-institutional settings, out in the world, where questions arise naturally, fluidly, spontaneously.

We also had the good fortune to demo the metaLAB at Harvard’s Zeega, which uses HTML5 as a  web publishing and interactive storytelling tool, using social media and real-time platforms. Ahmed did a great demo for us, and driven by the student interest, we created a mash-up: Gangnam Nayan Cat.