If you were here last year, welcome back, if you are new- welcome. I think I may have found a new direction. I recently watched the video below, read the book, and wrote this review on my teaching blog.

While the entire concept may be a bit too conveniently packaged and a bit flawed, it can be a good text for several reasons:

• It is available online in PDF format
• It lays out a clear course of action
• It identifies issues, which we can work on after reading
• It sparks great discussions

I want to read this book with whoever is willing and see where it takes us. Whether you are a former Intrepid Classroom participant, a new student directed here by your teacher, or a teacher who stumbled here form Twitter, here is my plan:

Intrepid Classroom has always been about bringing young people and teachers together using web tools to facilitate discussion, interaction, collaboration, and connectivity. Beyond the confines of school, curriculums, and expected roles and interactions, I hope that Intrepid Classroom can be a place where we can simply be people dedicated to change not stigmatized by the labels of teacher/student.

One of the biggest criticisms of this site has always been the lack of structure or cohesion. Here is what I hope to do to solve that problem: I want to build a semester long curriculum around Generation We. I hope that we can gather a group of ten to fifteen teachers and students to have weekly readings, discussions, and eventually a final project that raises awareness of global issues and promote activism.

We can use any tool that will help us stay connected and collaborate. These will be modified and announced as necessary, but as always, we will use this blog and the Ning as starting points. I would like to have group meetings using Elluminate or similar tools. I want you to have a say in where we take this book and the idea it presents. I don’t have anything more concrete at this time, because I do not want to create an entire plan and have no one sign up.

Here is what you need to do if you are interested, and are able to commit the time regardless of “real” school commitments:

• Leave a comment on this blog post stating your interest. I will email you with details as soon as we have a group together.
• Join the Ning if you haven’t already done so.
• Watch the video.
• Share any ideas you have about the direction of this course.

I hope to start January 1st, so please commit by then. This course is open to anyone who is interested in learning more about collaborative activism, regardless of your age or affiliation with any school. Let’s get together, learn, converse, connect, and create real change.

I agree with Eric Greenberg when he says:

The problems of today will not go away if we just sweep them under the rug and ignore them. They will only get worse. We cannot rely on those bound by special interests or protecting their turf to enact great changes and create a new order of justice and fairness. We need the unjaded youth, with their energy, optimism, and sense of purpose, to lead the world out of the mess it is in and toward the full potential of mankind.

I have repeatedly tried to explain that the main point of this classroom is to try and learn how to build a community of young people from around the world determined to work together to learn about and solve some of the global issues we deal with on a daily basis.

I didn’t want to assign projects or give too much direction, because I wanted to see if it was possible for a group of random students to take charge and give this project some cohesion. This doesn’t seem to be working, so I want to start promoting a project that is dear to my heart.

I have mentioned Daraja several times before, but now I have some specific task. I received the following email today:

I’m writing today in my position of Volunteer Program Coordinator for Daraja Academy. I am looking to see if you are interested in being a part of Daraja in some capacity, be it an hour of computer research from home or a six-month education internship in Kenya. If you have any special skills, such as in languages (especially Swahili), computers, teaching, media, fundraising, etc., feel free to include those too. Hope to hear from you soon.

Sincerely,

Grey

P.S. – The list below is mostly just food for thought; it includes projects already undertaken by members of the Daraja community, which I’ve provided as examples, as well as projects that we desperately need people on. If any of the items pique your interest, let me know and we’ll set you up.

• Starting a Daraja Club
• Fundraising Event (Benefits, coin drives, neighborhood meetings, etc.)
• Finding stores/restaurants who will donate a % of profits for one night
• Researching Corporate Sponsors
• Grant & Trust research
• Awareness campaigns (art festival booths, etc.)
• Coordinating vaccinations
• Coordinating Drives for goods (books, sheets, computers, etc.)
• Help putting together marketing materials
• Creating merchandise (calendars, greeting cards, shirts)
• Logo Design
• Grant writing
• Creation of admission materials—applications, forms, etc.
• Public Relations campaign—contacting newspaper, media, etc.
• Computer drive
• Textbook and reference book drive

So there you go. You want something specific to work on, then educate yourself about this amazing school and get involved. Find people here at Intrepid Classroom and see if you can work on some projects together. Raise money and raise awareness!

I also want to start using the chat feature on the Ning to try and bring us together more often. I want to set up a weekly meeting. It will be hard to coordinate it at first, so that every time zone can be involved, but let us start with a few different times and see which one sticks. Please come to the Intrepid Classrrom Ning this Friday October 31st at any of these times:

• 9:00 pm Doha
• 2:00pm East Coast Time USA
• midnight Asia (sorry guys.)
• 8:00am Hawaii

I have recently discovered a blogger named Injenuity, and I find her posts to be easy to read, insightful, yet very  dense and full of valuable insight into the world of online communities. She recently wrote a post about her dissipating love of Nings. Seeing that Ning has become one of our most used tools, I was curious to hear what you think about what she has to say. Please feel free to comment on her blog, link back here, or to your own blog to let us know what you think. Use whichever tool you think best; the important thing is that you share what you say in other communities with this one here.

The first comment was referring to the Ning:

I don’t get this site =(
Well, kinda…I don’t know what i should do and what I really can do in here..,a little help will be nice =D plzzz

Here is another comment:

I can see that Intrepid Classroom is growing and more members are joining. I have one question and I thought that I should ask it now since I saw you were online. What should I do to get part of Intrepid Classroom? I know that technically I’m in it but how do I really get accepted in Intrepid Classroom´s society? I just don’t know where to start. I hope you can help me Mr. R. Cya later in Intrepid Classroom and good night!

A quick review of what a Ning is used for would be a great place to start, but in short the Ning is a place to meet people. I would suggest that if you are not sure what to do simply reach out and talk to  someone. If you click on any member’s picture it will take you to their page. Read what they have said already. Most members have a separate blog, while some people are using the blog feature on the Ning itself. Listen to their music, read their words, and introduce yourself. You can send people messages or leave them comments on their page.

We are trying to learn how to build a network of people you can learn from and teach at the same time, so first you must get to know each other. It would also be a great idea to work on your own page as well. Share some music or videos and write why you have chosen that music. Share some of your thoughts on life, school, and the world around you. Invite people to connect.

Once you have done made a few connections you can join one of the many discussions already happening. Simply click on the title of the discussion under the forum section and see what people are saying. The What Makes A Book Worth Reading already has 63 responses. If you don’t find something that interests you, then start your own discussion about anything you like.

It was also brought up that perhaps there are too many pages:

I almost already feel like we have too many different pages. Sometimes I think that a post was on Ning but it was on Edublog and then I spent 30 min searching the wrong site.

But trust me, I feel each page serves a purpose. We will be using many other tools soon, so let’s make sure we all feel comfortable with the ones we are using now.  After you have mastered the Ning, you can begin working on some of the projects we are working on at the wiki The first is the design of a logo. Do you have any ideas? Can you draw some sketches? Then go to the wiki page and leave your thoughts here. (If you have not already done so, ask for a request to join. There is a link that will send me the request.) Once you have joined then simply click on the Edit This Page link at the top of the page and insert any text, video, or images you need. Hit save and  you have edited our wiki. This logo can be hand drawn or use photographs and text. We will all have to work on it together.

You can also get involved with the latest writing project tentatively called We Are One. Simply follow this link and add your part to the story. If neither one of these wiki projects is for you, then think of another project you would like to work on and present it here. See if you can get one or two people to work on it with you. Some ideas can be: creating a video about a topic you are interested, or maybe record a pod cast, or simply write a poem or blog post with another person. Perhaps we could all take pictures or video of where we live and share them with the group.

I will present more formal “assignments” soon. In the meantime, I want to see what you guys come up with yourselves.

That should keep you busy. Please feel free to contact me again if you have any questions. I know I can get wordy, so here is a list if things to do if you don’t know where to start.

1. Meet at least three new People in the Ning.
2. Work on your Ning page
3. Join a discussion.
4. Work on Logo
5. Work on We Are One
6. Create new Project

Final note for the people involved in the book discussion, my question to you is now what? You have done an amazing job creating a dynamic and rich conversation about books, but how can we synthesize the information? Can you perhaps take what has been said and write a concise, coherent blog post about adolescence reading habits? See what you can you do. Students are always complaining that they don’t like being told what to do…well here is your chance to whatever you want. But do something!

Great job everyone. Keep up the good work!

We hope to be able to guide and coach you as you become comfortable with the various tools. Please feel free to leave a comment either here or send me a message from the Ning if you need further clarification. We also have a running tab at the top of this page called Web Tools with explanations of the tools we will be using.

Here is a basic run-down of why you would use each tool:

Blogs- a good place to reflect on your own learning, seek feedback on longer written pieces, express yourself with writing, multimedia, photographs, drawings and more. Blogs are a great home base to anchor your online activity. I will be using this blog as a way to share resources, give “lessons,” and keep all of our activity in order.

Ning- a good place to have conversations and discussions, make announcements, share music, and socialize. If you do not have a blog of your own, the Ning offers you a blog option to write longer pieces.

Wiki- this is the place for more than one person to work collaboratively on a shared project, like the logo. The wiki creates pages that can be edited by a group of people.

Youtube- this is a place where we can share the videos we will create, as well as a place where we can start to add favorites. I hope this will become a great collection for videos to help raise awareness and promote activism and peace.

For those of you who are new to all of us technology, relax, take a deep breath and jump right in. For those of you who are old pros, please help us get everyone on board!

This is a good time, however, to start to think about what we want to do with Intrepid Classroom. It is one thing to simply get together and argue, discuss, and share our ideas, but then what? I see this experiment as way to bring students together from around the world, to not only exchange ideas, but also to try and offer solutions and create products to help create a more just, sustainable, and peaceful planet.

I have always taught that process is more important than product, but I would love to create small teams of students who can design and implement their own creations. Perhaps you can make a video for or against capital punishment, or a poem about the war in Iraq, or maybe a podcast about the affects of globalization on the developing world. We want to use art and technology to raise awareness and instigate change. You are the next generation of activist; this is your school. Tell us what you need to learn. Let us show you.

I understand that May is the worst time to even think about any of this, with end of year exams and anxieties, but please store these ideas in the back of you brain and let’s see what we can do over the summer and next year.

I have created a YouTube page for our class. I will send you the password via the Ning, so if you want to post your work, please contact me here for details. I am currently working on a video trailer for this class. I would love to get some video from you on what Intrepid Classroom, as a concept and as a reality, means to you. If you are not comfortable enough technically to create a video and post it on Youtube, contact people at the Ning for some help, and if that doesn’t work I can help you.

I have also added a tab at the top of the page for books and films. There are only a few hyper-linked items, but I hope to fill these spaces in the coming months with more in-depth explanations.

Please use Intrepid Classroom as a resource for music, films, and books that will help you in your quest for peace and justice. Thanks for stopping by. Do not be a lurker! Leave a comment. Let us know you were here. Tell your friends, let’s change the world.

As we move forward with this project, we will see that we are all on different levels technologically speaking. I hope that by using a variety of different tools any student, who comes to the Intrepid Classroom, will feel more and more comfortable using Web 2.0.

We are assuming that most students who regularly visit this site already have a blog and are familiar with its usage. If this is not the case, please don’t be shy, leave some comments and someone will help you get started.

I have been trying to organize the best tools for us to use: Wikis, Google Docs, so we can get to know each other, share ideas, videos, music, and any other things we may need to exchange. After much thought, I think a Ning is a great place to start. I will continue to use this blog as home base for posting lessons, longer pieces, links and more, but it may be a good idea to establish our resources on the Ning as well.

For those of you who don’t know a Ning is

Ning is an online platform for users to create their own social websites and social networks. Ning means “peace” in Chinese.Ning hopes to compete with large social sites like MySpace and Facebook, by appealing to users who want to create networks around specific interests or have limited technical skills. The unique feature of Ning is that anyone can create their own custom social network for a particular topic or need, catering to specific audiences.

Basically a Ning is like a closed/smaller version of Facebook. I have created one for us here, so please stop by and sign up. It is pretty straightforward. In the interest of security, if you are not in high school and not familiar with social networks, please do not post a picture of yourself. Otherwise it should be quite simple. If you have any questions either leave them as comments here, or try and figure it on your own.

See you on the Ning. I will try and post another music lesson soon.