Well, maybe one of the things that emerges from this interesting conversation with gurus John Hattie and Pasi Sahlbert, that a colleague put me on to, is that perhaps we are being overly critical and pessimistic about what were doing in Australia. Maybe because pessimism and cynicism can serve a political agenda better than acknowledgement of successes?
Sahlberg talks about teacher quality, equity, funding and a range of other issues in a really reasonable way. I respect the work that Hattie’s done, but do you sense here that he’s talking down our system, and emphasizing his own agenda rather than listening to what he’s being told? He’s being told that Finland values teachers, respects teachers and pays them well, values teacher autonomy, doesn’t over-emphasise teaching … his action plan for Australia … well, it doesn’t really reflect that.
Late last year I blogged about a short session I attended with Stephen Heppell on technologies in learning, which I enjoyed a lot. So, I was pleased to find a video of Heppell presenting much the same presentation I saw. So, I embed it here for your viewing pleasure. Some interesting points relating to ‘bring your own technology’ around the 19 minute mark and also on classroom design from a student perspective beginning around the 21 minute mark.
I’ve embedded the Apple announcement on text books below. I’ve already heard some negative reactions in the twittiverse arguing that this is another examples of Apple’s ‘walled garden’ approach, and that locking schools and districts into Apple systems entirely is not a good move. It seems there’s other questions too about whether these textbooks will be available on other platforms (unlikely) or available in other formats (very unlikely).
Nevertheless, I’m quite excited about it, particularly from a writer’s perspective. Could I write my textbook and have it on the Apple bookstore without the intermediary of the publisher? Like musicians do now? Could we break down the systems and empower good teachers and good teacher/authors and share their expertise more widely? And I’m definitely going to download the publication software.
But I have reservations, and they are more around the idea of the textbook in the first place. Maybe the textbook thing is bigger in the United States than here, or maybe because I’m an English teacher there isn’t generally the reliance on a textbook beyond the set novels and plays.
The video says they are going to change ‘one of the cornerstones of education: the textbook’. But is the textbook really that critical? How does this change learning? Or teaching? And, will replacing the traditional textbook with a ‘bells and whistles’ version change the classroom experience? Where are the collaborative tools, the feedback, the personalisation, the differentiation, the user-created textbook that we’ve talked about for some time.
There’s no doubt it will look pretty, it will save a lot of printing and heavy schoolbags for kids with iPads (oh yeah, how many is that right now?), they can be updated easily and they will be more engaging. But every time I hear ‘engagement’ as an argument for new software and hardware I cringe a little. There’s got to be better reasons than that. We shall see!
After watching this video of Ken Robinson talking simply and passionately about the essentials of learning: a student, a teacher, I almost feel ashamed of my last post talking about gadgets and tools. This gets back to the essence: what’s important, why it matters, and why politicians should keep out of it!
A new take on ‘Shift Happens’, but this time with a bit more of an educational focus. Interesting to see this kind of video coming out of a learning system!
Of course I’m going to get myself an ipad sometime in the forseeable future and enjoyed StephenFry’s piece on this new tool in TIME last month. Maybe for me it will be the second generation version, when the bugs like wireless dropping out have been fixed, but I must admit I wasn’t really seeing the ipad as a tool for students in the classroom.
As a long time proponent of the 1-1 computer version of learning, I couldn’t see the point in giving kids a relatively under-powered device that lacked the content creation facilities of a decent notebook computer. Our students get the full version of Office, large chunks of the Adobe Master Collection including Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat Pro along with a suite of other software like Inspiration, Photo Story and some tablet-specific things like Ink Art. We’re looking at flash drive based machines running Windows 7 that start up quickly and can multi-task with ease, as the students can too!
But I was talking to an educator yesterday who was pretty enthusiastic about the Ipad as a learning device, particularly for younger students. And that was something I hadn’t thought about, concentrating as I was on students like my senior Literature class who have been using OneNote as their note-taking tool and collaborating on multiple wikis.
So, I was pleasantly surprised to this post by Will Richardson, which has a video conversation with NY TImes columnist Warren Buckleiter, who talks enthusiastically about the potential of the ipad for younger students: the power of its tactile nature and the growing range of possible apps. The conversation is here:
I didn’t think I’d find it online, but after reading Waleed Ali’s piece on the National Curriculum in the latest issue of The Monthly, (more on that piece later if I can actually figure out what he is arguing) I went looking for Julia Guillard explaining the return to basics (basics +) emphasis on our new future looking curriculum. Anyway, I went looking and found it. This is the vision for a new National Curriculum. Be afraid.
Did she really say ‘Children will be learnt to read …’?
One of my goals this year is to promote the concept of PLNs (professional or personal learning networks) as a core component of future teacher learning in the connected world. These two videos take up some of the concepts around ‘why connect?’ in very different ways.
The first is from a blog I just discovered from Shelley Terrell with the great name, Teacher Reboot Camp. She’s a promoter of PLNs and now in my Google Reader feed list! It’s a short, emotional, compelling video about the value of connection.
The second is from a blog called The Lives of Teachers by Darren Elliot. It’s a longer, more reflective piece, with audio, and sourced in some detail and talks through some of the thinking about connectivity and learning in a modern world. I recommend you watch and listen to them both!
As far as I can tell, one of the most famous things in San Antone, where I’m heading for ASCD 2010 tomorrow, is the Alamo. I wonder if I do a tour it will be something like this famous scene from Pee-Wee Herman?
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