Interesting concept was birthed today as I had discussions with one of my senior colleagues. He was asking me how our new film and media subject was going and if the students were enjoying the subject. Well of course I carried on about how wonderful it was and how students were engaged in the class. I continued bragging about how the students were working together and helping each other solve different problems to produce work of a high standard. We then headed down the track on how we as teachers can start helping each other and use each others skills to better one another’s teaching practice. My colleague doesn’t have the technical skills I do, but he has 20+ years of teaching experience that when combined could create something powerful and effective. So we have a plan….
He has a class next term about to study a unit on Theoretical ethics. At the end of the unit there is a in class essay exam that they all must write on 1 of 5 studied issues in class. Our plan is to break the students into 5 groups for the term and give them the mandate to create media content that will teach their particular topic. After 6 weeks they will present their media content to the class and we will have 4 weeks to study and discuss the issues for the exam. All content will be created by the students, I will teach the basic technical skills required to create a podcast, their regular teacher will guide them to the appropriate content and resources and the students will create the course work.
What is more unique than the technology integration is the fact that we are taking a group of year 12 students and asking them to be collaborative workers for the good of each other as apposed to the system that is encourages them to compete against one another. I am sure it is similar in many school systems around the world – But effectively our students are ranked against each other in order to receive a score for university entrance. All of the students will need to rely on each other to create quality study resources. I am really excited about what we may achieve here. It is an experiment and it may be crazy to experiment with students in their final year – but I am confident this will work and make others in our school stand up and pay attention.
On another note I have invited my year 10 media students to use the equipment to create study podcasts for any subject to share with their peers. Two boys have started creating study podcasts for mathematics. Will wait and see what else comes of that one.