21st Century Educator

Well you would have to have been sleeping under a log for the past week to not have heard about Apple’s new iPhone 3g. I myself was waiting in anticipation for the release of the much rumoured upgrade. Being in Australia we have not seen it come to our shores yet (minus the few 1000 unlocked ones), so it was exciting to hear that Australia will be receiving the new device on July 11th.

After watching the WWDC Keynote address I was particularly interested in the educational applications for this device. I have embedded a youtube clip of the two educational applications that have been developed. Both these applications are for higher education, but both demonstrate exactly what is possible with learning on a mobile device.

WWDC Medical Apps for iPhone Demo

While I am sure the device will open itself up to some wonderful learning applications, I think there is more to it as a learning device. The addition of GPS and high speed access anywhere anytime is truly a reliseation of what has been somewhat of a innovative educators dream for many years. I remember back when I was finishing my degree in 2001, talking about this idea of anywhere anytime learning and always being connected. We didn’t really understand that idea as wireless technologies were just not to the standard we see today. While many of these technologies have been available in similar devices for a while now - none have seemed to have been as functional and as easy to use as the iPhone.

So what will be the greatest challenge if this device is embraced as a learning device? Well probably that very thing. This device is a very open device and it allows levels of users access never really seen before. How will our schools manage this? Will we lock it down or just ban it all together? Or will we have a serious discussion on how we can create a learning culture that embraces the amazing possibilities of such a device. Gone are the days of schools being able to manage what students see at school. It is now too easy for a student with one of these devices to view and access any content they want. Therefore, it is obviously going to be something that we as educators and schools will have to embrace and decide how we will guide our students. Once again this is a school culture issue and probably another example of the desperate necessity for schools to embrace the change and begin developing ways in which they will handle such technological change.

I can see this device being used for incredible educational purposes. Having access to learning resources in your pocket, being able to connect with experts in a number of different ways all from one device. Mobile blogging has finally been demonstrated as something that will be easy to do with this device. Imagine having a group of students on a field trip all reporting back to another class at school using a device like this. I guess it is time to wait and see how these technologies are utilised and if they will be embraced.

Late addition - Second life running on the iPhone

Most ed blogs seem to be forums of brilliant practice and places where folk show off things that have worked and reflect on positive experiences. I myself do this quite often. However, today is different…. this post is all about my big STUFF UP today!! I often talk about my media class with great pride and excitement. Quite often boarding on boasting about how awesome the program is and how brilliant my students are. However, today I stuffed up…. I did everything today in class that I get on my soap box and scream against.

Let me set the scene - I started today by letting the students know that we were going to look at trends in advertising. I showed them a few clips from the documentary “Merchants of Cool.” After showing the clip I spent 30mins lecturing them on what the clip was about. I tried to engage them in conversation but just lost it and became the old school lecturer. I stopped at the end of the lesson and realised what I had just done was exactly what I can’t stand seeing other teachers do. I disengaged the students with a topic that should have been interesting. I couldn’t believe how I botched up what should have been an exciting learning experience. They all (minus 1 or 2 really polite kids) made it clear through body language etc that the lesson was awful.

My bragging about a connected culture in schools that should be changing the way we teach was all coming back to haunt me. I was such a hypocrite. I know we probably all have these moments. So what does one do to get themselves back on track…. I re-watched this video created by a group of Marco Torres’ proteges…. Digital students in an analog world….

So sit back watch, enjoy, and be re-fired like I was this afternoon….

I am here on the first day of holidays after a great week away at the ITSC conference. A good conference will always inspire educators but I am starting to think these conferences just preach to the choir, reinforce what we all know, or just make us realise that we have every right to be frustrated at the system that we allow to dictate what happens in our classrooms. In fact I was taken back by a statement made by some guests at the conference when reflecting on their own school system - “If it doesn’t make sense they will do it!!” And once again we spend a week - and a substantial amount of personal or school money to be told that we are on the right track. The week was certainly worth every penny of my school’s PD money that got me to this event. But with attitudes that illuminate the truth of the statement above, will our schools actually allow the value of what has been spent be realised? We are now in a system here where our schools must publicly report the dollar figure they are spending on professional development. How does this actually demonstrate that the money is improving teaching and learning? I can see where this will head, we will spend big dollars on PD to keep the system happy, to make sure the correct box is ticked, to send a message to the community that we are serious about teachers being the best they can be, but unfortunately we will more than likely see minimal change in teaching and learning.

Sounds familiar to the reasons why we buy the latest gadgets….. We spend 10’s of thousands of dollars on the latest gadgets so we can be seen as being leaders in education. When in actual fact we fail to prove how any of this money being spent has improved teaching and learning.

In this country we are sitting on the cusp of possible revolutionary change in education. We have a new Government proclaiming we are about to have an “education revolution.” Folk at the conference last week were excited by this and were talking about the discussions to have laptops in the hands of students and teachers as positive and exciting potential changes. However, the skeptic in me can not see a bureaucracy really making a positive change. Why???? Well our education system needs change, but change that is headed by risk takers, people who see the need, know the how and are willing to do what it takes. Governments don’t like the idea of risk, they look for what is popular and change in educational thought is not popular. What is popular is tests, standards being met, declaring that no child will be left behind…. All the crap that gets spun by Government PR campaigns that aren’t worth the paper they are written on. In fact the change we require in our schools will not be popular, it won’t provide photo opportunities for politicians. It will require people that are willing to take a risk, stand up for what is right, make mistakes, learn from their mistakes and hold the needs of teachers and students as the focus of all that happens.

About a year ago I met a school principal who was intrigued by my willingness to express my opinions so publicly… I felt uncomfortable for a moment, thinking he was about to tell me that what I wrote was trash and didn’t do me any favours. In fact it was quite the opposite he was impressed that I was willing to take a risk and put my thoughts out there, and express the disappointment I had with different aspects of education. He encouraged me to continue as it was this kind of activity that encouraged him to seek what his staff were feeling about the profession. He continued to tell me how he ran his timetable each year. He sits his staff down for 5 minutes each and discusses where they feel they could best provide for the school and students. He then asks how the school can help them with PD, class structure etc etc. He then allows the staff to design their own teaching timetable. Actually allowing staff to design their timetable was a massive risk for him….. what if he couldn’t deliver? What if they needed more maths teachers and not enough people wanted to teach maths? Well he promised me that the risk was always worth it, and that it changed the mindset of teachers in his school as they could see they were valued and that the school cared about them as people and as professionals. If he couldn’t deliver on a teacher’s request he would negotiate and work them through the issues, often giving them extra support in areas they were not confident.

To me this didn’t seem like a big risk, but to the principal he knew what the consequence would be if he couldn’t deliver. What inspires me about this is that the attitude here is that while taking this risk may cause a number of problems, the eventual outcome is a change in culture that will be a long term benefit to the school community. The title of a great book I read some years ago sums this all up…. “If you don’t feed the teachers they will eat the students.” You feed the teachers by listening to them and rewarding those who have desire to take risks that will make them better educators and the school a better learning community. We need students to become people who are willing to take risks, yet we create an environment that does the exact opposite.

Unfortunately, I spend these holidays disenchanted by what I have to go back to. What was going to be exciting and potential for great change has been squashed by the system that suffers from serious tunnel vision. Our schools have been taken captive by Government requirements, timetables and other administrative items…. We refuse to encourage creative, risk taking behaviors and go to a system that tries to put everyone in a box. We work in a people business and think lastly of people, we proclaim that educators change lives, yet make sure that everything stays the same. Because I am someone who is capable of teaching mathematics I get given more maths classes…. Nobody seems to worry about the fact that my talents and abilities lie elsewhere. Why??? Because the system needs a maths teacher, the timetable needs a maths teacher and maths teachers are hard to find you know!! Since when does timetabling dictate teaching and learning? I realise there are administrative areas that are painful and hard, but seriously, must we destroy all creative thought that could possibly deliver a better result and generate a system that is dictated to by mere administrative task and procedure? Oh but I guess “If it don’t makes sense they’ll do it!!”

Well I am not going to say much about this….. But basically, I have stopped doing what I was for the past 13months. For reasons I will not be expanding on, I will be moving back toward the school/classroom environment. I am in the midst now of working out where exactly that will be and will be looking for something perminant very soon. I plan to make the most of this situation and look forward to having some more time and freedom to post here more often. Anyone want to give me a job?

For now I thought I would share this video…. This is a true blast from the past…. The Commodore64 commercial from 1984. As soon as I heard the jingle I had flashbacks to my childhood!!

This sums up why working with kids is never dull!!!

An eastern Ohio school district is experimenting with an incentive usually deployed by parents to coax good grades out of students — paying them up to $100 for good performances on state achievement exams.

So what do we think of this? What happens to these kids when they get to university? I can’t picture a university offering similar payouts!! Is this just another wonderful example of what happens when politicians run the education system?

read more | 

Recieved an email from Russ Egan last night requested an interview about my life as an educator.  If you are interested the interview is on his site.

Thanks for the chance to share some thoughts Russ!! 

Blogged with Flock

I have had an extremely busy week and a bit since coming back to work after the Christmas break. I had planned to get a podcast up this week but things got out of control and once again I stopped for a break and wondered “Where did all the time go?” This would probably be the thought that I had time and time again as a classroom teacher. I guess in a different role these days it has come as a surprise to me that I am still wanting to know where all the time has gone.

I started thinking about this last night and how our lives have become so much busier in a world that was supposed to supply technologies that made things easier. This would have to be the main reason I refuse to have a blackberry - Why on earth do I need phone calls, sms messages, and my email coming to me immediately!! When did the device take control of my life? I realise there is the off button that I can press when I get home of an evening - But how many people resist the temptation to just quickly check the latest email?

What an amazing world we are living in and things are going to just get quicker and quicker. I had a very respected colleague advise me recently that I should focus my formal studies in areas other than ed tech as I will “out grow” the ability to keep up with the constant world of change. I really appreciated this advice and have taken it on board to have a think about. However, is it true that we may just all loose the ability to keep up with change? At the age of 27 I think I am doing a pretty good job keeping up so far. What about generation X and Y are they going to grow up challenged by technical change one day as well? Or are they so use to change that it will just be something that is inbuilt for life?

I am starting to think that this is not as much of a generational argument as some may think. I believe it depends more on the persons level of interest or need to keep up with changes. Probably two interesting areas of discussion here…. First of all when does personal interest get taken over by sheer need to survive? All techno educators out there probably got into this game out of a interest in new technologies and a desire to see how they could impact education. However, now that many of us have positions that require us to share and utilise our knowledge and passion of these tools, will it ever get to the point that we struggle to keep up and therefore become irrelevant?

This final point is why I believe we need to make ICT and technology in learning all about learning and the learner. There is still a problem with teachers focusing on the gadget or the technology. If we try and simply keep up with technical change, we will eventually do ourselves out of a job - or we will get to the point of hating our job. However, if we continue to focus on the learning and creating a great learning environment, we will quite easily keep up with the change because it will just come naturally as another enhancement in great learning. This is why my award for greates PD of 2006 goes to Education.au - They get it - other conferences that have been around much longer don’t get it at all!! Too many techno nerds that think a PDA or a Smart Board will save the day!!! Then there are the strange agenda driven folk who spend entire conference sessions trying to tell us that we need to spend time worrying aobut girls in ICT!!! Oh please how about we just focus on the learner instead of who is doing what subject at school…. Did it ever dawn on any of these folk that maybe each learner is different and a large part of 50% of our population may not be interested in the subject of ICT (Computer programing). AHHHHH Those people frustrate me!!!! Hopefully most teachers have an interest in learning and the learner. Let’s keep it simple instead of worrying about what tool does what and who has the greatest version of what. There is my 2007 new years resolution - The rule of KISS - Keep it simple stupid!!

Blogged with Flock

Well once again I have been hit by a great conversation going on Dave
Warlick’s blog. His
recent post on teaching young students about the authority of source is a mind spinner. I don’t want to take away for the conversation on his blog, but this has raised a few issues in my mind that have been floating around upstairs for the last week or so. I just haven’t had the nerve or the time to write them down and float the ideas out there.

Those who know me well, would know that my Christian faith is very important to me. My world view is one of Christian Theism and given that I see the world through my personal faith in Jesus Christ all my opinions and thoughts come from that very underpinning of my life.
So….. what has this got to do with ed tech and this new information age? A question that I have asked myself for quite some time. And I think I am starting to see the link…. Bare with me here…..

In Dave’s post the question of teaching students to evaluate what is true has come up. Many folk have commented and given their own personal stories and how they feel we should be teaching students to think. As I look at these examples I am quickly realising that it all comes down to what is true and how do I see the world? This is an age old question but an even
more hard hitting question in this the age of overwhelming access to information. How can we expect young children to decide what is true and not true if we have a society that teaches us that truth is what ever you want it to be? Actually the very fact that I would suggest that this issue boils down to worldview and a need to have an understanding of worldview and or truth will turn people right off reading this blog. We live in a society that says don’t question any bodies opinion because they have the right to believe what they want.

My theory that I am going to throw out here is that without an understanding of absolute truth we can not expect anyone to honestly have the ability to accurately evaluate the truth or untruth of information. In fact we are heading into an age of complete access to all information and students today have an amazing amount of information available to them. Yes we need to teach the basic skills to work through the information, but what happens when we get to the heart questions of life and quickly get stuck on what we can and can’t believe?

Yes I realise the bleeding hearts out there would cry “separation of church and state” but if you have a real understanding of what that means you will quickly realise that it is impossible to separate church or worldview and state. If we don’t teach a set of solid values to students we teach humanism, which essentially is a worldview that says do what ever you feel is
right. If you are going to teach children in the information age that we are in and think that you can teach such deductive and deep philosophical skills without having a solid underpinning of values and how you see the world, I don’t see how it can work.

The debate on how we can get kids to understand what is true when there is so much information out there for them will ultimately fall back on our personal worldview and how we see the world. Yes we will teach some great basic skills to help with determining which source is correct and which is not but that is not a life long skill that can apply to everything. If the role
of education is to prepare children for life, then what life are we preparing them for when they have no set of values to base their worldview on.

Technology raises so many issues in schools these days, with everything from bullying on myspace to hacking a system. What is really starting to bother me, is that we as educators spend so much time talking about how we can educate the students to make sure that they don’t abuse the power given to them through technology, when it boils down to teaching young people what is right and wrong. If we have a world of no absolutes and more and more power and
access is given to young people then what hope have we got of things getting any better?

So go ahead and continue the conversation….. Am I off the track…. I don’t think so but the beauty of the age we live in is that folk can easily discuss and learn together.

technorati tags:brettmoller

Blogged with Flock

Ok so I am going to get the ball rolling here.  I am going to post some issues that I think would be a great discussion for any upcoming skypecasts.  What an amazing professional development tool this could very quickly become.  Let’s share ideas and see what is possible. 

So here are some of my ideas….. comment and let me know what you would like to be involved in and then I will organise time that suits everyone. 

1)  Technology in learning programs…..  What technologies enhance learning in your curriculum and how does it make the learning program or curriculum better. 

2)  Student access to technologies.  A look at what students are using today and how that could be integrated into thier learning.

3)  What are the characteristics of a 21st century learning program or curriculum?

4)  What skills do teachers need to teach this generation of studnets?

5)  Digital citenzenship….  What should we be teaching students?  Who is responsible to teach them responsible digital citenzenship?

Perhaps we could discuss these 5 points in the next skypecast?  Or should we just focus on one or two?  Any other ideas?

This is exciting stuff!!!!  Once I have some responses I will post a skypecast time and date.

Blogged with Flock