The Fantastic Blog Experiment

See: Technology skills for life beyond school

Pander Pondering’s post regarding technology skills for life beyond school has challenged me to question whether ICT will begin to play a larger role in the primary school curriculum in the future?

It is readily acknowledged in the field of education that technology is changing the way we teach, but is it also becoming time we start considering that the rise of technology may also begin to impact upon what we teach? Only time will tell if the advanced technology skills required by many jobs today will be able to be embedded into teaching and learning practice as is the current method for the majority if ICT learning. But I believe it is quite possible that the current curriculum is going to have to be reworked in order to adequately prepare students for today’s workforce and the workforce of the future.

EM

Having just read chapter 1 of ‘Meaningful learning with Technology’ and discovering My Feeds… reflection upon that same chapter “Meaningful learning with technology” Jonassen. et al. I  have come to recognises that technology has the potential to be used as a tool to  attach meaning  to lessons. Janassen et al state that “in order for students to learn meaningfully, they must be willfully engaged in a meaningful task”. I believe appropriate use of ICT is able to generate this engagement as well as attach meaning to tasks for students, especially in this day and age, as students generally find ICT enjoyable and they are so accustomed with involving it in their everyday lives that they can easily recognise the tasks have practical applications for their future.

EM

Reference:

Jonassen, D., Howland, J., Marra, R. & Crismond, D. (2008). Meaningful Learning with Technology (3rd edition) . New Jersey: Pearson Publishing, pp. 1-12

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A recent article titled Students without boarders by ISTE discusses the concept of global collaborative learning through using technologies such as web conferencing and wikis to connect students with peers in other countries and cultures.

The writers discus the benefits of using technology to engage students in such learning environments where they can work with others around the world on projects. “It is about building relationships and achieving authentic, meaningful learning” say the writers. I think the use of  common ICT tools in this way has great potential for creating motivating and meaningful lessons for students. In reading this article I was also pleased to learn that networks currently exist to assist classes and schools to build these types of learning relationship internationally; such as the International Education and Resource Network  iEARN and TakingITGlobal.

I believe this of use of ICT in the classroom is fantastic, as it does not involve ICT for the sake of it but uses ICT to enrich students learning experiences. This is definitely something I plan on using when I begin my teaching career.

EM

In the Monocle Chronical’s recent post titled Talking Technology (Laptops in NSW Schools) they discus the governments recent distribution of laptops to year 9 students.

I believe this is a positive step for the use of technology in teaching as it means every student will have equal access to computers and equal access to the benefits this technology offers. On the the other hand, I also believe this iniative will be a learning curve for our education system and I am be interesting to see what is learned from this over the coming years.

Will this technology result in higher student achievement? Will teachers be supported and trained to make the most of this technology and integrate it into daily teaching and learning practice? Will students truly value and take proper care of this equipment? These and many other questions will be answered over the coming years as this initiative is trialed and tested, and while this is a fantastic step in the right direction regarding the use of ICT, it may well produce some new challenges to be addressed over the coming years.

EM

I have just been reading an article from the UK’s Guardian newspaper which can be viewed here Pupils to study Twitter…

The article discusses current proposals to overhaul the UK’s primary school curriculum in order to make more room to include, amongst other things, more modern media and web-based learning with such associated requirements as students becoming familiar with blogging, podcasts, Wikipedia and even Twitter.

As a future teacher this idea of making the latest web based information and communication tools part of the curriculum sits uneasily and raises many questions, such as:

- With the rapidly changing face of technology how do we decide what applications to teach?

- Should we jump on board with the latest web based information or communication technology or will it prove to be a passing fad?

- With so many similar applications which one should we use and endorse?

- Is the act of learning a new application worthwhile in itself as a means of enforcing the fact ICT is always changing and evolving so therefore its users must also?

I believe questions such as these are healthy ones to be asking, espesialy of future teachers. I would be very interested to hear other people’s thoughts on the article and my questions?

EM

Here’s a short podcast to welcome you to the Fantastic Blog Experiment.

EM

Virtual Learning Spaces

Northern Beaches Christian School has a 3D Virtual World called ‘Booralie Island’ in which students are able to communicate with each other, create new parts of the island and participate in structured lessons.

When I first heard of this virtual learning space and its use in the classroom I was somewhat hesitant of its educational value, but after watching the above video presentation I quickly saw that it has great value as an educational tool and I was really  impressed by the opportunities it offers students as they use this space to create, explore, share, work in teams, and even role-play real life jobs such as running small businesses and town planning. I was also impressesed at how structured learning experiences could be outworked through this space – from mathematics lessons on measurement and mapping skills to class discussions and debates.  Overall this learning space is a very impressive example of things to come and would be a very useful and motivating tool in the classroom.

EM