August 26, 2008 – 2:31 pm
The world is characterised by change….and the rate of change is increasing!! Over the next 25 years, there will be 10 years worth of progress….over the next 100 years there will be 20,000 years of progress. Will there be a genZ? What does it mean to future proof? What does productivity look like?
Martin spoke about a world (eg Google led) of information rich where capabilities and capacities are king over content and specific skills. Leaders of business need to decide if they want a ‘back to basics’ or a ‘lifelong learner’ approach to the workplace.
Digital Nomadism describes workers who are using web 2.0 based tools for information sharing and socialisation. They shun email!! But Martin spoke about virtual distance in which shared values, trust and relatonships may not be as effective as face to face. So we need to use technology in a way which enhances relationships.
And using technology doesn’t always improve productivity…..Martin spoke about the importance of face to face communications for certain work activities (eg starting a project, performance reviews) and where technology compliments communications which have been grounded (ie shared sense of understanding) and how newer technologies are providing a richer medium to achieve understanding in conversations.
August 26, 2008 – 11:23 am
Martin warns that the concept of personalisation (Futurelab (UK) explores this concept) may turn into delivering curriculum by profiling. That is you may be categorised as a visual, aural or kinesthetic learner and material will be delivered to you based on some form of categorisation. This is not personalisation.
‘Brainology’ illustrates the flexible nature of intelligence through the awareness of brain plasticity. The brain is malleable and learning experiences will affect the connections in the brain.
Martin describes the concept of executive functions as a focus on process rather than content in learning. It includes activities such as planning, shifting(switching attention), inhibition(stop distraction), working memory(build on ideas), decision making.
He says that kids know smoking is not good for them, but they can’t control (inhibition) one or some of their execuitive functions. He says that the executive function is a bit like a rider riding an elephant. We need to get our kids to control their executive functions, like the rider on an elephant takes control of the elephant.
Martin says there is lots of opportunity to use technology to explore executive functions, but can we help kids improve their control of executive functions? He showed a pre-school progam in th US called the Tools of the Mind. A curriculum that promotes executive function. Martin says that executive functions are central to our day-to-day lives and can be improved through education.
August 26, 2008 – 10:42 am
Martin’s experience and expertise is in neuroscience. He says that the brain grows by the growth of the connections between cells and these connections reflect our experience. It’s the personalisation of the brian. (150 trillion). He says that repetition uses the connections and the pathways for the connections, but that emotion plays an important role in laying down these connections. This is most important when kids become anxious about say learning maths. Chemicals may prevent these connections communicating. The forming of new connections and the breaking of the connections occur all the time. This is what we call plasticity.
Martin described how the world has changed, how the technology has changed, how the kids have changed, but our system has not changed…or at least not very much. In fact, they respond in a negative way to the technology but recognise the significant power of technology to change. He says that kids have responded by using the internet to avoid work. See this link ‘Cheats prevented’. Martin says that the internet is used by kids for socialistion and not information finding only.
Martin says that ‘it’s not the technology that changes the way that you think - its about you and what you do with it’.
Martin says that the myth that technology replaces existing behaviours (eg reading) is not true. The kids use technology to enhance their normal experiences. He also suggested that when you go to a surgeon don’t ask how many operations have you done before, but what is your highest score in Monkey Balls 2. He says that there is evidence to suggest that gaming does improve a surgeon’s ability. He says games have a massive amount of information that the user needs to take in and demand a high capacity for attention. They develop attentional capacity!! This is why Mark Prensky rightly says ‘kids go to school to powerdown’
More to come later….Garry
August 22, 2008 – 3:49 pm
I have had a long recess of late and this is hopefully my return to regular blogging………
Ewan McIntosh’s recent post about Charles Leadbeater’s ‘Remixing Cities, Remixing Learning’ in which he describes schools as providing learning spaces in three concentric circles. The inner circle describes the role of the school as a physical place for learners to meet with teachers, learn from each other, mix with the community which may include enterprises. The next layer is called the social learning space, where people create networks and use networks for learning. The outer layer is the marketplace where services for education would be easily accessible such as the e-bay for learning.
This builds on my view that in today’s world those people who are networkers and organisations that are networked will have a competitive advantage. We have moved beyond the days of knowledge management which was create a document, put some metadata around, deposit in a database/LAN and never find it again!! In today’s world in which knowledge is far more dynamic its the connections in our networks where the value really lies and so the knowedge networks have come of age.
Ah to be short and sweet..bye for now!!
Alan Hird, Director, Professional Learning Team at the Department of Education, Employment, and workplace relations (DEEWR) spoke about the relationships that have been developed to govern the DER. He spoke particularly about the Australian ICT in Education Committee (AICTEC) which is taking responsibility for determining the priorities for the spend of the DER. AICTEC is establishing a sub-committee to look at professional development. This committee called ‘Teaching for a Digital Age’ will take carriage of professional development priorities. Alan indicated that a survey undertaken by Monash University in 2006 indicated that approx 20% of teachers want to know how better to interact with parents, and more recent survey indicated this had grown to over 80% of teachers.
But teachers want is not necessarily a top down approach. They are looking for support to enable a grassroots up revolution as well. A revolution that helps then to ‘connect’ with the community, their kids and engage them in learning that is authentic and relevant. This is not a one size fits all approach, in fact its very much about personalised learning.
Thanks to Derek Wenmouth, who linked to a resource ‘100 helpful web 2.0 tools for every kind of learner’ where the authors have arranged tools according to learning style. We need more of these types of resources that help students and teachers choose the appropriate tool for the appropriate learning situation. A web tool wizard for teachers and students.
education.au is holding a national symposium on e-portfolios today. We have just seen four presentations alluding to the fact that e-portfolios at an institution level are already used significantly. However, as Jerry Leeson pointed out, if the web is shifting to a more learner centred mode, then the e-portfolio world is very complex from a learner’s perspective. At each point they enter an institution they are likely to require a new identity, start from scratch in terms of achievements, acrreditation and qualifications, and then when they leave have some difficulty taking a record of their new found skills with them. Given the focus on productivity, human capital and digtal literacy it seems that these tools would be a very useful way to assist lifelong leaners. But as I said it’s complex and our role should be about making it simple, removing the barriers to learner’s access and control of their learning.
What we are seeking today is some direction for achieving simplicity for the learner. Interestingly, a survey undertaken by education.au suggested the driver was not necessarily the learner. This is such a new tool, perhaps learners are not aware that they may already be leaving their digital footprint on the internet. (eg facebook, linkedin)
The powerpoints are available on the education.au website.
Mark Pesce is the keynote for the ACER/education.au symposium. He speaks of the generation gap between those wacky kids and those well meaning adults. He has now made his speech available on video and in text.
In my presentation I show a video of people building a plane while they are flying the plane. Its a nice metaphor for what we have been doing for sometime. We seem to be making it up as we go along. That seems appropriate given the fast pace at which the technology and the world is moving at the moment.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=t39EAeE8ehc
A key issue that arose in my presentation is what is needed for a grassroots revolution by the teachers. Time is a barrier. What was gratifying was the very good use of technology by the schools. Two things strike me. Teachers undervalue the great work they are doing! Few see the need to share this with others (giving the time poor condition.)
My call is for teachers to become networkers and use technology to save time. Do it once and share with many was the mantra from the principal from Ringwood.
I have been reflecting on Mark Pesce’s talk where he speaks of ‘Those Wacky Kids’ and the ‘mutants’ , that is us, and how we need to bridge the generational gap. Fundamentally, kids get engaged in learning when their intrinsic motivation is high. So what sparks intrinsic motivation? Learning that relates to life and arouse curiosity, allow students a degree of control, and provide challenging and collaborative tasks. So we need to understand these wacky kids in order to link into the characteristics that increase motivation and engagement. Their world is a very different and more complex one. As Mark says we are the change agents and that is a very privileged and important position for educators to be in and the goverment recognises the importance of this position through increased funding of the DER.
Read about Mark’s comments here.
Daniel Owen (Branch Manager, Professional Learning), opened the symposium describing how the DER is based in an economic and social inclusion agenda and how this provided strong support from governments for financial backing.
There are five elements ;
- National Secondary School Computer Fund
- Broadband Infrastructure, Fibre to schools - Connecting schools.
- Online Curriculum Content
- Portals for Parents
- Assistance for schools in the deployment of ICT.
For more information, the www.digitaleducationrevolution.gov.au site contains more information.
Mark Pesce’s (how did he get this gig??) presentation was titled ‘Those Wacky Kids’. He spoke of the aliens, our kids in schools, who use technology in quite different ways to those ‘Well Meaning Adults’. Mark argues that the classroom is disconnected from the realities of the students. He argues that the first step in the revolution was to engage with the wacky kids. He says that there is a argument that kids see school as less relevant than their life experience and this is not the way to raise the next generation of leaders for Australia.
Mark showed his connections with his fellow ‘twitteratis’ and how last night he was encouraged to watch the Eurovision contest because of the funny comments he was getting from his fellow twitteratis. The comments were funnier in context.
This shows the power of the ‘C’ in ICT. Connections, collaboration, capability and capacity building in a more democratic world. Our role is to be change agents. Use the technology ourselves to share lessons learned and not be the immigrants and become the students.
