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23 March 2007
March Newsletter
Prague reports: Etopia: the dawn of an electronic democracy
Here is the link to the Guardian article which was published on 20th March. It is a generous account of our mission by Sean Dodson who also covered our work in South Africa. The line I liked best was “There’s no talk of targets or standards, or tests, just ideals and ideas.” I hope members will read the article to gain a better impression of what can be gained from attending a workshop.
Drew Buddy has also filed a members’ report. He attended thanks to a bursary from Oracle. Drew starts his report, “There is no doubt about the fact that one learns more in the company of friends than one does in isolation”. He also described the FutureLab bid he has put in as a result of the workshop which uses some exciting new technologies.
For those who could not attend, there are some pictures from the workshop. We hope to publish more of the schools next month.
ICT CPD at Naace
This year John Cuthell and I organised the ICT Continuing Professional Development (CPD) theme for the Naace conference that took place in Torquay this February. Naace is an English professional association for those concerned with advancing education through the appropriate use of information and communications technology (ICT). About ten members of MirandaNet are also members of Naace.
Some of the delegates followed our strand throughout. In the plenary they expressed a view about the use of ICT in schools which MirandaNetters will recognise. In the first place they cited key barriers in some schools as teachers' lack of time, poor technical support, the lack of effective ICT CPD programmes and assessment which does not value the impact of ICTs in learning. However, what they agreed overwhelmingly was that lack of vision for learning was the reason why the take up of ICT and results are still so poor in about 75% of schools. Communities of practice for professionals were seen as a key way of changing attitudes.
Running this strand on ICT CPD was part of researching into the ICT CPD experience of the members of Naace, MirandaNet and ITTE. Our hypothesis here is that many people who are charged with teaching other teachers about ICT have had very little support themselves in any formal way. This is why communities of professionals like MirandaNet are so important.
In the conference John and I were concentrating on the achievements we have seen in the use of practice-based research for whole school CPD. Richard Millwood opened the theme by talking about the practice-based ICT CPD models that he and Stephen Heppell used to run at Ultralab. Niel McLean, Becta, talked about multimodality and Vanessa Pittard, Becta, looked at the research that has been published about effective ICT CPD. Again, practice-based research came out very well. Tim Tarrant talked about Effective Models for ICT CPD with examples from UK teachers who joined him. Byron Evans, Adviser, RTU explained how teachers’ communities have been developed in Northern Ireland based on project work.
We also invited several senior managers and teachers from MirandaNet to present practice-based models that seem to be working in schools. You will find more about these presentations in the report: John Cuthell and Dai Thomas on ICT CPD – The MirandaNet Model: David Litchfield on Managing Information, Managing Change: Jane Finch, Primary adviser, There’s more to IT than just ‘getting someone in’, Mark Bennison, Vice Principal at Westminster Academy on Developing a Global Citizenship and Enterprise Agenda through ICT Underpinned CPD: Michael Smith, the Professional Development Coordinator, Forest School, Snaresbrook, who described his own CPD journey in ICT to bring out strategic issues and offer an opportunity for future thinking.
The final presentation mentioned in the report is Roger Broadie’s project for Naace “Practically Transforming Learning” offers teachers a web space where they can go for instant information on running leading-edge practice based projects. We will be in touch with Fellows for support on building this knowledge base.
John Cuthell and I are currently working on the whole staff ICT CPD programmes with Westminster Academy, London and Castle View School, Sunderland. Teachers from both these schools came to Prague. Do get in touch with us if you would like us to advise on ICT CPD programmes in your school as well.
Christina Preston
John Cuthell
www.mirandanet.ac.uk/profdev/naace_cpd.htm
News from Bangladesh
Shahjahan Siraj, a member, writes from Bangladesh.
UnnayanNews is a multimedia and development webzine that actively promotes human rights and development matters through its issue based publications and list serving .Its an independent non-political platform and South Asian first online multimedia journalism initiative. Along with news dissemination and story telling, it does advocacy for majority access to information and democratic participation in development process that profoundly impact to solve the digital divide, poverty alleviation and human rights development as well as to establish the desired harmonious, peaceful information society. Initially it will publish quaternary with local and regional contents.
UnnayanNews is a not for profit making project of Machizo, a Dhaka based social entrepreneurial multimedia and communication organization. Along with multimedia journalism and human rights promotion, UnnayanNews is engaged in action-oriented research, knowledge management, local content creation.
As the "UnnayanNet " did not get legal permission, please use the name "machizo" instead of UnnayanNet.
Shahjahan Siraj
Any more International news?
No Jam tomorrow (or, after the 20th)
Just in case you missed it, the BBC is suspending Jam from March 20th.
Read the full BBC story and see the press release.
We’d be interested to hear peoples' views about this.
A view from a Naace member was, “I think it's an opportunity for the BBC to go back to what it should have been doing all the time - exploiting their broadcast/factual/archive materials for the benefit of all learners, not trying to compete with the rest of the industry”.
New Scholars
Sangeet Bhullar
When I qualified as an engineer, the Internet was in its infancy. Over the last 10 years, I have been fortunate to find my true passion, which is the promotion of Internet and web technologies in the education, youth, community and business sectors. I believe that ICTs offer vital tools for learning, personal, community, business and economic growth. I believe strongly in the need for Internet literacy programmes that address questions like how the Internet works, what different domain names mean, laws online, better searching, organising online information. However, more than this, I feel we need to be proactively encouraging a better understanding of new technologies including web 2.0 type technologies like blogging, social networks, RSS feeds, podcasting, social bookmarks, web-based office type applications and voip solutions like Skype, which provide us with newer ways of connecting to the world, learning, networking, socialising, accessing specialised communities, entertainment and information. Only then will we create a vibrant knowledge economy. I am a member of two Welsh Assembly Government advisory groups (one on large community programme on digital inclusion) as well as the Institute of Engineering and Technology. In April 2006, I was appointed a member of the BBC’s Broadcasting (now Audience) Council for Wales.
Christopher Elliott
We live in a digital world where information is communicated by people using complex technology. In education we have an opportunity to help the young explore many different routes by giving them the signposts and road skills that enable them to travel down these paths. We can help them develop the skills needed to analyse a companies finances, predict the weather, produce special effects for movies, build systems that organise the information for millions of people; the list is endless.
But there are many dangerous rivers and chasms to cross for us all. The digital world is becoming the new drug of obsession for many of our youngsters, in particular boys. We can sit back and let our young use wizards, templates and standard clip art negating the joys of working creatively and we can all too easily be fooled by cheating and misguidance. So we must be vigilant.
How can we influence our students well?
Improve our own knowledge
Ask them to be creative
Give tight briefs that allow them to develop within boundaries
Explain well
Respect and nurture the kids,
Jim Fanning
I am assistant headteacher at Tideway, a secondary school of 650 students on the south coast of England, near the city of Brighton. Tideway was an early adopter of learning platform/VLE technologies (a pilot programme using think.com was set up in 2003, with a commercial product - Fronter - being purchased in 2004). The results of our work into the use of VLEs in the classroom can be found at www.learningplatforms.info .
I am particularly interested in the ways in which this technology has the potential to 'change' pedagogy and school structures. I completed a MEd in Technology Enhanced Learning at Stirling University in 2005 and started a PhD in Professional Educational Studies at Sussex University in 2006. The focus for my research is the use of the collaborative tools on a VLE - message forums, chat areas - by secondary age students and the ways in which these enhance student achievement.
Shalni Gulati
My research focus is on higher education student experiences of e-learning technologies. As a Churchill Fellow, I investigated the drivers and reflections of online learning developments in eight higher education institutions in the USA. This followed my doctoral study at City University London. I investigated how learners constructed meaning during eight online postgraduate courses that emphasised participation in online discussions. It showed that online communication tools enabled some learners to gain a sense of control over their learning, while leaving others feeling isolated and excluded.
Currently, at the University of Oxford I am publishing my research findings and developing proposals to explore the learning experiences of students in different higher education contexts, in different disciplines, that employ online communication tools including Web 2.0 technologies and Second Life. My aim is to extend the understanding of the conditions that give rise to different levels of control due to communication technologies use in higher learning.
Alex Phillips
I have had the ICT bug since playing around with my father's first computer in the early eighties, a Commodore Pet. I've taught now for 13 years, mostly DT but have always had some ICT in the mix somewhere. Now Head of ICT & DT, and moving shortly to a new position responsible for whole school ICT. Completed a Master's degree recently and am looking at the next step involving research into independent learning and ICT in schools.
Alex Savage
I'm an AST and SSAT Lead Practioner in ICT. This means that I have time out of my teaching to do outreach work in other schools, create resources, write research articles and give training.
ICT is still only a baby subject, but it is growing rapidly. The majority of ICT teachers still don’t have any qualifications in this core subject (me included). Meanwhile, our students are rapidly becoming more advanced in using ICT effectively than we are.
I’m interested in finding out what skills and understanding we should actually be teaching our students. How should we prepare them for living in the real and the virtual world?
A lot of my work is focussed on ways to bring the real world into the curriculum, especially through the use of web based technology.
I strongly believe that our curriculum should be more about discovering the real world and learning about how to communicate with real people. ICT has the potential to empower students to do both these things. However, far too often students are asked to anaylse fake data, research imaginary places and create documents for audiences that do not exist.
For me, there are two main ways of enhancing the curriculum with a global dimension:
1. Providing students with real life issues and real people for them to gather information from
2. Giving students’ work a real purpose by communicating their ideas to a real audience
By enabling students to engage more with the real world through their learning, they see a clearer purpose to what they are doing. This leads to greater motivation and better results.
Our current students will become global citizens in ways that we cannot begin to imagine. All we can do as educators is guide them along the first few steps of their journey.
Tony Sheppard
As an educational technologist I constantly look for new ways that ICT can have an impact on all learners within educational environments. I have been lucky enough to work in 2 innovative schools where I have been able to find some of these ways.
I am also a regular on many mailing lists and forums of technologists, technicians and teachers. My principle role in this is as one of the Site Admins for EduGeek.net.
I have worked on a number of working parties at local and national level, and presently have a strong interest in learning platforms and the personalisation agenda.
Gavin Stone
I have always used ICT since I qualified as a primary teacher back in 1999. Whilst teaching in inner-city London, I was one of the first people nationally to pass the NOF ICT qualification and my school was at the forefront of the introduction of interactive whiteboards. Since then, I have led ICT in international schools in Saudi Arabia, Macau and Italy, using a range of IWB's in these schools. Summer 2006 saw me return home to the UK, where I took on the role of Head of Whole School ICT at Lanesborough School, Guildford. The role is my perfect job: as well as leading and devising methods of staff training, I am overseeing the development and use of IWB technology and leading the implementation of ICT across the whole school. I am also bringing Moodle, blogs and other wonderful things into the lives of the boys I teach.
Beverley Tose
I am a recently appointed Head of MFL Department at Castle View School in the north east of England. I spent twelve years at different school within the same authority, five years of which I was Deputy Head of Department. The opportunity arose to apply for Curriculum Leader at a more challenging school in the same authority. Senior Management were looking for someone to completely overhaul the MFL Department which had seen little change in thirty years. I was appointed and intend to do just that!
Although I have little experience of teaching ICT, I see the need to enhance pupils' education through new technologies. The world has become a much smaller place due to increased internet access and the ability to find out much more about the world at the touch of a button.
I wish to increase motivation and achievement through the use of ICT. The creation of international contact schools will develop the pupil's cultural awareness and understanding of the world in which they live.
New Members
Emma Binyon
I am in charge of business education at a secondary school (11-16 years) in Sunderland. The school is a business and enterprise college so as well as being responsible for delivering examinable courses at KS4, I am also responsible for delivering enterprise to all year groups and also in our local feeder schools.
Stephen Bryce
I would like to become a member to help me with my Chartered teacher studies.
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