What do YOUR books do while your asleep?!

And I’ll be sharing the joy on my Reviews in 140 reading list. Just turn the page to view…..

“What’s wrong with education cannot be fixed with technology…No amount of technology will make a dent…. You’re not going to solve the problems by putting all knowledge onto CD-ROMs. We can put a website in every school – none of this is bad. It’s bad only if it lulls us into thinking we’re doing something to solve the problem with education.”  (Steve Jobs, Apple CEO, Wired magazine, 1998)

Hands-up all those of you with a box of painstakingly drawn OHTs (=overhead transparencies, Google it if you’ve never seen them) or a beautifully tidy cupboard of VHS tapes, preserved on dusty shelves and neatly catalogued? I’ve got a few of those tapes knocking about at home – the six year old’s scan at 20 weeks, my first bungee jump, a few ‘80s movies (big hair! Big shoulder pads!). All of these are testament to a bygone era when OHT was cutting edge, and VHS was the way we all recorded film for posterity. Their poor, sad, dusty selves are testament, too, to the speed at which technology changes around us, developing incrementally at speeds never before seen. Top YouTube hits like ‘Shift Happens’  reflects this move, as does this infographic comparing the internet of 1996 and today [too large to reproduce here].

Schools would be forgiven for feeling overwhelmed by the task of keeping up with each new development. No sooner have we purchased interactive whiteboards, then laptops are in. We’ve just bought the laptops, and now iPads are de rigeur. Don’t buy that textbook, you can just download the e-version. How will you make the most of broadband on your doorstep? We would be forgiven, too, for feeling somewhat at the mercy of the technology corporations who seek to market each new device as the solution for educators. Certainly, Oppenheimer (1997)[1], Cuban (2001)[2] and Postman (2000)[3] have all explored the idea of schools being aggressively sold technology on the premise of improved results, efficiency, and the urgent need to prepare students for the digital future. There are certainly plenty of e-cheerleaders around to urge us on. And similar movements happened with the advent of radio, of film, of TV…

So, how can we keep our heads when others around us are losing theirs? Especially if they have the keys to the budget, to your professional development, or to your schools’ charter?

To future-proof a school, in terms of technology and ICTs, seems like an impossible task in which we are forever Lewis Carroll’s White Rabbit, racing against time.

What do we mean by ‘future-proofing’?

I think it’s important not to think of future-proofing as making decisions so sound that they won’t need to be changed.

But in the context of schooling, I would suggest that future-proofing is understanding that we have always lived in changeable times, and that schools need systems, processes and people in a state of preparedness to anticipate developments, to respond to possible challenges and to embrace opportunities. Sound curriculum and effective pedagogy may change, but we don’t have to update to a new version of these every few weeks. Much of what we know about effective schooling, change management and leadership is supported by sound, longitudinal, international research; this is our rock to cling to when the waves of technological change threaten to swamp us.

As the title of this piece asserts, we need carpentry for tomorrow, not a hammer for today[4]. In other words, we should think in terms of fostering schools’ reflexivity and students’ competencies for a changing future, not (just) to manage a single task for today.

If schools are to think about future-proofing themselves to manage the technological developments ahead, they need the capability to review what they can already do, understand where they want to go next and plan how to get there, as part of an on-going cycle of review and reflection.

So….how we might future-proof ourselves? Here are five thoughts to get you started…..

1.     Keep the New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga o Aotearoa as our touchstones

These are our foundation documents for visioning, strategic planning, curriculum development and pedagogical design. If this is the starting point for decision-making, schools can feel sure that the rationale behind their choices, during periods of change, is more justified than making decisions on gut-feeling or because the school down the road is doing it.

2.     Inquire, inquire, inquire

A school that is flexible, secure in its processes and strategy is one that can respond to change in an uncertain environment. The inquiry model (adapted for the Best Evidence Synthesis series) is one that has permeated through resources on leadership, professional development and quality teaching, because it is crucial that schools, and teachers, can reflect and review on what they do, based on evidence purposely gathered. Again, decisions can be made based on firm foundations, not spur of the moment hunches.

3.     Build capability to use technologies effectively for teaching and learning

Part of a schools’ inquiry into how it is progressing might be done using a self-review tool (an e-capability model) and there are several to choose from, depending on your focus. The Ministry of Education is currently developing e-Learning Planning Framework for use in schools in 2012. The Māori-medium framework will be scoped in 2012, for possible development and use in 2013.

This framework will be a planning tool to help all teachers and organisations in New Zealand undertake a self-review of how effectively they use ICTs to enhance students’ learning (their e-capability).  The framework will provide a ‘road map’ for schools to identify where they are, the practical steps they can take, and relevant information or services to support them. Key areas of focus include the way e-learning can be enhanced through: leadership, professional learning, teaching and learning, digital citizenship, connections to the community, and technologies/infrastructure.

4.     Keep your finger on the pulse

Change is certain – but what is not so certain is how much we know about what is changing around us. This is where keeping in touch comes in – and technology can make this efficient and accessible. Teachers and school leaders can build their personal/professional learning networks (PLNs) to connect with other schools and clusters. Where to start?:

• Subscribe to useful news feeds and blogs using RSS/Google Reader.
• Participation in forums and online communities, such as Enabling e-Learning communities, can provide a flexible space to share ideas, resources and aspects of our practice.
• Build your PLN.

5.     Foster digital citizens

Can we future-proof our students? This is where the Key Competencies comes in – and, through a digital lens, these can be described as competencies for digital citizenship. Through effective curriculum planning and teaching, we can enhance students’ abilities to behave with integrity and responsibility online, build their digital literacy skills and maximize the opportunities online safely.

• Find out more on Digital Citizenship on Netsafe’s Learn-Guide-Protect site.

Further reading: New Zealand

• Future proofing schools: Emerging technologies.
• CORE Ten Trends: The ‘big ideas’ in technology of which New Zealand educators should be aware.
• The Horizon Report 2011: Synthesises short, medium and long-term trends in technology development.
• Future proofing our web 2.0 students
• Future-proofing our education system.

Further reading: International

• Making your schools future-proof
• How to future-proof our schools.

This journey towards my Masters started back in 1992, when I was a fresh-faced student, just qualified with my BA Hons in English/Euro Literature (mais oui!). I had been accepted to complete my Masters in Shakespearean studies (oh, the romance of it all, I thought at the time!).

But when I asked the bank manager for a loan, the conversation went something like this:

Him, smiling: “Congratulations on being accepted to pursue a Masters. So, what subject will you be exploring?”

Me, as excited and keen as only a twenty-something can be: “English – Shakespeare actually”.

Him, smile fading: ” And what job would that be leading to? Any ideas?”

Me, feeling less excited than 10 seconds ago: “Er…hadn’t really thought about it. But I love English. And Shakespeare. A lot.”

Him, sternly and with an air of a man who knows his business: “Well, if it were Maths or Science, no problem. But there’s not much call for jobs with an English background. So I’m afraid we won’t be able to lend you the funds for your studies.”

Ad that was it. I waited another 16 years until I had an opportunity to try again. And this time, I chose Education. Plenty of work in them there hills.

I’ve now finished the Research Methods course (and the other four papers before that). And it wasn’t so bad. In fact, that ‘dull’ paper was hugely rewarding, and I wasn’t the only student on the course who thought so.

And if you give me a sec, I’ll be able to think of why it’s the best paper you can study if you’re in education.

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Image source:  Some rights reserved by Bas.K

• Social media was foregrounded in the bigger picture, the context of the development of the web, all the way from the O’Reilly’s brain through the ‘happy ugly’ of MySpace (great video from Ze Frank) to the exciting possibilities of today’s social web for both learners and teachers.
• Great images: always more powerful to use a visual metaphor than a bunch of bullets.
• Big, fat philosophy. Open, sharing, enthusiastic advocacy for the power of the collective. Social media as digital dialogue that can be efficiently managed so we can choose to hear our favourite signals amidst the noise.
• Humour. Laughs. Wry self-deprecation.
• Great collection of tweets all the way through…

The six-year-old had a lesson on banking today from a well-known Southern Hemisphere bank. Let’s call it the Absolutely Solid Bank, for argument’s sake. She came home, all excited about a cash-gobbling monster stomping through stories with a salutary message: ‘Zoom to your needs, and wait for your wants.’ No argument from me thus far.

But then we argued…sorry, strongly discussed…the need for her to then wear a tattoo emblazoned with the brand of the bank that was a freebie at the end of the lesson. She loved the colour, the idea of the tattoo. And, apparently, everyone will have them on tomorrow…

What got to me most was the way the kids were being branded (albeit temporarily) by a corporate logo, sucked in by a shiny, ‘cool’ ploy (not to mention the looong list of crazy chemicals that are in these stick-on tats). So I resorted to bribery (money in her piggy bank in exchange for the tattoo. Fair, sensible, even ironic swap). If the bank wants to be altruistic, then the learning experience is fine. Otherwise, perhaps they shouldn’t be allowed to come and market themselves to primary children.

I love the message of saving, and I believe strongly in the value of financial literacy. But not at the expense of learning about the value of information literacy and the power of advertising. A hard lesson to learn when the person is teaching the first, but exploiting the second.

And when they come armed with shiny bribes.

[Image source: Naypong]

We are surrounded by media that rarely profiles the beauty of ‘aloneness’ – everyone is in a group, a family, laughing, barbecuing, cruising along holiday roads in cars crammed with cheerful, attractive friends, a relentless cacophony of ‘joining in’.  School curricula encourage us to ‘relate to others’ and ‘participate’.

And online, it’s the same. We can’t move for people twittering at us, urging us to like, share, ping, connect. I’d be up there with the best of ‘em.

And I’m not saying any of this is necessarily wrong. But what if we don’t want to? What if we can’t? Or feel that we can’t – in a world where we all seem to have to find a space to belong?

There was a great article in the Sunday Star Times recently that championed being alone – ‘Me, Myself and I’ by Catherine Woulfe – and quoted Auckland psychologist, Dr Susan Hayes.

“There’s a very strong human need for just space, to recharge. I think our culture is very judgmental about aloneness and I’m not sure where that came from. I mean, we are social animals and we do need social interaction… We do need and crave a sense of belonging and connection to others, but we also need and crave space to ourselves, just to think. And I think a lot of us get peopled-out without realising it.”

Dr Sherry Turkle of MIT, author of Alone, Together, urges us to moderate the time we spend frantically connecting online, just to feel connected, feel affirmed. That affirmation should come from inside us, not from someone else’s 140-character brain-burp:

…and this moving/corny poem, How to be alone, has had 3 million+ hits on YouTube:

So, do you ever get peopled out? And are we now in such a fast-buzzing society that escape is either impossible – or so frowned upon that it might as well be?

Image credit: Image: Idea go / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Or it is because I am on Facebook?

These are the assertions of a recent Pew Report – Social networking and our lives (Hampton, Goulet, Rainie & Purcell, 2011), which surveyed 2,255 adults to explore “how people’s trust, personal relationships, and civic and political involvement are connected to their use of social networking sites and other technologies”.

The paper seems to fly in the face of the usual media suspects who often claim that social networking leads to narrow, superficial, stunted relationships, lacking in diversity. On the contrary, the survey seems to suggest that regular involvement in social media sites is reflective of the opposite – civically engaged, connected, social beings. There is even an interesting discussion about MySpace and ‘perspective taking’, which might suggest that such spaces are not the closed echo chambers that we might assume.

And apparently it doesn’t make us dumb, either. When exploring how strong  the relationship is between internet use and the diversity of people’s overall social networks, they concluded that:
“Education is the best predictor of a diverse social network. Each year of education is associated with 1.5 additional points on the diversity scale. From this perspective, internet users have a boost in network diversity that is equivalent to about two years of formal education, bloggers have a boost of about four years.”

So all that blogging does pay off.

But I am still left wondering: is it the technology at play here – or are those people who are active in these networks those early-adopter, more socially-brave types that would have wide, active networks anyway?

Can you ‘do’ social media if you’re not very social?

[Image source: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/view_photog.php?photogid=2125]

I struggle, to be honest, with the tension between the natural evolution of communities of practice, grassroots-up, driven by members’ needs and wishes, and a community space that must show value, be accountable, justify the time and effort to facilitate and support it.

Who am I to assign a value to another person’s learning?

Two interesting papers I have read recently that have helped to clarify this potential dichotomy for me have been:

Feger, S. & Arruda, E. (2008).Professional Learning Communities:
Key Themes from the Literature. Brown University: Education Alliance.

This has provided a useful overview of communities focused on teachers’ professional learning, reflecting back to me some of the issues I have been pondering regarding measurability and accountability:

“Fullan (2006) asserts that there are many examples of PLCs that are implemented superficially, without an awareness of the depth that is needed for producing an impact on learning. He proposes that the effectiveness of PLCs should be judged on how well they are able to create cultures of professional learning on a system scale. Similarly, Stoll et al. (2006) made note that researchers assume that PLCs are effective when these practices are observed, that these characteristics in and of themselves are used to denote a successful PLC. While confirming impact is not necessarily a challenge for PLCs to tackle, establishing positive impact of PLCs has potential to alleviate other challenges faced by PLCs.” (p. 10)

The 2011 paper from Wenger, de Laast and Traynor – Promoting and assessing value creation in CoPs and networks: a framework - has been extremely helpful. It walks the tightrope between ‘top down’ and ‘bottom up’, acknowledging the situation in which folk like myself find ourselves, but providing a useful, Kirkpatrick-adapted framework for capturing the layers of value that a community might create.

Neither paper has resolved issues for me, but, if value must be established, then to work from that which those using the community value seems to be the best starting point.

[Image source: 'Crowd thinking by fotographic1980 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net]

The annual Wellington event is student-run, a huge achievement in itself. I was invited to speak about the way students might extend their uses of social media beyond the ‘social’ to enhance the way they learn. It was a whistle-stop tour, but I managed a whole room, real-time Twitter example (without touching an equipment!), explored some examples of how they might explore their learning passions (Shakespeare on Facebook! Chat to Stephen Hawking on Twitter!), and emphasised the importance of cybersafety and of being a digital citizen with integrity.

It was a pleasure to be invited, and to watch such a slick operation get underway. Many thanks, and well done, to the TechHui team and to those in the audience.

[Image source: www.techhui.org.nz/]