Teach carpentry, not hammer | Future-proofing NZ schools

“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.

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[1] Oppenheimer, T. (1997). The computer delusion. The Atlantic Monthly 280(1), 45-62.

[2] Cuban, L. (2001). Oversold and underused: Computers in the classroom. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

[3] Postman, N. (2000). Some new gods that fail. In The Jossey-Bass on technology and learning. San Francsico, CA: Jossey-Bass inc.

[4] The original quote is from Oppenheimer’s The Computer Delusion: “Michael Bellino, an electrical engineer at Boston University’s Center for Space Physics, stated in a protest against computers that, “The purpose of the schools [is] to…’Teach carpentry, not hammer,’” he testified. “We need to teach the whys and ways of the world. Tools come and tools go. Teaching our children tools limits their knowledge to these tools and hence limits their futures.” (http://www.tnellen.com/ted/tc/computer.htm)

 

[This piece was originally published in the NZATE English in Aotearoa Journal, October 2011. Theme: Future-proofing education.]

If you think it’s too difficult, you’re right.

This is cross-posted from a guest piece I recently wrote for CORE Education:

Feel the fear – and do it anyway

If Hilary had concentrated only on glacial ravines, would he have ‘knocked the bastard off’? Would Armstrong have taken his great leap if he had worried his oxygen failing?

And can schools embrace the learning opportunities presented by the web, by ultra-fast broadband, if they focus only on cybersafety?

We’re only a few weeks into the new school year, but there has been a slew of stories in the media about cybersafety – sexting, Facebook bullying and the like  – and we see the inevitable banning of technological access as a result.  A recent talk I gave at a local college to launch their e-learning professional learning for the year, saw excitement among staff but also concern about student safety and online bullying. A 2010 report, commissioned by the Ministry of Education, reminded us that “Preventing access in schools to mobile technologies or firewalling some sites does not teach effective and critical uses of these technologies that students have ready access to outside of school” (Wright, 2010)

Despite all the potential and promise that technology might offer to educators, to what extent do we still have a deficit model of technology?

The New Zealand Curriculum (NZC) advocates for e-learning as a way to “open up new and different ways of learning” (e-learning and pedagogy, NZC). And yet, for many schools, it is the very ‘opening up’ that is so challenging. School leaders understandably have to balance the opportunities for learners presented by, for example, ‘web 2.0 technology, with managing parental expectation and the duty to keep students safe.

Perhaps a marriage of the Key Competencies and digital citizenship might offer a potential pathway through the minefield. The NZC is littered with phrases that clearly align to the potential of e-learning; for example, the “active seekers, users, and creators of knowledge” (Vision statement, NZC) should arguably be “confident and capable user[s] of ICT” (myLGP: Learn, Guide, Protect – Netsafe) in order to create and seek knowledge for themselves.

Most importantly, the Key Competencies of managing self, relating to others, and participating and contributing clearly align to the importance of students becoming confident in the way they manage challenges online, in the way to they relate to, and communicate with, others in cyberspace.

Embracing the teachable moment, managing risk rather than banning access, and looking to the opportunities rather than the dangers are approaches far more likely to foster students’ integrity and responsibility. Especially when they will inevitably have to face cyber challenges without adult supervision.

Like Hilary and Armstrong, perhaps those schools that interpret the NZC through the lens of digital citizenship have found a way to navigate the possible risks and dangers while maintaining their focus on a greater goal – that of students being able to fully participate in the digital world.

[Image source]

 

Are you listening to me?!… Measuring students’ engagement

What does a student look like when they’re not engaged in learning?

Slack jawed? Sleepy? Distracted? Angry?…..Absent?

And if they are engaged, what does that look like?…Excited? Talking critically about the topic? Full of ideas, enthusiasm and persistence? Anyone who has been a teacher probably has a gut feeling on what this looks like.

And now a report – Measuring student engagement in upper elementary through high school: A description of 21 instruments (from the Institute of Education Science) – has summarised 21 instruments that can be used to quantify the level of engagement in a learning experience, at intermediate and secondary level. Why? Because research is increasingly drawing links between engagement and achievement, particularly research exploring the impact of e-learning/learning through ICTs.

Student engagement measures have been shown to correlate positively with achievement and negatively with the likelihood of dropping out of school (Fredricks, Blumenfeld, and Paris 2004)

So, in theory, if you can identify students’ needs, evaluate and track engagement, you might be able to explore reasons behind the data and intervene accordingly. Perhaps.

Instruments for measuring engagement, as cited in the report, include:

• Student self-report questionnaires
• Teacher reports on students
• Observational measures

The challenge, as this report acknowledges, is that engagement can be interpreted in different ways (social, behavioural, emotional…) – and the different tests measure different aspects. Which type of engagement leads to deep, transferable learning. Hmmm….

The most useful part of the report for me is the section that discusses the research behind engagement and it’s importance for learning to occur. The New Zealand Curriculum has engagement at the heart of its guidance on pedagogy – and while we may not be using psychometric tests to gauge engagement, we would do well to keep noticing where we see the excited faces – and the slack jaws –  too.

[image source]

Worth a thousand words…

I have blogged before about the power of visualisation as a way of capturing data – Ewan McIntosh had this as a key thread in his CORE Breakfast seminars in 2010.

Here’s a great website for profiling different infographics [a graphic or image that represents information] that are out there: FlowingData | Data Visualization, Infographics, and Statistics [image source]

We all know that many people learn best through visuals, images, graphics and so on. For many students, especially those with learning challenges that arise due to Attention Deficit Disorder or autism spectrum, presenting information visually can help maintain attention and focus on the matter being explored.

Capturing thinking in mind-maps and the like is well-trodden ground for educators now – but teaching students to read and interpret visual information is also important. Exploring language, symbols and texts (a New Zealand Curriculum Key Competency) is a pathway towards this.

So next time you have to explain an idea or present a complex set of data, use images and visual representation instead – a powerful way to convey your thoughts.

[Thanks to dk @ mediasnackers via Ali Hughes @ CORE Education for the link]

Teachers’ views on technology: snapshots from the frontlines

This is a neat selection of videos that explores the way different technologies are being integrated into teaching and learning. The New York Times asked teachers to submit videos that explored how technology had changed the way they teach…

The overwhelming themes that emerge are:

• Trust the students – be prepared to work with them.
• Collaboration and relating to others lies at the heart of how students learn about their worlds through technology.
• Connections and inquiry that never would have been made previously, both locally and globally, are now possible.
• Technology can support engagement for all students, especially those with different learning needs.
• The vital importance of everyone having access, not just a few, is central to strategic planning.
• Mobile computing, combined with cloud-based technologies, free the students and teachers from constraints of time and place.

 

Ewan McIntosh: On being an entrepreneurial learner

Had the pleasure of hearing Ewan McIntosh address the Wellington Edu-crowd this morning, courtesy of Core Education. And I have tried to capture the key points that he made here – trialling Omnigraffle for myself at the same time (visualisation being, after all, a growing focus for digital literacy;-)).

In essence, the social web should – could – be driving education much more than at present. He offered a whole range of real-world examples to illustrate different types of ‘social’ collaboration, and drove towards his main point that learning should be entrepreneurial in approach: self-directed, outcomes-driven, peer collaboration and inquiry-based.

And with ‘entrepreneur’ in the New Zealand Curriculum being a term that has been open to discussion, this is a helpful lens through which to view it.

Links related to Ewan’s trip to NZ:

• Ewan McIntosh eduTour 2010
• LinkLearning: Notes from a Cluster Day

Tell me you see a difference between board and screen..?

If there is no difference, then we need to talk.

This video by mokmcdaniel – Online Student Experience – highlights in grim tones, how depressing it is to be in a world in which exciting teaching and learning (with and without technology) is possible, but not happening for him.

While part of me can appreciate the drama and heightened negativity that this skilled filmmaker has amplified, part of me wonders how prevalent this kind of teaching is.

Just replacing a board with a screen, a pen with a keyboard, is clearly not the answer.

So what is? Where would you start?

Thanks to the Committed Sardine for the link.

Why banning cellphones won’t ban bullies

I read the two articles on mobile phones in Sunday Star Times this week with some amazement, and a wee bit of irritation.  The emotive story, about the student bullied on his cellphone on the front page, aimed to paint modern technology as something to be feared or banned unless it could be actively managed by schools. A second article inside the paper explored the more positive side of the argument with a description of the trial use of cellphones for learning at Howick College.

The issue of bullying existed long before cellphones, and it has always extended beyond school time, making it harder to manage. Schools have a duty to create a zero-tolerance culture towards bullying, regardless of how it is done.  Banning technology because of the way it might be used serves only to drive poor behaviour underground, and even further from the school gates. Even the Howick College trial referred to their cyber-safety policy as being about banning phones for improper use rather than fostering positive peer group behaviour.

The use of technology in schools should be hand-in-hand with the way we plan learning, and cyber-safety is part of that. I would advocate schools taking advantage of the ubiquity of mobiles to explore relevant aspects of the curriculum, such as how we relate to others, how we manage ourselves, how the use of technology enables us to participate with the understanding that this brings responsibilities as well as rights. The only way to help young people learn how to manage and navigate the challenging issues that can arise in these situations is to work with students as they use these technologies.

Mobiles are particularly pertinent because of their ubiquity – which means that, should they be used for bullying, the reach of the bully can be much greater – all the more reason to help students manage the situation and keep the issue in the open. Cellphones, with web access, mean that students don’t only need to know how to avoid bullies, but also how to manage other issues that arise with unfettered access to the internet.

While banning student access to a technology that they enjoy/need might be an appropriate step at some point down the line, I don’t think it should be a first (reactionary?) step. The opportunities for maximising collaborative learning beyond the classroom, together with the need to prepare students to make the most of technologies in today’s world, should be a key driver for promoting the use of technologies such as these. A positive, rather than negative, default position, I think.

Whether my child is going to be swimming with sharks or taking the bus into town on his own for the first time, I’d much rather he was prepared, knowledgeable, and supported than going into the situation blind.

Netsafe has some great advice on cyberbullying and also a useful guide for helping students take responsibility.

Image source: Electric Images (under the Creative Commons-Attribution licence)

Herding ducks in a barrel (Part 1)

The NCEA standards review, in English, has begun. And about time, too. As challenging as lining up ducks or herding cats? As easy as shooting those fish? Whichever way it goes, it’s got to be done.

According to the NZQA website:

The review will be carried out according to six principles developed by the expert group:
1. The standard must be derived from a curriculum or established body of knowledge.
2. A standard must have a clear purpose.
3. A Standard must allow valid and reliable assessment
4. Where more than one credit-bearing grade is available, grade distinctions must be based on qualitative differences in achievement.
5. Credit Parity (between standards)
6. Standards should not duplicate one another. The review will also consider such issues as the conditions under which assessment is carried out.

For English teachers, our expert group is the NZATE, a fact for which we should be grateful. A colleague recently cast doubt on the idea of contracting subject associations to complete this work as, in their experience, subject associations tended to be unreliable and unrepresentative.

How far NZ English teachers are represented by their national association is an issue beyond the scope of this blog, but representation is but a subscription away. We have the advantage of being a large subject area (whoops, said the ‘s’ word..) working across diverse deciles and areas of the country.

As Bali Haque points out, this is an opportunity to align curriculum with assessment (always useful). Perhaps it is an opportunity, too, for us to review what has happened to our programmes since the inception of NCEA: fragmented programmes, piecemeal planning, junior programmes with junior ‘credits’ (even the JCEA, in one school).

Somewhere in the middle of this drive for credits must lie the kinds of teaching and learning that transcend unit and achievement standards. How creative we all really want to be is a matter for debate later in the year when the proposals of the expert group go out for consultation. Until then, some points to ponder…

What should be internal? or external?

Do we still want Shakespeare to have his own special corner?

What about Level 1 formal writing – in school, or end of year?

Can we do something to bring those poor, sad but oh-so-useful unit standards into the happy fold?

And where are those neglected children, oral and visual, at the highest levels?

How can we ‘future-proof’ the standards to include new technologies?

What about the Key Competencies that we shouldn’t be assessing but which we might have to usher in by the assessment back door? English does, after all, have its own Processes AO which is the KCs in all but name.

And aren’t we all heartily sick of essays? Surely there are other ways to respond to the (short, extended, visual, oral and other arbitrary split) texts?

I say – let’s go mad and take a risk. If the end result looks like what we have now, we will have missed the opportunity for change that it presents. And not even National will revise the curriculum so we can do it all again this soon.

Sssh…it’s the ‘s’ word

What did you say? Your subject is English? Tsk, tsk. Don’t you know we not allowed to say ‘subject’ now? How very siloed and partisan of you. ‘Subject’ is now a forbidden word, something only to be whispered when no-one can hear you. For now we live in the days of cross-curricular, integrated learning in which the Key Competencies are king, and studying your favourite ‘subject’ has been relegated to the dusty halls of the past. Three raps on the knuckles….

Clearly, I’m being facetious, but it’s an interesting idea to toy with. A recent talk from the MoE reps involved in Schools Plus looked at the way schools, among a plethora of ‘solutions’, could timetable more creatively, and break down the barriers created by ‘subject areas’. One speaker actually chastised himself, mid-flow, for using the dreaded ‘s’ word.

I found this intriguing. It’s as if, just by saying (or not saying) something, just by giving a concept voice, it will happen, emerge blinking into the light, fully formed and breathing. The implication is that, if we talk about our ‘subjects’ as secondary level, we will automatically be shutting ourselves off from a more integrated world, in which pedagogy and shared learning are crucial.

I don’t disagree with the concept of integrated learning - in fact, I’m often actively pushing for it in conversations with schools. What puzzles me, however, is when people make comments like, “We shouldn’t use the word ‘subject’ anymore,” as though that will somehow offer a verbal band-aid to the issues of dis-engaged students and NZ’s ‘long tail’.

It is exactly this idea – that somehow, knowledge has been sidelined in the favour of process (this resonates with Mary Chamberlain’s unfortunately-misinterpreted comment made last year about students as ‘little knowledge banks’) – that will ensure that it is the teachers, not the students, who will dis-engage from the MoE’s, very important, messages.

So let that be a (integrated) lesson to you…