Educating the Dragon

My school is part of the Sitech Champion Schools programme. As part of that programme the staff here have been involved with a professional development model that appears to be working. Hardware and software have been purchased for the school and the company has provided many hours of training and professional development in it’s use in the classroom environment.

Private provision is an interesting situation, company’s vary in there product and support available. I would be interested to know of any strategy or framework which guides this aspect of school provision. As the product and support varies from company to company the experience of both staff and students also varies along with the development of ICT within the school. Is this a good thing, or bad?

Perhaps the diversity of provision is advantageous in Early Childhood and Primary phases but I would surmise that as students’ progress through Secondary and onto Tertiary national parity would be more desirable to ensure an ICT literate workforce.

Sitech Learning Zone

Here I am on my holidays. A chance, finally to catch up with Wes Fryer’s podcast142 on the speed of creativity website. The one I listened to last night rang true with me as Roger C. Schank spoke about his view of education. All the notes, wikis, blogs, presentation material etc are all available here from on the Speed of Creativity website so I won’t bother re-linking them all to here as they are 2 clicks away.

I wanted instead, to dwell on the concept he was dealing with in terms of creating valuable learning scenarios and not wasting time with the ‘just in case’ teaching that is so prevalent in our education system today.

David Warlick, when he was here for the Learning@schools conference talked about the fact that in New Zealand so much freedom is given over to New Zealand schools and not dictated from the ‘district’ or governmental level that the move towards School2.0, Classroom2.0 and Library2.0 stands a good chance of implementation in NZ schools. I think he was referring to where the purse strings are held. Which is true. However, if I were to share this podcast with staff and colleagues I am sure that there would be much puffing of cheeks and shaking of heads. A fear of unknown sits within our schools…. Even if the principal is progressive and forward thinking there are still those at the senior or middle management level had would vocal in their advocating for status quo.

Roger gave the quote from John Adams “There are two types of education, one will teach how to make a living the other will teach us how to live. “

I happen to agree. What I am most pleased about is that Roger does not leave us high a dry, with the idea that what we are doing is archaic but offers thoughts and suggestions as to how the curriculum for the 21^st Century should look. He stated:

“Writing

Speaking

Reasoning

Getting along with others

Making and executing a plan

Understanding what tools are available to you

Making use of known principles.”

 These are the core competencies. Regardless of whether you are teaching social studies, Science, or electrical engineering, those competencies above are the skills you will need.

So back to the
New Zealand way…. Like John Adams said we need to teach children how to earn a living and how to live, but then it’s very easy to ignore
Adams’ logical approach to education: Him being:

1. So far away
2. American
3. Dead.

But do any of those three reasons make him wrong?

Here is my response to Vicki’s question ‘Why teach technology?’ It’s my first go at uploading to Teachertube. Technology teaching is the equipping of students today for the environment tomorrow. Yes, the future is unclear but if they leave us armed with the tools, shortcuts, and critical thinking skills then they will be prepared for a lifetime of learning and change.

Ps. I wish someone would teach me how to embed vodcast and podcast into my blog. I look like such a newbie, but I just can’t figure it out.

I have had a headache for the past few weeks and its beginning to annoy me. Ever since I came back from Learning@School07(http://centre4.interact.ac.nz/spaces/space.php?space_key=1738) I’ve had a headache.

When you’ve had an experience like that it takes some time to fully digest what has been said. With my “not so popular” run down to the staff last week I sort of came to an impasse. I’ve reached a stage now that I sense I have very little real impact for change. My footprint in and on the school is minimal. The need in our community to educate ourselves for providing the meaningful, rich educational experience for our kids is huge, but without fundamental change in attitude and direction this ‘Net-Bust’ generation are going to be left out in the cold.  It’s going to take massive amounts of time, PD and commitment from the schools and businesses for our kids to succeed.

All that, by way of preamble for my most recent observation. ICTPD is essentially a sub-priority. Lip service is paid as is various amounts of money but there is always a greater priority, whether it be NUMPA,
Reading, Writing, AtoL. All of these are noble topics for PD but then so to should technology. We are a long way from the digital classroom being the norm, working digitally, training digitally. If our staffs are to be expected to be up skilled then really, quality focus needs to be paid to ICTPD taking the number one spot, even if it is just for a year.

I long to hear the words of a principal be:

“Ok, this year everything else is on ‘tick over mode’, top priority is for you to fully integrate technology into your classroom teaching.”

How long can you hold your breath for? I can’t hold it for THAT long.

As I have been asked to talk to the staff at school on Learningatschools 07 I have taken some time to reflect on David Warlick and Jennifer Corriero’s message along with Owen Alexander’s thoughts on the trends of youth today. We need to tell a new story, the old one is just that. We need to give our kids the best possible start for if we don’t we’re in trouble, regardless of which way you cut it.

1. Let’s assume that all our kids are hot-wired like so many of the kids today are. They are having to ‘power-down’ as the cliché goes when they have to come to school. Their 1000 decisions a minute has turned into 3 per hour. Not good. Are we challenging their thinking? No Are we directing their learning to engage in the digital economy or simply to sit on the fringe, on the dole watch sky sports and playing Halo4. why can’t our kids be ones designing the game, creating that alternate universe? With our sit down, listen up, follow the rules attitude we setting them up to be fruit pickers Watties packers, mashers or mincers. What happened to shooting for the stars and landing on the moon? Lets take a long hard look at these kids futures. The jobs that many of them could potentially get have not even been created. The kids in my class will retire in 2065. Its gonna be whole different world out there then.
2. Ok take lets take a different tack. Let’s assume they are not wired. Some of these kids don’t get access to breakfast at home let alone internet. If they don’t know stuff about the possibilities we can view it in two different lights. Firstly we could say “Hey let’s give them a basic education cover the 3 R’s tick the boxes and move them out Boy’s /Girl’s High let them worry about the future. Or we could say, if these kids are going to get any step up, assistance, helping hand, its going to be from us, the school. We have a primary responsibility for preparing these kids for a their future. Its not a future that we can see right now, not like back in the day, when  I could look at my dad going to work and see my life.  Theirs is future of possibility and wonderment, if they are prepared for it.

So many kids want out. They see the rugby players and the netballers and the movie stars and they think that’s the route to a brighter future. They don’t see the couple of geeks having sold Youtube for $1.65 billion US.

I was born in 1975, graduated in 1993. Back then the world was full of boomers- The boom went from 1945 through to 1968. That’s children being born. By the time I graduated all the jobs were gone. Even the teaching profession had a glut of staff. I remember going for several interviews where they had 65 job applicants per place. I was a baby bust- Tail end of the boom. All the jobs are take.

Well let’s go on 30 years the Net-Generation peaked in 1991.  Since then the birth rate globally has fluctuated. Our kids today could well be looking for a job in the Net-Bust era. What’s going to be the impact on them? Few jobs. They are a going to have to work smarter AND harder to beat those Net Generation kids with years of experience under their belts.

Whichever is the scenario 1 or 2 for our kids we have to act. How we go about it will look very different depending on those children’s access to the Net. The Net is opening up a whole world of possibilities out their, gaming and chat rooms is only the beginning. What are we going to do about it?

These figures are correct to the best of my ability. If you know better please comment.