Entries from April 2008 ↓

So today our Head of Middle School pulls me aside and lets me know that he’s spoken to our Principal, and has got the OK to make our Middle School a Technology Rich Hub, and starts telling me of what he’d like to do and what our best way of achieving this is.

And when shared with Lisa-Gaye the look on her face was priceless! After being told that he had some homework for her I could see the panic starting to show in her eyes. “What, in my spare time?” sort of response. After hearing him out it changed to an excited, expectant gleam.

So, out with the blank sheet of paper as we are rethinking some of what we are doing already, and seeing where we can take Middle School on this exciting journey.

Now, how big is that budget?

See, I knew this term was going to be a good one.

Cheers.

Yesterday I changed my theme for a “fresh” look, either that or I was bored, not sure which.

I have been informed by some of my readers that they were unable to leave comments due to some strange formatting issues. Soon I will change back to my last theme, once I’ve let James know what’s happening. Now I need to remember what Widgets I had loaded.

EDIT: I have now posted this on the Edublogs Forum.

Well. I don’t think I have written anything of substance lately, but I have spent a fair bit of time reading. My Blog-roll is not huge, a lot of it was taken from my friends Lisa-Gaye and Graham’s lists of who they each read. I do read the usual suspects (in no particular order), Will Richardson, Miguel Guhlin, Dr Scott McLeod, Sue Waters, and the list could go on and on.

Now, I’m a “Techie” and not a Teacher. Quite often what I read about pedagogy, learning outcomes, and rubrics etc go way above my head. I do witness first hand the frustrations LG faces as she tries to encourage those around us to use this taboo stuff called “technology” in their lessons. I understand that at times she feels like she is simply banging her head against a wall (or a TV cabinet, but let s not dwell on that) and questions is it worth it? We have shown our staff the “Shift Happens” video, to many oohs and ahhs, but not much has changed.

A lot of what I read shows that there are very distinct sides to this story, those that are successfully using technology in their schools with the blessings of those around them and are ensuring change happens, and those of us that are facing an up hill battle.

This morning I read a post by Miguel on Comic Strips with links to items by Ric Murry. I loved Ric’s cartoon series “sticklers.” They show the divide that can exist between tech-savvy educators and the administrators at their schools.

Unfortunately we don’t allow our students to bring their phones to school, at least we don’t fine them though.

I was refreshed reading Ric’s posts. He shares similar ideas, and uses different media to get these thoughts across. His posts have helped instill a glimmer of hope again.

Bring on Term 2!

Just bought myself a pressie, because I had to.

I have just read Graham Wegner’s post on Risk Free Classroom, and he makes some very good points.

I am on the OH&S Committee at our School and we have had some broken limbs on our play equipment, in the same way that Graham has mentioned. The Committee discussed this issue of the Play Equipment just last week and decided that we as a College had met all of the Safety requirements for this piece of equipment, and that there was a known risk involved, but the benefits of having this type of equipment on “Growth and Skills” really outweighed these risks.

Of course all this has come about because of Al Upton and his Mini Legend’s being closed down. Which in itself has raised the awareness of a narrow minded thinking towards safety and the use of Social Networking on the Internet.

I also read this comment by Bill Farren, posted in response to Al’s Reason for Closure page. Bill quoted a comment made by Rachel Dretzin, co- Producer and co-writer of PBS’s Frontline – Growing Up Online (on their site, in the What We Learned write-up): You can watch the full program on line, and/or download the transcript of the show.

Rachel says:

“One of the biggest surprises in making this film was the discovery that the threat of online predators is misunderstood and overblown. The data shows that giving out personal information over the Internet makes absolutely no difference when it comes to a child’s vulnerability to predation.”

So what are the risks of using Technology in our Classrooms? What would be better, to tech our students about the use of Social Networking and other Web 2.0 tools in a Class setting with a Teacher as Moderator, or to let them continue to learn about these things in the real world, in their own time, without any supervision. There are correct ways to interact on-line. There are correct ways to use these tools. Having a knowledge abut how your comments may be seen or perceived by others are all part of our Students learning. Why are they so often left to their own devices in these area’s.

On the other side of the coin, what risk are we putting our “Tech Savvy” students under by placing them in a classroom with a misoneistic Teacher and thinking that they will actually learn anything. That is a bigger Risk, and a greater disservice to me.

I also promise I’ll stop using my newly learnt word now too.

So why is it when a Teacher has a students in their class with Laptops (optional accessory as we’re not a 1:1 School) and as expected there is 1 student that seems to get off-task playing games or surfing the web, why is it that they want to throw Laptops out the window and not let them be used?

Why blame the whole user base just because 1 student (in this case) is a bit off task?

Now, not being a Teacher myself, I know that my comments may “ruffle a few feathers” but I also know that my Partner in Crime was literally fuming after a recent staff meeting over some of the comments that were made as this was discussed. She was diplomatic, and held her tongue.

Shouldn’t the Teacher be trying to find out why the student is off task, and try and work out ways to gather them in as well? Unless off course they are a misoneist, that’ll simply be their excuse I suppose.

How should a Teacher bring this student back, without casting all laptops into eternal darkness?