Showing posts with label Parents. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Parents. Show all posts
Tuesday, 2 July 2013
SchoolNet Blending the flipping classroom presentation
Blending the flipping classroom presentation for SchoolNetSA presentation 2013
Sunday, 12 May 2013
Future technology and the IT industry
On the first day of term the school’s teaching staff was privileged to have Fred Baumhardt, the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) at Microsoft South Africa, as a guest speaker. In a speech entitled “2016 and beyond”, Fred took the time to show our staff the amazing technology that already exists and will soon become affordable (Every year the price of a new technology decreases by approximately 10 times!). Many of the amazing technologies we were introduced to will be available within the next few years.
Fred showed us a world where connectivity was an everyday occurrence and a person’s ability to access information was unlimited. More importantly, he explained how this connectivity was already available, although the costs associated with staying connected were still, at times, exorbitant. He pointed out that as time passes this cost is decreasing worldwide and we, as teachers, parents and students need to take advantage of the abundance of information available to us. We need to train students to understand this abundance of information, to be able to use it effectively through research, to acknowledge the strengths and weaknesses of the information we find and, finally, to be able to analyse the content objectively.
This Utopian view of technology has to be balanced by an acknowledgement of the weaknesses of the hardware and software available to us, the need to have an ecosystem that supports its use and a confession by Fred that the IT industry as a whole have not come to the party in regards to education and its very specific needs.
Until now the IT industry has sold solutions that they have developed to support the software they have developed to be used by people who understand how to use the hardware and software as a unit. The attitude was, and in many times still is, one of ‘fire and forget’. Each user was expected to adapt their systems to fit the hardware and software that was already available. This was especially apparent in the Education field. Schools built networks to support the needs of the organisation without much input from the providers of the hardware and software. There was no concerted effort to develop solutions for education. In general, the money was not made in the education field.
This lack of partnership between providers and users has led to a vast variety of ‘solutions’ for educational institutions and each school has had to choose their own path. At this point we need to acknowledge the efforts any school network 'guy' who manged, in spite of the providers, the development of a stable, sustainable and, maybe most vitally, upgrade-able network for their school. As Fred mentioned this has been done, in many cases, despite the IT industry rather than because of it.
Things are changing!
More and more both hardware and software providers are looking at delivering a unified system to Education institutions. These technological ‘Ecosystems’ are been designed to facilitate the process of skills acquisition rather that the sales of software or hardware. Each school will have an ‘App’ that will govern hardware policy, software deployment and who can access which part of the network. This ecosystem will adapt to the varying needs of each school and, therefore, no solution will be the same.
More importantly, each individual will have their own ‘ecosystem’ which may not be the same as the school they attend. The schools system will then have to adapt to and incorporate the individuals’ choices and also support those choices. The next big step for both education and IT will be to allow open access to the systems that allow for effective and open communication in the hope that teaching and learning will grow from this openness.
In the hour that we spent with Fred we heard and saw things that both shocked and amazed us. If you are interested in seeing some of what we saw have a look at the following videos. All the technology in them already exists and will be available commercially in the very near future!
Friday, 1 March 2013
An afternoon with @abdulchohan
Hello all,
Sorry about the lag between posts but school tours hit the itinerary recently and I was pretty disconnected.
On my return I was invited to a talk by Abdul Chohan (@Abdulchohan) from the ESSA Academy in Bradford, England. Thank you Apple and Core for the invite.
Abdul was in SA to share his experiences of a one to one roll-out with us and to talk about the ecosystem his school has built to support both staff and students academically and technologically.
A few things he shared really stuck out:
1). The roll-out was not about having the device but rather about connecting student and teachers! He wanted both to be able to answer questions immediately the device was and is regarded as a tool that the students have access to and not as a reason for the lesson.
2). The schools pedagogy (The method and practice of teaching, esp. as an academic subject or theoretical concept) needs to support the use of a device but should NOT be based on the use of that device. His teachers are encouraged to make materials available as homework and use the time in class to concentrate on cognition and not information delivery. The idea is to allow proper understanding of new material, in any way, before putting pen to paper in a 'test'.
3).As a school ESSA are 'are asking teachers to have faith, to embrace change and therefore transform their teaching'. Abdul made the point that teachers are good at doing the same thing in new ways, ie chalkboard - whiteboard - interactive whiteboard, but not really transforming the way we teach. He defines transformation as technology allowing you to do something you could not do before.
4). And probably most vitally in my opinion he described how the schools technology ecosystem needs to support the device use. His school chose Apple products but that isn't the point, whatever you choose you need to make sure that the systems work to support the devices.
ESSA use iTunesU to make material available as courses, they use Google Apps for mail, they use Edmodo for communication and they use email for submission of work and, thankfully, so does my school (Except for iTunesU, not available in SA yet).
The amazing thing to me is that they decided to start this program and were able to run it fully within 6 months. Teachers were brought on board by allowing them to use the technology and not with hours and hours of professional development. In fact, the ESSA Academy doesn't run professional development days but has rather built them into the school timetable (every week on a Friday).
It was an amazing insight on how to progress with a BYOD/T roll-out.
The issue now is how do South African schools adopt/adapt this model to work for us?
1). INTERNET: When I asked about internet speed issues Abdul pointed out that his school, rather than connecting to the internet, built a robust and functioning intranet that allowed the devices to connect through wireless. The first step was to allow the students access to the schools servers to download worksheets videos and any other 'storable' material.
Maybe in SA we should rather focus on upgrading school networks? Once the savings on textbooks, paper, printing etc. start to feed through we can use those funds to upgrade or connect to the internet.
2). DEVICES: These are expensive but they could provide savings in other area's.
Maybe the school/district/government/country needs to look at available funds and how they could be re-used to provide this sort of program.
3). THE ECOSYSTEM: Computer software is expensive and short-lived. The ongoing running costs add to the burden a school has to carry.
Not true according to Abdul. Apps are once of payments and never need to be purchased again and, more importantly, there are thousands of free applications that do as good a job as a paid one.
4). WILLPOWER: Probably the most important part of the equation. Without acceptance and investment in a program it will never work. To many have failed due to a lack of foresight or investment.
In my opinion the decision to run a program like this is up to the willpower of the relevant stakeholders in education. Parents, children teachers and officials need to see this as a powerful and exciting way forward and not as a scary and uncharted territory.
There are so many questions to ask around a program like this however we need to start asking and answering them in order to provide an education that is relevant and future-proof, can we afford to wait?
Sorry about the lag between posts but school tours hit the itinerary recently and I was pretty disconnected.
On my return I was invited to a talk by Abdul Chohan (@Abdulchohan) from the ESSA Academy in Bradford, England. Thank you Apple and Core for the invite.
Abdul was in SA to share his experiences of a one to one roll-out with us and to talk about the ecosystem his school has built to support both staff and students academically and technologically.
A few things he shared really stuck out:
1). The roll-out was not about having the device but rather about connecting student and teachers! He wanted both to be able to answer questions immediately the device was and is regarded as a tool that the students have access to and not as a reason for the lesson.
2). The schools pedagogy (The method and practice of teaching, esp. as an academic subject or theoretical concept) needs to support the use of a device but should NOT be based on the use of that device. His teachers are encouraged to make materials available as homework and use the time in class to concentrate on cognition and not information delivery. The idea is to allow proper understanding of new material, in any way, before putting pen to paper in a 'test'.
3).As a school ESSA are 'are asking teachers to have faith, to embrace change and therefore transform their teaching'. Abdul made the point that teachers are good at doing the same thing in new ways, ie chalkboard - whiteboard - interactive whiteboard, but not really transforming the way we teach. He defines transformation as technology allowing you to do something you could not do before.
4). And probably most vitally in my opinion he described how the schools technology ecosystem needs to support the device use. His school chose Apple products but that isn't the point, whatever you choose you need to make sure that the systems work to support the devices.
ESSA use iTunesU to make material available as courses, they use Google Apps for mail, they use Edmodo for communication and they use email for submission of work and, thankfully, so does my school (Except for iTunesU, not available in SA yet).
The amazing thing to me is that they decided to start this program and were able to run it fully within 6 months. Teachers were brought on board by allowing them to use the technology and not with hours and hours of professional development. In fact, the ESSA Academy doesn't run professional development days but has rather built them into the school timetable (every week on a Friday).
It was an amazing insight on how to progress with a BYOD/T roll-out.
The issue now is how do South African schools adopt/adapt this model to work for us?
1). INTERNET: When I asked about internet speed issues Abdul pointed out that his school, rather than connecting to the internet, built a robust and functioning intranet that allowed the devices to connect through wireless. The first step was to allow the students access to the schools servers to download worksheets videos and any other 'storable' material.
Maybe in SA we should rather focus on upgrading school networks? Once the savings on textbooks, paper, printing etc. start to feed through we can use those funds to upgrade or connect to the internet.
2). DEVICES: These are expensive but they could provide savings in other area's.
Maybe the school/district/government/country needs to look at available funds and how they could be re-used to provide this sort of program.
3). THE ECOSYSTEM: Computer software is expensive and short-lived. The ongoing running costs add to the burden a school has to carry.
Not true according to Abdul. Apps are once of payments and never need to be purchased again and, more importantly, there are thousands of free applications that do as good a job as a paid one.
4). WILLPOWER: Probably the most important part of the equation. Without acceptance and investment in a program it will never work. To many have failed due to a lack of foresight or investment.
In my opinion the decision to run a program like this is up to the willpower of the relevant stakeholders in education. Parents, children teachers and officials need to see this as a powerful and exciting way forward and not as a scary and uncharted territory.
There are so many questions to ask around a program like this however we need to start asking and answering them in order to provide an education that is relevant and future-proof, can we afford to wait?
Thursday, 7 February 2013
Questions from Maggie!
Just a few questions.....
Was there a great uptake by parents to come to the training session?
We planned for around 40 families from the beginning, the sessions ended being around 20 families. This isn't too disappointing because this was for the very basics of iPad use and many people already use an iPhone or iPad device. Future sessions will include discussions on the 'Flipped or blended' classroom models, How creation apps work and the move away from content, a discussion on Blooms and how the Tablet allows teachers to work with higher order thinking, and how the parent can use the tablet to promote reading and analyses skills.
You say that you will do the same for other devices.....which forces me to ask the question of what is the breakdown of BYOD in the school?
We have a BYOT strategy, T being for tablet, and we allowed the use of any tablet the family chose. Generally about 95% have chosen the iPad and the rest have an android Tab (we only have 2 Slates in the school).
We did recommend the iPad to parents due to it's 'safer' (or 'closed', depending on your point of view!) app environment, however as a group we decided that to make a choice for a family would be against our IT committee's open platform policy. This did mean a long discussion and some hard debate!
Strategies for getting the teachers on board of coping with different devices in the classroom?
Simply...I have been given the time to spend with teachers, we ask them to plan lessons that require the student to create content on the Tablet and not specifically use an App to deliver content. Occasionally they might need a specific App, in which case the students without the specific app share an iPad or Tablet with another student. We have found that most Apps are available on both platforms (and many have websites that can be accessed and used on-line).
In order to help the teacher we have made the scheme voluntary for the first term of 2013 (until May) after which every child is required to have a Tablet of some sort. All we require of the teachers is to use the tablet occasionally in class, even if it's just a textbook or novel to read. At the same time we are training the teachers how to use the tablet and getting them to understand that how content is delivered by the student is not important but rather what is in the content should be judged. We have some teachers who's adage is 'I just let the kids teach me!' and that is possibly the best strategy we could hope for!
Hope this helps Maggie!
Was there a great uptake by parents to come to the training session?
We planned for around 40 families from the beginning, the sessions ended being around 20 families. This isn't too disappointing because this was for the very basics of iPad use and many people already use an iPhone or iPad device. Future sessions will include discussions on the 'Flipped or blended' classroom models, How creation apps work and the move away from content, a discussion on Blooms and how the Tablet allows teachers to work with higher order thinking, and how the parent can use the tablet to promote reading and analyses skills.
We have a BYOT strategy, T being for tablet, and we allowed the use of any tablet the family chose. Generally about 95% have chosen the iPad and the rest have an android Tab (we only have 2 Slates in the school).
We did recommend the iPad to parents due to it's 'safer' (or 'closed', depending on your point of view!) app environment, however as a group we decided that to make a choice for a family would be against our IT committee's open platform policy. This did mean a long discussion and some hard debate!
Strategies for getting the teachers on board of coping with different devices in the classroom?
Simply...I have been given the time to spend with teachers, we ask them to plan lessons that require the student to create content on the Tablet and not specifically use an App to deliver content. Occasionally they might need a specific App, in which case the students without the specific app share an iPad or Tablet with another student. We have found that most Apps are available on both platforms (and many have websites that can be accessed and used on-line).
In order to help the teacher we have made the scheme voluntary for the first term of 2013 (until May) after which every child is required to have a Tablet of some sort. All we require of the teachers is to use the tablet occasionally in class, even if it's just a textbook or novel to read. At the same time we are training the teachers how to use the tablet and getting them to understand that how content is delivered by the student is not important but rather what is in the content should be judged. We have some teachers who's adage is 'I just let the kids teach me!' and that is possibly the best strategy we could hope for!
Hope this helps Maggie!
Friday, 1 February 2013
Getting the parents on board?
This week we started teaching our parents how to use the iPad/Tablet.
The main point of our roll-out is that parents need to be partners in this project.
Firstly, they have all the usual parental decisions to make. How long can the child use the Tablet at home, what restrictions need to be used, can the child add or delete apps?
All these thing are up to the parents to discuss and negotiate with the child about. As teachers we cannot make these decisions for the parent, we give advice, train to use and help with software and hardware issues but we do not decide how the PERSONAL device is used.
Secondly, they should know how to use the devices themselves. The training this week focussed on setting up an iTunes account and setting restrictions on the iPad, later we will do the same on Android and Slate devices.
Finally, they need to allow the child to 'run' the device as their own. After discussing options we suggested each parent set's up one 'paying' iTunes/Play account that they run (and attach their payment details to!), in order to download paid apps and also one account for each child (set up in the parents name due to the 18 year age restriction, we can't allow lying now, can we?) to use for free apps that they will then update, control and, probably most importantly, access the iCloud with.
I learnt a lot too. Often parents are left behind or out of the technological revolution happening in education. They need to be involved and they need to be 'baby-stepped' through it. A teacher cannot assume that the parents can just up and run with the devices we are asking them to buy. As a school we need to be aware that parents often see technology from a different point of view. For them the important thing is the safety of their child, both literally in a security sense and on-line in the virtual sense. The first question we need to answer was regarding how safe our school cyber filter is. Luckily ours is pretty good!
We then need to let the parents understand that we all need to start some where, and that it's OK to ask question without feeling ignorant or embarrassed. Once this barrier is passed the training proceeds much more fluently.
The next step is to get our parents to have a device on their own and not just borrow the one they bought for the child....
...baby steps!
The main point of our roll-out is that parents need to be partners in this project.
Firstly, they have all the usual parental decisions to make. How long can the child use the Tablet at home, what restrictions need to be used, can the child add or delete apps?
All these thing are up to the parents to discuss and negotiate with the child about. As teachers we cannot make these decisions for the parent, we give advice, train to use and help with software and hardware issues but we do not decide how the PERSONAL device is used.
Secondly, they should know how to use the devices themselves. The training this week focussed on setting up an iTunes account and setting restrictions on the iPad, later we will do the same on Android and Slate devices.
Finally, they need to allow the child to 'run' the device as their own. After discussing options we suggested each parent set's up one 'paying' iTunes/Play account that they run (and attach their payment details to!), in order to download paid apps and also one account for each child (set up in the parents name due to the 18 year age restriction, we can't allow lying now, can we?) to use for free apps that they will then update, control and, probably most importantly, access the iCloud with.
I learnt a lot too. Often parents are left behind or out of the technological revolution happening in education. They need to be involved and they need to be 'baby-stepped' through it. A teacher cannot assume that the parents can just up and run with the devices we are asking them to buy. As a school we need to be aware that parents often see technology from a different point of view. For them the important thing is the safety of their child, both literally in a security sense and on-line in the virtual sense. The first question we need to answer was regarding how safe our school cyber filter is. Luckily ours is pretty good!
We then need to let the parents understand that we all need to start some where, and that it's OK to ask question without feeling ignorant or embarrassed. Once this barrier is passed the training proceeds much more fluently.
The next step is to get our parents to have a device on their own and not just borrow the one they bought for the child....
...baby steps!
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