Preparing for National Curriculum with ICTs
Dean Groom, Macquarie University
A three part workshop on developing a facultyLearning and teaching strategy to meet the needsof the National Curriculum, and ICTs in practice.
Episode 1
New environmentsNew outcomes
New uses of ICT
What changed about ICT?
• A move from learning to be a userto learning to be a creator
• Access is everywhere (government funding and falling cost of personal access)
• "Everyone wants reform, but few like to change."
• Everything is free, everyone is on, but me.
We design for content not for immersion
This is immersive learning to youth online.This is their playground and informal school
Literacy's for learning
• How can teachers deal with ‘the democratisation of knowledge’.
• A teacher introduces Newtons Law of Motion• one student views Uni lectures on YouTube• one describes it as ‘like’ when you play Tony
Hawke Skateboard on console• another hasn't even heard of Newton• and a few students cannot even read well?
The engagement problem
• A profession with poor digital repertoires
• Office, Email and Search (90%)
• We’ve don’t encounter new tools easily at work – most innovation occurs at home.
• Participation is voluntary
• Tools are available, but a new tool means rethinking assessment, evaluation and more … rethinking teaching strategy.
Systemic problems
Limited teaching strategies when usingICTs. Teachers given limited time to develop them inside systems that don’t equate learning with work.
Professional developmentIdeologyAccessto the internetto teacher-mentorsto personal devicesPolicy
• 200 million accessing Facebook daily
• Number 1 application on FB is a game
• Would take over 400 years to watch current content on YouTube.
• 3G means mobile internet (cheaply) – You can beat the filter
• Your friends are online
• Informal learning and connectedness
Personal vs Work Divide
National Curriculum – ICT word frequency
New ICT terminology
• Includes others
• Cultures
• Understanding
• Enabling
• New
• Individual
• Behaviour
Rethinking ICTs in the learning context
Learning to useLearning aboutCffice automationSearching
The curriculum focus in on making, creating, thinking, collaborating, exploring and using technology to show what they have learned and what they can do.
Episode 2
Faculty Strategies
Students want Teacher wants
Parents want Nat. Curric wants
Communication channels.
Access to peers
Direction to find correct answers with minimal effort.
Online access to read/write web
Recognise the challenges
• Churn – the rate at which people try and then stop using something. (too hard!, too busy, too old, too new, too risky!)
• Sink – the time needed to encounter, try and develop teaching strategies in anything new. (I’m learning to do it!)
• Drift – Why people drift away from something they once did. (I’m over it!)
Potential Gains Potential Loses
The National Curriculum for History Teachers
Potential Gains Potential Loses
Using new ICT strategies for History Teachers
What are the gains? Reasons I’d sink
Reasons I’d drift Reason to stick
Using new ICT strategies for History Teachers
Faculty Priorities
• Consensus! Don’t expect everyone to agree. Make choices, but allow people to explore individual ideologies.
• Make it everyone’s problem. Even digital warriors get tired.
• Keep it simple. Focus on simple tools and simple projects as a group before flying solo. Share reflection and experiences.
Strategy
• Select a limited range of tools in exchange for existing tools. Resource up!
• Create a faculty project so everyone is working on the same things in different grades. Begin with the end in mind.
• Redevelop one unit per term together.
• Everyone contributes at least 2 hours of development time. Put up a list!
Be prepared to unthink and avoid trying to theorise and predict every outcome. Start with the end in mind and allow people to deal with specific issues and solve them together.
Ouch!
Make it learning by doing
• Broadcasting – recording audio/video
• Message boards – constant chats lines
• Structure – set up habits of mind
• Calendars – managing time
• Accessible –able to work later online
• With friends – love working together
• Interactive objects – manipulation of data
Boring also means lack of
Realism, relevanceor resonance
Leaning by Absorbtion
• Skimming text books and filling out exercise 1a, 1b etc.,
• Note taking, copying down, listening to teacher speeches – death by powerpoint
• Anything in Microsoft Office
• Cut and Pasting, Searching Google
• Anything that isn’t easy to do.
Nat.Curric (ICT) History Syllabus
Preparing for crossing over
Teamwork enables a student to work effectively and productively with others.
It includes working in harmony with others, contributing towards common purposes, defining and accepting individual and group roles and responsibilities,
respecting individual and group differences,
identifying the strengths of team members, and building social relationships.
GoogleMaps
SocialBookmarks
GoogleGroups
Outcome& Content
