Dad-dancing

It's a widely accepted fact that kids know more about ICT and the 'cool' apps than teachers do. They have the time, the insight and the word-of-mouth recommendations to keep them ahead of the game (and their prying parents). Is that actually true, I wonder? Let's assume for now that it is, and that our learners really are the gatekeepers to all that is cool on the Internet. So, where does that leave us?

It leaves us in a very powerful position; we get to sit back, and let the kids do the work for us. We let them be the compass and barometer of our ICT lessons. We let them decide what to teach, and we let them teach it. Let them be the ones knackered at the end of each working day, instead of us.

What role do we have in our own lessons if we are as hopelessly behind the curve as we assume we are? We could just worship at the altar of our beneficent superiors, and let them run the show, whilst we watch on, impotently. We could play the buffoon to their straight-man, dad-dancing our way through our ICT lessons, embarrassing ourselves (and our cringing pupils) with our hopelessly out-of-date talk of MySpace, and this cool new 'social-networking app' (remember to do the air-quote thing with your fingers for extra cool-appeal) called Bookface. And why not? If we can't win this race, why even try? Let's just be content to support them as best we can, to try inject some actual guidance in the application of these tools, rather than try to keep up with them. They provide the tools and skills, we provide the ideas and pedagogical insight.

Overcoming apathy

Two weeks ago, I introduced Remind across three year groups and their parents. I sent letters home to parents inviting them to take part in this useful and informative project that would be mutually beneficial. I targeted my form class (year 7) and four KS4 ICT and Business Studies groups. So, that's approximately 200 pupils and at least the same number of parents. As of the time of writing, only 13 pupils and 2 parents have made the effort to take part. Only 3.7% of the people I am trying to engage. Allowing for letters getting 'lost' on their way home and a proportion of people that don't have access to the internet, that's still a pretty poor show. At which point do I decide to not invest any further time in it? My time is limited, and I have plenty of other demands on it, both professionally and personally.

Having said that, it would be naive of me to think that everyone would readily embrace this scheme. However, it does raise some questions and concerns. Is it the idea of Remind they aren't connecting with? If not, why not? Do I need to raise my profile with pupils and parents, as I have only been at the school for 6 weeks, after all? Is it a case of having to keep trying new ideas and new initiatives, in the hope that a few will gain traction and lead somewhere? Won't that just irritate the ones that are on board, or further disinterest the ones that are uninterested? Perhaps the low level of parental uptake is due to the lack of digital transparency I spoke of previously. Do pupils see this scheme as a way of me establishing a direct-line method of contacting their parents, and they are eyeing it suspiciously...?

I'm going to give it more time, more nagging and continue using it as though I am speaking to a larger audience than the 3.7%. If you build it, they will come. I'm also going to spend more time reassuring pupils of my motives behind this app. I am not using it to 'tell' on them; I just want to start a dialogue and use this as a gateway to more fun and interactive things we could do.

This week I am starting my after-school ICT club, with the aim of developing pupils into Digital Leaders.  It'll be interesting to see how many pupils are engaged in this idea...

Freaked Out - part 2

Belatedly, here are some of the good practice and ideas that were shared as part of last week's Freaked out training.

Creating a culture of pupil Digital Leaders: 

• Develop a of expertise – digital wizards, digital leaders and digital learners. Pupils can keep their own blogs and Twitter accounts. Section on ddp and minutes. Publicise digital leaders 
• Digital leaders charter - what they will offer pupils and staff
• Every break of lunch create a Genius Bar for digital leaders to teach pupils and teachers
• Digital leaders appointed by digital wizards
• Change school website, where teachers can produce a weekly blog, to increase learner and parental engagement

Making our schools more interactive:

• All displays contain at least two interactive items
• Use aurasma to create interactive displays, or videos for pieces of equipment. Scan wall display and a video will play. Good for explaining and adding detail to wall displays. Use it to do book recommendations and reviews
• Qr codes in classroom, wall displays, targeted key areas. Linked to audio descriptions of newsletters, blogs etc.
• Using audiobook and qr codes to leave feedback for pupils
• Using Twitter to write stories. Using Twitter as a hook to interest. Using a Twitter account for historical figures and get them to interact. Use as class display

Changing our learners from consumers to creators:

Use explain everything to get the kids to do their own interactive learning guides

An argument in defence of the use of mobile phones in schools:

It is frustrating for us to not to be able to use a mobile device. If we need to know something,we'd immediately reach for our smartphones. Why do we deny this facility to our learners? Simon displayed a wonderful image (which I can't find online) comparing today's mobile phone with the plethora of devices that we used to use independent of each other (phone,l camera, video recorder, GPS, microphone, etc.). And most of us have access to this wondrous device, yet we never use it!

Why not allow them to use mobiles?? If we mutually devise a code of conduct, to give the learners ownersip and a shared sense of responsibility for their conduct, can't we create a culture of acceptance? Yes there will be problems; but if they are dealt with effectively, if the risk is managed, then we stand to gain so much.  He shared an example of w working code of conduct, where lessons are colour coded as follows: 

Red – no phones to be used in this lesson, keep them out of sight use

Amber – phones *may* be used, keep them close at hand 

Green – phones will definitely be used, but use them responsibly

However, Simon seemed at pains to acknowledge that this practice is fraught with pitfalls, and that patience and an understanding SLT is called for.  To give an example, if I may share a ribald anecdote, I discussed the issue of allowing mobile phone access with my Year 10 ICT, at which point, several class members (no pun intended) erupted. They then shared a story of how mobile phones and Snapchat had been used in the school toilets to share images of people using the facilities...

Plenty of ideas there to chew on, I'm sure you'll agree.

Freaked Out training - part 1, apps

The course was an interesting day, and gave me plenty of hands-on experience with apps that I'd either had on my own personal iPad for ages and hadn;t found time to use, or completely new stuff. It was also valuable to be the only secondary teacher there, and I was treated as a guest of honour at times, which was cute.

So, as promised here's a list of the apps we looked at, and most were self-evidently useful in a classroom. I apologise if this information is absurdly behind the curve, but not having used the iPad in an educational context means I am forever playing catchup!

Simon recommended that schools have a core body of apps, rather that too many.
i can see the wisdom behind this at it allows teachers to be more focused and allows for better sharing of good practice. not to mention it is more cost effective.

All iPad apps (well, duh).
Explain everything - creates interactive and fun slideshows and screencasts.
iFiles - manages and transfers content on iPads, and allows easy downaloading of clips from youtube.
Book Creator - pulls in assets created in all manner of iPad apps to create an interactive story book. Really fun.
Aurasma - Creating interactive assets using augmented reality. I really liked the idea behind this app, and definitely intend to use this in my classroom. Learners take an image of a poster, for example, and it triggers an event such as a video or audio clip. A great idea and a good gateway towards acceptance of mobile phones in and around school.
Hyperlapse- creating time lapse video clips
8MM - a video recording tool with a variety of in-built filters to create authentic looking clips (e.g. for a history lesson)
WordFoto - generating word clouds from a customisable word list and mapping it onto an image.
Vemory - will search a user's social media account to automatgically create a memory book of images that have been tagged in a particular way
Skitch - annotating on an acquired image
Audioboom (formerly Audioboo)
iTubeList - creating safe playlists of youtube content matching a given criteria
Tagcloud - creating word clouds
Showbie - a student work manager
Post-it Plus - allows you to take a photo of a grid of post-it notes, and will scan them in and allow your to rearrange them on the ipad. Sounds crap, seemed cool.
Xnsketch - a pretty standard drawing app with some nice filters.
Tellegami - create a digital avatar that can be used to give presentations and such. I can imagine the pupils will love abusing the hell out of this...

Tomorrow, I'll discuss the key issues that Simon spoke about regarding 21st Century Learners, and some very interesting ideas on how we can help create a culture of digital leaders and learners in our classrooms.

Platform Neutrality

Wednesday I attended a Freaked Out training session delivered by Simon Pridham. It was an enjoyable hands-on session ostensibly revolving around the meaningful use of iPads in a classroom.
I'll make a more detailed report on the apps we used on another post, but I just wanted to share a thought that occurred to me.

As of the time of writing, our educational standardisation and qualification systems primarily revolve around the teaching of the Microsoft Office suite. After all, it's what's used in the real world isn't it?

Now the paradigm has shifted (not that you'd know it from the glacial pace of change of the Welsh Government). The iPad is the de facto system used from an early age, and there is increasing pressure for us to teach towards the iPad. After all, it's what's used in the real world, isn't it?

Headteachers are throwing massive amounts of money at Apple, oftentimes without there being any solid strategy to support this decision. This half-baked 'me-too'ism is potentially costly and can add to the burden of already overstretched teachers.

However, what concerns me is where this is leading. There is a real danger that we are allowing recidivism into our classrooms. Being so narrowly focused on one system to the virtual exclusion of all others didn't get us very far in the past, yet I wonder if we aren't hell-bent on repeating that very mistake with the lionization of the iPad. The use of a PC has become somewhat passé. Learners are becoming, in my own experience at least, less confident with the use of a mouse and keyboard. The widespread use of the iPads in primary schools has just substituted one transferable skill for another, and hasn't actually improved the level of skills in our learners.

We need to be more measured in how we spend our time and money; for us to be less hardware orientated and more platform neutral. Keep one eye on the future and another on the present.