Wk_8 Functions of the Panacea

I am of the opinion that PDAs are nice, but a full-scale integration of technology in all aspects of the school system would be nicer. I like the idea of an open campus where students who need the help actually show to class and those who do not... don't.

Those students who have little social training and are a burden to the teacher and actively destroy school equipment (some students took all of the mouse balls out of the mouses in the computer labs and disconnected the peripherals from the back of the desktops for no apparent reason), then they can stay home or at least out of the classroom.

Those students who want to learn would be allowed to learn in peace, without discipline interruptions. I have several students out on maternity leave at the high school level, others who take days off to see about their babies or sick parents (a few with cancer or living with aging grandparents). Synchronous and asynchronous education can greatly help these students. Other cases, where students are truant and should be logged in or are just not showing to class, then an automated system can call their parents’ cell phones and report their absences immediately.

I also like the idea of school not being compulsory at the 10th - 12th grade level. Once students have achieved the basics through the 9th grade, they are employable for certain jobs. The Japanese system has 10th - 12th grade for students planning to attend college only. If you want to join the military, you can do so at the 10th grade level, or used to be able to anyway. Now, a lot of countries are mimicking the dysfunctional system of the United States.

The school system at the K-12 level has multiple functions. One such function is the housing of students to keep them out of the job marker. The other function is socialization. Compulsory education gives parents a place to put their children during the day while they are at work. For this reason, a wireless environment would still consist of desks and chairs, classrooms that can house as many students as comfortable, and computers, such as tablet PCs and PDAs that are convenient to use, but do not take up much space. WAPs will be needed in every classroom, possibly even the lunchroom. Students would have wireless cards in their computer of choice (laptop, tablet, or PDA – hopefully not cell phone, though some of the notepad features on cell phones are just as good as wordpad on laptops). There would also be a wireless printer access point allowing students to print from anywhere in the building using the schools intranet.

Perkinson, H. (1995). The imperfect panacea: American faith in education. McGraw-Hill.

PDA presentation

Wk_7 Using the best Synch tool...

Several times in the blogs throughout this week’s discussion, I have read about the use of asynchronous communication as a support for synchronous meeting times. The synchronous communication can be a small part of the larger communication effort within a group. Seth Battis wrote:

“I believe the first step is to actually consider the nature of the communication that we are doing and to try to use appropriate tools for the problems at hand…. we have new tools that let us make better use of both our synchronous and asynchronous time. Consider the process of developing a joint document (a proposal for a new course to be taught by a team of teachers, for example). With our triple-threat schedule, we may only be able to find one quick time for a face-to-face meeting, but we can use wikis and other shared document tools (e.g. Google Docs) to share a single, evolving draft of our writing. Technologies are coming into play to allow us to do the same for video and audio editting.”

This really is the best way to make sure that communication is effective for all. A little for thought and reflection on the purpose of the communication can help dialogs flow smoothly.

There were also several resources and articles that mentioned asynchronous and synchronous communication. It was difficult to find one with the message and substance that I wanted to convey or respond to, but the above comment by Battis really said what I’ve been trying to convey in my posts.

One blog of interest was by Derek Wenmoth concerning an e-book review on the topic of synchronous pedagogy. He also had a really interesting article on Twitter and Digital Lemmings.

References:

Battis, S. (2008, January 2). Using what we teach to teach better. Available at: http://battis.net/blog/tag/asynchronous/

Wenmoth, D. (2008, October 15). Digital lemmings. Available at: http://blog.core-ed.net/derek/2008/10/digital-lemmings.html

Wenmoth, D. (2008, May 30). Tips for synchronous eLearning. Available at: http://blog.core-ed.net/derek/2008/05/tips_for_synchronous_elearning.html

My Skype Experience

It took me awhile to figure out that there was a button that easily added people to group chats. We also played tag one day trying to keep the audio chat open with four people or more. It kept going down on us. I loaded a picture of it in the discussion thread for the Skype Chat History in the Class Café.

I was in a video chat with the professor and a separate video chat with Rose. She was the first one I did the video with. It was fun. I really didn’t expect to get so much out of Skype. I am using it now with my KAM study buddy. It keeps down on the phone bills.
☺

One chat session went like this:

T. Rhodes-O'Neill 10/13/08 9:23 PM
Did I call you by mistake?
10/13/08 9:24 PM
I double clicked my history
jodylr9876 10/13/08 9:24 PM
yeah -
J.M Haefner 10/13/08 9:24 PM
yeah...I think I tried to call you back
jodylr9876 10/13/08 9:24 PM
no biggi
T. Rhodes-O'Neill 10/13/08 9:24 PM
weird

It seems everyone is still getting used to the program, but that double click is really annoying.
One file transfer went like this:
T. Rhodes-O'Neill
10/7/08 10:13 PM
Does it show you who you have chatted with recently?
10/7/08 10:14 PM
There is also a history option under the Window menu
❦
J.M Haefner sent file "JeansView.JPG" to members of this chat
10/7/08 10:14 PM
J.M Haefner
10/7/08 10:14 PM
yes
10/7/08 10:14 PM
I'msending you a screen shot
T. Rhodes-O'Neill
10/7/08 10:15 PM
Overall, Skype has been a wonderful experience.

Sterling in Education

My husband was reading me one of his favorite books, and I thought it interesting that it was relevant to the class discussion. Bruce Sterling was writing about the future using Ralph Waldo Emerson and Shakespeare’s seven stages of man as a basis for what is to come. He states:

“The Internet has no curriculum, no moral values, and no philosophy. It has no religion, ethnicity, or nationality. It just brings on the data, railroad cars of it, data by the ton. The Internet is scholarship that is electronically supercharged, decentralized, disorganized, multicultural, and out of control. It runs on gizmos and it reeks of the transcendental.”

“Education is meant to codify culture…. Computer networks… give you everything all at once… in a harebrained heap.” (p. 51)

I believe this is where the educator comes in. It is the job of the teacher to structure the information and teach students the skills needed to maneuver the networks for the purposes of gaining knowledge. Those who can use self-help and “How to” books are not the target audience for the educational system. Most people need a little more guidance and interpersonal communication than what a textbook or basic literature can provide. For those people, the educational system will be an eternal part of their growth as lifelong learners. I often thought that, due to the Internet, schools would become obsolete, but there is a segment of the population that will always need that social, face-to-face interaction.

‘Computers are getting more sophisticated and much more entangled in our daily life, but they are not getting any “smarter.” They’re not the ones who are getting a new education: we are’ (p. 55). This quote reminded me that professional development starts with the teacher. The technology can change and be modified all it wants, but if the teacher does not know how to use it, if the students cannot get access to it or understand the functions of it, then it is useless. A computer is only as smart and as helpful of a tool as the person using it.

References:

Sterling, B. (2003). Tomorrow now: Envisioning the next 50 years. NY: Random House.

Links of interest on the topic:

MostlyFiction.com. (2007). Tomorrow now by Bruce Sterling - read excerpt. Available at: http://www.mostlyfiction.com/excerpts/tomorrownow.htm

The WELL. (2003). Inkwell: Authors and artists: Topic 171: Bruce Sterling: Tomorrow now: Envisioning the next 50 years. Available at: http://www.well.com/conf/inkwell.vue/topics/171/Bruce-Sterling-Tomorrow-Now-Envi-page01.html

Tonnies, M. (n.d.). Bruce Sterling book reviews. Available at: http://www.mactonnies.com/sterling.html

Wark, M. (2003). Bruce Sterling's tomorrow now, a goofy leftist view. Available at: http://www.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-0301/msg00141.html

Applied Imagination & Audiovisuals

Applied imagination and audiovisuals

When looking for a blog on this week’s topic, I contemplated the title “applied imagination” by Steve Dahlberg; however, it was not what I anticipated. I did discuss using images and visuals to help communicate an idea, but it was not so much addressed to the educational community.

In another blog discussing the use of audiovisual files in education, Timmermans (2008) wrote:

‘One of the points which we stressed was that we found that although teachers and students liked the idea of working with audiovisual heritage, to use and reuse it into presentations and learning objects, it was hard for them to put this into actual practice.

In our discussion on the reasons why this is so hard, we found out that there are some commonalities with other projects and countries. This was also mentioned by someone as a “changing teaching paradigm”. We experienced that there’s not only lack of facilities and technical difficulties which made it hard for secondary schools to integrate our pilot in their curriculum. We also found a lack of ICT skills and imagination with teachers trying to take it into practice. Students weren’t much motivated because there was no full support from their teachers.’

This week we discussed podcasts and using technology in the classroom, but the reality is that the facilities and support are still not there yet. The professional development for teachers and student training in the technologies has a long way to go in terms of outreach (getting to the people who need the training), and adequacy (making sure that individuals are proficient before letting them use/misuse the technologies).

The lack of imagination on the teacher’s part brings me back to the research by Hernández-Ramos (2005) that found teachers using new technologies in old ways. Instead of renovating the educational system, they just used the tools to make it easier to do what they’ve always been doing, whether it was lecture or group work, the skills never changed. There is still a lot of foundational work that needs to be laid before technology will have a firm foothold in the educational system. Teacher support, student support, even community support that ensures access outside of the classroom, must be firmly in place before a comprehensive change can take place.

References:

Dahlberg, S. (2006). Applied imagination. Available at: http://appliedimagination.blogspot.com/2006/12/tom-wujec-using-images-to-think-and.html

Hernández-Ramos, P. (2005). If not here, where? Understanding teachers’ use of technology in Silicon Valley schools. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 38(1), 39-64.

Timmermans, N. (2008). Offering online access to audiovisual heritage for education. Available at: http://research.imagesforthefuture.org/tag/education/

OLEs in Education

Hye-Jung (2007) talked about Open-ended learning environments in an educational setting:

“The graphic arts classes I have taken are learner-centered, where students bring in their own concepts, and start from there they find tools to learn visual communication skills, artistic skills, and technical skills to develop their own art pieces. In OLEs, teachers provide support with technological tools and technical resources, which is crucial to guide students’ learning. Thus, Scaffolding is a necessary element in OLE to support students' learning.”

The entire concept of the Open-ended learning environment is providing an opportunity for learners to make their own choices about what they are doing and where they will go within the environment. I thought the art class was a perfect example of allowing student creativity to go unhindered by teacher influences. The scaffolding process, as mentioned in Alessi and Trollip (2001), provides students with an opportunity to be creative within a structured environment. The guidance is there should they need it.

“…mapping and constructing process or strategy of teaching and learning can be more flexible as we apply new technology…. A good model of instructional design for class in general would be balance between constructivist and Open Ended Learning depending on the subject.”

The flexibility of the OLE is exactly what Alessi and Trollip was referring to when they discussed different learning styles. I like how Hye-Jung stated that the balance really depends on the subject. I could see where more guidance would be needed in certain subject areas, such as a structured language environment and scaffolds in writing.

References:

Alessi, S. M., & Trollip, S. R. (2001). Multimedia for learning: Methods and development (3rd ed.). Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Hye-Jung. (2007). Technology for classroom: Constructivism and open learning environment. Available at: http://tfcblog-hjung.blogspot.com/2007/11/constructivism-and-open-learning.html