ICT in Education

Flipping Textbooks

January 30th, 2012 by doug

: Image by Amin Tabrizi via Flickr

The other day, I got quite depressed by watching a discussion on Twitter about textbooks. Not, you will notice, ebooks or even etextbooks but good old fashioned hardbacked or paperbacked textbooks; the sort we used to use when I was at school (and I’m talking about as a pupil not as a teacher). Does education find it really hard to let go of the past or does it just go around in cycles?

Even though I didn’t agree with almost anything I saw on that discussion, it did make me think about textbooks and the relative advantages and disadvantages of them.

Information

There is usually much more information in a textbook than on, say, a website. This is a big advantage in favour of textbooks. At one time it was claimed that CD roms would replace textbooks, but CDs and even DVDs just never seemed to hold as much information upon a topic as did the average textbook. Sure, the CD or DVD had the advantage that it could contain animation, video, photographs and interactive quizzes, all of which might be more difficult, if not impossible, in a textbook but in terms of actual amount of information, the textbook wins.

A disadvantage of the textbook is that it could soon go out of date or become inaccurate as things changed, whereas a website could be easily changed to keep it up to date and relevant.

Relevance and Appropriateness

One of the good things about textbooks is that you could have a textbook written on a subject for young pupils, have another textbook written on the same subject for older pupils and others written for adult learners. You rarely seem to find this, though, for websites or CD roms, though there are some for young pupils, most websites appear to be aimed at an almost ‘ageless’ audience. You used also to get textbooks that progressed in series with the learners; so you’d have book 1, book 2, or book 3 or beginner, intermediate, advanced … you rarely seem to get such progression in digital media.

Critical Thinking

Perhaps the biggest disadvantage of a textbook is that a class or school often only use one, so it had only one source of information which was also presented in only one way. By using the web, a school could have access to several different sources which could present different viewpoints on the same topic. The web could therefore better allow for the development of critical thinking in the learner whereas in the days of textbooks, the learner just assumed the textbook was correct and presented the only view. However, this critical thinking could only go so far because websites and other digital media rarely present as much information, upon which to be critical, as textbooks.

Engaging

This is a tricky one as I’m sure we can all think back to any textbooks we used to learn in school and I daresay ‘engaging’ is not a term we would immediately apply to them. TV looks much more engaging, CDroms look much more engaging, the web looks much more engaging, .. at least they did when they first came out, do these media still look as engaging as they once did?

So it seems that textbooks had some advantages over modern digital media but also some drawbacks. So should they be used or barred in 21^st century learning?

Why Can’t Textbooks Be Free? (forbes.com)
Borders Launches Online Textbook Marketplace (webpronews.com)
Textbook Sales (shalampax.com)
Are all textbooks created equal? (computinged.wordpress.com)
Free textbooks from Curriki (teleread.com)

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Tags: Education, textbooks, Twitter
Posted in Classroom Technology | 2 Comments »

Learning Without Frontiers 2012 a quick view

January 26th, 2012 by doug

Things change and, let’s be honest, if we’re in the world of technology, we have to accept that and, I’d suggest welcome it. Why I say this at the start of this post is that, quite clearly, Learning Without Frontiers was not the same as it had been in previous years. For me, as I could only attend the free festival, I missed the inspirational speakers, the challenging speakers, the examples of innovative or disruptive work that we had presented in the main hall of previous LWF events.
I think Pete Yeomans, @ethinking, put it to me, most succinctly by saying there was no ‘heart’ in this year’s event.
The inflatable pods at this year’s event were a nice idea; certainly much better than the metal frame stands so typical of events! I’m not sure they always worked, some speakers were drowned by the noise of passing people, popular speakers found their pods overcrowded and some pods seemed harder to walk around than others.
Clouds and Coding seemed to be quite prevalent in the festival, this year. As also did the BBC micro. I’m not too sure about seeing the old beeb model B once more; it’s nice from a nostalgic point of view but all the ‘retro’ feel to computing has, to my mind, a bit of an unhealthy feel about it. Oh, if you do want to see a working BBC computer you can either go into my attic or visit the National Museum of Computing, www.tnmoc.org
As I say, coding was much in evidence at this years festival, I have nothing against this initiative in education and support it in many ways, but let us not fool ourselves, it is not the answer to the problems of computing/ICT in schools and it is definitely not the answer to our economic problems! At the moment, it is as much hyped as anything else that is ‘new’ in education or technology; I only hope we can get over the hype and the bandwagon and create something with it that is both productive, beneficial and innovative for the education of our pupils.
Good to see Radiowaves having a good presence at the festival, thanks to Catmose College. Some of the pupils from the college were going around snagging visitors for video interviews and then presenting their work to a seminar audience.
I know as teachers, we sometimes have an equivocal view of commercial companies involved in education. Sometimes we feel uncomfortable with salesmen presenting their wares to us and inevitably trying to get us to part with money. There is always an element of commerce at such events and really it is important for schools to engage with companies, possibly more so since the move away from centralised buying of tech toward more independence in purchasing by schools. I do feel, though, that there needs to be a common change in attitude in education and commerce along the lines of making ‘education’ paramount over ‘making a quick sale’. It is only when a school feels a company accepts this and is supportive of education, that a school will feel comfortable in buying from that company.
All this waffle, however, masks what might appear to be the biggest change seen in this year’s LWF event. In his opening speech, Graham Brown-Martin said that he was moving away from the technology and the disruption that had been advocated in previous events. These, he felt, had failed to bring about the transformation we have all been calling for or expecting. In his view, transformation would not come about until there is agreement as to what the transformation would look like.
I was quite stunned when I heard Graham say this. Not stunned because I disagreed with his view, after all it was something I had been saying several years ago, stunned more because I had either not expected Graham to abandon the disruption approach or had thought he already understood the problems of ‘transformation’.
As I say, all of this was a change. Change is good if you feel it is moving forward but perhaps sometimes we do need to take a little look back at where we’ve come from before continuing on our journey forward. Perhaps for me, that sums up this year’s LWF festival, a chance to look back before moving forward next time. I only hope that next year the new owners of LWF, if owners is the right word, can remember to bring back the ‘heart’ of LWF.

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Posted in education | 1 Comment »

Who’s Going to Buy Apple’s New eTextbooks?

January 24th, 2012 by doug

Image via CrunchBase

Okay, so this is just yet another blog post written as a result of Apple’s announcement of their new system for creating and selling eBooks (eTextbooks) into education. What I want to do, however, is take a slightly different look at the announcement; instead of looking at the hardware or software that has been announced, I simply want to ask who is going to buy the ebooks?

It seems to me that there may be an issue which needs to be addressed. In Higher Education, it is common and expected that each student will buy (beg borrow or steal) their own textbooks. That is to say it is seen as the responsibility of the individual student to have their own copy of the textbook.

In mainstream schooling, the situation appears to be different. It is the school, or class teacher, which decides which textbooks are to be used and it is the school which takes on the responsibility of purchasing and supplying the relevant textbooks.

Apple’s new iBooks2 as a system for purchasing and displaying ebooks on the iPad, works well for those student in Higher Education. Does it fit as well with pupils in mainstream education schools?

Or are we seeing yet further evidence of a shift in mainstream education away from centralised institutions toward individualised learning? In which case, does Apple’s initiative merely provide yet further impetus in this direction? Should our mainstream pupils take more responsibility for their learning and should that responsibility stretch down as far as selecting and purchasing their own textbooks?

Apple’s new vision of education (macworld.com)
High schools weigh in on iPads in the classroom (macworld.com)
Overhyping Apple’s iBooks Textbooks (kumardeepak.wordpress.com)
“Reinventing” Textbooks, I don’t think so! (elearningstuff.net)
350,000 textbooks downloaded from new iBooks in just three days (geek.com)

Whos Going to Buy Apples New eTextbooks?

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Posted in education | 6 Comments »

Lesson Plans or Learning Plans?

January 23rd, 2012 by doug

: Image via Wikipedia

In a previous post I mentioned the opportunity I had to observe a group of teachers doing team planning. As well as the observations I noted in that post, there was a further observation that I want to talk about in this post. It appeared to me that most of the teachers taking part in the team planning exercise were essentially still creating what I’d regard as an old style lesson plan. That is to say, it was to be a lesson that was to be delivered by the teacher and the planning focused more on what the teacher was going to do or what the teacher was going to get the pupils to do and what resources would be needed. The lesson, while not always a straightforward ‘sage on the stage’ approach, was certainly one that emphasised teacher direction or teacher facilitation, focused more on the teaching rather than the learning or the learner.

This type of planning was very familiar and would have been easily recognisable to a teacher 10, 20, even 30 years ago, it was only the resources available which were different; the approaches were much the same. This led me to wonder how might we change lesson planning to be more reflective of modern learning approaches?

It seems to me that the plan could be less about the structure of the lesson and more about the learning. I know they are called ‘lesson’ plans and in the past they have tended to describe the content of the lesson. Nowadays, though learning doesn’t just take place in the lesson; it can extend into the home and via out of school activities. There are also a wide range of informal learning opportunities which a learner can bring to contribute to their learning. So there is no need now for our planning to be restricted to a traditional lesson structure.

I know some people will argue, quite correctly, that we have always given homework to learners, where appropriate, to supplement their learning in school. However, the concept of ‘homework’ is quite dated now. It would be wrong, perhaps, to continue to think in terms of schoolwork and homework. It would be better to think simply in terms of ‘learning’ and what formal learning that takes place at home is an integral part of the ‘school’ work that takes place also in school.

So instead of presenting the learners with schoolwork in a lesson and then giving them homework to be done afterwards at home, a teacher would present learners with, say, an area or topic for study. A lesson or a series of lessons would be made available for the learners to study this in school, supported by the teacher, a range of resources and the face to face guidance of the teacher. In addition to these school sessions, a learner would be required to continue or extend their studies outside lessons, bringing in any experiences, resources available to them together with outcomes from any informal learning they may feel is relevant.

So Learning Plans would contain more than just plans for a lesson, they would seek to set out a number and range of ways in which learners could explore a subject area. Each of these ways would be designed to ensure the learner encounters particular objectives. Each of the ways could incorporate a different learning style, so as to appeal to different learners. There could even be discussion between teacher and learner as to what particular types of activities they would like the chance to explore.

In a way, I guess you could see a learning plan a bit like a treasure map but with different routes to the treasure, or maybe even several different treasure locations.

Developing independent young learners through learning how to learn (slideshare.net)
Diverse Children’s Learning Styles And Activities (brighthub.com)
Creating and Using a Learning Styles Chart (brighthub.com)
Lesson Plans Integrating Differentiation (brighthub.com)
Designing Informal Learning (elearningstuff.wordpress.com)
Learning Score, a lesson-planning tool. [Review] (dougbelshaw.com)

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Tags: Education, Educators, K through 12, Learning, Learning styles, Lesson, Lesson plan, Teacher
Posted in Transforming Learning | 2 Comments »

Subscription Services for Schools, Why?

January 20th, 2012 by doug

Is it just me or is anyone else bewildered by the plethora of services and software available to schools via subscription? It’s not that I’m against the services on offer, most seem valuable, it’s the business model that I question. Most of the subscription services just seem so expensive! Why is this? Not only do they seem expensive but they also seem to lack flexibility.
I do question, and I’m sure most schools do also, why they are being asked to pay £2500 per year for a service. Does that service offer £2500 worth of NEW and relevant content each year? That really is the fundamental question and I feel sure many subscription based services would fail on that question.
Many subscription services seem to offer little more than storage and delivery of content. How much does that really cost the company providing the service? I may be cynical but it would seem that some companies are charging schools far more than would be justified by their costs. Do companies not feel that schools will see through this?
Why I say that subscription services seem to lack flexibility is that they often seem to be based upon a whole school subscribing. What, though, if the product or service is only really needed in one class, one year group, one keystage, or by a few special pupils? in such cases, the cost of a whole school subscription could be prohibitive and unjustifiable: consequently pupils may miss out. Can companies providing services via subscription not be more flexible in what they offer schools?
What happens when you cancel a subscription? Generally, it seems, you no longer have access to the services offered. Okay, that seems only fair but what sometimes also happens is that you no longer have access to old content or to material you may have made yourself by using the service. Now, is that fair and justified?
Lets compare this to the old days, you know, the good ol’ days! In the past I could purchase software and I could purchase as many copies as I needed or the budget would allow. That way I could try to meet as much need as possible. Alternatively, I could buy a licence for the software and that licence could cover as many users as I needed. Moreover, once purchased, the software could be used for ever more. Sure I might want to buy updates or addons but I didn’t have to. It would certainly have been very rare for a company to ask me to pay again each year for a product I had already purchased!
So what outcomes can be drawn from this ranting? Well, I would urge subscription services to review their business model. We are not against companies making a profit but we don’t like to feel we’re being ripped off by high subscription costs. We’re not against subscription services per se but the subscriptions need to be sustainable for schools. By asking high subscription costs, companies do risk being perceived, wrongly perhaps, as being of the ‘take the money and run’ variety. Above all, I think subscription companies need to be flexible in their offering and make sure they focus on the education benefits of their offering.
As for schools, it is understandable if they think twice about subscribing to a service. After all, they could be embarking on a path that commits them to an annual expenditure of funds. On the positive side, I feel schools should be much more prepared to negotiate with companies, I know individual teachers may not like doing this or, indeed, have the time to do it but negotiating can be important. If a company wants to do business with you, them they’ll be prepared to discuss and negotiate. If you do find a company that won’t negotiate, walk away!

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Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Using a Visualiser with the Visually Impaired

January 16th, 2012 by doug

A visualiser is essentially a static webcam that can be used to project images of real objects or text onto a screen, an interactive whiteboard or a webpage. By projecting an image onto a whiteboard or a large screen, they can be used in whole-class or large group teaching. By linking them to a server the image can be sent to a network of computers, including remote computers, or to individual handheld devices. The image can be, and most often is, displayed in real time but the image, or a stream of images, can be recorded, stored and used at any time. The visualiser is a very versatile piece of kit that can be used in many ways to enhance teaching.

What I want to touch on in this post is the use of a visualiser for pupils with visual impairment. Now, instinctively, the first thing you think when working with a pupil with visual impairment is that the image should be both clear and large. The visualiser can easily provide this; it displays the image of the object under its lens and projects this onto a screen. The image can be of a two dimensional object, such as text or picture in a book, or a real three dimensional object, it can even be of a moving real-life object, such as a spider (or ladybird for the squeemish). Careful use of a light source can help minimise shadows and/or emphasise the 3 dimensional nature of the image. The image produced from the visualiser can be enlarged to present it clearer to the pupils; this can be especially useful if you are teaching a large group or if you have a pupil with visual impairment who just happens to be sitting near the back.

It is traditional wisdom that images should be larger than life when teaching a pupil with a visual impairment but really the efficacy of this depends upon the nature of the visual impairment. What I’d like to suggest is that we do the opposite; we take the image produced by the visualiser and we shrink it and then shrink it even more until it is actually smaller than in real life.

Why do I suggest shrinking it like this? Well let us take the case of a learner whose visual depth is no more than a couple of centimetres in front of his eye. A learner with such an impaired visual field can rarely take in the whole of an object but has to move their head and eye around an object in order to perceive it all. If we present a real-life sized image to such a learner, they will experience difficulty perceiving it. If we have enlarged it, then we have only compounded the difficulty the learner experiences. If, on the other hand, we have shrunk the image to less than life size, we have increased the opportunity of this learner to perceive the whole object and, thereby, improved the learning opportunity for that learner. This, of course, assumes that the learner is able to get close enough to the projected image!

I make that last remark because, while it may be the case that the image can be projected onto a wall, projector screen or IWB, the learner may be prevented from getting close to the projected image by furniture or objects placed in front of or attached to the a screen. The learner would also have to be able to locate the small image among a vast mass of white space. Perhaps, in this instance, feeding the visualiser image to a server and then to a handheld device might be a better solution.

There may be many other ways of using a visualiser with visually impaired learners and, indeed, other obstacles to overcome. I simply present this as an idea for their use and a demonstration of their versatility.

Interactive Projectors – IWB’s without the whiteboard (whiteboardblog.co.uk)

Using a Visualiser with the Visually Impaired

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Tags: Display technology, Document camera, Interactive whiteboard, visualiser, visually impaired
Posted in Classroom Technology | No Comments »

Do Learning Styles Really Exist?

January 16th, 2012 by doug

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Do learning styles exist? Let me answer that by saying, most definitely ‘yes’. In saying that, though, I do realise that I appear to be swimming against the tide of opinion. Over the last few years, it seems, more academics have been coming out to try to dismiss the notion of ‘learning styles’. However, when I read or listen to their arguments, it more often appears that their arguments are not against ‘learning styles’ but against one particular theory of learning styles and how it can be used, or misused, in education.

In some way, I guess the study of learning styles is a bit like the study of the universe. It is clear that we do not yet understand the universe fully and we have many different theories to try to explain it. Just because we don’t like one theory, we cannot dismiss the universe. The same is true of learning styles; just because existing theories may be wrong does not mean that learning styles do not exist.

The problem seems to be that when people talk or think about ‘learning styles’, they are refering to one theory; the VAK theory which categorises learning styles according to a person’s dominant sensory mode (Visual, Auditory or Kinaesthetic). This, however, is not the only theory of learning styles nor the original. It is probably, the most well known, however, because it is simple and easy to apply. Being simple and easy, of course, does not mean it is correct.

Now let’s consider a question. As a teacher, do you believe that all and each of your pupils learn in the same way, at the same time, at the same speed and have the same ability to retain, recall and apply their learning? Okay, that’s a rhetorical question, only a few inexperienced teachers would answer ‘yes’ to that, yet, by rejecting ‘learning styles’, that is what teachers are being asked to believe.

So in some ways, rejecting the idea of ‘learning styles’ might be seen as a regressive step for it would mean that teachers need not be concerned about differentiation, about providing a range of resources or adopting a variety of teaching approaches. Teaching could be reduced to its lowest level, take no heed of differing learner needs and any learner who fails to learn or keep up could simply be considered ‘thick’, inattentive or both. I know that sounds a bit extreme but this actually reflects a viewpoint I have heard from some opponents of learning styles.

So I think we can accept that people do not all learn the same way and that rejecting ‘learning styles’ wholesale would lead to a regressive approach to education that few would desire. On the other hand, the VAK model of learning style categorizes learners into very broad categories and very easily leads to learners being ‘labelled’ according to their supposed ‘style’, V A or K. It is this ‘labelling’ of learners that I find objectionable, experience as a teacher has shown me that broad labelling of pupils is almost always wrong and often objectionable.

For me, learning styles is not about labelling, it is about understanding. It is about understanding how, maybe why, learners learn. As a teacher, by understanding how learners in my classes learn, I am better able to select or create learning resources and experiences for them. I am also able to avoid teaching approaches that are not likely to produce effective learning for the learners.

It is my belief that learning styles are far more complex than any simple model can explain and that each person has their own preferred styles. Moreover, it is likely that one’s learning style changes and develops with time and experience. As an educationalist, what I believe we need is not another theory of learning styles but a tool that records how each pupil learns best.

Learning Styles and their Importance (youreducationisalwaysyours.wordpress.com)
More Left Brain / Right Brain Nonsense (theness.com)
An Investigation into the Learning Styles and Self-Regulated Learning Strategies for Computer Science Students (downes.ca)

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Tags: Education, Learning styles, Learning Theories
Posted in education | 32 Comments »

Flipping Textbooks

Learning Without Frontiers 2012 a quick view

Who’s Going to Buy Apple’s New eTextbooks?

Lesson Plans or Learning Plans?

Subscription Services for Schools, Why?

Using a Visualiser with the Visually Impaired

Do Learning Styles Really Exist?

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Flipping Textbooks

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