I have decided that the time has come to establish my own presence online and part of that includes my own domain and web hosting. As a result, I have set up my own WordPress installation at my own domain and have migrated FudaBlog over there with the intent to update it more regularly.
The new home for FudaBlog is at http://fuda.me/ – posts made before now have been migrated to the new blog, however no new posts will be made here after today.
Posted in Uncategorized April 28, 2011
It turns out that, based on the staffing available at the school this year, I’ll be teaching Year 7 and 8 SOSE for the first time in a while. Given my last couple of years have focused primarily on IT, and the year prior to that was Year 11 and 12 Accounting and Economics, it’s both exciting and daunting at the same time. Exciting because I think it’s going to be a LOT of fun, but a little daunting because it means engaging more deeply with the Australian Curriculum than I had expected would be the case. That said, after looking over the History Curriculum for Years 7 and 8, I’m feeling quite confident I can do a good job of it.
My plan for the year is to shake things up a bit – to bring a Challenge-Based Learning approach to the classes and see if, by facilitating and guiding the students, they can meet all of the Australian Curriculum outcomes without the need for me to explicitly teach every aspect of them. I’d like to see the kids really engage with the material in a more meaningful way – to start to actually participate with others in the class in a way that enables them to get more of an idea about what it was like to be alive in the periods of history we’ll be exploring. To instil in them a desire to find things out for themselves, rather than rely on the teacher to tell them what it is they need to know.
For year 7, that means becoming a part of Ancient Chinese society – to understand what it means to be a member of one of the main groups within that society, and how law, religion and beliefs shaped the way they act. Similarly, for year 8, an exploration of Renaissance Italy should give them an appreciation of the various influences culture, art and wealth had on the lives of the people. It would be easy to point the kids to content online and in textbooks and have them “learn” by taking it in from secondary sources, but to me the emphasis on content seems to be misplaced given that really, if they want to know about that stuff, the answers are all a couple of clicks away on an Internet search.
Our role as educators now is to spark a desire for learning in the minds of every one of our students. For some of them it’s going to be a scary thing – it means challenging the idea that you know what you need to know, and that your opinion may not be correct – but the emphasis on teamwork and collaboration I hope will enable them to understand and appreciate different perspectives; perhaps even allow them to identify what backgrounds and experiences contribute to the views held by others.
So what kind of tasks will I be asking students to complete? That will need to be negotiated with my colleagues and the kids of course, but I’d like to see students write their own historical fiction (whether it be books, serials, diary entries or screenplays/film trailers is up to them) that provides insight into the life and experiences of well known celebrities and the common people of the time; perhaps participate as a member of a church or government, making decisions and analysing the impacts of those decisions on themselves and their peers; maybe use what they’ve learned to draw parallels to modern society and how history has directly and indirectly influences the lives we live today.
As I said, it should make for an exciting year!
Posted in Uncategorized February 13, 2011
Update: I indicated during my presentation that I would add more information based on the questions I was asked at the end of the session. See the headings at the end of this post for more information regarding accessibility issues. Thanks to all who asked interesting questions at the event!
A quick search on the Internet for information about technology in education will give you a myriad of links to information published by educators, theorists, technologists and others who identify the many potential benefits technology could bring to all levels of education. A lot of it focuses on the personalisation of learning, greater access to knowledge (both in and outside of school), and increased interactions with others that helps to make learning more relevant and real to our students. There has also been extensive study done that highlights the importance of quality teaching in harnessing the benefits of technology – the notion that no matter how impressive the technology is, without a good teacher utilising it effectively the realisation of those benefits is hit-and-miss. With so much work going on in this area, it’s no surprise that there has been extensive debate surrounding the iPad and its suitability for use in the classroom.
I’ve been asked to present a brief session at the ACT All Colleges conference on the 1st of February to explore what technology has to offer educators, with a particular focus on the iPad. As an advocate of more personalised approaches to learning, with less reliance on centralised infrastructure and a mandated set of applications/tools that students must use, I was more than happy to provide some insight form my experience and knowledge around the topic. This blog post supports the workshop session I delivered, but in a nutshell the content of the presentation was around:
- The pervasiveness of technology in our lives and the lives of our students – the world we live in is one where just about everything we do is influenced in some way by technology;
- The increasing emphasis on mobile technology as a means of accessing information and communicating with others;
- The lack of a significant investment in high-quality, reliable infrastructure in schools to support the lifestyle and habits many of our students are used to in their everyday lives (which becomes even more important when there are access issues at home);
- The potential that personal devices that are not managed by the school could have on improving the learning opportunities for students; and
- The power of the iPad as a mobile, personal device (as demonstrated through a series of useful apps and a brief overview of its technical capabilities).
I don’t intend to go into extensive detail about any of the above here, suffice to say that there is plenty of information about each of the topics I’ve state above scattered all over the Internet and published by reputable educational research organisations. What I will do, however, is provide a brief example of why the arguments made by many that the iPad is not useful in education because it is primarily a consumption device are misplaced.
1. The library of applications available is extensive (over 60,000 and counting). Not all of the Apps are designed to allow you to “create” things, but may do, and what you can create includes music, video, 3d models of houses, diagrams and graphs… just about anything you can think of.
2. The way many of the apps are designed encourages you to consume information in new ways – FlipBoard is one example of how presenting RSS feeds, your tweet streams and your facebook feed in a different format allows you to get more details from each snippet/post being made by your friends. Aweditorium is another example (this time around music) that encourages you to investigate/browse content you otherwise may not. The more you consume – particularly if that information is different to what you would normally interact with – provides you with more information from which you can construct your own knowledge and understanding of the world.
3. iPads are personal – they are not meant to be deployed as a “class set” or in place of a laptop trolley, and I don’t think there is any real benefit in managing them at the school level (such an approach de-personalises the device). That doesn’t mean they don’t fit in education, it just means that the model of schools providing the hardware for learning isn’t relevant when considering the power of mobile technologies. What is the point of a mobile device that you can’t use the way you want to?
The whole point of this post is to get you thinking about the approach you take towards technology in the classroom – to perhaps reconsider the outlook you might have on mobile phones and/or student-owned laptops/tablets in your classes. With so many powerful and interesting applications available, it seems a shame to be telling students what they can and can’t use to learn. Technology gives us, as educators, a real means to empower students to discover the best way they learn; to encourage experimentation and risk as acceptable techniques when learning something new.
For further information:
Managing iPads in the Classroom – Issues and potential solutions
Mobile Learning (Ulearning) – Blog posts from a strong advocate of mobile learning in Qld
The Open Book Scenarios – Exploring possible futures for teaching
iPad Trials in Victoria and NT
The list of Apps I demonstrated, referred to or had installed on the iPads during my presentation:
Organise
- Underscore Notify
- Things for iPad
- Evernote
- Instapaper
- DropBox
Consume
- Shakespeare in Bits
- The Elements
- Molecules
- Solar Walk
- Star Walk
- Geo Walk HD
- Beautiful Planet HD
- Pulse
- Shakespeare
- Louvre Museum
- 3D Cell Simulation and Stain Tool
- Nature: The Human Genome at 10
- Houzz
- Melbourne Museum Please Touch
- Zinio
Connect
- Aweditorium
- Flipboard
- Magic Piano
- CourseNotes
- AskPhil(osophers)
- ArtHD
- SCVNGR
- TweetDeck
Create
- Ideate
- Brushes
- ASketch
- SketchBook Pro
- iBand
- iDesign
- Home 3D
- ReelDirector
- Or, in IT classes, you could have students write their own!
Collaborate
- Inkling
- Popplet
- Maptini
- Google Docs (use in Safari – no App required)
- Whiteboard HD
- Skype (and other IM tools)
- Box.net
- Fuze
Accessibility and the iPad
The iPad has a number of accessibility features built into iOS, making it reasonably friendly to users with special learning needs out of the box. That said, the accessibility of some apps will be dependent on the features included in the app by the developer, so I’d recommend exploring those apps that you’re considering to investigate the accessibility features and whether or not they suit your needs before shelling out for a paid version of the app.
Treetops.org.au has plenty of resources surrounding Apple products and their accessibility features.
Posted in Education ,Mobile Technology Tagged: Education, iPads, mobile, personalised learning, Technology January 31, 2011
I just saw an article on TechCrunch that pointed to a (seeingly well-rehearsed) Keynote delivered by Vic Gundotra, VP at Google, that argued why Android is going to be so important for the mobile world. He sold it well, I have to admit, but it got me thinking a little more about how most of use the Internet and connected devices, and what sort of implications his ‘ideal future’ may have for us.
I find it interesting that he talks about the device that would lead to a 1984 type situation. I think he misses something vital – that the device is ultimately only a gateway to the world as we know it now. There’s something to keep in mind here – Apple may (with the iPhone ecosystem) dictate what we can and can’t do with our mobile devices in terms of the Apps we can install and the functionality we can tap into as developers, and yes, you could argue this is draconian, particularly given the App store approval processes and other thing.
However, when you access the Internet, what do you and millions of others probably do when you’re looking for something? I’d say most people hit Google. And what determines the results that appear when you search the Internet? The Google search algorithm. So, ultimately, who has the power to dictate what information you are most likely to see when you use the Internet? Google. And with that information, and the information you give them through services such as Gmail and everything else Google build and encourage people to use, they can tweak that algorithm to present you with what they want you to see.
Android on every phone may make the device and applications you can use on it “free and open”, but it also gives them even more information about you and how you use the Internet. And, in this world, information is power. Just think – if we all had Android on our phones, and we all used Google to search the Internet, imagine the power the men at the top of Google would have over you. What if they decided that ‘not being evil’ wasn’t any fun anymore?
Thoughts?
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged: Google, ICT, information, Internet, mobile, Technology May 21, 2010
I’m active in a number of forums online (Blogging is probably my lightest online presence) and I follow educational debates very closely. One that occurs in just about every forum in the online and physical world is the argument about students creating their own knowledge through projects and activities, and the critical importance of a constructivist approach to education in the world right now. I agree with the view that our kids (and indeed everyone else) need to construct their own knowledge, and that teachers should be providing students with all of the assistance and skills they need to be able to do this, but there are a couple of things I think a lot of educators forget about when they go on and on about the need for students to be creating ‘something’ to demonstrate their learning.
Assessing what students have learned is fraught with difficulty – they may not necessarily want to demonstrate what they know for social or personal reasons, they may be required to use a medium that doesn’t necessarily work for them (yes I’m looking at you standardised testing), or it might simply be that on the day we formally assess them they’re off their game. To help overcome this difficulty, we can use formative assessment strategies and can give the kids greater flexibility over how and what they present. So far I don’t think anything I’ve said is too controversial, and if you’re an educator I’d like to think that so far you’re nodding your head in agreement with me.
Here comes the kicker – how well do you differentiate between the creation of knowledge and the creation of things?
The iPad was met with a very mixed response when it was introduced – some people think its fantastic, others say it doesn’t have all the features they want but that it has potential, and others think its just a downright stupid idea. Without a doubt though, the greatest criticism I hear of it is that its emphasis on the consumption of information means it is not a relevant device for the world our students live in. Those who hold this view point to other portable devices and say how much more superior they are because they allow students to create things, whether they be multimedia-rich projects or simple word processing documents. Without getting into a debate about whether or not the iPad can ever be a creation device (I think it has that potential), if you are one of those people that holds this view, I want you to read through the scenarios I present below and reconsider your view. In both scenarios, pretend you are a student.
Scenario 1: Consumption, Consumption, Consumption
Imagine yourself walking into a library that has been redesigned from the ground up. It’s full of all of the latest novels, magazines, journals, and it’s got multiple TV screens and computers that deliver streaming media, news and commentary 24/7. It has a podcast library that allows you to download directly from it to any device, as well as open access to any online subscription service you can think of. You can turn on your own iPad, Acer netbook, Android mobile or Ubuntu notebook – all of them connect instantly to a wireless network that is secured but has no blocking filters in place, allowing you to interact with the world around you in a multitude of ways, including access to your social networks and chat services. You spend 8 hours in that environment, investigating things you’re interested in and learning about things you didn’t even know existed, simply by following links and catching interesting tidbits of information from the variety of stimulus material around you.
Question: Have you learned anything? Has that experienced allowed you to construct new knowledge?
Scenario 2: Creation, Creation, Creation
You get home from school and sit down to work on an assessment task. The task requires you to demonstrate what you have learned in class by posting to a blog, constructing an ePortfolio of your classwork, contributing to a class wiki and creating a 2 minute podcast episode that highlights what you have learned. You sit down and spend 8 hours working on this task, and create products that you’re fairly happy with.
Question: Have you learned anything? Has that experienced allowed you to construct new knowledge?
Hmmm….
My guess is that in both cases, you’ve answered the question the same way – yes, you’ve learned something and you’ve had the opportunity to construct some new knowledge or understanding from the experience. I’m not going to argue about that – I agree that in both cases the student has been given real opportunities to engage with and develop their own idea of what knowledge is.
What I’m curious about is which experience has been most useful for the student in terms of learning new things and developing an informed opinion about what (s)he learned as a result of each experience.
I think it would be fair to say that if students are consuming information that comes from a variety of sources and provides alternative perspectives and views, that the consumption of that array of information allows them to truly construct knowledge. If, however, we simply sat them down and got them to simply make things from what they know already (e.g. make a podcast, now make a blog, now make a website, now write a computer program, now create a movie…), I would argue that the experiences of that student would be much less rewarding and the knowledge they create is much more narrow.
It’s easy to hold up the creation of “stuff” as being the ultimate goal of education – if kids are making stuff, they are obviously learning something – but I also think it’s important that educators do NOT underestimate the value of consuming stuff too. The creation of knowledge does not have to result in a tangible product being produced – if that was the case, there’d be a lot of people out there who wasted a LOT of time over the years. Equally, the creation of stuff does not necessarily demonstrate the creation of knowledge.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged: assessment, constructivism, consumption, creation, Education, information, knowledge, Musings May 14, 2010
I attended the Sydney ITSC Conference (hosted by Apple) recently and Chris Betcher delivered the Keynote address on the topic “This is NOT Amazing”. It struck a real chord with me and I couldn’t agree more with the sentiment – it’s something that has bugged me ever since I began my teaching career.
I mentioned this idea at a recent guest lecture I gave at the University of Canberra, and promised the students that I’d direct them to more information when it came to hand. So, to keep my promise to those students, I’ve posted links to the relevant posts from Chris, as well as an audio grab from his lecture.
I missed his introduction, but the guts of the lecture is still there. He’s also indicated he’ll post a version of it up himself after he delivers the final keynote at the last ITSC on May 23, so a better quality version will be available at his site around then.
This is NOT Amazing
Chris’ Blog post – http://chrisbetcher.com/2009/11/this-is-not-amazing/ (he also makes a recent post on his blog – http://chrisbetcher.com/ – where he reflects on the ITSC conferences and the way they operate).
In Chris’ Keynote, he refers to his daughter and her Virtual Busking project. If you’re interested in checking out more info about that, you’ll find it here – http://chrisbetcher.com/2009/04/425/
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged: Betchablog, ICT, ITSC April 22, 2010
As I mentioned in a previous post, the ACT DET has recently announced the adoption of the cLc by Uniservity as its new Virtual Learning Environment. Over the last couple of days I’ve had the opportunity to really begin exploring how it operates, and here are my intial thoughts.
1. It has a lot of useful features
Now it’s probably true of every modern learning environment that many things Web 2.0 have been included – things like Wiki and Blog services, podcasting and RSS etc. The cLc has a quite extensive set of services built-in, and the editors allow a reasonable amount of flexibility to insert other stuff that isn’t built into the system. You can embed videos from YouTube and do all the usual stuff, but it doesn’t have every feature I would have liked. One of the obvious ones missing for me is an RSS aggregator/feed reader that can be attached to users and classes – given how much easier it is to have relevant content fed to you now, it’s a big hole that I would like to see filled in future versions.
2. The Interface needs work
I’ve spoken with the vendor and he’s acknowledged that the interface does have an “old school” feel about it – given it’s evolved from around 8 years ago that’s no real surprise. The good news though is that in September, Uniservity are releasing cLc Life – an update to the environment that will have a dramatic impact on how the user interface works. I’m going to reserve my criticisms of this aspect of the system until after Life is released and I’ve had a chance to use it, but until that happens, I feel that the complexities involved in using some elements will be a bit of a deterrent to teachers.
3. It will integrate nicely with our student management system
Setting up any online learning environment involves the tedious process of populating it with users and grouping them into classes (or whatever unit you want to use). Thankfully, this will be alleviated when the cLc launches in the production phase – the system will integrate nicely with Maze (our admin system) so that class lists are automatically populated with data, and the ability to do things like send one-click emails to groups of parents based on the school email records will make communicating much easier than it is now (gone will be the days we have to manage our own mailing lists). There are a few more minor challenges we need to address here, but they are related more so to the processes involved in keeping info up to date rather than the cLc itself.
4. It’s going to require a cultural shift
There are a number of ways that the cLc could be leveraged to deliver online learning experiences for our students, but its going to be important that our school works out a strategy that is going to work for our community. The ability to share resources across multiple classes should help alleviate workload concerns if staff work smarter, and ultimately allow more time spent planning as a collective which will be much more efficient than everyone planning things on their own. But this is going to require staff to embrace the change, and that’s an issue that we’d face regardless of the environment being adopted.
Am I as excited as I’d hoped I’d be when I first heard about it? No. Am I of the opinion it is going to have benefits to our students? It definitely has that potential, but ultimately that rests not with the cLc itself, but with the ability for our teachers to rise to the challenge and rethink the way they approach the use of an online learning environment to support their teaching.
Another example where it’s not about the technology, but it is about the pedagogy.
Posted in Education Tagged: cLc, ICT, online learning, Virtual Learning, VLE April 21, 2010
On Twitter the other night a few people were asking about applications we use on computers or to achieve various things. It got me thinking – what do we have installed on our computers at school and what uses do these apps serve? I thought it might be useful for other teachers to see and hear about the apps we use at school, so here’s a summary and brief description of each of them. I’ve only listed the Apps we run on our Macs – we run all of these Apps on Windows as well, but the Windows computers don’t get overhauled as regularly because its a lot more effort and I’m reluctant to spend the time updating our WinXP image when we’ll be rolling Win7 out shortly.
Audacity
http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
(Open-Source / Free)
The ubiquitous audio editor. We find very few students actually use it on the Macs (they tend to prefer GarageBand), but having it available cross-platform means they can work on projects in all of the labs regardless of OS choice. Great for recording and manipulating audio in various ways.
Blender
http://www.blender.org/
(Open-Source / Free)
A cross-platform, open-source 3D modeling and animation suite. There is a wealth of information online about how to use it, complete with tutorials in PDF, Video and HTML formats for students to follow. For most students, there’s nothing 3DS Max or Maya can do that Blender can’t. Perhaps some of your senior students require the advanced features of the proprietary packages, but it’s hard to justify a huge $ spend for one class when there’s a limited amount of $ in the budget.
Camino / Firefox
http://caminobrowser.org/
http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/
(Open-Source / Free)
Firefox is one of the most popular browsers around and we install it on all of our Windows systems. The Firefox implementation on the Mac, however, is a bit tedious – it doesn’t integrate nicely with the OS preferences which can be problematic with some network configurations. Thankfully, the Camino project simply takes the Mozilla (Firefox) Browser engine and wraps it around a native OSX Application that uses the system configuration – so you get the firefox experience with the OSX configuration. You can’t extend it with plug-ins the same way, but the majority of users at school tend not to extend the functionality through plug-ins anyway.
Celestia
http://www.shatters.net/celestia/
(Open-Source / Free)
Interesting app that allows students to explore Space. You can see the Earth and the position of other celestial bodies relative to it at any time of the day (I opened it up now and sure enough, Australia is in the dark), and can get information about how far away various planets, stars, suns etc are. A bit specific in terms of where it could be used, but it’s open-source and relatively small, so the cost of installing it is negligible. Some kids just enjoy playing with it in their spare time, and that’s a positive thing.
CeltX
http://celtx.com/
(Open-Source / Free)
A movie production suite – built in storyboarding, script writing and planning tools that would be familiar to any media or film teacher. Definitely worth a look if you do any movie production stuff with your classes.
ComicLife
http://plasq.com/comiclife
(Licensed)
One of the very few applications we pay for, ComicLife is a must for any classroom and any year level. Easily create comics using photos and the built in tools. Plasq have also created ComicMagic (available on OS X only) and it looks even better, but we’re yet to decide whether we want to go there yet.
DoubleTake
http://echoone.com/DoubleTake/
(Limited Use Shareware)
A simple program for stitching images together into panoramic shots. The algorithm it uses to determine where photos should be placed does an excellent job, and it even has the feature built into it to create QuickTime VR movies (where you can create 360 degree images that you can pan and rotate around). The unlicensed version watermarks the images you create, so it’s worth considering paying for the license to get rid of the Watermark. We’ve chosen not to at this stage, but it’s relatively cheap and under consideration.
Geogebra
http://www.geogebra.org/
(Free)
A geometry package that accepts both graphical and algebraic input. Great for any graphing and geometry exercises you would use in Mathematics and related subjects. Cross platform and easy to use.
Gimp
http://www.gimp.org/
(Free / Open-Source)
The Gimp is an Open-Source bitmap image editor – like PhotoShop but without the price tag. The interface is similar (although there are differences) and there are some powerful features from PhotoShop that are lacking, but like Blender above, for the majority of students every feature they need is there. Our digital photography and imaging units use Gimp and after a period of adjustment for those kids used to PhotoShop, they find they can do everything they need for their class in the package. It can be extended using various plug-ins too.
Google Chrome
http://www.google.com/chrome
(Free)
Google’s browser is new to the browser wars, but students and staff like it so we figured we’d let them use it. Good performance on both OSes, and integrates with system settings on the Mac (unlike Firefox – see above). Having a number of web browsers on the computer is beneficial for student who publish information on websites – it allows them to see how their page displays on different browsers and/or platforms.
Google Earth
http://earth.google.com/
(Free)
Google’s all-in-one mapping and geography tool – every school should have this installed on their computers. No excuses.
Google SketchUp
http://sketchup.google.com/
(Free)
The free version of Google SketchUp is a very easy to use and provides powerful tools for creating 3D images and models. More like a 3D CADD package than a Modelling and Animation Package (like Blender), it is very useful in Tech Drawing and Technology classes for having kids plan and prepare their jobs. Kids can even drop their models into Google Earth and, with the installation of an Augmented Reality plug-in, can use webcams (such as the iMac’s built-in iSight) to “hold” their models in their hands and rotate them to see them from various perspectives.
Handbrake
http://handbrake.fr/
(Free / Open-Source)
A powerful video ripping/conversion tool – great for converting videos into formats for use on mobile devices, or for extracting videos from DVDs. I know we’ve used it many times to extract school performances from DVDs that have been made in the past when a version has been needed for use on the network.
InkScape
http://www.inkscape.org/
(Free / Open-Source)
Inkscape -> Illustrator what Gimp -> Photoshop. A vector-graphics program that complements the Gimp nicely in digital imaging and design classes.
MS Office
http://office.microsoft.com/
(Licensed – no cost to the school)
We wouldn’t be running Office 2007 if it wasn’t paid for by the ACT DET – before the recent contract with Microsoft we were migrating to OpenOffice due to the costs associated with licensing on a school-basis. The new agreement means the school has licenses on every machine for Office 2007 (2008 for Mac). Install Ribbon Hero to turn learning Office into a fun activity. Our package also includes Visio, which is great for diagrams and charts.
Scratch
http://scratch.mit.edu/
(Free)
Developed by MIT, Scratch is a graphically-driven programming interface. Used in IT classes in Years 6-8, it’s a simple yet effective introduction to computer programming, scripting and object-oriented concepts. It removes the difficulties associated with learning a programming syntax or language, but provides students with the tools they need to make both simple and complex games and stories using structured and logical approaches.
Stellarium
http://www.stellarium.org/
(Free)
Explore the skies above earth from anywhere in the world – a great way to show kids how different the night sky can look depending on where and when you are. Pick any moment in time and see what the sky looked (or will look) like. You also have the option to overlay constellations to help the kids understand how they’re named, as well as various other features to explore the sky.
TextWrangler
http://www.barebones.com/products/TextWrangler/
(Free)
Used in our IT classes, TextWrangler is a text editor with advanced features like syntax highlighting and FTP capabilities. Great for programming and web development classes where kids are using multiple languages and syntax.
VLC
http://www.videolan.org/vlc/
(Free / Open-Source)
The all-in-one video player solves the issues we have with multiple codecs in videos developed by students and brought into school. If you ever end up in a situation where your computer just will not play a video file, it’s a safe bet that installing VLC will allow you to view it. It’s also required for HandBrake (see above) to work some of its magic.
XMind
http://www.xmind.net/
(Free / Open-Source)
A cross-platform mind-mapping application that includes various mind-mapping layouts such as organisational charts, fishbone diagrams and other brainstorming maps. There are packages out there that are a bit more powerful, but the cost attached to those packages doesn’t necessarily justify the benefits associated with the extra feature set. We find that XMind provides our students with a useful tool for mind-mapping and brainstorming activities, and its simple to use and easy to learn.
Naturally we have the iLife Suite installed on all of the Macs too (iPhoto, iTunes, iMovie, GarageBand, iWeb) and students use all of these apps for most of their multimedia work. We find that classes that want to do things like podcasting and movie making tend to favour the Macs anyway, so we haven’t invested too much effort attempting to find applications for Windows that achieve the same purpose. PhotoStory and Windows MovieMaker have been installed on the Windows systems, but are rarely used.
You’ll also notice that we’ve cut down our licensing costs significantly by relying on open-source products. This has the added bonus of creating an environment where kids don’t “learn the application”, but rather learn how to create or learn with it. Too many schools install the well-known apps without thinking about how alternatives can not only save them money, but give them a tool to educate kids such that they develop a greater understanding of user interfaces and application design.
This leaves much more money in the budget for buying hardware and peripherals, so we’ve got plenty of headsets, digital cameras and video cameras for our students to really take advantage of the tools we provide for them.
Posted in Uncategorized March 17, 2010
Today I received the news that my school has been selected as one of 8 in the ACT to pilot the new Virtual Learning Environment being adopted by the ACT DET. It’s called connected Learning communities (cLc) and is published by Uniservity. I know very little about it but from all accounts it’s going to be a big improvement on the existing product we use now.
It’s got me thinking – are these internally managed VLEs a solution that we should be investing time and money into? Part of the pilot program will require me to help staff at the school learn the environment and then integrate it into their practice – this is going to be time consuming and add to an already heavy workload. Would there be more benefit in selecting environments / tools teachers area already familiar with (like facebook, twitter, wordpress, edmodo, flickr etc) and simply deliver our students their educational experiences this way? It would save a heap on PD, and the fact that teachers already know many of the technologies should mean they’ll be able to come up with interesting ways to use them without prompting and hand-holding from other staff.
Of course, the big issues with such an approach are those relating to privacy and security of information. We can’t have our students publishing information about themselves willy-nilly online (even if that information is only used by the provider of the tool for account registration purposes) for legal and social/safety reasons – I understand this. We’re in a situation now where mistakes aren’t allowed – the legal and personal ramifications for such an event are too destructive. If we continue to see technology evolve at the rate it has been, I don’t think the legal system will ever be able to keep up with the changes.
So, instead we provide safe “sandpits” for the kids to work in. I really am looking forward to a bigger sandpit with more toys (and toys that are actually going to work well) – I just hope that we all keep in mind that the world outside of that sandpit is a very different place, and we need to make sure that when the kids leave it they know that their sandcastles aren’t going to be anywhere near as safe on the beach as they were in the sandpit. There was no water, animals or nasty outsiders to knock them down.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged: digital pedagogy, Education, Musings, Technology, Virtual Learning March 16, 2010
So it’s been ages since I’ve blogged (at least here – I’m a little more active on Twitter, but even then it’s been slow of late), but figured I’d throw a few comments out about my first impressions of Google Wave.
In a nutshell, it seems to me as if Wave is Google’s version of what email should have been, had the web been the web it is now when email was invented. It allows you to collaborate either synchronously or asynchronously with any number of people – I guess it’s a sort of social networking meets chat meets email meets blogging kind of space. I think it’s got real potential for changing the way we communicate, but before we get too excited about it, consider what we do now and how it might change the way we use other apps.
For example, replace Twitter followers with people in a Wave, and you’ve got the ability to not only micro blog (without the character limit), but also convert your micro blogs into conversation threads – something Twitter doesn’t really do well (though there are a number of Twitter apps that help with that).
I’ll wait until I’ve got a few more colleagues and friends using Wave before I make my judgement, but overall I think it’s the kind of thing I could grow to like using. I’ve always used email for communication – even now at work due to so many other techs being blocked (I can’t use Wave at work!) – so the ability to take the advantages of real-time communication and sharing and combine it with something that for most people should feel as simple as email is a real bonus.
Posted in Uncategorized Tagged: collaboration, Google, Wave October 19, 2009
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