Tag Archives: reading

Summer reading⤴

from @ blethers

What have I been reading recently? Nice of you to ask - I have been reading more than I might, because it's been the kind of weather that allows you to read outside, and I'm an outdoorsy sort who can't bear to sit in if the sun's shining or even if it's not and ... and ... Enough. Right now I've started on Lucretia Grindle's The Lost Daughter  and I'm enjoying it hugely, in the way you  do when you've read several of an author's books and settle comfortably into the environment - in this case Florence - and the characters (Italian cops) you've met before. I continue to be slightly irritated by the writer's tick of consigning adjectival clauses to a separate sentence more than once (once is fine, but it's too distinctive a trait to use more often), but she writes a good tale and the setting is terrific.

I'll not go on about that, however, because I'm just settling in - though I may return for a final thought. Before embarking on the Grindle I was reading the deeply unsettling The Disappeared, by Kim Echlin. Set in Canada and Cambodia, this is a story of the Killing Fields, so I'm now considerably more clued up on Pol Pot and the horrors of that era than I was in the 70s, when I was too preoccupied with bringing up children. As I shall be visiting Cambodia and Vietnam next year, it seemed a good way for a fiction fiend to pick up some history, and a pretty ghastly history it is. Echlin writes in an elegiac way that incorporates Cambodian words into her dialogue and reflects the music that brings the lovers of her story together, but under the poetry of her language is an undercurrent of tension that meant I sometimes had to stop reading (at bedtime, usually) before I was ready to.

I read another thought-provoking book in Frankie and Stankie, by Barbara Trapido. This is a delightfully-narrated account of growing up in the South Africa that existed while I was a child, the South Africa of growing apartheid seen through the eyes of the child of white liberals who nevertheless mingled with the rest of white society - though they took a dim view of the Afrikaaners, whom they saw as boorish country clods. The child-like clarity of the prose means that events happen without necessarily being interpreted; with our hindsight we are able to see how things gathered their own ghastly momentum and changed a world even as its inhabitants watched. I'm glad to have read it.

And then there was the appropriately seasonal Instructions for a Heatwave, by Maggie O'Farrell. This is the story of a family, beautifully and lovingly told, with fascinating flashbacks gradually explaining what is happening and making it possible for the family to continue. I especially enjoyed the seemingly effortless mastery of the writer, the firm grasp of tense, the fine strokes of characterisation. Set in the heatwave of July 1976 - a heatwave in London which was not, I can tell you with all the authority of a diarist, a heatwave in Dunoon - the writer keeps the heat there, oppressively present without being over-described, so that you are constantly aware of the difficulties of coping rationally with any crisis. I saved this one up for the appropriate season, and it went down a treat.

And now, chums, I'm away back to Florence. I'm not after all going to say any more till I'm finished. The sun is shining in the garden and I want to read ...

Creative Teaching and Applied Imagination by @TeacherToolkit⤴

from

The online blogosphere provides teachers with the opportunity to reflect online and use one another to bounce-back dialogue. This reciprocal-feedback is an integral component that defines us as teachers within the profession. I would never have thought such an opportunity existed when I first started out in the classroom in 1993! In this blog, I … Continue reading →

ICT For Teaching Assistants⤴

from @ TecnoTeach

Galloway, J and Norton, H (2011) ICT for teaching assistants. Oxon: Routledge.

http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780415583077/

This book is not just for teaching assistants but for those involved in teaching children ICT skills and ways to use ICT for learning. The hardcore ICT skills associated with Word Processing, Data Handling, Creating and Presenting and Control and Modelling, are touched upon in this book. It does not provide sequential lesson plans but more of an overview of the main skills required to 'work' the software alongside some ideas how to use the software.

Do not expect step by step instructions to help plan lessons. Instead expect to use the book as a resource to develop your own knowledge of the skills that need to be taught for various ICT software.

What I do recommend from this book is the Inclusion' chapter where it provides clear instructions how to adapt computers to make them accessible to all learners.

Dear parent: why your dyslexic child struggles with reading⤴

from

In a letter to parents of children with reading problems, Maryanne Wolf explains how dyslexic children’s brains are organised differently. Although it’s long I’m reproducing it in full as it is so powerful.  No one can ever prepare a parent for two things: the immeasurable love that comes with having a child; and the sorrow […]

Forde, C., McMahon, M. & Reeves, J. (2009). Putting Together Professional Portfolios. London: Sage. Part 2 – Describe/Reflect/Evaluate through Windows Movie Making⤴

from @ TecnoTeach

'A portfolio is a means of structuring, demonstrating and reflecting on your development as a professional.  At the heart of portfolio development is your learning' (Forde, 2009, p,13).

The three elements to examining practice:

Reflection - Why something was undertaken a specific way.
Description - What happened?
Evaluation - How did this affect me?

It is not just examining one's own practice but what we observe and learn from others.  This can be through observing others teaching, attending a lecture or undertaking a CPD course or reading a book or article.  The only difference is, although we can reflect on what we observe or read, it is not until we put this into practice can we truly reflect on how this affects ourselves.

There are times when we reflect and match our learning to specific attainment goals, for example,   Standard for Initial Teacher Education (SITE) or HERA for lecturers at University.  The model of reflecting, describing and evaluating may paint a picture to the reader, however, this picture sometimes requires evidence to substantiate the claims being made.

Using the models presented above, I reflected on a recent Digital Moving Editing process with students that was undertaken last week.

1.  Reflection on Digital Movie Making Editing Process With Students

Small groups of student teachers had completed the filming part of their digital movies and were ready to progress to the Editing process using Windows Movie Maker.  This software was being used as it can be found on the majority of machines in schools, the University has this on their machines and all students have access to this software on their personal computers.

Prior to editing, the movie files required converting from .mp4 to .wmm.  The file were in this format due to using Flip Cameras.  To convert the files the online tool, zamzar.com, was used due to no converter software being on university machines and to show students a possible tool they could use for converting specific files.

2.  Description of What Happened

Converting the files using Zamzar was timely due to the software only allowing one upload at a time.  A link would then be sent to a specified email account to which the converted file could be downloaded.  To save time, students were asked to share this task rather than one student undertake with the whole process taking around 30 - 40 minutes.

In general, all files converted and played in their new .wmm format, however, the problem occurred when we tried to import them into Windows Movie Maker Software.  Some of the files corrupted with the pixels becoming blurred.

To counteract this problem we downloaded trial versions of conversion software and converted all the files again.  This worked well for all groups minus one: Windows Movie Maker would not recognise all the files saying an 'index' file was missing.  We searched this problem, download additional files but could not fix the problem until it became apparent that the problem was due to all the files being converted at one time rather than one by one with the software: problem solved.

Next minor problem, for one group, was when they imported their files to WMM it would only allow one to import and removed this when another was imported.  Although a minor problem this was a little unusual as normally you see all files that are imported.  To counteract this we simply had to place the files on the storyboard each time they were imported.

Last problem!!!  A diligent student had worked very hard, all alone and without help or fuss, to edit her movie.  It was just about finished when she asked me about saving it as her space on the University would not allow.  Now, the student had imported all her files from a memory stick and I pulled it out!!!  This was not a good move because the computer was still looking for this files from the memory stick and all her hard work was deleted from WMM!!!  I had suddenly made the error that I warn all students about: past the point of no return...

3.  Evaluation of WMM

Looking back at this scenario, many problems would not have occurred if there was a video converter on machines rather than try online or trial versions.  With different cameras being used and different file formats available, it only makes sense to have a reputable conversion software in place to ensure this part of the process flows smoothly.  It can be very frustrating going through this process and things not working and it it technical setbacks like this that may stop many in moving forward with digital movie making.  Having spoken to technical support, we are now getting a converter software to use, Wondershare, for future movie make inputs.  Yes, a bit late for this one but sometimes it is only after events that we reflect and decide what to do to eliminate replication.

The next question that I keep asking myself is 'Why continue to use WMM?'  The latest version is not so easy to use and the current version, that we have on our University machines, is no longer running smoothly without hitches.  Is it time to inverts in a simple child-friendly software, similar to digital blue but one step above, that schools might be using or one that students can introduce into schools?  Part of me says it is time to move on but the other part says use what the majority have on their machines so student teachers can at least try WMM at school rather than not.

Whichever method I decide to employ next WMM session, I need to look at what local schools are using, try different tools out and take into account the benefits and disadvantages of each tool.  It may end up that a varied approach is taken rather than the one shoe fits all method.

If you incorporate WMM into your classroom practice or Local Authority then please let me know how you get around the conversion aspect and what software you use for editing.  Please take into account that the target age group would be for children age 9 - 12 years old.  We already use Digital Blue Software and want to go the next step up.  Look forward to your replies.

Forde, C., McMahon, M. & Reeves, J. (2009). Putting Together Professional Portfolios. London: Sage.⤴

from @ TecnoTeach


Chapter 1 - What Is a Portfolio

'a space in which you can plan and reflect in depth on your practice, helping identify your strengths and find ways of building on these' (p.1).

OR

'a collection of materials put together in a meaningful way to demonstrate the practice and learning of an educational practitioner' (p.1).

IT IS NOT

'a random collection of materials and artefacts'.

What is the purpose:

* to illustrate achievements?
* to demonstrate ongoing developments of thinking and practice?
* to collect evidence?
* to provide a vehicle for reflection?

Types of portfolios:

* Course Content - contains items that have significant relevance to a course.
* CPD Portfolio - contains record of professional development with reflections and evaluations.
* Competence-based Portfolio - achievement against specific criteria.
* Accreditation for Prior Learning - contains evidence related to prior learning.
* Project Portfolio - contains resources and reflections of groups related to a specific topic.

There are quite a few similarities and differences between what we place in different types of portfolios that it is easy to get blur the boundaries between the main focus or to use the wrong tool for the job.  In this age where many use blogs and wikis as their electronic means of reflection and evidence, I do question whether the correct tool is being applied for the correct purpose.  How often I have seen wikis being used as a reflective tool in the format of a diary and blogs being used as a place to record evidence when the other way around would be much more beneficial.  Surely as years roll on it is much easier to view an organised wiki to view specific key evidence that trail through a specific tag in a blog and likely so, it is easier to map development by viewing the learning journey in a blog than fish through a wikispace.  

If you are using a blog or a wikispace: what is the purpose of your online space?  Look at the different types and purposes and see if you can reflect on the reason you have either chosen a tool or been asked to use a tool and is it the right tool for the job.  Hopefully by looking at the above key aspects, you will begin to understand the 'why' and 'what' of ePortfolios and the online tools available.  There will be cross-overs and stand-alone moments but at the end of the day the underpinning purpose should be a place to map the development of one's relationship between learning and practice.

My Personal Response:

I originally created this blog, not to illustrate my achievements or collect evidence but to share what I was doing with technology in the classroom with a wider audience where the knowledge of the crowd was far greater than the knowledge of the individual.  By joining the 'community of practice' of my fellow educational bloggers, I could learn from them and reciprocate this knowledge sharing by sharing my ideas through this blog where developments in emerging technologies were at the heart of my reflections.

Over the years, this blog has moved a little towards collecting evidence, however, still has the reflective process and sharing as the main reason for posting.  It has still not, to me, met the purpose of 'illustrating achievement' due to it being my personal reflective area to connect with others and converse rather than just show.  Illustrating my achievement comes primarily through my professional CV or through my personal wikispace that provides more a timeline of events and evidence rather than the reflective process.

So the question is, why am I writing about Portfolios and discussing my blog?  It appears that many use blogs for the purpose of a Portfolio and tag specific aspects of learning.  For me, this is not the purpose of my blog, and like the old saying goes, 'what is one man's meat is another man's poison'.  


Christensen, C. M. et al. (2008). Disrupting Class: How disruptive innovation will change the way the world learns. New York: McGraw Hill⤴

from @ TecnoTeach

Next on the reading list is Clayton Christensen's Disrupting Class. Thankfully this book provides a little more innovative reading rather than putting modern terminology to old pedagogy. What is also favourable about this book is that it does not throw down your throat the old adage of 'Digital Natives' that Prensky likes to put forward but takes a wider reflection on learning with comparisons to the global business world: the world we are preparing our children to survive in.

So rather than state that today's generation are a multi-tasking generation who should learn the way they learn sub-consciously out with the school environment, it is quickly asks the questions: Is our child-centred methods of learning what will enable our children to succeed in the future. Christensen does query this briefly when he highlights that Asisan students are performing better in league tables due to their 'lecture' stye of learning compared to student-centred learning style of America who are falling further behind the league table. On the other hand, an article in the Washing Post argues the benefits of the American style of teaching as it prepares students for a fast-paced future where problems-solving, communication, collaboration and innovation are at the heart of learning, not just memorising facts and figures.

I do believe that both go hand in hand just like teaching and learning work together. Remember, you can teach but a child may not learn and a child can learn without being taught. When teaching and learning work together the educational experience is far richer. Just the same as we need to be able to have knowledge and skills as the backbone to what we can offer but we also need the ability to innovate, solve problems and work with others. It reminds me of how my own musical ability and my children's. I am a mathematical musician who reads music to perform, who uses my memory to know how a piece of music should be interpreted. Composing my own music or simply playing a requested tune is not possible if I do not have it in my memory or the notes are not there to be read. My children, on the other hand, learnt music initially by ear. They learnt by exploring all the instruments my musician husband and I had around the house. Learning to read music was a chore but they persevered and are now accomplished musicians with the ability to read and play all music styles through using the skills and knowledge they have developed over the years. They are also able to extend what is on the written script to wonderful musical treats rather than just the notes that are there. Without the skills and knowledge they would be limited in their creativity and their ability to work as a team with an array of musicians. Without their innovation and creativity they would be limited to only playing what they know and what they can access.

Teaching and learning with technologies is similar to this. Yes today's generation have the technology around them and use aspects of the technology to create, communicate and collaborate to meet their own needs. Some will be innovative and creative and some will just do what they have learnt from others. It is the job of educators to develop the skills and knowledge of children's use of technologies alongside creativity and innovation. Technologies should not just be a 'bolt on' in the classroom to make something look presentable but should be used where the technology will enhance the learning environment not duplicate what works perfectly. Christensen mirrors this view where he states that 'schools use computers as a tool and a topic, not as a primary instructional mechanism that helps students learn in ways that are customised to their type of intelligence...Teachers have implemented computers in the most common-sense way - to sustain their existing practices and pedagogies rather than to displace them' (Chrsitensen, 2008:81).

How often is the above still true for many educators who still use technology to make their learning apparently meet the needs of all learners - visual and auditory learners will get images, audio and video in presentations!!! Hands-up those that have taken this approach? I have to admit, when I started my current post as a lecturer all my primary teacher pedagogy was thrown aside as I became the lecturer that focused more on imparting knowledge to the crowds rather than teach the way that underpinned my personal classroom pedagogy. I was too centred around the educational content rather than the students' learning needs. I only began to address learners' needs after the module assignment at the end of each block where the assignments revealed current understanding of concepts. Unfortunately, my evaluation of learning was too late for current learners due to them moving to the next module. Christensen discusses this conventional teacher assessment process where 'if students haven't mastered all the material but know it well enough to get a passing grade, the students will move on' (Christensen, 2008:108).

Reflecting on my 'lecture' pedagogy, I changed my 'sage on stage' delivery to a more interactive model using the technology students had in their pockets, bags etc. Interactive teaching and learning using mobile technologies is my pedagogical style and area of research. In January I will be presenting with newly appointed professors at Dundee University's Discovery Day. This will focus on my current research using mobile devices in lecture theatres to change my delivery style, enable all students to be active in learning and to meet their immediate needs. Hopefully, in the new year, the research paper will be complete and I will be able to share many of the positive findings with my global peers.

So to finish with, educators need to always keep at the back of their minds, no matter what method they use:

If a child does not learn the way we teach we should teach the way they learn.

Prensky, M. (2010). Teaching Digital Natives: Partnering for real learning. London: Corwin⤴

from @ TecnoTeach

I have always enjoyed reading Marc Prensky's writings where I have connected with his thoughts and ideas. I have to admit, I was rather disappointed when reading his 'Teaching Digital Natives' due to the lack of innovation and creativity that normal comes through in his writings. Marc is now putting forward the notion of 'Partnering for Real Learning' as if it were something new. He is making out that education is still sitting in the Victorian bubble where we lecture children rather than meet their immediate needs, teach programmes of study rather than use the contexts they thrive in outside the educational environment and have learning as a one way street where we fill empty vessels rather than 'partner' their learning. Is this new reading? Is this new theories of teaching and learning? I think not!

Student-centred learning, scaffolding, facilitating learning are not new buzz words or concepts they are practitioners' teaching and learning techniques that have been put forward for many years. They are techniques that I have used with and without technology. To me, all Marc has put forward in his book is to come up with a new buzz word: partnering. Why make new words when they all ready exists and work well: a bit of a slap in the face to him advocating that technology should only be used if it changes the learning and teaching environment rather than a bolt on!!!

To be fair on Marc, there are aspects of his book that align with today's thinking and will be a book that I would suggest to student teachers to read, reflect and debate.

Here are some of the key points that I took from the book:

INTRODUCTION SECTION

* Attention - today's students have a different attention capability than other generations. This is true and true for every new generation of learners. What needs to be noted is that today's generation are multi-tasters who select what they want to focus on and block out what does not interest them. So is it short attention spans for the 'old ways' of learning, as Marc asks, or is it short attention spans that need to be trained to be more focussed to enable deeper learning?

* What students want from schools - not to be lectured, respected, trusted, follow own interests and passions, create, work collaboratively, connect and 'real' education. Again I agree with many of these aspects but this is NOT new reading. As a qualified primary teacher, active learning and meeting the needs of children were at the heart of my pedagogy; that was last century! I have always wanted children to create, collaborate, communicate and co-create with their immediate peers and those around the world. I do believe that we should let children follow their interests and passions but we need to open the doors to other avenues that might spark another interest rather than just keep a child in an 'interest bubble'. Learning is about meeting needs then extending and exploring.

Marc states that the new educational pedagogy should involve 'partnering' to enable the above. Yes that is true but again not a new concept.

CHAPTER 1 PARTNERING

Direct Instruction - teachers who lecture, talk and students listen, take notes, read and memorise. Again the term 'direct instruction' comes in many titles: didactic teaching or passive learning to name a few. Although not a new concept, what I did like was Marc's analogy of this style of learning where he referred to it as the Federal Express where 'you can have the best delivery system in the world, but if no one is home to receive the package, it doesn't much matter. Too often, today's students are not there to receive what their teachers are delivering' (Prensky, 2010:10). How often I see this in a lecture theatre where students are there but the information being delivered is not reaching the recipients. A scenario in many learning environments and one which Marc states can be changed by students and teachers adopting different roles in the 'partnering' process: student as researcher, technology user/expert, thinker, world changer, self-teacher and the teacher as coach/guide, goal setter/questioner, learning designer, context provider, and quality assurer. As you can see, not ground breaking theories of learning just written with Marc's twist of wording!

The rest of the chapters delve deeper into the ways partnering can occur in education looking at 'how' children learn today rather than how they interact with technology. If you are looking to read about ways to 'use' technology with our 'Digital Native' then this is possibly not the book you want to read. If, on the other hand, you want to look at 'how' today's 'Digital Natives' learn then this might be a book to read in conjunction with the key theorists in education to provide a balanced approach rather than a one sided view.

Do We Still Need Editors?⤴

from @ TecnoTeach





Although written in 2005 this book is now slightly outdated as I review five years on. Blogging was just taking off for many at this period but technology has moved on where there is more instant communication and collaboration occurring.

There are, however, small pockets of information that can be taken from the book with the first being the publishing aspect. Prior to blogging, journalists were the publishers and they had to persuade their editor to publish their stories. This was not a free voice process with the editors editing the stories as they pleased prior to publication. Blogging, changed the wheel where the journalists, alias the Web 2.0 bloggers, no longer have to go past the editor to publish but can freely put their stories on the internet for anyone to read.  Freedom of speech...freedom of text...  To an extent freedom to bypass people enables all to have a voice but for many this freedom can come at a cost.  Apple employees are not allowed to blog and neither are many other employees as the company safeguards what is written about them or by their staff.  In schools, who blog, this authoritarian line is taken by some, to an extent with others and completely ignored by a few.  Why?  This all depends on the systems that are in place.  Some schools are not happy with children blogging freely and do not want children's work to be put in the eye of the public.  An experience I had of this approach came from the school not wanting parents comparing children's work online where enough pressure was placed on the child to achieve without comparing daily against others.  The middle ground, is where teachers allow children to blog but through a moderated environment where the teacher approves children's post prior to publish.  The majority of post that evolve through this method are account of events or learning rather than reflections on personal learning.  The final approach, a free voice for all, is very rare and I am not too sure why such freedom is granted since I have never gone down that route.  Surely, anything that will go out the school building to the public eye should be moderated, like the editor of a newspaper.  I therefore ask the question: should primary children be allowed the freedom to blog freely where their voice can be heard without submitting their voice to an editor first?

If you answer that we are giving children an authentic audience, to an extent this is correct, however, who reads their blogs daily?  All public blogs can be read by anyone, however, Hewitt (2005) explain the notion of 'The Tail'. This reflects the 95 - 99% of blogs that do not get thousands of followers each day. They are the tail at the end of the graph that no one or just some follow.  Our children are 'The Tail' and very few people will read their blogs. Very few people read mine as I am part of 'the tail' too, but, as I have said in previous posts, I do not blog for an audience I blog as a reflective tool where I can dip back and find reflections of readings or educational tools that I have encountered.  Maybe the notion of 'giving all freedom to let their voices be heard to a global audience' is the wrong notion and blogging should be more about what will the benefit be to publishing one's reflections on an open space to recording in a private diary.  Why do I not just use good old Word and type my reflections in there?  Why do I not just buy a paper notebook and scribble my thoughts in there?  The answer to all of these questions is that a blogging connects me with a small group of like-minded people in my 'tail'.  We learn from one another.  Children can learn from one another too rather than just publishing to Web 2.0.  


This takes me back to my questions: 'Do we still need editors?'  As an adult I would say no if I follow the rules of etiquette on the net.  Student teachers - I would say no, however, with the way that many freely write in their social media pages, I would have to say that they still need to be taught net etiquette to ensure the balance between personal and professionalism are not weighed too heavily to one side.  Lastly, as for children, I am still under the impression that moderation is required through an editor, their teacher, to ensure what is placed online represents a school rather than an unguided free voice.  Schools are about providing the conditions that scaffold children's learning and this is no different with technology where it is imperative that children are taught net etiquette to safe guard their futures.