A few things that I have taken away from the conference built from conversations during the breaks-
1. Move away from validating the use of ICT in learning by doing things better. Thinking that it needs to be ‘better’ than other or well versed practices is not beneficial. Validating use of ICT as part of the current learning agenda, because we live in digital worlds, I think is a better approach.
2. Not talking ‘ICT” but talking types of ICT practices/applications
3. Big talk about remodelling schools- do we need to be in a physical place through-places where children come together to social network, do inquiry collaborative projects, visit simulations, reflect, think critically….

Thursday keynote- Keith Kreuger from the US is CEO of the Consortium for Schools Networking (CoSN). By this stage of the conference it is very difficult to remain focused. In the auditorium I can see many people doing their email- attention has lapsed.

Keith looked world wide at ICT integration and states currently ICT is at a marginal point of use. US gov has been recommending zero money to support ICT use in schools. US call it Educational Technology. Presidential candidates talk on ICT:- $500mill McCain on virtual tutoring and home schooling/ Obama talks about innovation and changing schools-$500mil 21st Century Skills- talking creativity, HOT etc.

Keith focused on developing leaders. These leaders ‘raise the bar’, talk and demonstrate good teaching and changing learning environments, support communities of practice for professional development and renewal, redefine assessment.
A lot of this is not new and I feel that what Keith presented was reinforcing what we are doing well here.

CoSN.org video titles ‘Learning to change’ really good to show parents and teachers. 

Margaret Cox was a keynote speaker on Wednesday, Day 2 of the ACEC conference. She spoke about her research on students’ formal and informal uses of digital technologies,.
She is from King’s College London, University of London.

She tooks us on a historic journey of IT developments over the last 3 decades. Some of the points I took away include-
1.    It is unrealistic to talk about ICT as a term in the sense that it too general. It is more important to talk to teachers about specific applications such as web browsing or podcasting. Asking teachers if they are competent with ICT, may get teachers responding with a ‘highly competent’ by their definition of ICT as using the internet for research.
2.    Time can limit ICT integration. Margaret makes the point that teachers value ICT but only have ‘limited’ time due to other curriculum constraints/requirement.
3.    With the huge amount of things you can do with ICT you cant expect every teacher to be competent in everything. Teachers must be limited to become competent in one application and then build on that.
4.    For teachers to be using ICT the school needs to develop long term plans
5.    She found large disparity between home and school use which is predictable, however it was interesting in the detail of pinpointing which ways through clear questioning- eg when asking children what they do in school and outside school questions would be directed such as blogging- posting a response, responding to other person’s response etc,

Margaret seems to be getting down to the nitty gritty with exactly what children are using ICT for. She has just finished a book which can be googled- “inside the black box”. One thing I took away that I think is valuable for all of us, is that Margaret has given us some well defined ways students and teachers are using ICT which can be used to create baseline data in our schools. We can use this data then to redefine learning practices. Just google her name and go to Becta website.

The first keynote speaker at the ACEC2008 was Mitch Resnick from the Lifelong Kindergarten group at MIT- Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The focus of his dialogue was on enabling "creativity" quite timely as this is the focus for Education 2009.

He began by discussing the move from an ‘Information Society’ to a ‘Knowledge Society’ which he suggests requires an innovative economy dependent on creative thinking. He went as far as to say that being creative will be a basic need, a need that makes us happy.

He continued the rhetoric around moving away from the transmission model of teaching into different models for teaching and learning that were based on creativity. He suggested that the models we use in Kindy/prep/preschool are more able to develop creativity- when children are choosing their pathways to investigate and create using concrete resources such as building blocks, finger-paints. This idea then was drawn into later learning contexts- why are we moving away from this model as children progress through the school?

We don’t have the resources- building blocks and finger-paint are tools for this stage of development. However, when children get into primary and onto secondary school we don’t have the resources that support deep conceptual engagement. Or do we?

Mitch suggests then that ICT tools can become our conceptual facilitators. He puts forward a model for inquiry that would resinate throughout schooling and life- imagine-create-play-share-reflect-imagine.  Using ICT in this recurring sequence is in line with Piaget and Seymour’s active process of knowledge construction.

Early exemplars of this process were 20 years ago= teaching the turtle, lego TC logo, lego mindstorms.

He showed us examples of children working with these ICT construction tools. Children were inventing wearable digital devices, making household inventions, engaging in the process of design/make/appraise. His latest development has been a free program called scratch- http://scratch.mit.edu/

His intention for this program was for children to use this tool to express themselves in an online world, wanting children to be the designers of the games, programs because that is where deeper learning can occur rather then when just ‘interacting’ with game/software. Children are using the software to write programs. I experimented with the ‘turtle’ logo years ago but like everything it seems to have gotten easier now to program. What was presented to me in this keynote was a way to enter into programming easily and in a hands on ‘click and drop” fashion-like building blocks.

Mitch told us of the many ways (that he had not imagined) that Scratch has been used by children. One of the powerful things I took away was that children were sharing, collaborating and being critical of each others work and co-constructing programs through the scratch website. Scratch enables children to ‘share’ what they make.  Children are ‘remixing’ each others work, supporting each others learning with developing tutorials on how to do specific things, teams working together on projects, creating a Scratch community even with a TV series for weekly news updates on what is happening in their community. Check it out.
Would be great to hear your learning adventures with Scratch.

Date Claimer

Wednesday 12 November 2008. Followed by a BBQ. Rex Boggs is asking for session suggestions. Geoff Elliot will be presenting also. 

Thursday 6 November 2008 at the Coffee Star. Bring a friend and ideas for 2009. Commencing 3:30pm for a 4pm start.

Afternoon tea provided at 3:30pm thanks to Parkhurst SS

Workshop Venue: Parkhurst SS

Presenter: Dave St Henry

Software: Jam Trax

Pedagogical links: To use of IWB and making music for any media presentation. Fantastic lab for use by local schools.

Workshop commences 3:45pm to 5pm.

Many thanks to Dave and Lyle Walker (Parkhurst principal) for support. 

I am a pre-service teacher in my fourth year of university.

Currently I am teaching year 9, 10, 11 and 12. 

I teach students history and computing with a focus on Multimedia (Flash, Photoshop, Film & Gaming).

Information Technology is my passion and I also currently studying a Bachelor of IT. 

I am a huge fan of ICT for increased student engagement and accelerated learning.

I also host my own online learning community for students through the use of a Moodle.

- Tammy Butow

My Blog: http://butow.blogspot.com/

Delicious Links:  http://delicious.com/butow

My SlideShare: http://www.slideshare.net/MsButow

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