Sliced Bread

 picture credit Robert of Fairfax. 

As I say goodbye Year of the Rat and hello Ox, I’ll leave a fullstop on my previous 7 months of ’new’ learning. For those who may be new to SB, this time 12 months ago I barely used ICT at all, well maybe ebay and read the papers, but little else and certainly not professionally. So now I’d like to puntuate my learning journey and leave 2008 with a few thoughts.

It’s been full on and fun but that curve of learn has seen a rank unfit trudger start a personal Himalayean incline, onwards and upwards with many Tenzings all aiding his Big Enlightenment.  

Now with the minor Sliced Bread base camp reached, whilst sucking copius O2, my dizzy head still tries to sort the figjam noise from those who matter. Not so easy ah master san, Why Is It So?

As my about page says a bit more about this journey, my employer offered 200 regional chalkies the chance to hear ‘What’s The Plan Stan’ and attend a North Coast Region Technology Forum waaaay back in May.

Reluctantly, due to State of Origin time of year if the truth be known, I said “Okie dokey Boss” providing this is a BS free zone that doesn’t waste my time or our schools scarce TPL budgets.

I went, I listened, I absorbed, I liked. Yee hah, this little shin dig was a goodun’, especially Tim Anderson, a man with his hand firmly on it, the vision of ICT in DET NSW that is. Calm reassurance of out future ICT directions.

Maybe DET NSW is not cutting edge innovative, and nor can they be, but never the less they are very committed as the world’s second largest Public School system with 1.4million users on the DET network.

I’m happy with our future directions, more so now the stupid political funding fights are behind us to some degree.

Long story short now, I embarked on what was suggested to us by the conference gurus.

“Get amongst the web2.0. Go home jump in the web2.0 mud pit, splash around get down and dirty, and experiment with what it all means”.

Well that’s NOT what they said BUT it’s what I heard. My type of learning. Independent, fast but deep and real choices.

After all this web2.0 mumbo jumbo is only modern tools to help already great teachers aid improved classroom engagement, learning, creativity, depth and connectivity. Sounds good hey and it is finally a regional priority, albeit at no6 but they are all important.

Pretty powerful stuff this web2.0 I’ve since discovered, in spades.

So with nary a thought I decided the best way to learn is to do.  

My attempts to learn the fundamentals of web2.0 are now in place to refine further in 09. Thanks to all who helped (as I have said repeatedly if they really follow my blog, TaMuchly)

• Wiki, blog, and RSS TICK,
• home page aggregator, Skype, social bookmarking, TICK TICK,  
• PLN, twitter and CCP

all ticked, understood and used to some degree. Anywho, enough to share this new world or learning with interested colleagues in 2009.

Shlock horror I can almost feel a New Years resolution coming on.

No fear not gentle readers, we all know the crevaces those silly things crash down and become, but a focus for my restless brain in 2009 is still needed.

Ok my 2009 focus will be;

• DET NSW Tools project, (in conjunction with wireless laptops and CCP, when we get ours)
• Drop in Drop Out Wednesdays to Introduce our fantrifficfabulicious staff to essential Web2.0 Tools.
• Just in Time Learning Team to aid and abet our Campus/College ICT plan 2009 to 2011
• Promethean Activstudio to Beauchamp’s stage 4 level
• Involvement in our new DET provided School Webpages (sorry no link, walled garden DET NSW only)
• Strengthen my own PLN and pursuade DET NSW to officially recognise this as QTL & TPL  

Ahhh I feel better now, now my mini resting 2008 full stop punctuation has been left, see there it is   .  

I can now happily engage in some festivities to see the Ox rise and the Rat set. Base camp Two further up the Everest of Web2.0 awaits for ‘MyAlign09′

Happy New Year and a massive TaMuchly for 2008.  

If you want to join a quality Australian PLN for educators in all sectors, I recommend me.edu.au. Thanks to Kerrie for alerting me to it.

This promotional video for me.edu.au, featuring me.edu.au users Simon Brown, Jess McCulloch and Martin Pluss, provides an overview of the free me.edu.au professional networking site for Australian educators managed by Education.au on behalf of DEEWR.

If you still want more have a browse through this resource, I did and liked it.

I’m always up for a bit of irreverency so after eduguru and helper to the hoards Sue Waters tagged me for next in, whilst on holidays no less, well who was I to disappoint?

Here are my ‘7 things you really don’t need to know about me.’

1.  Adora Rum Truffles are ace numero uno. Yummy in the extreme, shelf life = minimal.
2. My trusty steed is a 05Dakar650, my ADV nickname is FSOD an Adora prize awaits the 1st codebreaker
3. Luceat Lux Vestra was my high school motto. Wish they had of practiced what they preached.
4. VH1971 770 4 speed 265ci sky blue Valiant Charger was my BEST car ever owned. Oh sweet hemi + 600 Holley music.
5. 2007 ANU award was the best teaching recognition ever, scary but good. Thanks Ben. (Your ‘esky’ aka the museum, awaits a grand opening in 2009, It’s where all the cool history stuff goes my students tell me).
6. Spent 7 years as an APC driver with 12/16th HRL B Squadron, Chauvel Depot Muswellbrook. Loved every minute of it.
7. A single malt tour of the British Isles finest distilleries is a planned retirement indulgence. Thank my sister for dreaming that one up. 

 I’ll pass the meme baton on ’7 things you really don’t need to know about me’ to

1 Darcy Moore

2 John Larkin

3 Graham Wegner

4 Anne Mirtschin

5 Elaine Talbert

6 Chris Betcher

7 Jess McCulloch

Have fun, tag 7 more, share 7 things and see if this meme survives unmutated.

 credit

Today Mick P and I surveyed and observed students as part of Principal Mark’s “Personal Control and Responsibility” Teacher Professional Learning (TPL) session at our campus. It caused some reflective thinking, good.

Teachers had choices to learn and participate by either;

• research ‘engagement in learning’, individually or in groups 
• particpate in “Head Games” or
• complete a group work activity.

Three different learning methods focused on the common aims;

• explore the benefits of choice in education
• share ways of providing this choice
• gather ideas on Personal Control and Responsibility and what it means for teachers
• provide a basis for staff welfare targets.

We choose to research the student perspective on what they do if given “free choice”. Students had been given time on computers as teachers engaged in this TPL. Students were totally engaged in what they were doing. Why?

This is what they’d selected during our 20 minute observation;

• arcade games = 5 (from the simple to extremely complex)
• quizella = answered collaboratively by a pair
• chat rooms
• motorsport news online newspaper
• editing google pictures, “a mash up”
• Japanese Culture and online Christmas shopping
• researching personal interests eg Maitland Gaol

Only half had actually selected games, which is what you may expect all to choose. 

Others selected educational, practical or text based sites. The overiding feature was their collaboration, engagement, learning and sharing.

Many watched and spoke to others about what they were doing and followed their recommendations (”check this out”, or “that looks good, whats the address?”) 

There was chat and sharing, laughter and learning, collaboration and networking. It was certainly not just single students working in isolation at a screen. They appeared to be personally in control and engaged.

It may not be traditional classroom syllabus based learning, but lets face it most of our life long learning is not based on narrow document constraints either. Which do we rather if given a choice? Can our current syllabi be made more meaningful or delivered in a manner that elicits deeper learning and connections?

The application we witnessed from students reflects what choice can do for deeper student engagement and learning.  We should aim to further close the gap between this style of deep learning, sustained engagement and collaborative application so it aligns more to the traditional syllabus requirements. How?

It is a given that any quality teaching is based on strong relationships. We are ‘teaching children not content’ and ‘kids learn the teacher not the subject’ both age old sayings but still highly relevant.

The valid assertions of building strong rapport, relationships, trust, warm fuzzies et al with their students is, or should be, the basic starting point for all teaching and learning.

These are the absolute fundamentals of quality teacher/learner relationships and all teachers should be fully cogniscent of this essential starting point. Do you really know your kids? Do you connect?

It is well past the time to build on these motherhood statements and important fundamentals of QTL and ask how can students engage more deeply with authentic, meaningful learning when the given of strong relationships is already firmly entrenched?  

What do 21st century students need? It sure isn’t what we needed 40 odd years ago when ‘Wyndham was in’. Likewise, it isn’t textbook, chalk n talk, lecture, test, retest, empty vessal education either. We all know it’s far more Plutarch’s ‘kindle the fires.’

Wider research has shown for some time now the value of project based learning, second life, educational games, online learning, connectivism, constructivism and virtual communities.

When aligned and applied well, these methods and theories result in quality outcomes where choice and attention to individual learning styles is strongly implicit. Sure its still based on warm fuzzy educational relationships but tomorrows screenager learners will want MORE of these choices, not less. Nothing to be scared of here, move along.

Many of the properties of virtual environments seem to be conducive for good learning: they tend to be interactive, engaging, safe places for students to learn by doing and experimentation, and they provide scaffolding and immediate feedback.

When given choice, you may think students will only select shallow sugary throw aways but research has shown the balance swings towards deeper learning when engaged with authentic meaningful choices. They want to learn if the project is real; witness hands on prac subjects through the ages. Fairly major motivational/educational advantages to begin with.

Students seek relevancy, substance and clearly defined choices in their learning. This is why so many learning institutions are moving towards PBL and contructivism. It is wide, deep, real learning projects that engage students with and by choices.

Many universities have extensively researched virtual learning communities based on gaming and second life. It is one way of future learning that communities are exploring. (Read the Jokaydia flyer near our photocopier for more information on one award winning educational innovation.)

Another observation about today’s learning was the high level of staff engagement and quality input. Even the boss was wrapt. Imagine sharing today’s 2 hours of TPL with a wider audience. It should of happened because thats how good it was. Laggards see global sharing/web2.0 as just another flossy edutrend, but no, no, no, this time its real folks and all learners should engage sooner rather than later.

Teacher’s will assume more control of their own TPL as the semantic/read/write web is understood, becomes accepted and better utilised. PLN’s are the way forward with meaningful connected professional development. The days of one size fits all PD lectures are long gone, for kids and teachers. Bring it on.

‘It won’t happen overnight, but it will happen’, a lot faster than the education industry has been prepared to accept in the past. I hope the 0 to 50 year olds are ready to teach and learn by it over the next few decades.

To finish I think, Charles Leadbeater’s excellent video ‘We Think’ is in need of a rerun. This content is not new or futuristic, it is now. It is us who need to change. Hope you enjoy it for the first or 50th time. (ps Of course you can’t watch it at work, DET NSW is the pyramid you’ll see, that’d be a silly learning suggestion, watching educational videos at work? no no no)

(Edit: After requisite time and reflection, this post now has a tad more depth, links & comments than the initial 40 minutes PD we had)