Educational Origami

In this update of on the wire I have a couple of interesting articles and the odd infographic to share

1. BBC Future – Why your brain loves to get feedback – http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20130226-why-your-brain-loves-feedback An interesting article on the importance of feedback. This supports the research from Professor John Hattie in his book Visual Learning about the importance of feedback (not that I think Hattie’s work needed further support – http://www.treasury.govt.nz/publications/media-speeches/guestlectures/pdfs/tgls-hattie.pdf)

2. Free Stock Photos – There are some excellent sites that will provide you with access to good quality stock photography for free. Here are a couple to check out

• http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/images
• http://www.kozzi.com/
• http://www.morguefile.com/

3. On a lighter note – Paper is Not Dead. This video about the iPad and paper is doing the rounds at the moment, and it makes a valuable as well as humorous point that is worth considering. technology isn’t a replacements for traditional approaches to activities, its an alternative. We need to consider the best tool for the job.

paper is not dead

4. Virtual Tours from Mountain peaks and Base camps – http://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/news/article.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10872387

This is an article from the NZ Herald that contains a number of virtual tours of mountain peaks and base camps. Here is the link to the blog post by the adventurer who created the tours – http://googleblog.blogspot.co.nz/2013/03/explore-everest-kilimanjaro-and-more.html

and finally an infographic on apps and the impact these are having – http://mobilefuture.org/resources/app-infographic/

Here are a couple of educause updates. These are part of the excellent seven things you should know series, published monthly by Educause.

The latest two are:

• 7 Things you should know about microlectures – http://www.educause.edu/library/resources/7-things-you-should-know-about-microlectures
• 7 Things you should know about group texting – http://www.educause.edu/library/resources/7-things-you-should-know-about-group-texting

Educause has a number of interesting libraries that are worth exploring – here is one I like, the video and multimedia production library – http://www.educause.edu/library/video-and-multimedia-production. Have a look at this 7 things about the evolution of the textbook  to see the links that are coming through with video and multimedia production – http://www.educause.edu/library/resources/7-things-you-should-know-about-evolution-textbook

Also have a loom at the K-12 Library - http://www.educause.edu/library/k-12

For the last year, Harry and I have been working on the ipad applications book for high schools. The Book is called Apps for learning, and is published as part of the 21st Century Fluency series with my Colleagues Harry Dickens, Lee Crockett and  Ian Jukes. This book has been a huge amount of fun to write. I had a great excuse to by numerous applications and try these out. The book details what we consider to be the best applications for high school at the moment.

Some people have criticised the ipad, and the same criticism could be leveled at any of the new genre of touch screen devices, that these are consumption devices. I disagree emphatically. I put my money where my mouth is and wrote ALL of my contributions to the book on the iPad using pages. I editted ALL of my pictures using Adobe Photoshop Express. I planned and brainstormed for the book using iThoughts HD.

You only need to look at the increasing list of schools adopting the ipad or its kin as their primary mobile learning device to see the huge potential for this tool when used properly. It is the use of the tool that is critical, deliberate and considered, meaningful and purposeful use to enhance teaching and learning.

Here is the link to the book - http://www.amazon.com/Apps-Learning-iPhone-School-Classrooms/dp/1463612850/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1314830290&sr=1-1.

Also worth checking out is book number three - literacy is not enough which is available on line from Corwin Press.

At the innovate conference in Sydney in march I did a casual interview where I was asked a couple of questions and videoed as I replied.

It was a little daunting, but quite fun

http://www.schooltube.com/video/8340ef6e57b934375208/Inspire-Innovate-Vox-Pops-Andrew-Churches

A handful of the best is one of the presentations I ran at uLearn09. The basis of this presentation is a collection of open source, free or great proprietory tools that I use in my classroom.

While the “software for schools” deal does provide a basic productivity suite for computers in schools and an OS it is a very limited selection of the tools that many learner need and use regularly. Here is my list of some of the tools that I use: (NB some require registration, and others like Comic life will require purchase but are well worth the investment)

(with apologies for the tardiness)

Most of us have met them. If we teach in independent schools, higher decile schools or teach in more privilaged areas they are becoming increasingly common. Even the more short sighted of teachers can see them increasing as our future becomes increasingly electronic. Whether we call them Digital Natives (Marc Prensky), Digital Children (Ian Jukes), Neo-Millennials (Dieterle-Dede-Schrier) or 21st Century Learners (Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach ) they are increasingly becoming the future of teaching.

So what are they?

Well they are students who are shaped by there environment. The environment they are exposed to is media rich, immediate, fast, engaging, dynamic and instant. Its electronic and digital, Its a communication medium with instant gratification. Marc Prensky, described the array of media the students are exposed to in his papers on Digital Natives I & II .

This obviously has a huge effect. Digital Natives, those students who, through consistent exposure to these factors and access to a variety of digital media, are engaged and motivated by the use of digital technologies. They are adept in the use of digital medium, and as Dieterle-Dede-Schrier and Marc Prensky wired to used these tools.

So what is a Digital Native, a Digital Child, A Neo-Millennial or 21st Century Learner?

It helps perhaps to look at a digital native in reference to someone we are familiar with: A teacher, who is moer often than not as Marc would describe them, a Digital Immigrant. (source: Educational Origami )

These changes in prefered method and mode of learning are changing and shaping the way we teach (21st Century Teachers), how we design and build our classrooms (21st Century Learning Spaces) and how we are resourced (facilitating 21st Century Learning or taking a measure of ICT integration). For teachers to engage and educate, to facilitate and motivate, our methods of teaching must match their methods of learning; our teaching spaces must reflect their learning spaces; our teaching tools and resources must support their learning strategies. There must be in short, a paradigm shift in education . Teachers must become 21st Century learners and more.

(The posts refered to above have been incorperated into the educational origami wiki. If you would like to contribute to these please become a member of the space and add to them .)

Resources:

Educational Origami – http://edorigami.wikispaces.com

• 21st Century Teacher
• 21st Century Learning spaces
• Facilitating 21st Century Learning
• Digital Children
• Neo-Millennial learning styles
• Bloom’s Digital taxonomy
• Traditional practice and digital alternatives
• ICT and learning style

Have our classrooms really changed that much?

http://www.commoncraft.com/podcasting

Yeeha – another great resource from Lee and the crew at Commoncraft. This is a excellent resource and well worth using with students and staff alike.

Good effort.

I read Wesley Fryers Blog entry this morning and took the time to watch the video to. Other than the storyboard reading like an advertisement for Apples iPhone, its fascinating. I must echo Wesley’s comments on it being exciting and impressive.

Essentially ACU  – Abilene Christian University – has issues students with iPhones as a standard part of their University stationary (the details and costs are not mentioned, neither are the security arrangements). They then use their iPhones for:

• RSS feeds – personal (facebook) and academic – podcasts and classmaterials linking to iTunes
• course calendar
• address books
• Campus events
• online payments
• voice recorders
• txt alerts and messages from teachers & the school
• timetables and schedules – including changing classes

They have built in some very cool functionality, like a 3D campus map with GPS tracking to show you where you are an how to get to class (I presume its GPS or perhaps triangulation from cell towers). Auto “in class” busy on the phone when you are scheduled into class, linking to VLE etc.

Watch or download the movie here -

This is for most of us a dream, we don’t have the relationship and support of a major player like apple or the finances to implement this scale of concept – particularly given the cost of iPhones and connection.

However, on a achievable scale, we do have almost ubiquitous access to cellphones. Most of my students have atleast 2 cellphones. They have optimised their calling plans and have one on each provider. While many of the features that we see in the iPhone are not available, many of the simple features are, particularly in WAP enabled phones -

• text alerts and messaging,
• calendar synching and updates,
• pod and vodcast,
• voice recording,
• Cameras and video camera
• internet access
• easy communication with teachers, mentors, administration, coaches, peers etc
• reminders even RSS feeds to tell students they have updates, new posts etc.

The potential of these tools is huge. Are they a disruption? I have not found them to be. My students know that if their phone rings in class, with out a legitimate reason, there are consequences for interrupting and interfering with the learning of the other students. Do I ban them – No, its not worth the effort. Do they self manage – Yes.

Watch the video – wish you had the ability to do what they have done – its neat and a vision of the future.  Read the vision they have.

• Convergence and the 21st-Century Classroom:
• Envisioning the 21st-Century Campus:
• Solutions for the 21st-Century University: