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You raise a very valid point and it's a dilemma I have come across, but
have yet to resolve. A couple of years ago I had a Year 7 Somali girl
who knew very little English and was easily distracted in class. I
taught her to work with backgrounds and images in Powerpoint and to my
delight and surprise this girl showed an amazing flair for design, and
she became totally engrossed in her PP work. Technically she "failed"
the modified course that I gave to my junior ESL students in IT, but I
gave her a glowing report. I learned that my modified course needs to
be more flexible and accommodating. I like the idea of assessing a
student according to a his/her specific circumstances (cultural and
personal) and bugger VELS and the progression points if they
disadvantage the student.<br>
<br>
Paul Chandler wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:442B8BAB0827E1438ABFB75152F52D0501386714@yvgmailsrv.YVG.local"
type="cite">
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<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"><font
color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> Roland wrote:</font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"> </span><br>
I have
some Sudanese lads who are struggling with renaming files yet can
happily play
computer games and chat online. Is it appropriate to measuring their
learning
from their understanding of a computer desktop, a metaphor based upon
the
workings of a small business office? The different ethnic groups at our
school
have vastly different traditions and ideas of what it means to 'be
working
together'. I am now not sure if the collaborative, learning model that
I carry
about in my head is best and only way forward. <br>
<span class="379582202-24102007"><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial"
size="2"> </font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"><font
color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">I once read (in a scholarly text
on metaphor
in the English language) of an ESL student who was wrestling with the
phrase "the solution of your problems". Rather than interpreting
'solution' as akin to 'output', this student had seen it in a chemical
sense, and in his mind was something like the "dancing
mothballs"</font> <font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">demo (if
you're not
familiar with this, it's described here: <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://www.science-is.com/bubbleballet.htm">http://www.science-is.com/bubbleballet.htm</a>)
... so every so often, in his mind, a problem/mothball would float to
the
surface, and needed to be tackled head-on ... but most of the
time, life
was lived keeping them in motion ("solution") rather than obtaining
"the
answers". This strikes me as a rather interesting (but definately
non-Western) way of living life. Cultural context is
important.</font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"></span></span></font><font
face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><span
class="379582202-24102007"><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2"> </font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"><font
color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">I often find myself surprised
that here is
another group of students who I need to explain what a filing cabinet
and
suspeded files are. It's a while since someone asked me "what do we
need
to save our files from?" (the boogie-man who lives around the
corner?) But it certainly seems true that students (of any
culture) barely have enough knowledge of the workings of a business
office
in order to get the most out of the standard computer metaphor, which
is based
on that. So we should perhaps stand back and query "collaborative
business
office" metaphor on which must of our work relates, and also wonder
exactly what
sense of the computer, through the user interface, the student is in
fact constructing.</font></span><br>
<br>
I would like us to engage with what it
really means to transform ICT education, beyond rubbing the latest
shiny new toy
or unboxing the latest bit of commercial software. I like asking the
big
questions in my IT classrooms so here is one. What can we do to really
help our
students make this world a better place for us all to live in?<br>
<br>
<span class="379582202-24102007"><font color="#0000ff" face="Arial"
size="2">In the spirit of
asking big questions, perhaps it is time to explicitly make the
computer, the
user interface and the metaphors which frame them the object of
study.</font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"></span></span></font> </div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"><font
color="#0000ff" face="Arial" size="2">Cheers,</font></span></span></font></div>
<div dir="ltr" align="left"><font face="Times New Roman" size="3"><span
style="font-size: 12pt;"><span class="379582202-24102007"> </span></span></font></div>
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