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<font face="Calibri">Yes Ken - I really believe that the staff at my
school perhaps think I just absorb my skills and knowledge by osmosis
or some other mystic transference process every time I boot up my
computer! Little do they realise how much time we spend keeping up to
date! Yet in the past when I have offered to give an ICT session at
lunchtime or after school only 2 or 3 staff will turn up (and they are
usually the "converted")!<br>
Give me an English novel to read any day! Although I must say I doubt I
could cope with trying to read students' essays on the novel!!! <br>
Cheers<br>
Ros<br>
</font><br>
ken price wrote:
<blockquote
cite="mid:bccc6ca40903110225p13b38dfdvcae6b23f1fd57b2c@mail.gmail.com"
type="cite">
<div>The task of remaining current with ICT is a massive issue. I've
been both a Mathematics teacher and a Computing teacher and you are
most certainly correct as far as content is concerned. 90% of school
maths content is the same as it was 40 years ago - and a quick look at
textbooks will verify that (pedagogy however has changed significantly
though). Computing content has a very short half-life.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Some time back we changed the mandated programming language in
one IT subject from Pascal to Java, One of my colleagues in another
school asked their principal for some time to learn this language and
update their notes, assignments etc. The response was "I used to teach
English and we had a new novel every year. What's so hard about
changing a computer language?"</div>
<div> </div>
<div>And it was said in all seriousness. </div>
<div> </div>
<div>The nature of ICT and the workload in remaining current is not
well-understood by most people outside of it. Some people find even a
change of web browser challenging, but at a deeper level of study the
change is much more demanding of course. The most successful PD models
I have seen rely heavily on the generosity of the teachers involved and
their willingness to go beyond the minimum. This is of course
impossible to mandate across the board. It isn't always about sending
people to training, though that has its place.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Any suggestions on workable models for PD in the use of ICT
tools generally, or the ones discussed here specifically? (workable =
able to be scaled to all staff, not just the enthusiastic.)</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Ken, TASITE Tasmania<br>
<br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Wed, Mar 11, 2009 at 2:46 PM, Bane, Janet
A <span dir="ltr"><<a moz-do-not-send="true"
onclick="return top.js.OpenExtLink(window,event,this)"
href="mailto:bane.janet.a@edumail.vic.gov.au" target="_blank">bane.janet.a@edumail.vic.gov.au</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote"
style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><br>
I often think I should have been a maths teacher - algebra and
trigonometry probably haven't changed much in the past few decades
(sorry to any maths teacher if I have offended you), but if you think
of the giant strides made in the field of computers and ICT, its no
wonder schools can't keep pace.<br>
<br>
</blockquote>
</div>
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