[Yr7-10it] ICT in the Essential Learning Standards: Whats the Big Idea

Mon Jun 27 12:41:14 EST 2005

Interesting and passionate debate. Contrasts very positively with the lack of debate going on elsewhere.
I wanted to pick up on two points described by Victor as the future role of ICT. I should start from the outset by declaring myself as a teacher of students and that I have a specific background and training in the pedagogical content knowledge of Science. (The reason for the reframe from I am a Science Teacher hopefully will become apparent)
Firstly his assertion that a role of ICT teachers would be as learning facilitators
"2) ICT learning facilitators, whose role is to train non-ICT-teachers in using ICT to improve learning and teaching in the classroom"
Is I think a suggestion that has a lot of merit. We have a Learning Technology Coordinator who is a IPM/Maths teacher and has, I think, a 0.3 time release for her Learning Tech duties which is sufficient to search out resources for busy staff and hold them under there noses but insufficient to work with and model appropriate use and best practice in a coherent way. The earlier model was a drop in session with a Tech savvy teacher (none of whom were IT) which failed from lack of interest. However if all the IT teachers and Library and Tech Staff at our school had a similar role and the disposition and training to work not only with students but with ADULT learners then things would have a better chance of changing.  It would however I am sure be a suggestion that would take a creative and courageous school and a particular type of facilitator that could be respectful of the teachers with whom they are working with and ultimately empowering. Its would not be sufficient for the IT teacher to take the IT focussed lessons while the classroom teacher marks assignments.  

His third role "3) ICT teachers, who specialise in using ICT innovations to effect constructivist learning across multiple disciplines. We may yet need to argue that some of the Maths, English or SOSE topics are better
taught and learned in our ICT classes than in their traditional settings!" 
would be dangerous in the same way that if I were to advocate ICT as a discipline is dead and that I could teach it all in my Science or Maths Class I would expect to run into a wide range of dificulties. 
I base this on the notion of Pedagogical Content Knowledge which I have gained through my training and experiences in the classroom.  "pedagogical content knowledge (PCK), a special kind of knowledge that teachers have about how to teach particular content to particular students in ways that promote understanding." 
>From http://www.ied.edu.hk/apfslt/v4_issue2/mulhall/index.htm#intro

Which got me to thinking in ICT P-10 what are some of these factors. None spring to mind.
For an example of the kind of thing I am talking about see
http://www.ied.edu.hk/apfslt/v4_issue2/mulhall/mulhall8.htm#appendixa

In essence it is a way of mapping the Big Ideas about the Subject /Unit, the identification of which is a good starting point in any case against your responses to these questions 
What you intend the students to learn about this idea.
Why it is important for students to know this.
What else you might know about this idea (that you don't intend students to know yet).
Difficulties / limitations connected with teaching this idea.
Knowledge about students' thinking that influences your teaching of this idea.
Other factors that influence your teaching of this idea.
Teaching procedures (and particular reasons for using these to engage with this idea).
Specific ways of ascertaining students' understanding or confusion around this idea.

I think that it is reasonable to assume that ICT has some specific Pedogogical Content Knowledge that means a Maths Teacher would not be able to deliver it as effectively. 

Certainly VELS challenges all of us to rexamine our practice to improve our own understanding and therefore aid students. The notion of PCK might well be a useful way of defending the discipline from attack but whatever the outcome if Victors second role for ICT teachers was to become a reality I think the benefits for all stakeholders would be immense 

Yours

Peter Morgan

Dr Peter Morgan
Year 9 and 10 Mathematics Coordinator
Acting Faculty Head of Mathematics
Xavier College
135 Barkers Rd KEW 3101
03 9854 5479
>>> vdallave at bigpond.net.au 06/27/05 11:18 AM >>>
As a relatively new teacher (my methods are ICT, maths and chemistry),
after 15+ years as a Software Engineer/IT Architect I feel compelled and
qualified to contribute to this most important discussion. First of all,
I would like to extend my gratitude to Keith Richardson and the many
active members of this list for their invaluable and selfless support of
our profession.

I concur with Tony Forster's analysis of ICT's place in VELS, in which
it supports constructivist learning through such activities as games
programming and digital story production (eg 3 in 6 competition);
however, I would like to add a further dimension. ICT teachers need to
continually explore new ways of facilitating constructivist learning in
the classroom. This may be their ticket to job security but, more
importantly, it is their obligation to improving our education system.
Let me explain. 

Post dotcom boom I saw many traditional software development jobs going
overseas to cheaper labour suppliers. In an increasingly globalised
economy this trend will continue. As a society we are increasingly
becoming consumers of ICT products, as opposed to producers of ICT
products. In our schools non-ICT disciplines are rightly increasing
their consumption of ICT products in their classrooms, as these products
become more pervasive and less expensive. We should applaud and support
this, since this is where we can value-add. But this potentially creates
a vacuum in our curriculum. So what we must do is continually
investigate and explore new technologies for their effectiveness in
learning and teaching. This year, for example, I had great success in
using Game Maker to teach programming to my year 10s. A revelation to me
was the difficulty my students had in just thinking logically. It got me
thinking: Is our maths curriculum so cluttered that our students don't
have time to 'think'? So now I can see a day when (games) programming
will be used to teach logic in maths. In the meantime, it would be my
(our) perogative to find yet other ways of facilitating constructivist,
student-centred learning.

Word, excel, powerpoint are now ubiquitous (school, home, work) ICT
consumables. We as ICT teachers are doomed if we allow the curriclum
decision makers to believe that this is all we teach. Our classes, in
contrast, should be laboratories of ICT-enabled learning innovations,
and we should be continually challenging the Heads of Learning to
'employ' our skills in their classrooms. This ultimately benefits our
students, who will be more engaged in their learning.

I see ICT jobs in school as falling into the following categories: 
	1) ICT infrastructure (ie hardware, software, network, security
etc) management and support
	2) ICT learning facilitators, whose role is to train
non-ICT-teachers in using ICT to improve learning and teaching in the
classroom
	3) ICT teachers, who specialise in using ICT innovations to
effect constructivist learning across multiple disciplines. We may yet
need to argue that some of the Maths, English or SOSE topics are better
taught and learned in our ICT classes than in their traditional
settings!

Victor Dalla-Vecchia
vdallave at penola.melb.catholic.edu.au 

-----Original Message-----
From: yr7-10it-bounces at edulists.com.au
[mailto:yr7-10it-bounces at edulists.com.au] On Behalf Of Keith Richardson
Sent: Saturday, 25 June 2005 7:22 PM
To: Year 7 - 10 Information Technology Teachers' Mailing List; List IS;
ListMulti-Media; List IP&M
Subject: Re: [Yr7-10it] Re: [Year 12 IPM] ICT in the Essential Learning
Standards

Thank you Tony - your thoughts here have started me thinking along a
different track. I decided to try to tease out what the VELS was
actually saying in relation to the four interdisciplinary strands, to
see how we might be able to make ICT effectively serve all of the other
learning strands. My desire would be to make it indespensible. What I
found excites me - I saw that ICT is 'really' the central lynch-pin that
will enable each of the other three IDS's to serve the curriculum needs
of the whole school. Sounds presumptuous? Maybe a little, but we will
have to think BIG and value ourselves (meaning ICT of course) if we want
others to value us and not dispense with us. I think that what we have
to do, in concrete terms, is establish precisely WHAT we have to offer
that the other disciplines NEED - we want to be correctly recognized as
indispensible, and our skills appreciated and not undervalued or
de-skilled (no longer needed by education). By recognizing that ICT is
central to the four interdisciplinary strands it can be sold as
providing accesss to these for all other learning strands. Wow! Other
thoughts? Attached please find my interrelationship diagram and summary
of the interdisciplinary strands. Keith Richardson.

On Sat, 25 Jun 2005 10:28:40 +1000, "Tony Forster"
<forster at ozonline.com.au> said:
> I see the VELS as an opportunity to expand the creative use of ICT in 
> schools rather than a threat to the teaching of ICT.
> 
> The VELS stresses the need for developing generalised skills rather 
> than the learning of specific information in a rapidly changing world.

> It is the ability to learn which must be learnt. It talks of "deep 
> understanding of the subject matter" and reducing "the crowding of the

> curriculum to give students time to explore the underlying concepts of

> tasks and problems they
> are set".
> 
> Creative use of ICT such as game programming (or the 3 in 6 
> competition) is closely aligned with the values of the VELS. 
> Constructivist learning in which students take an active part in their

> self directed learning is strongly supported by the VELS.
> 
> I give detailed reasons in a word doc at : 
> http://www.freewebs.com/schoolgamemaker/#vels
> why I believe that Constructivist activities like game programming can

> deliver most of the outcomes of the VELS in one class.
> 
> Tony Forster http://edrington.haileybury.vic.edu.au/computerclub
> 
> _______________________________________________
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Keith Richardson
IPM List Moderator
Head of ICT, Leibler Yavneh College
Elsternwick
Ph: 03.9528.4911
k.richardson at yavneh.vic.edu.au

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