[Yr7-10it] RE: Year 7-10 IT structures
Cameron Bell
bell.cameron.p at edumail.vic.gov.au
Wed Oct 24 08:24:55 EST 2007
Dear Mr Gesthuizen,
Regarding the homework you set us - "What can we do to really help our
students make this world a better place for us all to live in?"
Did you want that as a PowerPoint or Word Document? Also, I have read
all through the text book and can't seem to find the answer. Can you
give us a clue as to what chapter it is in? Also, when is it due?
Could you at least make it multiple choice?
Regards
A. Typical
PS - Will it be on the exam?
Roland Gesthuizen wrote:
> I am really excited to read all these posts and all the right
> questions that we seem to be asking each other.
>
> I agree with Bill. The OLPC is a fascinating invention. Like the
> student that freely dips into the wireless access spilling over the
> school fence from his neighboring home, the mesh technology has even
> enough range to bridge between the different islands in the Solomons.
> Whilst the original vision for the telephone was that it could be used
> to pipe music directly to homes, we would be equally narrow minded to
> think that the Internet was for edumail and piping music to pockets
> filled with iPhones.
>
> 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.
>
> I have had some indirect contact with of the huge technology issues
> faced by countries on our doorstep. From young computer technicians
> trained in Melbourne to set up Ubuntu Linux networks for East Timor,
> the KhmerOS group that has managed to retain a Cambodian keyboard and
> recover their language using Open Office and the network manager on
> Naru who is experimenting recycling old hardware using Kbuntu.
>
> 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?
>
> Regards Roland
>
> On 23/10/2007, *Bill Kerr* <billkerr at gmail.com
> <mailto:billkerr at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> hi Cameron,
>
> The OLPC has wireless mesh networking and a new user interface
> (sugar) based on a community metaphor, which invites extensive
> collaboration with each child having their own laptop. In that
> respect (and some others) OLPC is superior to its new low price
> rivals from Intel etc.
> http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/05/community-user-interface.html
> <http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/2007/05/community-user-interface.html>
>
> If each child owns the laptop then that open up potential for home
> use - as well as the clearly important "sense of personal ownership"
>
> I agree with you that if the laptops are introduced and teachers
> keep to their old techniques and lesson plans then its not going
> to work very well at all
>
> That is sort of the point of this discussion - where would /
> should it lead?
>
> Papert has argued for years that maths could be transformed with
> one laptop per child but that it doesn't work with other ratios.
> The pencil argument, it would be poor education to chain up
> pencils in a lab or to insist on sharing of pencils
>
> As you say:
> The laptop struggles to break out from being a glorified
> word-processor, file storage and email client to the off the shelf
> tool that gets used as needed, to develop a solution for the
> problem at hand.
>
> With OLPC the laptop does or should develop or appear to develop
> some sort of agency of its own, it demands to be used in new and
> different ways - are the teachers up to it?
>
> btw I attended a conference at Methodist Ladies College
> (Melbourne) in circa 1980 when every child had a laptop and they
> were using logo extensively (David Loader was the Principal).
>
> Your points about forcing collaboration are interesting and I'd
> like to hear more about the tool you mention that facilitates a
> process whereby students "produce work that reflects their own
> knowledge, not the groups knowledge"
>
> I'm wary of formalising collaboration in an institutional sense. I
> think learners have the right to choose their time and place for
> collaboration. When setting up groups I often do permit a group of
> one. I'm aware of one very good educational blogger who has been
> arguing this for some time:
> blog of proximal development
> http://www.teachandlearn.ca/blog/
> (I will dig up some of his posts about this particular topic if
> you want)
>
> cheers,
> --
> Bill Kerr
> http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/
>
>
> On 10/23/07, *Cameron Bell* < bell.cameron.p at edumail.vic.gov.au
> <mailto:bell.cameron.p at edumail.vic.gov.au>> wrote:
>
> But Bill, lots and lots of schools have implemented laptop
> programs - some for many years now. We have found that you
> don't need one laptop per child - in fact, I believe that
> insisting each child having their own laptop can stifle
> pedagogical progress. When each child has their own laptop or
> they are working in a lab, the teacher is generally just using
> the same teaching techniques and lesson plans they always
> have, insisting on personal work, students working in
> isolation (communicating, but in isolation) with the whole
> class doing the same activity at the same time. The laptop
> struggles to break out from being a glorified word-processor,
> file storage and email client to the off the shelf tool that
> gets used as needed, to develop a solution for the problem at
> hand.
> We have run with a one-between-two program here for the past
> couple of years (I was skeptical as I had just come from a 1-1
> school) and apart from a couple of dedicated labs, we now
> deliberately aim for one-between-two for all our technology
> infrastructure. It means students _must_ collaborate as teams
> on producing work and we are being forced to develop methods
> for students to be able to collaborate- but then produce work
> that reflects their own knowledge, not the groups knowledge.
> It's tricky but I have found a very useful little tool that
> enables that to happen in my classes and the rest of the staff
> have adapted too! Some of us are creating digital portfolios,
> this requires group prac work, but individual reflections. How
> do you do this with one-between-two? You are forced to examine
> individual learning plans, multiple lesson plans within a
> lesson, rather than the one-size-fits-all approach that we
> have always done. (Primaries have done this for years!) While
> 1/2 the class use the laptops for part of an activity, the
> other 1/2 are doing another part. For us, this is also
> essential to break up a 72 min period and help keep the
> students focussed.
> One between two is cheaper too! ;-)
> Cheers
> Cameron
>
> Bill Kerr wrote:
>> There is a large elephant in the room that no one has
>> referred to so far: the OLPC
>>
>> The one laptop per child non profit project not only plans to
>> deliver millions of laptops to third world children but has
>> also become a hand grenade in the commercial world - and has
>> succeeded in forcing down the price of other laptops now on
>> offer
>>
>> "... the whole global mind-think around technology has changed.
>>
>> No longer is low cost computing in education a fantasy, no
>> longer are big technology companies secondary, and everyone
>> wants to sell technology into classrooms. Intel introduced
>> Classmate PC
>> <http://www.olpcnews.com/countries/brazil/olpc_classmate_mobilis.html>
>> to Brazil, Asustek is selling Eee PC's
>> <http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/intel/negroponte_100_laptop_asus.html>
>> in the USA, and even thin-client manufactures compare
>> themselves to OLPC
>> <http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/competition/stephen_dukker_anti_olpc_campaign.html>."
>> http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/countries/sales_inhibiting_xo_distribution.html
>> <http://www.olpcnews.com/sales_talk/countries/sales_inhibiting_xo_distribution.html>
>>
>> How will schools and education departments in the wealthy
>> west react to the fact that in a few years we will have the
>> capability for every child to have their own laptop?
>>
>> Will we treat them like mobile phones and ban them or try to
>> figure out a way to utilise them for optimal educational
>> development?
>>
>> The use and misuse of computers in schools has up until now
>> been based around the idea that computers mainly belong in
>> labs and / or that access is limited. The fact of limited
>> access has acted as a powerful brake for many teachers not to
>> extend their knowledge much beyond the basics.
>>
>> Most (all?) of the maths curriculum could be taught using
>> laptops. In fact MIT produced a series of books in the 80s
>> for teaching much of maths and aspects of language and art
>> using logo.
>>
>> Shouldn't we factor this potential into the discussion? If we
>> are talking about the future it might be incorrect to assume
>> that the pattern of distribution of computers in schools will
>> remain similar to the present.
>>
>> --
>> Bill Kerr
>> http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/
>>
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> Year 7 - 10 IT Mailing List kindly supported by
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au <http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au> -
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> --
> Roland Gesthuizen - ICT Coordinator - Westall Secondary College
> http://www.westallsc.vic.edu.au
>
> "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can
> change the world; indeed it is the only thing that ever has."
> --Margaret Mead _______________________________________________
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> Year 7 - 10 IT Mailing List kindly supported by
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> Curriculum and Assessment Authority and
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> Information Technology Teachers Association Inc
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