IWBNet Third ITL Master Class Conference

Prior to delivering two workshop presentations to the IWBNet Third  ITL Master Class Conference, I prepared this short post.

with the theme Raising standards and teaching better with digital technology, the conference aimed to enhance the teaching and learning environment.

The conference program is here.

Surfing the Digital Education Revolution into the 21st Century is the first of my contributions.  Just how I might introduce this puzzled me for a while.   Certainly I have many examples of digital pedagogy employing both Constructivist and Connectivist approaches, but where to begin.

Fortunately I attended the Google Apps For Education Community Conference in Sydney last April. This conference showcased the new suit of Google Apps for Education (GAFE). Here I met Russell Burt, Principal of Pt England School, Auckland, and active member of the Manaiakalani Schools Cluster.  Russell introduced an exciting example of a whole school approach to digital pedagogy.

Apart from the immediate interest and importance of his presentation I was impressed, as an educator of some 42 years standing, that he was certainly not turning his back on the accumulated pedagogical knowledge that we have acquired through the 20th century, far from it.  This started me thinking about the best way of introducing my first workshop at the IWBNet Third  ITL Master Class Conference.

Blended Learning

Blended learning is something that good teachers and schools have practiced for many years.  It uses a variety of tools and recognises a variety of abilities and learning styles amongst students. Searching for a convenient diagram to represent this pedagogical process I came across one in German. Using Google translator, I quickly decoded it and produced this diagram.

Source http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Blended_Learning.jpg

I like this diagram because it is so simple and it covers most of the bases. Essentially, the methods and theories addressed in this diagram have been well executed in the 20th century.

20th century media

For the most part of the 20th century media was predominantly, print media. Of course their was radio, strip films, movies, slides, television, video and so forth, yet print remained dominant. Towards the end of the 20th century some text books actually came with CDs. What education tended to lack in the 20th century was contemporaneity and immediacy. Books and electronic media were largely retrospective.

A new focus on constructivism and connectivism

Constructivism has been with us for a long time. For me some of the best constructivist pedagogy I encountered during my own education was in the Scouting movement. Walking through trackless country with only a map and compass is a great way to learn about topographic maps and navigation.  So, constructivism has always been something that has engaged my professional interest.  

In the 21st Century constructivism will be greatly assisted by the increasing contemporaneity and immediacy afforded by the Internet, by Web 2.0 tools in particular.  This opportunity for a connected future can only enhance the constructivist approach.

At its heart, connectivism is the thesis that knowledge is distributed across a network of connections, and therefore that learning consists of the ability to construct and traverse those networks. Steven Downes

Connectivism is, in a sense, the digital dimension of social constructivism.

My approach has been to begin building a framework of digital tools that are intended to scaffold students from simple constructivism and point them towards new learning opportunities characterised by diversity, autonomy, openness, collaboration, creativity and connectivity.

Blended Learning in the digital era

Blended learning will continue to be an essential and holistic tools, but now it will be supported digitally. In the following diagram I have attempted to modify the 20th century possibilities in blended learning to reflect what is emerging.

My workshop takes a practical focus on just how we respond pedagogically to all of the essential elements of the constructivism/connectivism interaction. It will be supported by real world teaching and learning resources.

The Powerhouse Museum Flickr Stream

Sydney's Powerhouse Museum maintains a generous Flickr stream collection of historical photographs.  Over time this collection seems to have been steadily growing.

Preparing for a quick demonstration of ThingLink, I remembered that it is possible to work directly with images from Flickr, process them in ThingLink and embed them in Blogger.

Looking for something very typical of late 19th or early 20th century Australia I just happened to stumble over this striking image. Puzzling was the only word that came to mind. My first impression was that the image had been shot in a studio as many other in the collection have.  With a little simple research it became apparent that it had been shot in Freeman Brothers Studios, on a glass plate, and was given to the Museum in 1969.

The State Library of NSW has an interesting history of the business which began with the  arrival of William Freeman in 1853 followed by his brother James, the following year.  This marked the beginning of Australia's oldest continuously operating photographic studio. The Freeman Studio is now in Shorter House at 193-195 Clarence St.  Digital works have been produced from 2003 onwards.

If you read this far you'll realise that the photo at the top of the post has its own very special story.

Augmented Reality and the Green Iguana

Green Iguana - iguana iguana

I took this photo with an iPhone4.  The beautiful creature was in a glass case at the Mogo Zoo.

Recently I've been looking for ways of incorporating augmented reality (AR) into my teaching. AR affords an opportunity for the layering of information and the learning experience.

Working with QR codes has enabled the layering information onto images and objects in the classroom. Building a dedicated QR server has extended this throughout the school into corridors, library and open spaces.

Aurasma has allowed me to add video to images placed around a teaching space and to also apply this to objects in the outside world.


Google My Places and the opportunities for sharing geo-specific data amongst students, offers immense AR possibilities.

Sharing geo-specific information amongst students in real time is an emerging option with the roll out of GAFE and when Google Glass finally arrives, well that will be an entirely different ball game.

ThingLink
Not till I discovered ThingLink have I had access to an AR tool that offers such boundless diversity of application. Almost everyone I've shown this to has seen immediate application to their own teaching area. ThingLink speaks for itself.  What can be done with this is limited only by one's imagination.

I discovered thing link while exploring options for presenting material for an up coming workshop.  My challenge is to organise some useful experiences for peers.  My theme is Surfing the Digital Education Revolution into the 21st century.  This is something that has been occupying much of my thinking lately. Blended learning is the key and in the digital era this can be a rich experience for students. My own preference is to develop digital project based learning (PBL) opportunities that rely on a constructivist approach.  Differentiating PBL to address the learning needs and styles of different students is an essential element.

Searching for useful resources to illustrate the creative possibilities of a digital approach in differentiating curriculum I came across this diagram.  Thanks are due to Susan Oxnevad and her Cool Tools for 21st Century Learners blog for this.

So I discovered ThingLink. Then I realised that I could embed it in a blog.