Take responsibility, by Terry Freedman
The general thrust of education these days is on student-centred learning. This is often expressed by depicting on the teacher’s role as being the guide on the side rather than the sage on the stage. Regardless of whether you agree that that’s how things should be (and as it happens I don’t!), the often-stated philosophy these days is that students know best.
But does stating that philosophy mean that it is observed in practice?
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Sponsored article. Many schools across the country have invested in tablet technology, but are they using them to their full potential? Research indicates that used correctly, tablets are fantastic learning tools and can really inspire students and aid teaching. A potential barrier to tablet technology being fully utilised in schools is the complexity of storing and moving work and sharing finished pieces between students and staff.
Here are a couple of conferences coming up which look pretty good, and which are taking place in England in the near future.
I was discussing with a colleague the fact that some of us were trying years ago to introduce mobile technology into education. I can’t speak for others, but certainly for me it was an insight into how Sisyphus must have felt. He, as you may know, was the hapless guy who was condemned to push a huge rock to the top of a hill, only to see it roll all the way down again within inches of reaching the top. Doing that once would have been bad enough, but he was sentenced to do it forever.
Equality is a big issue in education, especially in connection with technology. For example, we are used to hearing phrases like “the digital divide”. But what does “equality” mean in this context – or, more pertinent perhaps, what should it mean?
Sheffield High School makes for an interesting case study in that it has not yet actually implemented a BYOD programme. The groundwork has been laid, with the school working with its parent organisation, the Girls Day School Trust, to ensure that its networking infrastructure is robust enough to support the intended developments.
Wildern School has partially implemented Bring Your Own Device, or BYOD. Students may bring their own devices in as long as the teacher and head of department concerned have agreed that phones and other devices would be useful in a particular lesson.
The unique challenge for the Children's Hospital School is balancing the need and desire to enable all long stay students to be able to access their own device with the need for security. Although this challenge is faced by other schools, the uniqueness in this case stems from the fact that 80% of the student population changes very frequently, so the school has little idea what devices students will be bringing.
What are the potential benefits and challenges of introducing a Bring Your Own Device policy into a secondary (high) school? In this, our latest case study, we look at the experience of The Arnewood School Academy in England.
St Crispin’s School is a slightly larger-than-average secondary school serving the town of Wokingham, England. An 11-18 school, it has 1102 students. The number of students with special education needs is about average, whilst the proportion of students from ethnic minority backgrounds is below average. Relatively few students are eligible for free school meals.
St Crispin’s was attracted to the idea of BYOD because, as Mike Elward, Assistant Head/Director of e-learning says
Why did Les Quennevais School, in Jersey, pilot a Bring Your Own Device programme, what challenges have emerged, and how do students use their devices?
The general thrust of education these days is on student-centred learning. This is often expressed by depicting on the teacher’s role as being the guide on the side rather than the sage on the stage. Regardless of whether you agree that that’s how things should be (and as it happens I don’t: see Please! No More Mantras!), the often-stated philosophy these days is that students know best.
But does stating that philosophy mean that it is observed in practice?
George Spencer Academy is a mixed secondary school in Nottingham, England, with 1350 students aged 11-18. Although it is located in a large town, it has only a small proportion of students who are eligible for free school meals.
The school decided to go down the BYOD road in order to be able to explore the potential of personal devices without incurring costs of purchase, training or technical support. The idea also fits very well with the school’s vision, which is concerned with giving a personalised learning experience to all students.
Although I visited Flitch Green to talk about technology – specifically, iPads and mobile learning – I discovered that as in any good school the technology serves the vision of the school, which is about learning.
Flitch Green Academy is somewhat unprepossessing – at least from the outside. But once you go through the door, it’s a different story.
Here is a selection of online articles that I think worth reading – some of them are my own (he says modestly), but others are others’! They cover a wide range of topics, including the flipped classroom, Bring Your Own Technology, what happens in an internet minute, up and coming conferences and others.
Here is an interesting case study of how a small school has successfully introduced BYOD with a particular group of pupils.
Finborough School is an independent, ie private, all-through school, ie age range 2-18, in a rural English setting. It has 274 pupils.
The early experience of Copland Community School in introducing iPod Touches to all new pupils.
“Well”, said Elaine as I bounced in last Wednesday evening. “You’ve got your mojo back.” This was quite true. Having spent a few hours reading various articles about why things can’t be done, or how there could be dire consequences if they were, I wasn’t in much of a frame of mind to attend a conference, especially one which seemed to be ‘motivational’. Quite frankly, when I’m feeling miserable the last thing I want is someone trying to cheer me up.
(c) Terry Freedman All Rights Reserved