Have Ada Lovelace in your Computing or education technology classroom

February 13, 2019

Help to bring education technology alive by introducing a letter from Ada Lovelace to Charles Babbage into your Computing or education technology classroom.

Politics and education technology reviews

February 12, 2019

To what extent is bias in reviews unavoidable? And does it matter anyway?

Discipline in the classroom: what, why and how (Updated)

February 11, 2019

UPDATED What is classroom discipline? Why is it needed, especially in lessons where technology is being used? How can it be established?

Digital Education Prize draw: Understanding How We Learn

February 10, 2019

The prize draw for subscribers to Digital Education is a book called Understanding How We Learn. It’s comprehensive, well-researched and readable. What else do you need to know?Read on for details.

Mitch Resnick at #Bett2019 — ink drawing effect. Photo by Terry Freedman

Interview with Mitch Resnick

February 8, 2019

What is a kindergarten approach to learning, and what are its characteristics? What are its advantages? Could adopting such an approach work in our education system? Here’s what Mitch Resnick said when I interviewed him at the January 2019 Bett show in London.

A new framework for judging teachers

February 5, 2019

Fears about the unintended consequences of the proposed new Ofsted framework — have your say — plus links to other articles about Ofsted-related fears.

Photo by Andras Vas on Unsplash — Photo by Andras Vas on Unsplash

What do kids get up to online?

February 4, 2019

Here are several research reports on kids’ behaviour online.

Digital Education: Safer Internet Day

February 3, 2019

With Safer Internet Day just around the corner, the latest issue of Digital Education contains several links to resources and reports.

What kind of ed tech house is your school?

January 31, 2019

If the ed tech in your school is horrible, and mistreated, then perhaps this article, inspired by a talk by A J Crabill, Deputy Commissioner for the Texas Education Agency, will help.

The 4 stages of Bett

January 30, 2019

The four stages of Bett, illustrated.

4 websites to stimulate ideas for Computing projects

January 29, 2019

Four interesting and stimulating websites with which you may not be familiar. Use them to spark discussion about and ideas for Computing projects.

Bett 2019: some photos

January 27, 2019

Here are some of the photos I took at Bett 2019.

Pick up your free unofficial Bett guide at http://bit.ly/TFBett19 — Pick up your free **unofficial** Bett guide at http://bit.ly/TFBett19

Bett 2019 News Bulletin 2019-01-25

January 25, 2019

(Very) quick looks

Here are a couple of the things I’ve seen at Bett so far.

Robots

Kubo: teach younger children coding by placing physical objects (“tactiles”) on to a special board, thereby making a small robot travel. You can build up surprisingly complex programs. Concrete learning definitely has a place, though you will need to be very hot on classroom management to make sure bits don’t go missing.

DF Robot: They make and sell kits for the Micro:bit and other such devices. I liked the modular aspect: you can add sensors of various kinds, and there is an add-on which gives the Micro:bit internet access. Impressive.

More news soon, probably after Bett. Look out for more product reviews, and an interview with Mitch Resnick, probably in my newsletter Digital Education in the first instance.

In the meantime, I’ve compiled a list of hints and tips for Bett, along with the seminars I find most interesting, and various organisations’ ed tech predictions for 2019. You can download the free pdf from here:

http://bit.ly/TFBett19

Bett 2019 News Bulletin 2019-01-22

January 22, 2019

More news regarding Bett.

Bett 2019 News Bulletin 2019-01-21

January 21, 2019

If you’re attending Bett this year, these news items may be of interest.

Bett 2019 News Bulletin 2019-01-20

January 20, 2019

Read on for information about a free pdf guide to Bett and the Education show, and some news about a particular product.

The ways m-learning is transforming online education

January 18, 2019

Allowing students to use their phones certainly brings with it some challenges. However, the potential benefits are great.

The Education Show 2019

January 17, 2019

The Education Show is going on next door to the Bett show this year, on 24th and 25th January. Here are pointers about a few of the sessions going on.

Bett2019 Pointers: a personal perspective

January 16, 2019

There is tons to see and hear at the Bett show this year — even more so than usual I think. Here are the things I’ve earmarked for myself, based on the assumption that by next week I will either have mastered the technique of being in several places at once, or somehow acquired a team of ten people.

Recent book reviews

Review: Power Up, by Matthew Lane

This book looks at the maths concepts — and, to some extent, the physics concepts — hidden in popular video games.

Review: The Shortest History of AI

How is it that ChatGPT, Claude and other Al models appear to perform so well at certain complex tasks that some people become convinced that they're sentient — only for them to then promptly fail at simple tasks that even a child could handle?

Review: Teacher Geek

Every so often I like to take a look, or another look, at a book published a while ago, and today I’ve been looking at Teacher Geek, by Rachel Jones.

Review: Teach Fast

The book contains some interesting ideas.

A question of leadership

I have somewhat dichotomous views of this question of whether leaders make a difference, or much of a difference. I think my views can be classified as macro and micro.