Being Innovative and Improving Results?

Great investments in ICT in schools have rested on the assumption that there are great educational benefits for education. For example, in 2008/2009, 880 million pounds were spent on ICT in UK schools; combined with greater investment in families gaining access to the Internet at home means that 'much rides on the claim that digital technologies will be as important in the 21st century as the book was in the 19th'. However, much of this does rest on belief: relatively few studies have compared the educational benefits in settings without ICT intervention, and indeed 'a simple increase in ICT provision does not guarantee enhanced educational performance' (Livingstone, 'Critical Reflections on the Benefits of ICT in Education, 2012, pp.10-11).

Educators interested (vested interests?) in the benefits of ICT Integration are quick to point out that the problem lies in the nature of the testing, which itself is stuck in an older paradigm of lower-order thinking and paper-based testing of 'basics'. There may well be some truth in this. However, at a school level, students, parents and teachers are still concerned about the 'bottom line': we certainly wish for the higher aspirations of learning which might produce inquisitive, collaborative, enthusiastic learners, but we do want them to pass the test, and pass it well!

So, another way around this question is to look at what studies shows does work well in schools when it comes to the important tests (like the HSC) and see how ICTs can augment these successful approaches. This might sound like a rather pragmatic line of argument, but teachers will quickly identify with what they know intuitively is good practice, and this might well form the basis of a good synthesis at this point in time, when the HSC is not yet a measure of creativity, empathy, or collaboration. One such study is a study of quality teaching practices in top-performing HSC teachers by Ayres, Sawyer, and Dinham (1999-2000). Among a range of contributing factors to HSC success was the school background (positive and motivated school culture); subject faculty (teamwork, profile; rapport with students); teachers' personal qualities (orientation to students, subject, and work); and teachers' professional development (in-school and out-of-school PD and networking). Steve Dinham's article 'Quality Teaching in Action' (in How to Get Your School Moving and Improving) details a range of successful teaching strategies observed in the classrooms of these successful teachers, many of which were characterised by 'automaticity', with variations on techniques happening 'unthinkingly and instantaneously' (p.31). A possible test of ICT Integration, in this (admittedly rather narrow) approach to learning and teaching might then ask the question: how can the increased use of ICTs in the classroom make these proven strategies work even better?

a. Classroom Climate - enthusiasm; use of group work; interest in students' lives; cooperation and sharing; on-task behaviour
b. HSC Focus - regular practice on HSC components; HSC as common goal; teachers going 'beyond' the HSC - teaching for understanding rather than just the exam
c. Building Understanding - Looking for the connections of the subject to students' lives; using student responses; focus on interpretation rather than simply reproduction of knowledge
d. Note-making - students  having 'ownership' of their own notes; students sharing notes from discussions
e. Writing essays - work on essay technique, but not 'dumbing down' the challenge; encouraging independent thinking
f. Questioning - Skilled use of open and closed questions used purposefully at different stages of the lesson
g. Whole class discussion, group work, independent work - open debate encouraged; group work used to assist in problem solving; individual activities and presentations encouraged.
h. Assessment - Formal and informal, characterised by quality feedback.
i. Other Strategies - Individual teachers 'toolbox' of ways to engage the students (see Dinham, pp.30-34).

Without attempting to answer my own question in any detail, it seems evident to me that ICT Integration can assist teachers and students in virtually all of these strategies, provided that learning remains the focus, and not the use of technology itself. For example, using OneNote on a laptop or Tablet PC - set up initially by the teacher, perhaps, with tabs and scaffolds but with plenty of space for independent thinking  - would be an excellent way to augment classroom discussion and activities and provide a lasting record of thinking that would assist students' preparation for examinations. Similarly, group work can easily make use of a range of ICTs to build understanding and provide quick and efficient methods of collaborative planning and production. However, in creating an enthusiastic classroom climate where debate is valued, there will be times when students need to close the lids of their computers, get out of their seats, take part in role plays, argue their case, perform experiments, read quietly, partake in structured discussions, and so on. In other words, the classroom will be an enhanced learning environment if traditional forms of education are challenged by technology, but not replaced by it. Not yet, at least. After all, that elusive quality of 'classroom climate' is ultimately based on human relationships, and human relationships cannot be built on screentime alone.

That, at least, is my argument at this point in time, as someone who enjoys the cut and thrust of classroom debate, but believes very much in the importance of students working together and alone, to produce quality work that is not merely a reproduction of everything I have written on the board, or flashed across their screens. It is an exciting time to be in education - let's all aim to maintain intellectual rigour and individual care of each student, however we manage (or 'let go of') our learning spaces.

The Bookless Library

During the recent 'non-term time' (I prefer this to 'holidays' because during the year, most teachers work during their breaks) - I read the first 80 pages of John Brockham's How is the Internet Changing the Way You Think? The book contains 150 responses to this question, from a range of viewpoints - artists, writers, neurologists, technologists - bright people with a range of views. The first two chapters get the ball rolling nicely in terms of the debates about literacy and digital literacies. In 'The Bookless Library', Nicholas Carr, author of The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, laments the decision by Cushing Academy (an elite Massachusetts prep school) to empty its library of books. The headmaster of the college is of the opinion that reading Chaucer on a kindle is the same as reading it in a paperback - the medium doesn't matter. Carr disagrees: 'as a technology, a book focuses our attention, isolates us from the myriad distractions that fill our lives. A networked computer does precisely the opposite. It is designed to scatter our attention.' Carr isn't against reading online as such, but he feels that there is something to be lost as well as gained in 'going digital': 'it's hard not to conclude that as we adapt to the intellectual environment of the net our thinking becomes shallower' (pp.1-3).

As a book designed to provoke our thinking should, the second chapter takes the opposite view. Clay Shirky, author of Cognitive Surplus, argues positively for the changes in reading habits that have come about as a result of the Net. The central comparison Shirky sets up in 'The Invisible College' is the historical one of a group of sixteen century natural philosophers who - unlike the secretive alchemists - had a culture of sharing, and hence made rapid progress in putting chemistry on sound scientific footing. Beyond the 'narcisism and social obsessions' that characterise much internet usage, Shirky argues for a similar revolution in thinking that comes from new forms of reading, writing, publishing and collaboration: 'We could, however ... use it as an Invisible College, the communicative backbone of real intellectual and civic change' (pp.5-7).

So, how do schools respond to this challenge, and what is my view, as English teacher, writer, and educational leader in a school?

The Sydney Morning Herald today had an article subtitled 'the digital age is transforming the way students learn' ('Humble book loses its shelf life' - James Robertson). The article describes two schools who are going ahead with forms of digital literacies and new pedagogies - but concludes with the 'problem' of high school assessment, which remains largely based on traditional examinations as the 'end product' of the school system. Hence, 'for now, teachers will have to walk the line between the traditional and the digital themselves'. This is the reality schools face - and as a believer in the power of books to transform our thinking, I tend to think we need to advocate for both 'long form reading' (novels, creative non-fiction) whilst opening our minds to the incredible potential of the Net to inform us as creative citizens of the present and future. I am learning to read certain things on my Kindle or Ipad (educational leadership articles, for example, don't lose much shine). However, I like the touch and feel of a novel in my hands, and the memories it provides for me on my bookshelf. Perhaps one day we will have 'digital wine' but I will be one who still enjoys the dust of a wine cellar (or, at least, a wine rack under the house) and I will lament the death of the publishing industry if it comes to that. What's your view? After several weeks back 'online', I can say that a blog can be as lonely as a diary - and possibly even less permanent. After all, my first blog came and went and I managed to remove the digital trace. But I am not sure I would have burned a diary with my thoughts on publishing my first novel.

I hope that the humble book maintains a shelf life. I also hope that teachers engage with digital forms with their students now, before the digital divide means we lose their attention altogether and opportunities for assisting students to see the tremendous positive power of the Net is lost.

Going Digital - Issues for Schools

My first experience with blogging was some years back - a blog I set up to promote the launch of a work of fiction. Once the book had finished its print run, and had 'gone digital', I abandoned my post. For one thing, as a teacher, I found that some of my students had accessed the blog and found amusement at the thought of teacher as author. I can take a joke at my expense, but for various reasons, I wished to move on.

Blogging involves a risk - you can be accused of various forms of narcissism: naval-gazing, pretentiousness, self-importance or self-promotion. In the case of the novel blog, I was attempting to promote something, though in that kind of low-key, understated Australian way. After some years in the virtual wilderness, I return to digital writing. My purpose this time is both simpler and more complex: I wish to write about educational issues - something important in my job as a director in a Sydney school - with a particularly interest in contemporary issues related to curriculum and pedagogy change.

The blog is personal and not meant to represent the views of my employer.

I hope to write about once a week though I doubt I will be successful in this. I am far too busy at it is to make rash promises. This entry has the theme 'Going Digital' and I will be very, very brief. Last year, as part of a Masters course, I completed a literature review related to the topic of digital literacies and pedagogy. Today, in reading an article (referenced below) I found this nice little summary which addresses some of the key issues I wrote about in my review (and in a sentence or two, which is perfect):

"Web 2.0 is a set of communication practices: distinctly human activities that are made possible by this infrastructure ... This pattern of features has been shown to reconfigure practices in four areas of human communication (Crook, 2008) - each with particular significance for what might be experienced within teaching and learning [my layout from here - for clarity]

1) Inquiry. Web 2.0 creates new structures for organising data: new sources to refer to, multiple forms of authority, and new tools to interrogate this rich space of information

2) Literacies. Widely accessible digital media offer new modes of representation and offer tools that invite developing fluency in the related modes of representation and offer tools that invite developing fluency in the related modes of self-expression (cf. Manovich, 2010

3) Collaboration. This concept of join activity implied by this term is extended by the range of loosely-coupled co-ordinations that can exist within structures of large scale network participation (cf. Tapscott & Williams, 2006) ...

4) Publication. Web 2.0 structures can support users in creating original material for dissemination, providing for that both tools and an audience.'

Charles Crook, 'The "Digital Native" in context: tensions associated with importing Web 2.0 practices into the school setting', Oxford Review of Education, 38:1, 64.

For teachers, and for school leaders, these four areas provide a range of challenges: how and what we teach; how and what we share of this within and beyond our organisation; how changes are managed and innovations and transformations are balanced against traditional forms of assessment which measure our academic successes regardless of our progress in these areas.

In trying to find the right balance between a personal and professional tone, I end on this note: starting this blog has distracted me from the formal task of writing an essay. My topic is to identify and discuss the major challenges faced by curriculum leaders in my educational context. I could write a lot about this informally, but within the educational community of a Masters degree, I am confined to a single audience, in traditional forms, with collaboration at the pointy-end of assessment discouraged.

It is important for educators to keep moving back and forth between the 'participatory attitudes and participatory aspirations' of Web 2.0 and the more formal structures of education and assessment that constitute real-world experience when it comes to accreditation. Otherwise, we can be accused of naval-gazing, pretentiousness and self-importance in blogs and tweets that are little more than dressed-up thought bubbles that might be better kept to ourselves.