tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-61652818197602752302024-03-06T15:05:08.186+13:00Interrogating educatioNZThis blog is a collaboration between Drs Noeline Wright and Dianne Forbes, teacher educators and educational researchers at the University of Waikato. We are keen on examining the role digital technologies can play in learning and teaching, as well as wider educational issues. We take turnabout in posting to this site.
We should also state that these views are our own, and do not represent the views of the University of Waikato or the Faculty of Education, where we both work
Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.comBlogger79125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-3573943243373861832016-08-26T14:58:00.003+12:002016-08-26T14:58:30.536+12:00COOL schools option: a long term view of the potential political agenda<b>Introduction</b><br />
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The Minister of Education has announced that Communities of Online Learning (COOLs) will become a feature of the compulsory education landscape in New Zealand. Apart form this being yet another ramping up of the privatisation of our education system, it reminds me of a prescient short story from way last century. I'll refer to that in a moment. First, here are some snippets of bonhomie from those in political power here: <a href="http://www.newshub.co.nz/politics/online-schools---education-solution-or-absolute-disaster-2016082406">"</a><a href="http://www.newshub.co.nz/politics/online-schools---education-solution-or-absolute-disaster-2016082406">Mr Seymour hopes it'll involve foreign-based providers as well"</a> Mr Seymour is the one and only ACT party member of parliament, representing the hard core of neo-liberalism activism in the country. His presence makes the National Party's work in chipping away at dismantling our system for private enterprise look benign. He also says "<a href="http://www.newshub.co.nz/politics/online-schools---education-solution-or-absolute-disaster-2016082406">It'll replace going to a traditional school, and ...is a brilliant idea</a>."<br />
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<a href="http://www.teachingandelearning.com/2016/08/keeping-our-cool-about-cools-without.html" target="_blank">Claire Amos sees a rosy future for the idea</a> - and good on her for such a positive spin. She has a firm grasp of the educative possibilities. Her post outlines some possibilities where learning is enhanced by the option - and why shouldn't it be? In the right hands, it can be a strong and positive adjunct to deliberate acts of teaching and learning. When students are ill - or even teachers- then learning need not be as disrupted as it might be currently. It can extend students and provide options for accounting for and creating new knowledge. However, I think there is more afoot.<br />
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<b>The politics perhaps? </b><br />
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Hekia Parata as Minister, meanwhile, is talking up this innovation by saying it provides existing schools with opportunities to enhance current practices and offer students greater variety in their learning. But what if future governments also keen on privatising education wanted to completely dismantle public schools and make then less than viable in the face of private companies taking the lion's share of public money? <a href="http://blog.core-ed.org/derek/2016/08/schools-cools-and-kids.html" target="_blank">Derek Wenmouth</a> issues a caution in his very good blog post on the issue when he talks of the apparent influences on the regulation regime that might eventuate here to police this change.<br />
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We might even find ourselves in the position Miss Boltz found herself in the satirical (and scarily prescient) short story by Lloyd Biggles Jr <i><a href="https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=oVx6Ynt2VN0C&pg=PR11&lpg=PR11&dq=And+madly+teach&source=bl&ots=AAIKvs1ThH&sig=Z85hC2BWopprRvNE5ajJgzLI4vM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiqnvzK4djOAhWGGpQKHatWClwQ6AEIQDAI#v=onepage&q=And%20madly%20teach&f=false" target="_blank">And Madly Teach</a> </i>in a collection called <i>A Galaxy of Strangers </i>(1957 <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6YBNEfAiPDxLVU5UWplMFIxc00/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">but out of print</a>) let me explain:<br />
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In this sci fi story (well it was futuristic in 1957), Miss Boltz comes back to Earth after teaching 'overseas ' in Mars for a while. There, she'd had classes full of kids, and taught them English - books, talking, arguing ideas, writing and building connections. Back on Earth, she needs to keep teaching, so goes along to find out what her new appointment was. After all, she had been teaching for 25 years, loved it, and was respected for her expertise. The Deputy Superintendent of tSecondary Education however, suggests she immediately retire because teaching is a "young person's profession". Mr Wilbings goes on to tell her that there had been a 'revolution in education" and that for 5 hours teaching a week, she would need forty hours preparation. There would be 40,000 students who attended class by watching her on television. The success of her teaching would be measured by a fortnightly Trendex rating, but the only thing students had to do was to register. Assessments, feedback and any kind of communication with students other than pushing material to them, was frowned on.<br />
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On her way to being shown how to use the tv studio, she wonders to the engineer who shows her the controls for broadcasting herself, how she is to teach 40,000 students written and spoken English without ever hearing them speak or see their writing. A few weeks later she meets another teacher, who explains, in response to a similar wondering that<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Let's not be dragging in abstractions like <i>progress</i>... The New Education looks at it this way: We expose the child to the proper subject matter. The exposure takes place in his own home, which is the most natural environment for him. He will absorb whatever his individual capacity permits, and more than that we have no right to expect... What the New Education strives for is the technique that has made advertising such an important factor in our economy. Hold people's attention, make them buy in spite of themselves. Or hold the student's attention and make him learn whether he wants to or not" (p. 9). </blockquote>
Miss Boltz protests that students would not learn social values, to which the other teacher replies<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"On the other hand the school has no discipline problems. No extra curricular activities to supervise. No problem of transporting children to school and home again.... The most potent factor in this philosophy of the New Education...it's money...we save a fortune on teachers' salaries... The bright kids will learn no matter how badly they're taught and that's all our civilisation needs - a few bright people to build a lot of bright machines...Anyway, in the not too distant future there won't be any teachers. Central District is experimenting with filmed classes. Take a good teacher, film a year of his work and you don;t need a teacher any longer. You just run the films..."(pp. 9-10)</blockquote>
The story shows how the Trendex works to 'judge' the success of the teacher through how many students are watching, but the <i>quality </i>is not a factor. So, the story descries a variety of scenarios of 'teachers' doing a slow striptease to "all you cats and toms out there" to explain the predicate in English, ostensibly to students who are US 11th Grade. Another teacher juggles, and another draws caricatures while supposedly teaching history. All for Trendex ratings. Forget the pedagogy or the challenge in learning.<br />
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I won't tell you the rest of the story - it's worth reading for the social and educational commentary it makes. It also highlights a point about those who make educational policy need to speak to those in the educational trenches - teachers and teacher educators - in terms of knowing about successful learning and what is needed for developing skilful, knowledgeable, socially adept and critical citizens. As a teacher educator for example, educational researcher and someone with 20 years' experience in secondary schools, I actually know what I'm talking about. I'm not unusual as a teacher educator. People like me should not be ignored in the equation, for we have a wider view than the site of one school and we make it our business to keep an eye on wider implications of policies.<br />
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And then there's the potential problem of kids at home by themselves. Hands up, those who want to supervise the online learning of their own kids every day of the week from home? Consider what's implicated in this little <i>bon mot </i>on the MOE <a href="http://www.education.govt.nz/ministry-of-education/legislation/the-education-update-amendment-bill/establishing-a-regulatory-framework-for-online-learning/" target="_blank">website about Cool Schools</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Who will be responsible for the supervision of a student enrolled in a COOL?</b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Enrolling COOLs and schools will be responsible for ascertaining and agreeing with parents and caregivers, about the supervision arrangements of students enrolled. In all cases where a student is accessing online learning, the enrolling school or COOL will have a policy that clearly states the supervisory responsibilities of the enroller and students’ parents.</span></span></blockquote>
So how might this work? What guidelines will be in place for the 'enroller' to create a fit-for-purpose policy with actual teeth? Will it be fair? Will it expect a staff member to pop in every day (if in an urban area - rural might be more complex) to check on progress (eg by video feed or actual physical presence)? A computer's camera being timed to take regular pics to prove a student is online? Or Analytics to check frequency and time spent? Or both? Is this potentially the equivalent of a GPS ankle bracelet for students? Or will the expectation be that students actually do this in a school so that surveillance can be more easily achieved? <br />
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As far as teachers and caregivers are concerned, what new learning might they need to make this work successfully? What does it imply for households' technological equipment and wifi needs? Who will be expected to supply it?<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-70809193194651497982016-08-26T09:31:00.000+12:002016-08-26T09:31:00.901+12:00Teachers and Curriculum and Waikato Journal of EducationThis is a shameless post to publicise two of the journals published by <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wmier/publications" target="_blank">WMIER</a><br />
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The first is <i><a href="http://tandc.ac.nz/tandc" target="_blank">Teachers and Curriculum</a></i>, which is calling for papers for a 2017 October issue date. The focus, as you will see below, is a <a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zSEyQntaxwFT8rl8TD0Kj52zA4iSmh6V8ifQDHs7R8g/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Call for Papers</a> for a special issue on <span style="font-family: Calibri; font-weight: 700; white-space: pre-wrap;">Mobile technologies and learning </span><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">as noted below. So, if you've been involved in, for example, some action research on your own practices (ECE, school, tertiary) then this might be for you. On the other hand, you might be starting a masters degree or a doctorate and writing a literature review that could offer insights to readers on the topic. You might be a researcher working with others in some education context and have been developing findings from this research. In other words, if you've been wondering about using mobile devices for learning purposes, then sharing your findings by contributing to this issue is timely:</span></span><br />
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<a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zSEyQntaxwFT8rl8TD0Kj52zA4iSmh6V8ifQDHs7R8g/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 21.333333333333332px; font-style: italic; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Teachers and Curriculum</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 21.333333333333332px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></a></h1>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zSEyQntaxwFT8rl8TD0Kj52zA4iSmh6V8ifQDHs7R8g/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank"><br /></a></b>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 21.333333333333332px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zSEyQntaxwFT8rl8TD0Kj52zA4iSmh6V8ifQDHs7R8g/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Call for Papers 2017 </a></span></h1>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Calibri; font-size: 21.333333333333332px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zSEyQntaxwFT8rl8TD0Kj52zA4iSmh6V8ifQDHs7R8g/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">Special Issue: Mobile technologies and learning</a></span></h1>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 16px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You are invited to submit an article to </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Teachers and Curriculum</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> for the 2017 Special Issue: Mobile technologies and learning. This will be edited by Nigel Calder and Carol Murphy. It will be published in October 2017.</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Teachers and Curriculum</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is a peer-reviewed online journal supported by Wilf Malcolm Institute of Educational Research (WMIER), Te Kura Toi Tangata Faculty of Education, The University of Waikato. It is directed towards a professional audience and focuses on contemporary issues, stories from the field and research relating to curriculum, pedagogy and assessment. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This Special Issue of </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Teachers and Curriculum</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> aims to provide an avenue for the publication of papers that:</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">report on research in any aspect related to the area of mobile technologies;</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">provide examples of informed curriculum, pedagogy or assessment practices related to mobile technologies, and</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 6pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">review resources that have a curriculum, pedagogy and mobile technology focus.</span></span></div>
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</ul>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">For the 2017 Special Issue the Editor welcomes contributions that are:</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">research-based papers with a maximum of 3,500 words, including references, plus an abstract or professional summary of 150 words, and up to five keywords;</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">papers with a focus on informed, innovative educational practices with a maximum of 3,500 words including references;</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">opinion or think pieces with a maximum of 1500 words; </span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">text, publication or resource reviews with a maximum of 1000 words; and</span></span></div>
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<li dir="ltr" style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; list-style-type: disc; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline;"><div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 6pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">research project/thesis summaries from postgraduate students and teacher co-researchers and collaborators.</span></span></div>
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</ul>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Timeline</span></span></h2>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 6pt; margin-top: 6pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Paper submission due</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">:</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">1 April 2017 (all articles submitted via <a href="http://tandc.ac.nz/tandc" target="_blank">website</a>) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 700; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Issue Publication</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">October 2017</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Any queries on paper foci please contact: Nigel Calder (n.calder@waikato.ac.nz)</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></span></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.2; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Note 1: It is expected that all papers submitted will have been “colleague reviewed” prior to submission to ensure a starting point of high quality.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Note 2: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Teachers and Curriculum</span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> is published online only.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Note 3: </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We welcome expressions of interest to join the paper review team.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The second journal to shamelessly promote is </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i><a href="http://www.wje.org.nz/" target="_blank">Waikato Journal of Education</a></i></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">. Both of these journals use an open source platform to share educational research that we think will be of use to the education community worldwide. </span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Waikato Journal of Education</i></span><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> (WJE) recently celebrated its <a href="http://www.wje.org.nz/index.php/WJE" target="_blank">20th year with a special issue</a>. Next year, an issue will focus on the politics of education in New Zealand:</span><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: italic; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; widows: 1;"><i>Nine Years of National’s Education Policy: Where to Now? </i>The call for papers for that issue has gone out, so if this is your area of interest, consider contributing! </span></span><span style="background-color: white; widows: 1;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">This year, the first issue focuses on family literacy while the second one will be a bumper crop of articles spanning a wide array of contexts, countries and sectors. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; widows: 1;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">These two journals are open to anyone to read and submit to. Please take advantage of these Creative Commons licensed journals to see what's being reported in the part of the world. We also welcome your feedback and your submissions to either journal. </span></span><br />
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Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-48019060626108187622016-08-01T15:57:00.000+12:002016-08-01T15:57:52.355+12:00Summer Research Scholarships: Earn and Learn at the University of WaikatoI'm thrilled that a project I want to undertake has been approved for <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/scholarships/s/university-of-waikato-summer-research-scholarship" target="_blank">summer research scholarship </a>funding. This means the university will pay a student to help me with my research project this summer! I feel compelled to write a blog post in order to help make students aware of the benefits of a summer scholarship, and to spread the word about my project so that it attracts some suitable applicants.<br />
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Each year, researchers from our university submit projects for summer scholarship funding, hoping to employ a student as a research assistant for ten weeks of full time work between November and February. In return the students who are employed receive $5000 tax free and learn a few research skills in the process.<br />
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Last year, I received funding for a project I was working on related to social media in tertiary teaching and learning. The summer scholar worked on a literature review related to this topic, learning how to search effectively using electronic library resources, and how to construct a <a href="https://www.zotero.org/" target="_blank">Zotero </a>group library full of annotated references. For the student (a marketing/management major), the work was flexible, mostly completed online, and an opportunity to learn about new searching tools and techniques, as well as to investigate an interesting subject area. The payment was a significant boost to a recent graduate, and the learning (attending sessions with library staff, and researching the topic) was a fun aspect too. In this win-win situation, I had the opportunity to learn and work alongside the summer scholar, and the annotated bibliography produced continues to be a useful resource in my research and writing.<br />
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This year, my project is about blended learning at Waikato, and I plan to investigate the instances of blended learning (see <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2016/07/variety-in-blend.html" target="_blank">this previous post</a>) that are happening in various faculties within our institution. As part of the data gathering process, I want to conduct video interviews with lecturers (or other university teachers) who are integrating aspects of online and on campus teaching and learning as part of their courses, across a range of disciplines. With appropriate ethics approval (of course), I am also hoping to talk with students taking the courses, to hear their views about the pros and cons of blended learning in our tertiary context, the varieties/forms it takes, and what enables and constrains the learning in a blended format. The intended outcome will be a series of small case studies, comprised of short video clips, and accompanying text. The project is #17 in <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/303288/01.-Full-Project-Abstract-List.pdf" target="_blank">this full project list.</a><br />
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To assist with this case study research, I am looking for a research assistant who is interested in video interviewing. The suitable candidate might be finishing their second or third year of undergraduate study, or could be a masters student taking taught papers, in any discipline at any university in NZ or Australia. The full regulations for the scholarship are <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0018/300807/UoW-Summer-Research-Regulations-2016-2017.pdf" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
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<b>Could this be you or someone you know? One of your students? One of your peers?</b><br />
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The summer scholar for the BlendedLearning@Waikato project will be:<br />
- eager to learn about interviewing as a method, and to have a go at interviewing with me at first, then independently<br />
- confident with a video camera or willing to learn<br />
- available to work in Hamilton during the summer period (with holidays in the middle encouraged)<br />
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I am interested in hearing from potential candidates, who then need to <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/scholarships/application-forms/university-of-waikato-summer-research-scholarships" target="_blank">apply </a>to the scholarships office by <b>31 August</b>.<br />
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In summary, the summer research scholarship is a mutually beneficial opportunity for me to work with a research assistant to progress my project, while the scholar learns and earns at the same time!<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-26429555626588869152016-07-05T15:39:00.000+12:002016-07-06T09:27:30.557+12:00Variety in the blendGetting ready for a new semester, I am pondering the fact that until recently I have described my teaching as "mostly online" or "fully online". However, there has gradually been a shift in how I see this online teaching, since most of it occurs in a blended context, to a greater or lesser extent.<br />
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By ways of explanation, looking ahead to the coming semester, I am teaching four classes, and each is either online or blended to some degree. I'm using this post to think-aloud about the elements of blended learning in my classes and how they differ in the intent and timing of the face-to-face.<br />
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I like this Mindflash explanation of <a href="https://www.mindflash.com/elearning/what-is-blended-learning/" target="_blank">blended learning</a>, because it includes mention of flipped learning as well as structured independent study. Other definitions stipulate that the online study should <a href="https://blended.online.ucf.edu/about/what-is-blended-learning/" target="_blank">replace</a> some of the face-to-face component, rather than being merely an add-on, which is an important point in terms of workload management for students and staff. Still other definitions do a great job of illustrating some of the <a href="http://edglossary.org/blended-learning/" target="_blank">variations </a>possible, both in terms of models and quality.<br />
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In semester B, I am teaching:<br />
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One fully online class, an undergraduate elective, entitled 'Learning through ICT: Issues, perspectives, and strategies'. We'll call it the <b>ICT option</b>.<br />
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One mixed media class, a compulsory paper for students in our Bachelor of Teaching, <a href="https://education.waikato.ac.nz/qualifications/undergraduate-degrees/bachelor-of-teaching/mmp/" target="_blank">Mixed Media Presentation,</a> entitled 'Curriculum and Assessment'. We'll call it the <b>MMP core paper.</b><br />
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A masters level 'research methods' class, compulsory for students as a precursor to the research component of their masters degree. Let's call it the <b>masters class.</b><br />
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And a new class for me: Originally an on campus offering, entitled 'The teaching and learning process: Innovative approaches', which I have elected to blend with online components. This one will be referred to as the <b>new blended course.</b><br />
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In each of these three classes, there is a continuum from fully online to blended study, and the blend occurs in different ways.<br />
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For example, the <b>ICT option</b> is fully online. It caters for students who are located at a distance from the university, often in their final semester of study, and is sometimes taken by students who have timetable clashes with other options. I see it as "full immersion in online study", and explain it this way to students. The online interaction takes place in Moodle, and is comprised of asynchronous discussion, opportunities for synchronous chat, and video-conferencing. Resources include video and electronic text materials, and websites. Students are encouraged to 'do and report back' when it comes to exploring new technologies (e.g., social media tools), and interviewing teachers and learners about their use of ICT. I'd be reluctant to add a compulsory on campus component to this optional course, or to mandate synchronous work, as the students who take the paper have opted into an ICT-rich experience, and are often already challenged by distance and scheduling. So far, paper appraisals indicate that students are happy with the fully online design, and appreciative of flexibility and choice.<br />
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In contrast, the<b> MMP core paper </b>begins with two compulsory lecture/workshop sessions f2f, as part of the week-long intensive block of on campus times for students in this initial teacher education programme. In every class, there is a firm expectation of attendance on campus, in part due to Education Council requirements for the ITE qualification. When we meet with the students on campus, we take time to build a rapport, establish expectations, workshop complex concepts, and prepare students for ongoing work and assessments online. For MMP students, meeting on campus is an essential ingredient in the MMP blend - along with work in schools, community study groups, and online. Time spent with peers and staff on campus is of interpersonal importance, cultivating relationships that are then developed and sustained online as a learning community. I often say to students on campus that my aim is to "put them at ease and rev them up simultaneously" in that I want them to be reassured that they are facing an achievable challenge, so they leave feeling ready to tackle their learning with energy and enthusiasm.<br />
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The<b> masters class</b> is in between the ICT option and the MMP core paper, in terms of the blend of online and face-to-face interaction. While it started as a fully online paper, and many of the students are in similar circumstances to those in the ICT option, the students working at masters level can be less comfortable with working entirely online. Although they are often working full time (e.g., in school leadership or as educational consultants), and are geographically dispersed, the masters students are often compelled to take the online version of the paper due to the timing of the offering. That is, it is offered in semester B, and they have to take it before they embark on their research project (directed study, dissertation or thesis). The same paper is offered on campus in semester A, and in summer school as a blended offering, but students may find the July-October timeslot suits their circumstances, so they find themselves working online. I am particularly sympathetic to international students who travel to NZ, only to find themselves taking an online class! The online format can be challenging when many of the concepts are new and complex, and even controversial - ethics and paradigms can be tough to engage with online! We keep things lively with online debates and screen video-interviews with active researchers, but there are times when the students want to meet and talk through their own projects, and to puzzle through some of the challenges of research in a face-to-face context. In response to this, we have started to offer informal meeting opportunities - for students who can make it to the campus - to discuss concepts, experiences, projects and assigned work. Last year, Noeline and I instigated this prior to an assignment and found the students were so relieved to meet with us, and with each other in person, there was an overall stress-release when we met with students to offer reassurance and talk through research challenges. So that students who could not make the on campus meeting did not miss out, we produced a video-summary (Panopto) immediately after the meeting to go over the key points raised, and to clarify points of interest to the group. In the semester ahead, we plan to do this optional meet then follow-up video-cast, about three times - near the beginning, middle, and toward the end of the semester. Of course we have always been available for appointments and phone calls, including skype and appear.in conferencing, but meeting on campus as a group will be an ongoing part of the design in this paper.<br />
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While the masters class barely nods toward blended learning with a small number of f2f meetings, I am taking a <b>new blended course</b> where we will experiment further with blended and flipped learning. Having inherited this paper very recently, it came with a weekly lecture, followed by a weekly tutorial (with two timeslots for students to join the tutorial so as to work in smaller groups, as their timetable allowed). Given my preferences for A) online learning and teaching; and B) working smarter; and also considering that C) the paper is about innovative approaches to learning and teaching, I have redesigned this option. This year, students will work on campus for one session a week, which will be a workshop in which we will learn about a range of pedagogies, work with guest experts (my learned colleagues), and engage in hands-on activities. We'll continue our learning online each week, with preparation for the on campus class, which will take the form of a video to view and analyse, an article written by the guest expert, an interview with the guest, a discussion to elicit prior knowledge, or a mini-investigative task. Obviously, this is an attempt to flip the learning and to create continuity between sessions. Following each face-to-face class, students will continue to discuss the topic online, in an asynchronous Moodle forum, moderated by me, and with a couple of follow-up posts from our guest expert. We know that groups of 10 are ideal for this purpose, to enable deeper interaction and reflective learning through the discussion. I'm excited to see how this plays out, and the extent to which it challenges students while enabling their learning. I'll follow that up, so watch this space!<br />
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In conclusion, I would say there are many ways of blending learning, and many reasons for doing so. (See <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2016/06/blending-learning-and-teaching-one_66.html" target="_blank">Noeline's recent post</a> also). Sometimes, this is about meeting the needs of diverse students, and it might even seem contradictory at times since it can be about reassuring students, ensuring their comfort, but can also be about challenging students to move out of their comfort zone. Neither is blending learning all about the students, as we are increasingly being reminded of the need to work strategically (smarter) and to reduce the time we spend on teaching, while maintaining the quality of our teaching. While this may seem an impossible challenge, I have explained <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2016/03/if-you-want-to-be-productive-try.html" target="_blank">elsewhere </a>that I value the flexibility, and time-shifting efficiencies of online teaching. I'm more and more convinced that blended learning is an effective way to survive and manage tertiary teaching, while maintaining high quality pedagogy in terms of student engagement, deep learning, rich feedback and relevant experiences.<br />
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How about you, readers? Care to add your voice to our discussion of variety in blended learning?<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com27tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-74441652429674666202016-06-24T12:11:00.003+12:002016-06-24T12:11:01.782+12:00Blending learning and teaching: One example<a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6165281819760275230#editor/target=post;postID=399281650235156111;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=1;src=postname" target="_blank">Dianne's last post</a> has got me thinking about how we connect when we have combinations of face-to-face (f2f) and distance students, especially when we have to cope with three scenarios simultaneously. The juggling has to be creative to get all three to work.<br />
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I thought I'd share with you what we've tried to do in one paper that's part of a secondary graduate initial teacher education qualification. It is a compulsory, full year paper that has to be comparable across three versions - f2f locally, f2f in another city (about a two hour drive away) and entirely virtually, where students are spread throughout the country and are often already working in schools. These people might be teachers from other countries whose ITE quals are not recognised here, and this includes many teachers from the UK who migrate to New Zealand. <br />
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Another complication is that this paper consists of three diverse modules: Te Puawaitanga, which is about understanding cultural diversity and honouring our treaty partners; literacy across the curriculum, which is examining textual strategies and their links to learning; and PICT - pedagogy and ICT.<br />
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On the face of it, they have nothing in common, yet they are part of aspects underpinning the New Zealand education system. They help address the <a href="http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Key-competencies" target="_blank">Key Competencies</a> in the curriculum and support the professional practices of novice teachers. They also position these pre-service teachers to examine themselves, their contexts and their practices. So that there are synergies across the three modules, the other lecturers and I use Panopto to stream live and record our lectures to our local f2f group. This is accessed through Moodle and all three groups are using the same Moodle site. To provide a mix that acknowledges the three versions (they are labelled HAM, NET, TGA), students are in subgroups for each discussion and all discussions are online in response to whatever is prefaced by the lesson itself. The discussions are also predicated on students having to try something out after the lecture to inform their online posts.<br />
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To organise the Moodle page this year, instead of having three different sites, all three groups (HAM, NET, TGA) and all three modules are organised into the same online space. Each module has its own section so the lecturers modified their section to suit. Each section was collapsible, to stop the page looking too daunting, but had easy navigation options that started with a structured overview diagram. I created it using <a href="http://draw.io/">Draw.io</a>, which cleverly works with Drive. I had never used Draw.io before, so I had to figure out what to do and solve the problems I needed to address. I had to create the three modules' content information as labels, adding hot links for each to the relevant area of the module, get the timetable information in order, and then work out how to imbed the overview into Moodle. The intention is that it operated as a ready reckoner for students to quickly find their way around. This is what the overview looks like. Students can enlarge or reduce the size as they wish by using a + or - option above it:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlsg76cAv1r-5pvcvFV4WV8fzxl_ySW2ZB8C5Jpj8I33vXVCnWxvk3sNHcvprhfirWPDP5AzyPaBQvLW_geJRB9TGSG2L_5WnFTXEFc8aTJxIWusMTUPwXPIy_PKkkjZtxJMx-iAFKkLg/s1600/overview.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="531" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlsg76cAv1r-5pvcvFV4WV8fzxl_ySW2ZB8C5Jpj8I33vXVCnWxvk3sNHcvprhfirWPDP5AzyPaBQvLW_geJRB9TGSG2L_5WnFTXEFc8aTJxIWusMTUPwXPIy_PKkkjZtxJMx-iAFKkLg/s640/overview.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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However, even the best laid plans have issues. One of these is the expectation that students will familiarise themselves with the site and read the information designed to help them, from the get-go. As learners, when we're busy, we tend to skim and look for shortcuts. This is eminently sensible when you already familiar with things, but not a good idea when everything is unfamiliar. When the total cohort is about 120 students, addressing individual <i>help!</i> emails (outside of Moodle) that ask questions about things that are answered in the site itself, often requires some restraint. This is because questions can come thick and fast at the start of a programme. They can be overwhelming and stressful when students do not indicate whether they have tried to find out the answer before emailing, so this requires some more digging to check what didn't work first in order to rule certain things out, or offer good solutions where possible. A short video that screencasts the answer to a stated problem is one I find that works which I post into the Moodle site for everyone to use (in the Q&A area - see the image below):<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7OidpzEscYyM8BXw7Fy7iqQlGKQMzbuoECsVr5oGyK4jWM2dC6on166kti1_0y2qqlWXYWLLcLr-qvLP6CMIpQAKnlfpS7U6Ks7DqEF_SmOgn0xrA6beyhTN_jMFKYOEwuhNTVsMcP18/s1600/top+page.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="235" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7OidpzEscYyM8BXw7Fy7iqQlGKQMzbuoECsVr5oGyK4jWM2dC6on166kti1_0y2qqlWXYWLLcLr-qvLP6CMIpQAKnlfpS7U6Ks7DqEF_SmOgn0xrA6beyhTN_jMFKYOEwuhNTVsMcP18/s640/top+page.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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I now have quite a large store of how-to screencasts that become useful as a just-in-need arises. As Dianne's post notes, the video posts can personalise and humanise what might otherwise seem distant and cold. One of our colleagues, lisahunter, describes her trials and tribulations of trying to teach online as a new staff member in <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wmier/publications/books/digital-smarts-enhancing-learning-and-teaching" target="_blank">Digital Smarts.</a> She describes some of the labyrinthine efforts that took place as she found her way. You might enjoy reading her chapter. The book is free!<br />
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Also as Dianne observes, clarity and presence is something we strive for and constantly seek feedback on how well things are working. To that end, Dianne is leading a partnership with York University on peer mentoring online, where we are paired with someone else to seek a dispassionate point of view about our own puzzles of practice as we teach online. It is a wonderful experience and creates links that might not otherwise exist across space and context.<br />
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So what are your experiences? As a lecturer online or as a student learning through such an LMS as Moodle? We'd love to hear from you.<br />
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<br />Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-3992816502351561112016-06-09T10:39:00.000+12:002016-06-09T10:39:26.358+12:00Teaching Online: Clarity and PresenceThe final week of semester is already here and we are encouraging students to reflect upon their learning, and upon our teaching. This is not to suggest such reflection takes place only at the end of semester, but rather that this is the final chance to prompt evaluative thinking and to obtain student suggestions before class ends.<br />
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In a <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/06/student-feedback.html" target="_blank">previous post</a>, I wrote about ways to elicit student feedback and a little about how my colleagues and I respond to the suggestions that students make. In today's post, I want to sum up some of the ideas shared with us by our current cohort of first year students in the Bachelor of Teaching degree, studying online. This summary is for my own analytical purposes - to synthesise student input and consider how to action it; and also for students - to show we are listening and taking suggestions seriously, ready to act upon these. It may also be of interest to colleagues who have a stake in what students completing their first semester of online study have to say. As always, there is much to be learned from listening to student feedback.<br />
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Earlier in the semester, the coordinator of our programme travelled to the regions to visit students in their base schools and returned with some informal feedback for us. In a nutshell, she reported that students were happy with our work in the online class because everything is nice and clear and my teaching partner and I are on hand for students when needed. That is, the students immediately highlighted <b><span style="color: red;">Clarity</span></b> and <span style="color: red;"><b>Presence </b></span>as two key elements in their satisfaction.<br />
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I've kept my ear to the ground to find out more about these two factors and have swiftly concluded that they are of tremendous importance to first-time online learners, and are reasonably straight-forward to achieve. They also represent, in my view, two of the biggest pitfalls for lecturers who teach online. Taking a closer look at each factor in turn,<br />
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<span style="color: red;"><b>Clarity</b></span> - is about having a clear and simple layout in the LMS (in our case, Moodle), so it is easy for students to navigate and to find materials and interactive spaces for various purposes. I think of the Moodle site as a classroom first and foremost, and a tidy classroom can be read as caring for one's environment, and being organised. Of course there are other interpretations of tidiness, but when it comes to online classes, students seem to appreciate uncluttered simplicity.<br />
Beyond spatial design, clarity is also about communicating expectations. We post a weekly reminder for students, warning them what is coming up, deadlines ahead, and how they might prioritise their time in the week ahead. Each year, we refine our assignment instructions and criteria, working to clarify these as best we can.<br />
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<span style="color: red;"><b>Presence </b></span>- is about being there when students need us. Of course we can't predict when students will need us, so being present means <b>'standing by'</b> regularly. This is a familiar message to me, as my <a href="http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10289/7108/thesis.pdf?sequence=3" target="_blank">doctoral work</a> some years ago yielded the very same finding - that is, students studying online prefer lecturers to visit the Moodle space daily to answer questions, and to appear in online discussions 2-3 times a week in order to signal presence and reciprocate the degree of involvement expected of the students. Online, students perceive lecturers who are not actively present as being absent from class. Even if the lecturer is <b>'standing back'</b> to enable students the freedom to express their ideas or to develop scholarly independence, students cannot know that this is the case unless they are explicitly informed. Which brings us back to clarity of communication.<br />
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There is a subtle distinction between standing back and standing by. The latter involves monitoring, signalling presence in unobtrusive ways, and being ready to intervene before problems escalate.<br />
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Alongside our responsiveness to student queries and our regular input into online discussions, students have expressed their appreciation of our panopto recordings. Initially, we intended to produce a videocast weekly (as we do in our shorter 3rd year class), however we found this repetitive so instead recorded 9 videocasts between February and June. In each, we spoke to the camera, news-reporter style, and talked the students through the week that was and the week ahead, expressing our interest in their discussions, explaining key ideas, and reminding them of upcoming deadlines and expectations. You could say Panopto videocasts are where clarity meets presence.<br />
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The students said:<br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">"</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">Your Panoptos are fantastic as it makes the subject and your expectations clear and easy to follow! (which is very important when you are stressed at 2am, on your own and hundreds of miles from uni, eating cake!!)"</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">"</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">The panoptos have been great and it adds a personal touch to the paper."</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"it was like I was in a class environment and you were speaking directly to me. By doing this, it really personalised this paper for me."</span></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif;">"</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">I really enjoyed the panoptos, as it gave me the direction I needed at certain times."</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">"</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">Just to know that you are around made it so much easier"</span><br />
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Perhaps all of this sounds pretty standard. It isn't hard to do, after all. So, doesn't everyone teach this way?<br />
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Well, apparently not. There are still instances where lecturers struggle with clarity and presence. Perhaps they inherited an online paper, and had to hastily cobble together something based on past years' classes, resulting in a cluttered, confusing mess of a Moodle site. If lecturers are unfamiliar with a paper and unsure of expectations, this lack of clarity is conveyed to students. A staff member who has never used an eportfolio may find it challenging to teach students how to do so. As for being present, it seems some lecturers are overwhelmed by the volume of online traffic, or are intentionally standing back for legitimate reasons. Unless the learning intentions are shared, or better still negotiated with students, however, the students will remain in the dark.<br />
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If we want students to lead online discussion, we need to model this first and provide guidance and scaffolding to support their leadership.<br />
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If we teach online, it is not sufficient to drop into class once a week. Even lengthy posts at such intervals will be a case of 'too little, too late'. Teaching time in an online context is more effectively apportioned as 'little and often'. This is how we keep on top of the volume of messages and how we demonstrate we are there, working alongside students.<br />
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I am grateful to the students who have conveyed this feedback as they have taught me something very valuable about my teaching, helping me to prioritise and act.<br />
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Because this sounds self-congratulatory and even a bit smug, I will finish by saying: We haven't got it all right, we are not perfectionists. Thanks again to student feedback, we are re-examining one of our assignments for next year with a view to altering the summative weighting; we plan to provide more explicit demonstrations of how to contribute to online discussion; and we are modifying our word limits in the forum. As further student feedback comes to light, it will alert us to any further concerns and hopefully point us in new and productive directions.<br />
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How does student feedback inform your teaching?<br />
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How important are clarity and presence as factors in effective teaching?<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-76773168457086070052016-05-31T12:00:00.000+12:002016-05-31T12:00:09.959+12:00If you teach, you know isolation....This is a response to <a href="https://shiftparadigm2011.wordpress.com/2016/05/29/coexist/" target="_blank">Mark E Weston's blog post </a>. He called his "<span style="color: #666666; font-family: "droid serif" , "georgia" , serif; line-height: 1.4;">TEACHING PROBLEMS (And How to Solve Them) – The Shift Paradigm Series" </span><span style="font-family: "droid serif" , "georgia" , serif; line-height: 1.4;">and I've stolen the first sentence of his post for mine. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "droid" serif , "georgia" , serif;"><span style="line-height: 1.4;">I'd like to respond for the following </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">reasons</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;">:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "droid" serif , "georgia" , serif;"><span style="line-height: 1.4;">First, I don't know much </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">about</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;"> </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">the</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;"> educational </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">context</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;"> he's referring to in his post, or what sort of schools he has in mind, for those are not made clear. For </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">example</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;">, does he have </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">secondary or</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;"> primary in mind? Or both? Second, I'm not sure if he has a particular country's schools in mind either, or if the post is to mean schools everywhere on the planet. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "droid" serif , "georgia" , serif;"><span style="line-height: 1.4;">Some of what Mark describes may be ubiquitous </span><span style="line-height: 22.4px;">descriptions</span><span style="line-height: 1.4;">, such as: </span></span><br />
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The paradigm that guides the field of education assigns great value to standardized school days, unidirectional meetings, institutional not personal development, and cookie-cutter buildings. It commits students to age groups, teachers to levels and subjects, and both to buildings and classrooms. A teacher teaches a set of students in a classroom. There she is singularly responsible for how and what students learn. Every other teacher, each in a classroom, is singularly responsible for her or his students’ learning and performance on achievement tests and other academic measures.<br />
The design and organization of your school—schedule, meetings, professional development, technology, and building—reflects your responsibility for student learning. It may support you meeting that responsibility but definitely prevents you from working collaboratively with other teachers. And, if you try to work together, you encounter difficulties. So you and other teachers co-exist. Co-existence is the source of your isolation.</blockquote>
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However, when I think of the changes to schooling contexts in New Zealand, I cannot but think, 'yes, but..' to a number of his contentions. </div>
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Let me explain.<br />
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Firstly, in new Zealand primary schools for example, there has always been a focus on collaboration in year level or learning area syndicates of teachers. This persists, and is aided by collaborative tools like GoogleDocs.<br />
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Secondly, because of population in various parts of New Zealand, or, in Christchurch's case the need to rebuild schools after the earthquakes, new kinds of schools are being built. They are built in accordance with new thinking about how education happens. The new thinking defines these spaces as ILSs (Innovative Learning Spaces), or, in <a href="http://www.education.govt.nz/school/property/state-schools/design-standards/flexible-learning-spaces/" target="_blank">Ministry of Education speak</a>, ILEs (Innovative Learning Environments) or FLSs (Flexible Learning Spaces).<br />
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Thirdly, there are online portals here which foster collaboration, such as:<br />
<a href="https://www.pond.co.nz/welcome" target="_blank">POND</a><br />
<a href="https://www.tki.org.nz/" target="_blank">TKI</a>.<br />
Other aspects foster collaboration in educational research, such as <a href="http://www.tlri.org.nz/" target="_blank">TLRI</a> or <a href="http://www.education.govt.nz/ministry-of-education/specific-initiatives/investing-in-educational-success/teacher-led-innovation-fund/" target="_blank">TLIF</a>. A brand new initiative to share good practice has just been announced too - the <a href="http://elearning.tki.org.nz/Ministry-initiatives/Grass-Roots-Ideas-Initiative" target="_blank">Grass Roots Ideas Initiative</a>.<br />
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And a way for educators to collaborate across the country is provided by #edchatnz - the Twitter hashtag used for regular discussions. One of these is collated in relation to the question<br />
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<a href="http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Reviewing-your-curriculum/Curriculum-and-the-community/Question-1" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: small;">Question 1 – Why engage with the community when designing your school curriculum?</span></a></h2>
And lastly, I shall give you a secondary school example, which also counters Mark E Weston's contention that </div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #404040; font-family: "droid sans" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 15px; line-height: 24px;">Teachers who co-exist do their core work alone, all the time, never together. For instance, when one designs a complete lesson—pedagogical approach, strategy, materials, and rubric—other teachers do not benefit from her efforts. Similarly, when a teacher delivers instruction, she cannot share what she learns from her delivery with others. Such duplication of efforts and disconnection of core work is why your workload is so high. It is why you have neither time nor energy to teach well. It is why teachers burnout. Why the field of education cannot reform itself. And why you feel so isolated.</span></blockquote>
<a href="http://www.hpss.school.nz/" target="_blank">Hobsonville Point Secondary School,</a> a new (state funded) school now in its third year, has taken advantage of the option to resign how the school enacts the national curriculum, and how teachers work in these new spaces. From the beginning, teachers have critical friends who are colleagues they turn to for advice. Also, teachers work in cross-curricular teams developing a term-long big module that pulls together learning from 3 subjects under one theme. Each week, the teachers get together to review students' progress and design the next week's learning programme. In this school, not teacher is isolated or teaching alone. They may plan lessons individually for their curriculum, but these lessons are designed to complement the two other subjects and links to learning outcomes that all work towards.<br />
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When they teach, they do so with colleagues present. The learning and teaching take place in wide, open and large, communal spaces. Breakout spaces for smaller group or individual work make it easy to concentrate on specifics and complete tasks as needed. Teachers, like students, collaborate as needed.<br />
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Teachers openly blog about their growing learning, as does the <a href="http://principalpossum.blogspot.co.nz/" target="_blank">principal</a>. They let me visit a few times a year to find out how they are evolving(see, for example, <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; text-indent: -48px;">Wright, N., & Adam, A. (2015). The ‘critical friend’ role in fostering reflective practices and developing staff cohesion: A case study in a new secondary school, New Zealand.</span><i style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; text-indent: -48px;">School Leadership & Management</i><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "helvetica neue" , "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; text-indent: -48px;">, 1-17. doi:</span><a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13632434.2015.1070821" style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #277bbe; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px; text-decoration: none; text-indent: -48px; word-wrap: break-word;">10.1080/13632434.2015.1070821</a>).<br />
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This way of operating is now spreading to another school which opened this year (<a href="http://www.rjhs.school.nz/" target="_blank">Rototuna Junior High School</a>). It has heavily borrowed ideas from HPSS, and so this open, collective and supportive vision of education has an opportunity to override the <i>paradigm of one</i> that Mark describes. I am currently awaiting review feedback on a paper about <i>disrupting the paradigm of one</i>. I'll let you know when it sees the light of day!<br />
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While Mark hopes for change, here in our little corner of the world, it is already happening, and has been for some time. Perhaps isolation is blessing- may be it means we work harder to make connections and support each other.<br />
So what's happening in your corners of the educational world? Anything similar?Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-83390279191219843112016-05-25T15:57:00.000+12:002016-05-25T16:02:37.094+12:00Social Media and the Doctoral ResearcherWe (Noeline & Dianne) were recently asked to present a few ideas about social media to a group of doctoral students in our faculty. In such busy, wildly variable territory as social media and academia, this is a fairly big ask as it can be difficult to know where to start. There are a range of commentators already picking out the pathways for researchers and doctoral students to traverse. Here are a few messages we shared, to provide a starting point:<br />
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Firstly, it makes sense for each student/researcher to take stock of the social media tools they already use for personal and any research-related purposes. Perhaps a familiar tool could be turned to research purposes? Or it might be time to branch out to explore a new tool or selection of tools. We really are spoiled for choice!<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMcmQHgqMJ_QhRndE19N5EoxklDeLN48P1qkhyphenhyphen9ZF39ei_dchA7bQRJdM0j8u5p8kv4GvwxXxCThaI27uZ7R1snDYUdultBgCODxhkbNXYxhMPsHkZ_ZCF9NhzGZ3ndPAleuItOjLVBU8/s1600/whatissocialmedia.png" imageanchor="1"><span style="color: black;"><img border="0" height="547" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMcmQHgqMJ_QhRndE19N5EoxklDeLN48P1qkhyphenhyphen9ZF39ei_dchA7bQRJdM0j8u5p8kv4GvwxXxCThaI27uZ7R1snDYUdultBgCODxhkbNXYxhMPsHkZ_ZCF9NhzGZ3ndPAleuItOjLVBU8/s640/whatissocialmedia.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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teachersandsocialmedia.co.nz</div>
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But choose we must, if we are to avoid paralysis, so a <b>purposeful </b>choice is a wise start. </div>
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<b>Why might a doctoral student/researcher use social media? </b></div>
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Various purposes might come into play at different stages of a research project or doctoral journey. For example, different tools can be used for organising and curating research materials and the range of literatures in the project. Social media can enable us to connect and converse with people who are exploring similar methodologies, or who are experts in specialist areas. Professional contacts can be made and sustained. Help with writing, time management and productivity, and other practical assistance can be accessed via social media. Advice can be sought on relational challenges around working with supervisors. Social media can be used to access support and to boost morale.</div>
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While social media cannot solve all problems, there are a range of possibilities and purposes it can serve.</div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As a first port of call, we suggest: <b>Blogs and blogging.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Reading blogs provides a gentle starter for those who are new to social media, and there is no shortage of relevant content. Our number one favourite for doctoral students is <a href="https://thesiswhisperer.com/" target="_blank">The Thesis Whisperer</a> which really is a one-stop shop for anything you could want to know about completing a doctorate. Edited by Dr Inger Mewburn, Director of research training at the Australian National University, The Thesis Whisperer is a portal to a wide range of sites and topics of interest to doctoral students and incorporates new perspectives and experiences of doing a thesis with every post. With six years of archives, an ebook, and a comprehensive "more like us" list, there is no better starting point.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">As well as reading blogs, the next logical step is to <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/meta-blog-blogging-in-academia.html" target="_blank">write one</a>. Many doctoral students/researchers find this a good way to write regularly, test out ideas, elicit feedback and build up a bigger picture.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If writing a blog seems like a big step, doctoral students/researchers might try micro-blogging with the likes of Twitter. The close relationship between blogging and Twitter means that bloggers often tweet links to new posts in any case. A good start in Twitter is to find some relevant researchers and fellow students to follow. From here, a snowball effect ensues whereby it is possible to mine the followers/following lists of everyone you follow in order to select other relevant tweeps.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Twitter can be particularly powerful in conjunction with conferences in your discipline or research area. While it is expensive and time consuming to attend many conferences, there is the next best thing. It is possible to follow along some of the thinking of contributors in real time, and get a sense of key themes and reactions via a conference Twitter hashtag. For us, <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/deanz2016?vertical=default" target="_blank">#DEANZ2016</a> is a recent and rich example, enabling vicarious participation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Another use for Twitter is to promote any of your published articles to generate a readership. </span></div>
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<span id="docs-internal-guid-29043678-e612-bf38-f5b4-45700afe5593"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif; font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Scoop-it - curate and connect</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Scoop-it can be a great curation tool for topics. You can follow others' topics or create your own. Susan Bainbridge curates one on </span><a href="http://www.scoop.it/t/connectivism" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: black; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Connectivism</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> for example, and Noeline curates one on </span><a href="http://www.scoop.it/t/pedagogy-in-schools" style="text-decoration: none;"><span style="color: black; text-decoration: underline; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">pedagogy in schools,</span></a><span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> particularly focusing on New Zealand contexts. You can annotate the items you curate as well, so you can make notes that identify your reason for curation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-weight: 700; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Google tools - store, share, collaborate</span></div>
</span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Times, Times New Roman, serif;">If you are collaborating with anyone (for example, co-writing an article) Google Docs is a great tool. You never need worry about which version is the current one, you can always check the revision history and return to a previous draft, and you don't need to worry about saving. If you also make it available to work on it offline, you don't even need an internet connection. </span></span>When you are back online, it updates to the latest version again. You could also use Docs to share drafts with supervisors if you give them comment rights. You then have an opportunity to have an online conversation with your supervisors - useful if it's difficult to meet at particular times.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Similarly, Slides allows you collaborate for co-presentations, or develop diagrams for your work. If you want a simple survey tool, Forms can be very useful. It saves all responses in a spreadsheet, and it will generate summaries of responses by question, creating pie graphs for percentages for example. For a first view of data, this could be very helpful. The spreadsheet can be exported as a csv sheet too.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Another valuable affordance is the ability to upload all kinds of files to Drive. Folders can help you keep track of files by topic, and the search tool makes it easy to find things again. You can also share items with others. </span></span></div>
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<span style="vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">ResearchGate or academia.edu are two services which allow academics to upload and share their own work with other academics. it can be a great way to publicise your own work too. These are also good ways to connect with other academics and build a network. </span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Up for a challenge?!</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">From here, if you are new to social media as a doctoral student/researcher, why not try one or more of the following:</span></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Set up a T<a href="https://twitter.com/" target="_blank">witter account</a> </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Check out <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/deanz2016" target="_blank">#DEANZ2016</a></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Find researchers to follow</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Tweet about your research topic, interests and needs, using hashtags</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Find and read research blogs</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Comment on a blog</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Plan a blog, starting with the purpose and title</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Establish a blog, draft a first post on your research and goals</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Finally, bear in mind that social media is a complement to your research work and not a substitute for actually doing the research and writing! Build up a personal learning network that can help you at various stages of your doctoral journey.</span><br />
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<i>Dianne & Noeline</i></div>
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<!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-91263190727352815322016-05-16T10:00:00.000+12:002016-05-16T10:00:26.212+12:00In a reflective mood: Browsing a 20th anniversary issue of Waikato Journal of EducationI'm currently the general editor of the <i><a href="http://wje.org.nz/" target="_blank">Waikato Journal of Education</a></i>, and have been for quite a few <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwUJfN8RHr5T9lYCH9EhlchaWG9n3lwY7oDMlR_laJaERVPjWBEXY8eBKKwf-xQOnzpJxrtC7rMQw2_cEO2v-eSeC_u-FfFrfnSt63ZO6HjNB6QgCFGxizbhYtQT-_Ol3jK9UPmlf1EgM/s1600/wje_logo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="157" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwUJfN8RHr5T9lYCH9EhlchaWG9n3lwY7oDMlR_laJaERVPjWBEXY8eBKKwf-xQOnzpJxrtC7rMQw2_cEO2v-eSeC_u-FfFrfnSt63ZO6HjNB6QgCFGxizbhYtQT-_Ol3jK9UPmlf1EgM/s200/wje_logo.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
years now.<br />
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It's a modest but robust journal that has a rather eclectic view of education and writing for that education audience, diverse as it is (ECE, schools, tertiary) and covers a wide range of interests. THe journal says of itself that:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #111111; font-family: 'Times New Roman', Times, Georgia, serif; font-size: 16px;">Previous special issues and sections have included sections on creative research in the arts; Pacific education: research and practice; bodies in motion; theorising pedagogy; Māori culture and education; Māori education, teacher education, curriculum, ethics and tertiary education; educational leadership; and new voices in ethnography. The journal appeals to a diverse readership that includes academics, graduate students, teachers across all sectors from early childhood to tertiary, policy makers and "the public".</span></blockquote>
On my watch, we have migrated from a print to an open, Creative Commons-licenced publication so that more people can access some of the gems inside it.<br />
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Last year we reached a 20 year-milestone. Its initiator and first editor was invited to edit this anniversary edition, which was also launched at the 2015 <a href="http://www.nzare.org.nz/" target="_blank">NZARE</a> conference in Whakatane.<br />
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The table of contents of this <a href="http://wje.org.nz/index.php/WJE/issue/view/22" target="_blank">special 20th anniversary issue</a> is a glimpse of the treasures inside it. Clive McGee's introduction outlines a brief history of the publication, noting that over its 20 year history, over 300 papers have been published. He goes on to say that there are<br />
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... about 470 authors although some of them have contributed to more than one paper. Over half the authors were from the University of Waikato, nearly a third from other parts of New Zealand and an eighth were international. Most authors were from universities; however, some authors were teachers who were part of research teams. </blockquote>
These 300 or so papers address a wide range of topics, and we now have special sections that allow a concentration on one topic while also leaving room for other papers. Over time, the journal will continue to evolve. One <a href="http://wje.org.nz/index.php/WJE/issue/view/18" target="_blank">recent issue on Mantle of the Expert</a>, for example, was a collection of video articles. That was a first for the journal, but it won't be the last. It may be that the next issue (due out soon!) might contain a few video abstracts, possibly beginning with the special section editors introducing the topic - family literacy - via a short video.<br />
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As the journal evolves and is creatively expanded by the ideas from new general editors and Board members, it still needs volunteers to review articles. It still needs authors too!<br />
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If you think this something for you, then please sign up. Make sure you also indicate the areas you might like to be a reviewer for - there is a space for that. For example, what kind of research you are familiar with, what subject disciplines you are interested in or research.... Without that kind of information, it's almost impossible to choose people to assign to the reviewer role - we aim for a good fit between an article and the skill set of a reviewer.<br />
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And remember - this journal is accessible to everyone, any time, from anywhere. Please dip into it and read to your heart's content. We want you to!<br />
<br />Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-17345112270313722432016-05-09T10:42:00.000+12:002016-05-09T10:42:15.423+12:00Flexible Learning @ Middle EarthElf ears, hobbit holes, Gandalf and the launch of FLANZ...<br />
<a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2016/02/professional-learning-2016-why-you.html" target="_blank">As anticipated</a>, the recent DEANZ conference was a great success, with record attendance, an inspired theme, smooth organisation, good humour and a whole lot of quality learning through a variety of keynotes, invited speeches, workshops, presentations, refereed papers, speed sessions, posters and informal networking.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKpbIIzjSWvCF3OdDqRwQHvCJYHktmPVCTTeCRbeIWcmupwzVX_LpjVELbrP2_ttdprjFwiYMKlr7MVEYD2cBib-FqvMr5Kt-RCKdmVpfMUWEbxLgktr-Tm1bExqrhjuEu6fQ9nrGTyOU/s1600/DEANZ+logo+final2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKpbIIzjSWvCF3OdDqRwQHvCJYHktmPVCTTeCRbeIWcmupwzVX_LpjVELbrP2_ttdprjFwiYMKlr7MVEYD2cBib-FqvMr5Kt-RCKdmVpfMUWEbxLgktr-Tm1bExqrhjuEu6fQ9nrGTyOU/s200/DEANZ+logo+final2.jpeg" width="200" /></a></div>
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Highlights included:<br />
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The opening keynote address by Professor Curt Bonk illustrated the changing realm of education, prioritising aspects of content creation and curation, creativity and the need for persistence and grit. Adventurous, personalised learning was to the fore, whilst the key challenges are around quality, copyright, plagiarism, and assessment. <br />
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To hear more from Curt, give this RNZ podcast a listen: <a href="http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/afternoons/audio/201797491/e-educator-curt-bonk" target="_blank">"This is an age in which we blend" </a><br />
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The Great Debate, on the moot: That online and face-to-face pedagogies are identical, was hotly contested amid generous doses of humour! On the affirmative side, the team argued for the necessity of key underpinning pedagogical principles that persist across online and face-to-face contexts: Relationships, feedback, effective design of learning opportunities - these are important whether one is learning online or face-to-face.<br />
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The negative team's stance presented the ideal of blended learning, contending that online and face-to-face pedagogies are different and can be complementary. Blending the best elements of both is the way forward for quality pedagogy, and it doesn't make sense to blend identical ingredients in any good cocktail.<br />
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To focus my experiences at the conference, I selected sessions related to <a href="https://youtu.be/oCvXf_QBqD0" target="_blank">ePortfolios</a> and eMentoring in order to consolidate and grow my understandings around these learning tools and processes. It was exciting to learn of the application of these ideas to medical personnel - as eportfolios are used in nursing education, and rural doctors are collaborating throughout the pacific region. I learned about virtual mentoring occurring via the VPLD with teacher participants, mainly from the school sector. And my collaborator, Dr Richard Walker from the University of York beamed in for a presentation of our York-Waikato peer mentoring scheme for online teachers in the tertiary sector.<br />
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My favourite new insight came courtesy of Stephen Harlow's reminder that elearning is environmentally-friendly learning, due to the lower carbon footprint of students who study at a distance from campus.<br />
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In terms of practical takeaways from the conference, I'm off to play with eTV and Zaption next, and to review my new copy of <a href="http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007%2F978-981-10-0700-2" target="_blank">Maggie Hartnett's book</a>.<br />
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The conference hashtag ran hot, creating a vicarious learning opportunity for those who could not make it to middle earth physically.<br />
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The conference dinner at Hobbiton, combined with a moonlit tour of the shire was second to none.And here are some shots of that experience:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4NyqNM3T6OhN1jpDUXVKafB3ecgI5HQ_fbMqCv2saAuuyMcDcKw2z0BZcW-D7cCeDxWMKDawDEL7XP-9I7Dk4prDT17dQN8zO64lCtSv_iAeVxN4FXREFVN-0vlNbijwT40hkQUHsNFE/s1600/daisies.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQGwgKBx56uVQn-DpMSs38qo-p3sV-nPfJVRFEtaepvq5umhEu_96O-_Y1JTaJeUAJbYABMkzGP5Rs7oqiNlO2Df6Z2O_fc_s8KBtlTglN6Ef3SIji-JZ3rk7ROFdZFD_vJEq_ZcYT4MI/s1600/hobbit-hole-33_26315508760_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQGwgKBx56uVQn-DpMSs38qo-p3sV-nPfJVRFEtaepvq5umhEu_96O-_Y1JTaJeUAJbYABMkzGP5Rs7oqiNlO2Df6Z2O_fc_s8KBtlTglN6Ef3SIji-JZ3rk7ROFdZFD_vJEq_ZcYT4MI/s200/hobbit-hole-33_26315508760_o.jpg" width="200" /></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK4La2FSDQDBFHrOetjViBNZuOHHDSYbKl1o1Ck2RZj927M8W6dRAAdplL6i1YoD_-KvyW-wMnUvanBv4Feu0kWvtIOJBbEmRmycLyB91BIXyjYWiYdDabuIT8rR2x6W0740DKiLIotcA/s1600/curt%252BHobbiton.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhK4La2FSDQDBFHrOetjViBNZuOHHDSYbKl1o1Ck2RZj927M8W6dRAAdplL6i1YoD_-KvyW-wMnUvanBv4Feu0kWvtIOJBbEmRmycLyB91BIXyjYWiYdDabuIT8rR2x6W0740DKiLIotcA/s200/curt%252BHobbiton.jpg" width="200" /></a><img border="0" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4NyqNM3T6OhN1jpDUXVKafB3ecgI5HQ_fbMqCv2saAuuyMcDcKw2z0BZcW-D7cCeDxWMKDawDEL7XP-9I7Dk4prDT17dQN8zO64lCtSv_iAeVxN4FXREFVN-0vlNbijwT40hkQUHsNFE/s200/daisies.jpg" width="200" /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYmgJXXxLepbaVqOWKw-CeS0GKZAbOBSNzRIRNAgcprDqjycKYaBTx5ozrfOeDcP1QorZhBGwdhwklmAC6IX9Z7LxxEjzSKdzJnmDO6gk5GZnSTeKj72Pn5DiWRC13vtrbsOzss-v7u6s/s1600/the-green-dragon_26315400090_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="132" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYmgJXXxLepbaVqOWKw-CeS0GKZAbOBSNzRIRNAgcprDqjycKYaBTx5ozrfOeDcP1QorZhBGwdhwklmAC6IX9Z7LxxEjzSKdzJnmDO6gk5GZnSTeKj72Pn5DiWRC13vtrbsOzss-v7u6s/s200/the-green-dragon_26315400090_o.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMLctP1nDVPhgL8ZwvqllJwdGhRiSPmAYUl_MPgHrt8JluTnHQXuyNU1nwZkaHsGMoFFlhEXj7KG4bk5fXMN_a0XpYZp9ifM13nT1Tn4qSBCLbz_7AnNPcPBBsqNtlbd_7GRTgi8jbIlY/s1600/dinner+at+hobbiton.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="111" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMLctP1nDVPhgL8ZwvqllJwdGhRiSPmAYUl_MPgHrt8JluTnHQXuyNU1nwZkaHsGMoFFlhEXj7KG4bk5fXMN_a0XpYZp9ifM13nT1Tn4qSBCLbz_7AnNPcPBBsqNtlbd_7GRTgi8jbIlY/s200/dinner+at+hobbiton.JPG" width="200" /></a><br />
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Awards were presented to ...<br />
<i>Postgraduate awards sponsored by Wilf Malcolm Institute of Education</i>:<br />
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<ul>
<li>Amina Adam: Best postgraduate paper</li>
<li>Tahani Alahmadi and Steve Drew: Runner up postgraduate paper</li>
</ul>
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Stephen Bright: Best refereed paper<br />
<i>DEANZ award winners:</i><br />
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<ul>
<li>Donna Dyer for a Mobile Builders - Carpentry App</li>
<li>Rachel Whalley for VLNZ (virtual learning network)</li>
<li>Lifetime DEANZ Award: Andrew Higgins</li>
<li><a href="http://journals.akoaotearoa.ac.nz/index.php/JOFDL" target="_blank">JOFDL</a> best paper award went to Elaine Khoo</li>
</ul>
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The poster award, by popular vote, went to this poster:<br />
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The conference signalled the end of DEANZ and the beginning of FLANZ...Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-41979134673568157322016-04-11T11:03:00.000+12:002016-04-11T16:58:50.976+12:00Flat out: Effects on things we like to do and contribute....There come times in educators' lives when there are perfect storms. The hiatus and/or dearth of posts in the recent weeks is a case in point. Since this blog is a voluntary choice Dianne and I have made, it is often the first casualty of workload.<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">
So this is my apology for the delays, and a window on the kinds of tasks we undertake in initial teacher education while we also support the wider sphere of learning with, through and about digital technologies. </div>
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Both Dianne and I are currently heavily into teaching - for Dianne, completely online and for me, a blended format of face to face and online. I teach a paper that has three versions to accommodate students' learning contexts. It is face to face in Hamilton (HAM), and theoretically face to face in Tauranga (TGA) at the same time. The third version is NET - for students who are truly studying at a distance. To accommodate these three versions, Those of us teaching in the paper (which I co-ordinate) decided to upend it and try something new. We created a meta-Moodle version, where all three versions are in the same space, and, while we present the instructional part of the class to the HAM group, it is being broadcast live and also recorded using Panopto, the tool the University uses for such purposes. This has been no mean feat to co-ordinate and establish. And together, there about a 100 students to cater for. This is one of the things that has been taking up my thinking time, for, to complicate matters, part of the paper is being taught by two people who are completely new to it. It's like juggling hand grenades. I never know when sometime will drop and we have a situation on our hands! So far, students have been remarkably sanguine about it, and have been very positive, which is a great outcome so far. Fingers crossed it persists!<br />
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Concurrently, Dianne and I are also involved in the hosting of a conference in two weeks. Dianne has blogged <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2016/02/professional-learning-2016-why-you.html" target="_blank">about it here</a>. She is providing one of the keynotes that will identify the innovations the faculty of education has enacted Waikato in its teacher education programmes. My role is co-convening the conference with a colleague Dr Elaine Khoo, and I'm principally responsible for editing the proceedings and creating the conference booklet about the programme, as well as being Elaine's right-hand-person for dealing with issues of conference organising. Immediately after the conference, Elaine and I are editing an issue of <a href="http://journals.akoaotearoa.ac.nz/index.php/JOFDL" target="_blank">JOFDL</a> for conference presenters who submitted expanded articles. That will be a great extension for presenters and support the dissemination of their ideas.<br />
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Also underway is the annual round of funding bids for <a href="http://www.tlri.org.nz/" target="_blank">TLRI</a>, The Teaching and learning Research Initiative. It is one of the few channels available for funding education research projects in New Zealand, so it is hotly contested. I have to say, that although there is a LOT of work in putting one together, it can be a really useful experience, for there is a great peer review process administered by <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wmier/" target="_blank">WMIER</a>, also my workplace. I was commenting today to my boss that the most recent review feedback to search out more adaptive learning behaviours. Through that search, I came across perfect-fit article from way back last century by<a href="http://psycnet.apa.org/psycinfo/1989-03202-001" target="_blank"> Rohrkemper and Corno (1988) </a>which discusses the necessity of learning stress and coping with challenge. It's a gem. <br />
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To add to the list of things to do right now, Dianne and I are co-editing a Special Issue of <i>Elearning and Digital Media</i>, which we have also <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/06/call-for-papers-e-learning-and-digital.html" target="_blank">blogged about</a>. We are in the throes of handling the reviewing process, and working our way through those processes to finalise the issue.<br />
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I'm also involved in researching two new schools.... Somewhere in all of this I also have to find time to do my own writing, for publishing your work is the bread and butter of academic life.<br />
Oh yes - and a have a private life squeezed in there somewhere. So you can see how these blog posts go down the chain of to-dos. <br />
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<br />Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-20426516101473846172016-03-29T13:58:00.000+13:002016-04-08T08:15:06.644+12:00If you want to be productive, try blended learning<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="http://www.productivity.govt.nz/inquiry-content/2683?stage=2" target="_blank">A new report from the Productivity Commission</a> raises concerns that New Zealand's tertiary system needs to develop new models of working. The assumption is that universities have not changed and are still locked into a lecture-room mentality.<br />
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While I would debate that this is the case, given my own experience with online learning and innovative pedagogies, it has come to my attention that some 'academics/lecturers' are unable to see past the notion that teaching has to be face-to-face to be effective. Putting aside the question of how much these experts actually know about teaching (or learning), I want to make this point:<br />
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<b>Academics could be more productive if they would open their minds to the possibilities of blended learning.</b><br />
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<b>What is blended learning? </b><br />
Combining the best parts of on campus, workplace, community and online interaction, where the online communication can be synchronous and asynchronous and where learning management systems like Moodle form a foundation for critical discussion, individualised feedback, and plug-ins like Panopto enable video-casting, while wider social media expands the audience and interactive possibilities.<br />
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In any given week, I will present panopto mini-lectures and explanations to students; facilitate online discussion; give individualised feedback via dialogues or eportfolios; talk on the phone or via skype/appear.in and receive notifications of personal problems from students themselves or from our pastoral care administrator. Along with the rest of our teaching team, I met with students last month, for a block of oncampus time, and it was wonderful to see them in person and to teach, talk, listen and assess some work in a regular class setting. It was also exhausting and I can see how teaching full time on campus sucks the life blood out of my colleagues! When the students returned home, our work continued online and in their base schools and communities, and I felt things gradually settle into a productive pattern for all of us. I feel connected to the students I work with and I am proud of the quality of our interactions and pedagogical approach. I am especially proud of what the students accomplish when they qualify as teachers while juggling family, paid work and adult life.<br />
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<b>Will it work for every subject?</b><br />
Yes, blended learning can potentially work for every subject, where there is a will there is a way. If students need time in laboratory settings, arrange this for them on campus or elsewhere. That is part of the blend. Teacher educators like my colleagues in MMP successfully teach physical education, dance, drama, music, visual arts, science, mathematics, literacy, technology, te reo and all manner of other subjects via a blended approach. I have a colleague in chemistry who swears by YouTube clips and simulations, and another in electronics who sent students down to their local hardware store to obtain components and then the students' whole families got involved in constructing circuits in the kitchen.<br />
Let's try to think outside the square and find some imagination.<br />
And no, it doesn't all have to be online. That is the point of a blended approach.<br />
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<b>Will it work for every student?</b><br />
Why wouldn't it work if the approach is individualised to the student's needs? Some students may need to meet more often in person, to have additional structure, targeted feedback, or to have disability taken into account. This doesn't mean they will do better in an on campus programme with lectures, tutorials or labs, and dinosaur teachers.<br />
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I have learned from recent interviews with alumni from the first MMP cohort (1997-1999) that study groups in their local communities were a significant support for them. Students in the same region would get together over coffee every week and sometimes more often, to support each other and talk about their assignments, throughout the entire three years of their degree. And some of these study groups became lifelong bonds, with members still in touch after 19 years.<br />
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What I'm saying is that if students need to meet in person, this needn't be with the lecturer in every case. Peer support is important. To meet with a lecturer, students can phone, make an appointment to visit, or talk via skype or appear.in<br />
There have been times when I've travelled, particularly to Tauranga, to meet with students too. I see less of a need for it these days, as students use the alternative avenues suggested in between on campus blocks.<br />
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In terms of structure, I like to have an organised approach myself, so I start each week with a list of priorities for students to work on in each class. As well as listing these at the top of our online paper, I email them to every student, and then sit with my teaching partner/s to talk students through what is coming up (via Panopto).<br />
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In terms of individualised feedback, it is a nonsense to suggest that students on campus get more of this. Large classes are just a blur of bodies and backpacks! I certainly did not receive individualised feedback in Education 101 when I studied with 150 others, and as a first-year (Fresher, in Otago), I was far too intimidated to ever make an appointment to talk with my lecturers.<br />
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Online, we have an Individual Tutorial Dialogue space with each and every student. Students readily pick up the phone to ask a quick question, and receive a quick answer. And when students have a query at 2am, chances are there will be another student online in our 'Can anyone help?' space to come to the rescue. It is a great feeling when students gain independence and interdependence with peers, which bodes well for the teachers and professional colleagues they will become.<br />
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I've provided written bullet points to accompany panoptos for a student with a hearing impairment. Now graduated, he was able to fully participate in every aspect of the online class, and thrived in asynchronous online discussion with his peers. But on campus, he had to rely on interpreters to sign and note-takers to help him keep up. Blended learning enhances equity of access by enabling students to study without leaving their families and communities for prolonged periods, reducing the cost and helping mature people to take up new learning opportunities.<br />
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<b><span style="color: red;">But one size doesn't fit all!!</span></b><br />
What is there about blended learning that suggests it only comes in one size? Not all campus-based teaching/learning is created equal, and the sky is the limit when it comes to personalising learning in a blended format. By definition, there are more options when we blend diverse contributions to a student's education.<br />
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<b>So what has all of this got to do with productivity?</b><br />
I honestly believe that teaching online and in a blended mode has helped me to become more productive as an academic. I listen to colleagues wrestling with timetable clashes and room bookings, wondering how they can be in three places at once, if there even is a suitable venue to gather their class. I hear people say that they don't have time for their research, administration and service, let alone to have a life because they are too busy teaching, with too many classes and too many students, and too much pressure on their precious time!<br />
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Get a life! Try blended learning. Done well, your students will thank you for it! And you just might be able to shift a little time to do a few other things well too.<br />
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When I finish writing this post, I'll check online and answer student queries, and I'll monitor the current discussion and respond to two of the groups. I can call it a day and go home to my family and in the morning, (I might even work from home!), after checking back online and finishing the last of the eportfolio feedback, I will shut down Moodle and take some research time. If the phone rings, it will be because a student needs my immediate support, and I'll be there, but I won't be lugging my notes over to any dusty lecture theatres and I don't have any crusty powerpoint slides to revive. As for the laboratory, I hope the students have a good day in their base school!<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-23387214418096108212016-03-21T12:03:00.000+13:002016-03-21T12:03:07.773+13:00Building capability in understanding I currently teach in an ITE (initial teacher education programme) and have been interested to read students' posts to questions about experiences of online collaboration. Before this task was set however, I had created an opportunity for all the cohort to experience just that, through turning an OECD pdf (<i><a href="https://www.oecd.org/edu/ceri/50300814.pdf" target="_blank">The Nature of Learning</a></i>) into a GDoc, making a comment about the task, making multiple copies of this doc, then sharing each copy specifically with the email addresses of about 10 of the cohort. We ended up with about 15 groups. They had to choose three starters to precipitate a comment response in side the GDoc about the information contained in the document. The choice of starters were:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">I wonder if....</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">This suggests to me...</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">This idea is new to me because...</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">I've seen/experienced/read about something like this when I...</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">I don't understand.....</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">I'm not sure this makes sense to me because....</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">So, [ask a question]....</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , sans-serif , "sans"; font-size: 13px;">Does anyone else....</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Some students had never done this kind of task before, while others had experienced different kinds of online collaboration they drew on when later discussing their experiences. What I found very interesting in their posts was that many had not recognised this particular shared reading task as a possible experience of collaboration. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">For those who had never done this kind of thing before, it precipitated some moments of wonder as they realised what might be possible. Others worried about missing f2f personal interaction because they missed the body language cues. Some even argued that social interaction is diminished by online work, although this was not accompanied by evidence to show this. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">What I learned from this is that even those who had prior experiences of different types of online collaborations, the conceptions (Yes, I know it's early in the year!) about what constituted collaboration were quite wide. Some saw it as a communication means (a connection/transfer of information view), while others thought that it was about working to achieve a task/project outcome (a pragmatic, task-oriented view). Few explicitly noted that collaboration could also mean building knowledge and thinking together as social constructive activities; ones which <a href="https://theconstructionzone.wordpress.com/2011/09/01/collaborative-projects-what-does-it-mean-to-%E2%80%98co-construct%E2%80%99/" target="_blank">Peter Skillen</a> talks of in a blog post. Skillen also refers to <a href="https://bsherry.wordpress.com/2010/02/28/what-is-deep-understanding/" target="_blank">Brenda Sherry's </a>post about how what she thinks schools and learning should be about - fostering deep understanding. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">We hope we are fostering that kind of thinking with our ITE students, through exposing them to ways of learning that perhaps challenge or push their comfort zones a little. </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">I particularly liked Sherry's focus when she she poses a challenge of her own, for it resonates strongly with how I try to challenge my learners:</span></span><br />
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MAYBE WE SHOULD ASKING, “WHAT <strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">KIND OF THINKERS </strong>DO WE WANT OUR STUDENTS TO BE, RATHER THAN WHAT STUFF DO WE WANT OUR STUDENTS <strong style="border: 0px; font-family: inherit; font-style: inherit; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">TO KNOW?”</strong></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">I hope that as the year goes on, my students' conceptions of how knowledge is built, shared, understood and created, is expanded so that they can create a variety of opportunities for their learners to practise. I hope too, that their levels of thinking grow deeper and deeper. After all, if our goal for all learners is </span><a href="https://bsherry.wordpress.com/2010/02/28/what-is-deep-understanding/" style="background-color: white; font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;" target="_blank">deep understanding</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">, then we are in this together! </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></span>Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-76144081935615656642016-03-15T10:34:00.001+13:002016-03-15T10:34:06.507+13:00Peer mentoring for online teachers<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Are you new to teaching online or would you like to refresh your approach by looking at others' online teaching?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Are you an experienced online teacher who likes to share with colleagues and make connections across universities?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Universities of <a href="http://www.york.ac.uk/" target="_blank">York</a> and <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/" target="_blank">Waikato</a> are seeking expressions of interest from staff who teach online and would like to be paired with a colleague from one of our institutions for mentoring purposes. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The University of York has been operating <a href="https://elearningyork.wordpress.com/2016/03/08/peer-observation-for-distance-learning-tutors-participants-wanted-for-2016/" target="_blank">a peer observation scheme</a> since 2011, and joined forces with Waikato in 2014-2015 when online lecturers from Waikato's Faculty of Education opted into the York-Waikato peer observation and mentoring scheme, which involves partnering with a teaching colleague from the University of York in order to set goals, exchange feedback, and generate new ideas.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Here are 4 reasons to opt into peer mentoring:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">1. Teaching online can often be an isolating practice, particularly when budget constraints increase teacher-student ratios and make team-teaching less common at tertiary level. An online mentor is someone to consult with when you need collegial support</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">2. Mentoring is a way of valuing teaching and professional learning, to strive for continual improvement, and to prioritise the scholarship of teaching and learning alongside other research endeavours.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">3. While the institution may place greater weight on student appraisal data, peer mentoring is a way of triangulating with student perspectives. As well as knowing how our students experience our classes, and what their needs are, much can come from the perspective of an experienced colleague.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">4. An international mentoring partnership is an opportunity to widen perspectives and to build research partnerships too. Waikato staff who participate in the York-Waikato online mentoring scheme might also be interested in applying for the York Link Award in order to follow up their work in person with colleagues in York.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">If you are interested in joining the partnership this year, please email <a href="mailto:diforbes@waikato.ac.nz" style="color: #1155cc;" target="_blank">diforbes@waikato.ac.nz</a> by 21 March <wbr></wbr>with details of: </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The partnership is about collegial support, being internationally connected and informed, and working flexibly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Colleagues from any institution working in any discipline are welcome, so please forward the information to any interested online teachers</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">. </span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-79740821259399936902016-03-07T11:41:00.000+13:002016-03-09T08:39:23.268+13:00Education and research in the 'real world'I've been thinking lately about perceptions and beliefs and how these can be tempered by the seas of economic and political change. Sometimes, the term the 'real world' is used to dismiss the realities of others' professional lives as being somehow deficient or incomplete. This is often the case when universities or schools are discussed by those in the 'real world' (ie a different professional or occupational one).<br />
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Some dismiss a university as an <a href="http://www.leaderu.com/humanities/veith-ivory.html">ivory tower</a>, but, as <a href="http://www.leaderu.com/humanities/veith-ivory.html">Veith</a> argues, it is neither immune from influences of the 'real world' nor separate from it, for it in turn, influences the 'real world'.<br />
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Those of us inside the 'tower' are feeling the effects of economic and social change. Neo-liberalism for example, is taking a stronger and stronger hold of thinking and practice. Some of the effects of this are larger and larger workloads (so we work weekends, nights, annual leave) and have larger and larger classes in the name of 'efficiency', or, perhaps, cost cutting.<br />
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Being research focused also has its problems when the research that might have a huge influence in say, 10 years' time, is not funded because because its ROI (return on investment) is not discernible quickly. Education is a victim of this thinking. Finding sources of funding for research in various aspects of this field is getting harder and harder, so that educational researchers throughout the country scramble to bid for less and less and from fewer and fewer granting bodies each year. The ROI on the effort it takes to write these bids can thus be zero.<br />
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And yet, the educational research undertaken in this country can be ground-breaking, and none more so than work carried out at the University of Waikato. Te Kotahitanga is one these. Professor Russell Bishop won the <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/news-events/media/2010/05Special%20award%20brings%20international%20recognition%20for%20Education%20Professor%20.shtml">Paolo Freire Award </a>for this work, and the positive <a href="https://ictenhancedlearningandteaching.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/a-demonstration-report-effectiveness-of-te-kotahitanga/">effects of the programme are still being felt.</a> The New Zealand educational research association, <a href="http://www.nzare.org.nz/portals/306/images/Files/2015groupweb2.pdf">NZARE</a>, has also honoured its work.<br />
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This Te Kotahitanga research was longitudinal, involved a lot of schools, and resulted in a wide number of publications that have been hugely influential in New Zealand schools, and ultimately on M<span style="background-color: white; font-family: "georgia" , "bitstream charter" , serif; line-height: 24px;">ā</span>ori students' lives and careers. This research could only exist with external funding. Education does not have an immediate ROI. Nor does research into it. However, its effects, as indicated by Te Kotahitanga, can be profound. In the ECE sector, Professor Margaret Carr's work and <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wmier/early-years-research/where-have-we-published">Learning Stories </a>is another example of both local and international influence.<br />
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So, as Veith argued about the American academic system, the ivory tower concept is as mythical as the unicorn. I would add the supposed divide between the 'real world' and universities is a myth too. The gradual squeezing of funding for research into aspects of education in New Zealand is turning educational itself itself into a unicorn. If ROI thinking persists, educational research will become a mythical beast and the field will be the worse for it.Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-14553446847746721692016-03-01T10:20:00.000+13:002016-03-01T10:20:28.565+13:00Orientation: Ready, set... Go!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Officially, today is the first day of semester for students studying on campus here in Hamilton. <a href="http://www.ori2016.co.nz/" target="_blank">Ori2016</a> got underway last week and today the serious study is set to begin, with queues at the new payforparking machines before 9am this morning. This year, the university (Student Learning) has made a conscious effort to ensure the students participate in an <a href="http://www.ori2016.co.nz/ori2016/pdf/new-student-schedule.pdf" target="_blank">academic orientation</a> that sets them up for success in student life, as well as a social time.<br />
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However, for students and staff involved in our distance programme in initial teacher education, the work began some weeks ago, and the orientation has involved a combination of work online and on campus. This is a good time to reflect on how we orientate students in a blended programme and what the essential elements of effective orientation might be, particularly for mature students, returning to study, who are often new to studying online.<br />
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It seems to me that orientation is about setting students up for success and some of the ways we do this are by modelling organisation and encouraging students to dip their toes in and explore. For this reason, we strive to have our online papers in the <a href="https://education.waikato.ac.nz/qualifications/choose-a-subject/teacher-education-the-faculty/distance-education/" target="_blank">Mixed Media Programme</a> (MMP) ready and up online a week before the students arrive on campus for their block face-to-face time. Putting a class online doesn't mean it has to be all front-loaded and fully nailed down independently of student input, but rather that the essential elements of the course are ready, in keeping with the calendar description and paper outline, learning intentions and basic readings to start things off, plus an orderly structure with some dates to hang the course on. Having the class online before the students come on campus enables them to explore and come armed with questions and thoughts. While not all first year students will manage to get into the online class and look around, many do, and most of the third years take the opportunity to reconnect and make an early start on gaining familiarity with the learning challenges ahead. The work of our colleague, Merilyn Taylor, is designed to improve the transition experience of the first year students studying online, as <a href="http://coursecast.its.waikato.ac.nz/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=036d4203-7e90-4000-ad0d-e59980c50a14" target="_blank">Merilyn discussed at WCELFest16 </a> by giving the students a taste of basic online tasks and academic community, boosting confidence to participate actively.<br />
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When we meet the students on campus, as part of the block course component in MMP, our sessions are designed to fulfil a range of orientation functions, fundamentally centred around establishing starting points that are <b>respectful, relational, responsive and real</b>:<br />
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Firstly, we want to show the students that we are real people, rather than faceless robots at the other end of a computer network. We enjoy meeting, talking, listening, sharing and spending time with students face-to-face, from the Powhiri to the social gatherings, the classes and the chats in the corridor.<br />
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Secondly, we want to establish conditions that are conducive to powerful learning. For me, this means balancing the tension between challenge and reassurance. I want the students to feel curious and intrigued by the coursework and learning challenges ahead, so that they are ready to jump in and put in their top efforts, taking the work seriously and rising to high expectations. However, I am also mindful that adult learners can be anxious, despite the wealth of relevant experience they bring to all things. So, I'm intent on promoting confidence too. In a nutshell, I guess I want to stir them up while putting them at ease, which is a balancing act designed to banish complacency without creating undue stress. My mission is to cultivate <a href="http://www.edutopia.org/mihaly-csikszentmihalyi-motivating-people-learn" target="_blank">flow</a> so that students are urged to throw themselves into their learning, without feeling daunted by the prospect.<br />
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Thirdly, we use our on campus sessions to demystify the assessment procedures in class. Where possible, our assignments take the form of rich tasks requiring higher order thinking. For example, the third year class is entirely built upon developing student leadership, critique, discernment of alternative perspectives, and productive argumentation. This is a tough ask, weaving learning with assessment, and it requires that students have a chance to rehearse the skills involved, as well as to see models and to receive formative feedback on initial efforts. Our in-class activities are designed as a dry-run for each assignment, not because we are 'teaching to the test' or because passing the assignment is all that matters, but rather because we crafted the assignment around the learning intentions and need to support the students' learning in these directions.<br />
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Finally, in relation to assessment, we try to get an assignment underway very promptly in the course. First year students present an oral assignment worth 20% on the third day of their course. By week 2, third year students are leading online discussion and facilitating group work. Early assessment builds momentum in the courses and enables early success and timely feedback.<br />
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When we farewell the students from campus, and they return home to work online and in base schools, our parting orientation contribution is a follow up vodcast (Panopto) in which we verbally recap the key learning intentions and instructions and remind students about how to refocus when they return to home base. We aim to panopto on a weekly basis this semester, in order to present the human face of online teaching by reaching out to students, giving feedback about assignments and discussion, and talking through upcoming tasks.<br />
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In all of this, we are striving to orientate the students to their learning and to the relationships that will underpin their academic and professional development.<br />
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How do you orientate students in your courses?<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-62558545613143952342016-02-16T15:21:00.000+13:002016-02-16T15:21:35.476+13:00Professional Learning 2016: Why you should come to DEANZ<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">A highlight of this year promises to be the <a href="http://conference.deanz.org.nz/" target="_blank">DEANZ2016 conference in Hamilton</a> in April. As organisers and speakers, we are eager to promote the conference and to urge everyone to come along! When we go to conferences we are looking for fresh thinking, a good balance of theoretical insight and practically relevant takeaways, an opportunity to hear, meet and talk with fascinating educators and thinkers, and hopefully some quality catering (<i>definitely</i> great catering!!! - Noeline's aside)</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">7 reasons to get to DEANZ</span></b></h2>
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<li><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Fresh year, fresh thinking - DEANZ reinvented as FLANZ - innovation is the order of the day. </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">DEANZ, a national organisation, started 31 years ago, evolving from the Distance Education Association of New Zealand, to the Association for open, flexible, distance learning, and the New Zealand association dedicated to making </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; font-style: italic; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://deanz.org.nz/on-making-ako-accessible-for-all/" target="_blank">ako</a></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://deanz.org.nz/on-making-ako-accessible-for-all/" target="_blank"> </a>accessible for all. This conference announces the formal name change to FLANZ -</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> <i>Flexible Learning Association of New Zealand</i>. This shift highlights the emphasis on flexible technology-supported learning options for learners today and in the future, and demonstrates how much this field of learning by distance and with technologies has altered in two decades. </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;">The conference programme encourages delegates to embark on critical conversations and experience practical examples that will most likely trigger reflections on past lessons, offer solutions to current conundrums and promises new directions in flexible learning.</span><span style="font-family: times, 'times new roman', serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The variety of presentation formats - keynotes, the great debate, posters, speed sessions and workshops. The great debate promises to be a highlight, with the moot: </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> “That online and face-to-face pedagogies are identical”, a hot topic for educators.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">International and national speakers - DEANZ2016 welcomes</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> delegates from the US, Canada, Africa, Pakistan, Israel, Taiwan, Malaysia, Turkey, NZ, UK, Australia and the Pacific rim.</span><span style="font-family: times, 'times new roman', serif; line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"> Keynote speakers and invited speakers:</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Keynotes</i></span><div>
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Professor Curtis Bonk (University of Indiana) </b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">- highlighting past, present and future innovations in the field. Curt will also run a workshop on quality learner engagement in digital learning contexts (see his photo below)</span><br /><ol>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG9CdQm3pVI5YTh9nHpJJ_kQlPfdj70XJxkFswFyCiPMAevim5pkFQGWYQu_BtlQZO8nFoBmcqIlnh0fdauXWa4EFdItidrhu8ym0GzX7o9vy7VPdZIzwUSiDLAxbpg7AIlCYva5pCSTQ/s1600/images.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiG9CdQm3pVI5YTh9nHpJJ_kQlPfdj70XJxkFswFyCiPMAevim5pkFQGWYQu_BtlQZO8nFoBmcqIlnh0fdauXWa4EFdItidrhu8ym0GzX7o9vy7VPdZIzwUSiDLAxbpg7AIlCYva5pCSTQ/s200/images.jpg" width="115" /></a><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Dr Dianne Forbes (University of Waikato) </b>- </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">highlighting innovations in teacher education, via an historical look at Waikato's mixed media programme, as the blended Bachelor of Teaching approaches its 20th anniversary. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Carolyn Alexander Bennett (FarNet)</b> - </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">highlighting innovations in NZ in the primary/secondary schooling sector, via the </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"> NZ Virtual Learning Network Community (NZVLNC). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 22.08px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Invited</i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Phil Garing (Synapsys) -</b> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">highlighting innovations in NZ industry with a look at learning and development in a commercial context.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="background-color: white;"> </span></span></b></span><b style="font-family: times, 'times new roman', serif; line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">Joyce Seitzinger (Academic Tribe)- </span></b><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 1.38; white-space: pre-wrap;">highlighting innovations in designing personalised learning experiences.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #222222;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 22.08px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> 4. The conference has </span></span>wide appeal across all educational and private training sectors that have an </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">interest in flexible, online, distance and mobile education</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">. The 2016 conference is initiating the i</span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif; line-height: 20.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;">naugural Best Postgraduate Paper Award sponsored by <a href="http://www.waikato.ac.nz/wmier/" target="_blank">WMIER </a>to recognise quality research amongst emerging scholars. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> 5. Cross-disciplinary - education, health, engineering, environmental studies - how digital and flexible approaches can enhance learning across a range of disciplines.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> 6. Tourism and education - conference dinner at <a href="http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/ED1601/S00052/flexible-learning-with-a-hobbiton-flavour.htm">Hobbiton.</a> </span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">A rare opportunity to enjoy an evening tour of the shire, and a great time at the Green Dragon.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> 7. The University of Waikato - a leader in digital, connected, mobile and blended learning, Waikato introduced New Zealand to the internet, mixed media online initial teacher education programmes. In that sense, it is a world leader. This is the first time the conference has been hosted by The University of Waikato in Hamilton. its traditional conference settings have been Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="http://conference.deanz.org.nz/registration-of-interest/" target="_blank">Register</a> as an early bird by the end of February. See you there!</span><br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-35501089490766437732015-11-30T10:53:00.000+13:002015-11-30T10:53:07.858+13:00Looking back on 2015 - positive momentumWhat might we celebrate as 2015 draws to a close?<br />
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On the one hand, there are a number of factors to be very concerned about, in terms of the current political climate and the constraints on the work of educators and researchers. Funding is tighter than ever and there appears to be a lower value placed on qualitative methods and social justice agendas.<br />
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On possible effect is our research being bound by the politics of the day. This obstructs our ability to be intellectually independent. There is a <a href="http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/290483/police-block-gang-expert's-data-access" target="_blank">recent case of this in New Zealand</a>, where a researcher was denied access to some documents. Such obstruction means we need to be agile and willing to adapt to changing conditions and societal needs if we are to fulfil a legal obligation to be a social critic.<br />
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This leads us to wonder: in these complex times, what purpose does our blog serve?<br />
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<b>Dianne </b><br />
For me, blogging in 2015 has been about cataloguing practice and reflections, using the blog as a teaching mechanism, to articulate understandings for sharing with students. I blog when planning or recording commentary and insights about an event or process - in an online class, an elearning brown bag lunch, or a teaching advocacy session. In this way, the blog helps to gel the different parts of my role together and assists me to weave my professional efforts into a more or less coherent whole.<br />
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In 2016, I expect to continue to blog by way of reflection on <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/05/blended-learning-some-constraints-and.html" target="_blank">my teaching</a> and ongoing projects - related to peer mentoring for online teachers, and helping students and graduates to use social media for professional learning. I have played with ideas around social media in education throughout the year, with highlights including the <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/07/social-media-reputation-risk-and.html" target="_blank">ECSM2015</a> conference in Porto, and the opportunity to learn about <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/cross-cultural-social-media-for.html" target="_blank">Chinese social media</a> from visitors.<br />
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Then there's our ELDM special issue on <u>Twitter in Education</u> and we are very much looking forward to submissions by<b> 26 February 2016</b>. I have enjoyed talking (and tweeting) with prospective authors and reviewers for the special issue, and the range of topics and coverage is coming together well. If 2015 was the year of <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/07/digital-smarts-book-is-out.html" target="_blank">our book</a>, 2016 will be the year of our special issue. There is still time to work on a submission and the <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/06/call-for-papers-e-learning-and-digital.html" target="_blank">call for papers</a>, via this blog, is still an active link with constant readership.<br />
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What would I like for Christmas and for 2016?<br />
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<li>Some spam-free responses by way of comments on our blog from thoughtful colleagues and readers.</li>
<li>A successful special issue.</li>
<li>To meet some of the new intake of students in initial teacher education who may have heard me speak about <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015_05_01_archive.html" target="_blank">teaching myths</a> at our open day.</li>
<li>To keep the lines of communication wide open and co-constructive with students so that we can exchange feedback to advance our learning together.</li>
<li>To <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/04/working-smarter-strategies-for-managing.html" target="_blank">manage my time</a> in ways that matter and make a difference.</li>
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<b>Noeline</b><br />
For me, I like to use the blog as a thinking aloud piece. Sometimes it's about scoping ideas about bigger picture educational policy and what this might mean for educators - both in schooling sectors and tertiary.<br />
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My posts are sometimes also about political observations related to education. For example, the OECD. There are two posts: the <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/09/the-oecd-report-on-digital-technologies.html" target="_blank">first</a>, in September, is about the report on education and media tended to portray it, while the <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/11/further-on-oecd-report-on-digital.html" target="_blank">second </a>updates my thinking as it was prompted by a blog post about the relationship between the tools and pedagogical thinking. Both go together.<br />
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Anecdotally, I talk with teachers in a local secondary school who read the blog (hi to all of you at Hillcrest High!) and are happy for talk to be off the cuff. As Dianne intimated earlier, both of us would like some engagement with the ideas in the blog itself. Besides, it's always nice to engage with others over ideas. And it will make a great change from the pesky spammers who only want to promote some product or other. The 'delete forever' button gets a bit of a workout as a result.<br />
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The blog helps us, as Dianne suggested, to think, encapsulate and make sense of what we do, read, experience and learn. My occasional posts about working with some teachers is a case in point - it helps me make sense of something I notice while I have the privilege of being in their classrooms. One example is about science classrooms <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/science-teachers-integrating-digital.html" target="_blank">HERE</a>, while <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/07/part-four-more-musings-on-classrooms.html" target="_blank">part 4 </a>in a series links more musings. A blog post by Sean McHugh that inspired my post about <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/thinking-about-learning-and-teaching-in.html" target="_blank">mathematics teachers and weights and measures</a> was picked up by an Associate Principal and shared with a mathematics department, so I guess this blog helps provoke some thinking (I hope!).<br />
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Anyway, this will be our last post for the year. Soon we will be on annual holidays to recharge ourselves. We hope you all have a great set of celebrations - whatever your beliefs. We hope you go well and go safely.<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-37978104886032313452015-11-20T09:24:00.000+13:002015-11-23T21:18:54.632+13:00More on the OECD report on digital technologies in educationThe previous blog post I wrote on <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/09/the-oecd-report-on-digital-technologies.html" target="_blank">this issue in September 2015</a> was in response to some of the media reports that took one item and made it the central focus of the report, when it was nothing of the sort. I have now come across a blog post that puts together comments from a range of international academics who have also commented on ideas the report covers. Essentially, the <a href="http://openeducationeuropa.eu/en/node/173798" target="_blank">blog post </a> by <span style="background-color: white;"><a href="http://openeducationeuropa.eu/en/user/32689" style="border: 0px; color: #551a8b; font-family: Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 16.5px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none !important;">Maria Perifanou</a> outlines comments that strongly advocate for the d</span>eliberate acts of pedagogy that are crucial for learning. Yes!<br />
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It has never been more important for teachers to have active, deliberate control of designing the learning activities and processes (this includes learning where students are active participants and decision-makers). This is, however, no mean feat, especially if teachers keep the long goal in mind of developing tomorrow's citizens/adults who can ethically, morally, and safely, take their places as decision-makers in their own societies. This doesn't happen in a vacuum or by happenstance, but by deliberate and careful design over long periods of time.<br />
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Deliberate acts of pedagogy that facilitate critical thinking, the ability to interrogate texts of any kind, and to not believe politicians' words all the time, is crucial for the health of our communities. With the growth also of strong efforts to turn everyone into consumers to <i>buy, buy, buy!</i>, we must educate our learners to think first of all: what are the messages I'm receiving? What and how am am I being persuaded? This also links to understanding political persuasion.<br />
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For example, in the advertising context, I'm thinking of the relentless advertising for the machine that says it creates healthy smoothies that a juicer can't. This advertising does not compare like with like. If it did, it would have little to offer that a blender can't do, other than being a bit easier to clean afterwards. A juicer is about removing pulp; a blender doesn't do that. So why would there be a deliberate effort to mis-compare? It is about creating need when there isn't one, playing the health-conscious card to potential consumers. is this justified? Such a question could raise all sorts of ethical considerations that might not be thought about. In 2007 for example, Ribena was left red-faced by <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/mar/27/schoolsworldwide.foodanddrink" target="_blank">New Zealand schoolgirls </a>who unearthed its levels of Vitamin C. The began with a question about which of the comparable fruit drinks had the most Vitamin C.<br />
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So why aren't we using common texts such as these to interrogate in our classrooms? These can leverage the affordances of the internet to offer students the opportunity to come up with answers to relatively disarmingly simple questions like:<br />
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<i>Does this product compare like with like? How do you know? How did you test the argument of the advertisement? What do you learn from this investigation? What would you advise potential buyers about this product? If you had the money, would you buy one? Justify your decisions. </i><br />
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Imagine classrooms where students are encouraged to use the internet, check out the purposes of certain pieces of equipment, make comparisons, draw conclusions, and report their findings to their peers? This could include investigating the value of educational Apps- are they fit for purpose? Do they help learning or so they stop at drill and rote memory?<br />
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Deliberate acts of teaching are about the end game of critical thinking and using readily available tools and texts to facilitate this development. it doesn't require much technological nous, but keen pedagogical expertise. Tasks that begin with a problem and leave the process open, are ones students can easily attempt. They combine the skills of close reading, analysis, discussion, using literacy strategies such as creating tables of comparisons, drawing conclusions, and writing up reports of some kind (blog, printed text, video, poster, infographic etc) to present to peers. This is mathematics, science, technology, English and the entire range of <a href="http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/The-New-Zealand-Curriculum/Key-competencies" target="_blank">Key Competencies put together.</a> A teacher at almost any level could justify such problem-based learning tasks. The differences, I suspect will be of degree - of complexity, the sophistication of the resources, and the expectations of the final outcomes.<br />
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So let's take back the power and claim what is rightfully ours as educators - the ability to provide deep, meaningful learning that transcends narrow technicist views of who teachers are and what they should do. My colleague Dianne Forbes' <a href="https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6165281819760275230#editor/target=post;postID=3084874519640620041;onPublishedMenu=allposts;onClosedMenu=allposts;postNum=1;src=postname" target="_blank">last blog post</a> is entirely relevant here for she outlines teachers' roles in actively creating learning from positions of strength and clear purpose.<br />
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So what do you think about this argument? Discussion is really welcome!<br />
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<br />Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-30848745196406200412015-11-16T09:53:00.000+13:002015-11-16T09:53:51.733+13:00Being a teacher … now and tomorrow<div class="MsoNormal">
I’ve been browsing through a book called
‘<a href="https://www.routledge.com/products/9780415675727" target="_blank">Learning identities in a digital age</a>’ by <a href="http://about.brighton.ac.uk/education/contact/details.php?uid=aml" target="_blank">Avril Loveless </a>and <a href="http://www.stir.ac.uk/education/staff-directory/academic/ben-williamson/" target="_blank">Ben Williamson</a> (2013) and have found the chapter on ‘being a teacher in a digital
age’ (chapter 8) particularly insightful.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">As a Teacher Educator there is much in this
chapter that resonates with what I am trying to <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">be</b> and to <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">teach</b>.
Recently, we discussed similar questions in faculty groups as part of our
review of initial teacher education. What do teachers need to know, do and
understand in order to be effective in diverse settings? What do we want for
the beginning teachers we mentor?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Guided by Loveless & Williamson (2013),
and following discussion with a small group of colleagues, a little of my
current thinking falls around the words highlighted below, with the suffix sion/tion:
meaning <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">act of, state of or result of. </b>So,
this is my thinking on what teachers do, are and achieve. This is what we are
aiming at ideally as we teach, including those of us who teach teachers about
teaching.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="t">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: #cc0000;">Vision</span> </b>– As teachers, we need to be purposeful,
imaginative and as resourceful and wise as we wish/expect students to be, say
Loveless & Williamson (2013). This is compatible with the <a href="http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/The-New-Zealand-Curriculum" target="_blank">New Zealand Curriculum</a> vision for young people </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "times new roman";">to
be</span> confident, connected, actively involved, and lifelong learners. It stands to reason that these goals are essentially appropriate to teachers. Can a teacher who is not confident, connected, actively involved or a lifelong learner successfully teach someone else to develop these capacities? Can we expect students to have purpose, imagination, resourcefulness and wisdom if we do not lead them by modelling these qualities? If these are the attributes we seek in our next generation, these are areas for teacher leadership. At its core, this vision needs to prioritise social justice and ethical responsibility, with appreciation of diversity, in order to be responsive to the needs of all students rather than just the privileged few.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="color: red;"><b>Foundation </b></span>– Teachers need subject
knowledge and a dynamic approach to advancing and revising this knowledge
continuously. Pedagogical presence and reach are essential attributes,
alongside interest and actual enjoyment of one’s field. If we can’t model
passion and joy in teaching, then how can we guide others to find it an
exciting career?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Digital literacy is a key foundation,
comprised of skills and attitudes toward problem-solving and change. Fundamentally,
the ethical core lies with commitment to equity and to valuing people and
learning.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Without vision and a foundation to build
upon we would be stuck, floundering and faking it at best.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: red;">Decision</span></b> – Teachers are curriculum-makers,
not merely there to deliver or transmit what another has designed. Instead,
teachers have to make decisions, to do so in flexible and adaptive ways, and
with the social good in mind. Again, ethics comes into decision-making, as does
courage and wisdom. Specifically, Loveless & Williamson remind us that
environmental sustainability must now be part of our decision-making in terms
of social good.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: red;">Action</span></b> – Just as students are encouraged to
be actively involved, teachers need a <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/carol_dweck_the_power_of_believing_that_you_can_improve?language=en" target="_blank">growth-mindset</a> as lifelong
learners, willing to proactively create and pursue learning opportunities and continual improvement. Being active is
about being critical rather than passive in our acceptance of the status quo. This critical stance also pertains to our own practice, as we actively interrogate and build upon our practice. Action that takes a new direction can be transformative of learning
possibilities. Action also includes the strategies we use when teaching and
learning. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Without these two states/acts/results, we
would be indecisive and passive. So, I guess we would still be stuck.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: red;">Participation</span></b> – In terms of being
connected, teachers cultivate relationships and collaborate in
knowledge-building communities. Whether virtual or f2f, participation stems
from being decisive and active. This is important in terms of relationships
with students that make a difference, and also in terms of <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2014/09/professional-learning-passive.html" target="_blank">proactive approaches to teacher learning</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: red;">Innovation </span></b>– Teachers who take risks, in
creative and inventive ways, who improvise and who seek originality, rather
than doing things the way they have always been done. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><b><span style="color: red;">Reflection </span></b>– As part of lifelong learning,
we need to be prepared to critically examine our practice and to grow. Perhaps
this is what future focused learning is about. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="color: red;">What have I overlooked?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="color: red;">What else do teachers need to be, do and
strive for?</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-49500869938744434592015-11-06T09:30:00.000+13:002015-11-12T13:14:25.313+13:00The rise of the neo-liberal agenda in New Zealand's education systemThe current government is about to review the Education Act. This is probably a good thing, given how much has changed in the social, economic and political landscape. However, it is wise for all in education to look behind the curtain to understand more about what the intention is. I am cautious, because there are precedents to the stealthy creep of particular agendas that seem to be about delivering more and more into the hands of those who wish to make money rather than focus on the social and educational health of its citizens.<br />
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I'm thinking here about the move to alter legislation to allow bars to open for Rugby World Cup televised games. So, at 3, 4, 5 am, people could congregate in bars to watch matches. Apparently this went well. Today, there is a call to loosen the strings on when bars can open because of this. This is after there were limits placed on access to booze because of the increasingly deleterious effects on people, the work of the police, traffic accidents and youth boozing. There is no mention of such issues in <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/71006311/Government-help-needed-to-keep-pubs-open-for-Rugby-World-Cup" target="_blank">David Seymour's call</a>, originally focused on a sense of patriotism for rugby. David Seymour is the sole Act Party member of parliament, representing a highly focused, neo-liberal view of the world. He is the voice of the far-right policies that, as far as I can see, the National Party wants to keep away from in public, to avoid scaring the horses, ie the public.<br />
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So what does this have to do with education? I suspect the same bit by bit whittling away of terms, conditions and principles. On the face of it, there are some possibly good ideas that <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/73584867/principals-or-boards-could-govern-multiple-schools-under-education-revamp.html" target="_blank">Hekia Parata suggests</a>. For example, new entrants starting school in cohorts rather than at their fifth birthday. I wonder what new entrant teachers think of that? Would having a whole new cohort start at once work? How difficult would it be for such a teacher to manage say, 10 students (who would be added to an existing class most probably) who start school for the first time? Such teachers seem to be remarkably silent on this.<br />
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As a starting point, the names of those appointed to the Education Act review <a href="http://www.education.govt.nz/ministry-of-education/specific-initiatives/taskforce-on-regulations-affecting-school-performance/" target="_blank">Taskforce</a> might bear some scrutiny. The <a href="http://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Ministry/Initiatives/Taskforce-on-Regulations-Affecting-School-Performance/TaskforceReport.pdf" target="_blank">Foreword</a> by the chair intimates the focus when he says "Through our enquiries and consultation the Taskforce has concluded that there is a strong case to review the Act to provide a greater focus on student outcomes and more explicit roles and objectives."<br />
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One key thing that seems to be undefined, is what 'outcomes' mean. For example, all of the internationally highly regarded <a href="https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/series/2515" target="_blank">Best Evidence Synthesis</a> reports begin with their own interpretation of 'outcomes'. A literature review on e-learning also undertook this in order to fulfil its brief on reviewing <a href="http://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/ict/e-learning-and-implications-for-new-zealand-schools-a-literature-review/downloads" target="_blank">e-learning and student outcomes</a>. It discussed outcomes in relation to both students and teachers. So what is the Taskforce's view of the term?<br />
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Other ideas also require some cautious investigation. For example:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Changes suggested include removing "unnecessary red tape" from school boards, possibly having some govern multiple schools. Parata said principals themselves had expressed an interest in leading more than one school, particularly where there might be very small rolls.(<a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/education/73584867/principals-or-boards-could-govern-multiple-schools-under-education-revamp.html" target="_blank">O'Callaghan, 2015</a>)</span></blockquote>
I wonder what constitutes 'unnecessary red tape' if this is about school governance? How representative would school boards be if they govern more than one school? Whose interests are best served? Page 6 of the Taskforce recommendation suggests that Boards' roles might, for example, include:<br />
– ensuring that school leadership has a focus on raising
student achievement<br />
– setting objectives for the school and monitoring results<br />
– monitoring and planning progress in relation
to a school’s charter and annual plans<br />
– reflecting government priorities<br />
– having sound fiscal and property management<br />
– being a good employer<br />
– ensuring school leadership maintains student
and staff safety.<br />
<br />
Some of these are absolutely fine for a Board to undertake. But what about 'setting objectives for the school and monitoring results'? What might that mean, be interpreted as, or result in?<br />
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Another idea I urge caution on is this:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 18px;">Schools that were "doing well" could have more freedom and extra decision-making rights, but having a "graduated response" to underachievement by schools would mean earlier intervention for those not doing well, Parata said (ibid)</span></blockquote>
What does 'doing well' mean? In relation to what? Who sets the terms for 'doing well'? How is 'doing well' measured? What would be put in place to deal with schools defined as having 'underachievement'? And what is this going to be based on? Will the goalposts shift each year or each term of office? Will it allow any Minister of Education to make unilateral decisions about schools and schooling and teaching (as has been a past feature of Parata's stewardship, for example) and expect compliance?<br />
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What might these changes portend for the health of the education system, and those who teach in it? Will it give more power to Boards to expect a business model in its school, possibly undermining or in contradiction to, a pedagogical one? How might this affect how teachers are expected to behave - as professionals with professional expertise, or as technicists, who do what they're told and 'perform'? Will it lead to more rampant privatisation of what is a public good? (regardless of what Treasury might deem it to be). I have a lot of questions and very few answers, but I <i>am</i> worried about the directions it might take, and what elbow room it give to further neo-liberal inroads into education.<br />
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I'd love to hear others' ideas on this.Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-35385949334976341912015-10-15T15:36:00.000+13:002015-10-15T15:36:58.953+13:00Meta-Blog: Blogging in academiaThis week I invited two of our fellow blogging academics from the university of Waikato to join Noeline and I to talk about blogging with interested colleagues over lunch. <br />
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Terry Locke blogs <a href="http://criticalvoice.ac.nz/" target="_blank">here</a><br />
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Alison Campbell blogs <a href="http://sci.waikato.ac.nz/bioblog/" target="_blank">here </a>and also <a href="https://talkingteaching.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">here</a><br />
<br />
Marcus Wilson sent his apologies, but he blogs <a href="http://sci.waikato.ac.nz/physicsstop/" target="_blank">here</a><br />
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And if you are reading this, you have found the blog I co-author with Noeline Wright.<br />
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Colleagues in attendance included Leigh Hynes, who has a series of blogs, including<a href="http://royalhynesight.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/blogging-focus-continued.html?spref=tw" target="_blank"> this one</a><br />
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My reasons for convening this session, as part of our regular elearning brown bag lunch offerings were to talk about why we blog, and for whom, how blogging links to our work as tertiary teachers, researchers and academics, and to share some of the highs and lows of blogging. It is interesting to look at the different approaches to blogging between individuals, and across faculties and disciplines. For those considering starting a blog, this was a chance to consider why they might do so and to plan the first steps. For those who are not considering starting a blog, this is a chance to find out why on earth anyone else would! Participants were invited to come along to share the blogs they read.<br />
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What follows are a few tidbits from our discussion.<br />
<b><span style="color: purple;"><br />Why do we do it!?</span></b><br />
<br />
In terms of purpose, it seems we blog:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: purple;"><b>- to write and think. </b></span>Writing helps with thinking and short blog posts are an opportunity to succinctly express an emergent idea. Getting thoughts into print is an expectation and for many of us, a way of life. Terry blogs to collate his life’s work as pre-retirement project. He is articulating his philosophy, gathering up his poetry and linking other blogs that influence his thinking. I blog to catalogue my thinking across teaching and research, to cultivate a writing routine and fluency. In our blog, we could do a better job of linking to other blogs.<br />
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<b><span style="color: purple;">- to help students.</span></b> Alison’s blog started as a way to help students of scholarship Biology. I find that I can articulate <a href="https://education.waikato.ac.nz/ELTC/threshold-concepts/threshold-concepts-defined/" target="_blank">threshold concepts</a> via blog posts and then share them every time this is relevant to student learning needs. I can address learning needs without repeating myself endlessly. The best example is <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2014/07/is-there-hope-and-depth-beyond-bandwagon.html" target="_blank">learning through ICT</a>.<br />
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<b><span style="color: purple;">- to elicit feedback and interaction, generating partnerships.</span></b> Blogging is another way to network with like-minded people. The biggest frustration for Noeline and I about our blog is that we would like to get more response – feedback and interaction. Contributors talked a bit about how to ‘drive traffic to our blogs’ and it is apparent that the scientists among us have blogs syndicated to the science media site which assists with readership. We all rely on twitter to publicise our blog posts, and Alison uses Facebook too. I still find that most comments about the blog come from students, commenting within Moodle, or from colleagues chatting in the corridor/staffroom. While this is welcome, a few more responses on the blog itself – via the comments function – would be great. Anything other than the spammers really!<br />
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<b><span style="color: purple;">How do we do it?!</span></b><br />
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Some of our colleagues have several blogs on the go, for different purposes, and maintain a range of sites. Most of us carry unfinished blog posts in our head. Alison writes two blogs and has four posts in mind right now. For me, I look for ideas to blog and try to line up a few ahead of time. In much the same way as I organise the eBBL – When I meet someone, read something, attend a workshop or seminar, I ask myself, is there a blog post here?<br />
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I work to a deadline. Each fortnight I need to produce a post and I usually do. The actually writing of the blog post takes an hour or two. I always share draft for feedback from blogging partner but do not feel constrained to act upon the feedback received. I reserve the right to leave the post half baked, as is the nature of the medium.<br />
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In terms of the nitty-gritty, I find it helps if I a) take my laptop to shape up a post on the spot while in the <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/3ps-to-turbo-charge-my-writing-response.html" target="_blank">session</a>;<br />
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And b) sit down and write immediately after an <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/tweeting-up-special-issue.html" target="_blank">event</a>.<br />
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It seems the biggest challenge with blogging is <span style="color: purple;"><b>TIME</b></span>. We overcome this by scheduling, and linking blogging to other work opportunities and obligations.<br />
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<b style="color: purple;">Key tips:</b><br />
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<ul>
<li>Choose the register, pitch, language and length wisely. Who are your audience?</li>
<li>Blog with a writing partner – for peer review, motivation, and to share the load</li>
<li>Link with other work related tasks – your study focus, teaching, students, research, life’s works</li>
<li>Marry with Twitter, Facebook and other blogs to drive traffic</li>
<li> Consider blogging as an assessment task for students. Examples include for science communication, literacy, or in keeping with other learning intentions.</li>
</ul>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-6761304592117585922015-10-06T09:02:00.000+13:002015-10-06T09:03:08.368+13:00Twisted pair? This post is inspired by Steve Wheeler's <a href="http://steve-wheeler.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/twisted-pair-twistedpair.html" target="_blank">#twistedpair challenge</a>.<br />
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Essentially, it's about finding a link/synergy between two seemingly unrelated things. His post about <a href="http://steve-wheeler.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/danger-illustrated.html" target="_blank">teaching critical thinking </a>led me to this post.<br />
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Earlier, I have written about <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/02/pedagogy-can-we-understand-it-in-terms.html" target="_blank">pedagogy and food</a>. Now I want to connect Heston Blumenthal, the chef, and the research process. His <i>In Search of Perfection</i> (<a href="https://vimeo.com/34158026" target="_blank">see this example of the series</a>) programmes are a great way to learn about action research. For example:<br />
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<li>he starts with a question - how do you make the best UK steak and salad meal? </li>
<li>he then asks a number of subsidiary questions to get under its skin.</li>
<li>he does some data collection: he asks what people like in a vox pop and then follows up suggestions</li>
<li>he asks experts in the field for their views, practices and protocols.</li>
<li>he experiments with some of these - in the case of the steak, variations in the ageing process -what is the difference in flavour when cooked? </li>
<li>He then is able to make some decisions about tenderness, flavour, texture, fat and smell and tests them out by experimenting with samples of his own. </li>
<li>This leads to new knowledge and perhaps new practices.</li>
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This whole process is the way deliberate Teaching as Inquiry, a version of action research, can help teachers learn more about themselves, their practices, their wondering, and their learners. As Heston strives to know more by undertaking research into his practices, so teachers can learn from the principles of his method. He learns from things that go wrong (won't do that again) as well as things that are partially helpful or hugely successful. All of the data is potentially useful to add to knowledge. <a href="http://www.ero.govt.nz/National-Reports/Teaching-as-Inquiry-Responding-to-Learners-July-2012/Findings/Teachers-inquiry-into-the-impact-of-their-teaching-on-students" target="_blank">ERO (2012) </a>argue that inquiry is about challenging thinking - it's about examining taken-for-granted practices through an evidence-based process. Heston Blumenthal's cooking investigation process shows how to do it. </div>
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<br />Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-33881383079991352982015-09-23T12:15:00.000+12:002015-09-23T12:15:00.164+12:00The OECD report on digital technologies in educationThe hype around the report is getting quite a bit of media time. Some of it is highly superficial. The <a href="http://www.oecd.org/education/new-approach-needed-to-deliver-on-technologys-potential-in-schools.htm" target="_blank">website </a>providing the summary says this very early on:<br />
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<span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 17.1429px;">“</span><a href="http://www.oecd.org/education/students-computers-and-learning-9789264239555-en.htm" style="background-color: #f9f9f9; border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: #2973bd; cursor: pointer; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 17.1429px;">Students, Computers and Learning: Making The Connection</a><span style="background-color: #f9f9f9; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 17.1429px;">” says that even countries which have invested heavily in information and communication technologies (ICT) for education have seen no noticeable improvement in their performances in PISA results for reading, mathematics or science.</span></blockquote>
I suspect some media have been lazy and taken the comment on face value. Since OECD PISA evaluations focus on reading, mathematics and and science, these are the only areas it can comment on in relation to digital tools.<br />
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Digging a bit more, the report's conclusions are based on:<br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: 19.2px;">results from PISA 2012, the report discusses differences in access to and use of ICT – what are collectively known as the “digital divide” – that are related to students’ socio-economic status, gender, geographic location, and the school a child attends. The report highlights the importance of bolstering students’ ability to navigate through digital texts. It also examines the relationship among computer access in schools, computer use in classrooms, and performance in the PISA assessment. As the report makes clear, all students first need to be equipped with basic literacy and numeracy skills so that they can participate fully in the hyper-connected, digitised societies of the 21st century.</span></blockquote>
On page 3 of the<a href="http://www.keepeek.com/Digital-Asset-Management/oecd/education/students-computers-and-learning_9789264239555-en#page5" target="_blank"> report </a>itself, it describes some interpretations of its findings that appear to have been ingnored in some of superficial hand-wringing I've seen. On New Zealand television for instance, Mike Hoskings on <i>Seven Sharp</i> recently made comments typical of these superficial responses. The OECD's interpretations include the unsurprising but deeply important points such as:<br />
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<ul>
<li>"building deep, conceptual understanding and higher order thinking requires intensive teacher-student interactions and technology sometimes distracts from this valuable human engagement"</li>
<li>"we have not yet become good enough at the kinds of pedagogies that make the most of technology: that adding 21st-century technologies to 20th-century teaching practices will just dilute the effectiveness of teaching"</li>
<li>And on page 4: "great technology cannot replace poor teaching".</li>
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The OECD also urges that this dilemma of a gap between the affordances of the technologies and the skills and pedagogical abilities of teachers to take advantage of this, is urgent. Digital technologies the report urges, is "the only way to dramatically expand access to knowledge" (p. 4).<br />
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I am gratified that <a href="http://karenmelhuishspencer.com/2015/09/19/students-computers-and-learning-5-takeaways-from-that-report/" target="_blank">Karen Melhuish-Spencer's</a> blog post also took this superficiality to task and delved into the report to mention the the kinds of things I've alluded to. She did a great job too, so it's a post worth reading! Another person who also took to the virtual pen to show her distaste for superficial and scare-mongering headlines, is <a href="http://www.teachingandelearning.com/" target="_blank">Claire Amos</a>. Her September 16 post is in agreement with both Karen and me. </div>
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Essentially, we are in the position of knowing for certain that what teachers do and know matters for their learners. Without continual support and TIME to think, read, learn, and try stuff out in robust ways, teachers will be unable to leverage what is on offer and learners will be no better off than playing with shiny toys. This puts me in mind of a <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/08/thinking-about-learning-and-teaching-in.html" target="_blank">post I made earlier </a>about mathematics teaching and learning, inspired by another blogger, Sean McHugh.<a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015_01_01_archive.html" target="_blank"> Dianne, in an early post </a>has also alluded to the idea of 'intellectual character' and its relationship to fostering deep thinking in learners.<br />
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New Zealand has high student to computer access, and this is likely to increase as ultra fast broadband is rolled out to all schools. The tables in the OECD report (see pages 60ff) indicate something of this high access as it was in 2012 when the data were collected. Then, schools will have uncapped internet. However, in my dealings with two large secondary schools in our area, the quality of the IT provider/support is neither reliable nor seemingly very aware of the need for nimble, not restrictive help. My knowledge of this is from numerous discussions with teachers who have to liaise with the providers. </div>
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So the situation is by no means simple: I teach in initial teacher education (ITE) as well as working with teachers in secondary schools to track their ICT use. I therefore have a sense of what graduates bring with them to ITE. Their attitudes about what matters in the digital sphere often do not match their pedagogical understanding or their ability to design learning that uses these technologies to support learning rather than as an end in themselves. Some teachers in schools also struggle with this.</div>
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The tools themselves are not the answer - a dedicated focus on the pedagogical is crucial. And always has been. Let's take the advice from the report and look deeply at what it implies, not what the media superficials who don't do their homework, highlight. </div>
Noelinehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05722399092974621433noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6165281819760275230.post-49523582345577611092015-08-27T15:08:00.002+12:002015-08-27T15:08:19.784+12:00Tweeting Up a Special IssueFresh from a synchronous tweet-up with authors interested in contributing to the upcoming <a href="http://interrogatingeducationz.blogspot.co.nz/2015/06/call-for-papers-e-learning-and-digital.html" target="_blank">Twitter in Education Special Issue of ELDM</a> I’m reflecting on how the issue is shaping up.<br />
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Good chat this morning! Well, it was morning NZ time.
It was evening in the UK for Sue and afternoon in NY for Jeffrey and in Florida for Simon. A pleasure to be joined by authors from three different countries at this stage.
We hoped the tweetchat would be an opportunity to connect in real time and toss a few ideas around, encouraging authors to proceed with their contributions to the journal and addressing any questions the writers may have at this stage. I expect it is also useful for prospective authors to see who else is writing for the special issue and what the topics are likely to be.<br />
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At this stage, authors have offered a wide variety of topics and they touched base within and outside of Twitter. We’ve kept a spreadsheet to track interest. Today’s Tweet-up involved 7 contributors, and suggested that there is active interest in areas such as:
Using twitter for PhD thinking; and Twitter with tertiary students – sharing literacy news and cultivating student-lecturer partnerships in learning. We all got excited about the prospect of revisioning lurking in Twitter as a more constructive practice. 'Lurking' might be frowned on, but it can also be about standing by and observing, akin to learning through listening and positive silent engagement (Sue Beckingham). I'm also intrigued by hashtag agency (Jeffrey Keefer). These indicate an exciting array of topics.<br />
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We are encouraged that the contributors are taking diverse angles, involving different participants in research, examining complex social and psychological phenomena, as well as pedagogies through twitter. In some cases, the authors are well underway with writing, shaping their articles. In others, the article will be a chance to turn conference presentations into peer reviewed outputs in a quality <a href="http://ldm.sagepub.com/" target="_blank">Sage journal</a>.<br />
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For some, the research is in early stages - starting or generating data. There are also authors who are still thinking about how they might contribute.
The good news is we deliberately made the timeline generous for this special issue. We understand and respect the need to take time to craft creative work. That is why the deadline is <b>26 Feb 2016</b>. We do of course welcome early submission and can organise review in a timely manner.<br />
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In the meantime, we would like to nurture and encourage authors, to act as sounding boards for ideas in the formative stages, and to help in any way we can. Our aim is to attract a wide range of high quality submissions, and we are assured that if this special issue becomes too large, there is an opportunity to carry submissions to a further issue.
From this point, we encourage all authors to keep in touch – if you would like to talk – skype, appear.in, email or f2f, please get in touch. We are happy to explore writing possibilities with you.<br />
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Let’s have another tweet up next month. And for those based locally in Hamilton, New Zealand, there is a conferencing opportunity at the 9 September elearning brown bag lunch. Hope to see some of you there!<br />
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Sincere thanks to the participants at today’s tweet-up, a pleasure to virtually meet and chat with you all.<br />
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<a href="https://storify.com/difo38/tweeting-up-a-special-issue" target="_blank">Storify</a><br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03624736837687930553noreply@blogger.com2