Madeleine Cox

Global Education

Posted on May 13, 2012 by coxm

The end of my school’s academic year is barely a month away, and I’m looking in two directions. Firstly, backwards, to the recent past of learning, planning, collaborating, failing and succeeding (probably in equal measures). Secondly, forwards, to the future: the next academic year and beyond. Looking back at the previous sentence I realise it won’t sound as good as Buzz Lightyear’s mighty line but, hey.

So what does the future contain?

Image by fss8info (flickr)

The 2012 Horizon report is yet to be released; however, its recently published communique repeatedly uses the word “global” in its overview. The preview highlights ten areas in which education and learning are being most consistently affected, focusing on “truly international” trends in technology.

The references to “a rise in informal learning” (#9) and the creative solutions to “challenges of access” (#7) particularly capture my attention. If I am to step into my next academic year, and step into the future with my students, I want to connect them with other students around the world. If it is to be a truly “global” collaboration, I believe it to be more beneficial that they connect with as wide a variety of learners as possible.

A long-distance 'thank you'. Image: my own

One of the first steps will be to consider where global collaboration is needed. This year I’ve taken encouragement from students making connections beyond their immediate world. This has been achieved through their blogging, as well as the opportunities for community interaction that our school provides.

Earlier this year a connection was forged from an unexpected need. My Grade 11 class were studying the novel ‘Purple Hibiscus’ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. After several discussions and arguments regarding the correct pronunciation of characters’ names, we decided to find out for ourselves. One student emailed the author, another conducted online research, and I emailed a colleague’s contact at a school in Nigeria. Despite not using email, the teacher painstakingly handwrote each name phonetically. This was scanned by the school principal and sent to us. In return, my class created and signed a ‘thank you’ card representing the purple hibiscus flower. This small exchange changed the way the student interacted with the text: suddenly there was meaning beyond the page, and a need to reach out to another country.

For effective global collaboration, not just connection, I would draw upon Kim Cofino‘s comprehensive Step-by-Step Guide to Global Collaborations. I also intend to make the most of the extraordinary range of international events that my school is hosting next year. Students can learn so much from each other, just as there is so much I can learn from colleagues around the globe.

Further reading (viewing!): watch an excellent conversation with Alan November: The Myths and Opportunities for Technology in the Classroom (New Learning Institute on Vimeo). His points about the student as a contributor to the community resonate with me.

Posted in Course 4 | Tagged collaboration, connections, global | 1 Comment

Action-Packed Learning

Posted on May 6, 2012 by coxm

Fun filming. Image: my own

During last year’s Grade 6 study I kept hearing the same question:

“Are we watching the movie today?”

This year it’s been:

“Do we play with the cameras today?”

Before the students began developing their movie analysis, they had time to explore the different uses of a camera and the roles of director, actor and editor. Having made up their own rules (mainly along the lines of “No fooling around” and “Respect other groups”) they worked productively together and enjoyed the freedom of exploring a different space to the classroom.

The word “play” in the students’ question was an apt interpretation of a lesson which offered them time to do just that - experiment, explore and learn in a way that might otherwise traditionally be consigned to the ‘one-way delivery’ of lectures, video demonstration or textbook.

Last year Steve Denning interviewed authors Douglas Thomas and John Seely Brown, posing a series of questions which both promoted and challenged their educational theories. In response to a ‘traditionalist’ argument, they stated that “If you watch a small child explore the world, they don’t need to be told to study, explore, experiment or learn; they do it naturally.” It is with this in mind that I believe that Middle and High School students need as much ‘play’ time as “a small child”.

After the Grade 6 students finished their ‘movie-making’ and uploaded their footage, they reflected on the process that they had gone through. Each student wrote a blog post, some helpfully linking to his or her partner’s blog. They embedded screenshots of key angles and other types of shots in their posts and shared their thoughts. Students went from trying out different angles to joining another group to film with multiple cameras and even jumping over the camera for the ultimate action shot! These extracts speak for themselves (click on each image to visit the full post):

It is only near the end of this academic year that I really feel I’m starting to use the students’ blog posts in my classes. With more time to ‘play’ in class, the blog posts can exercise the important skills of reflection, presentation, inquiry and further investigation, responding to the natural curiosity that the lesson hopefully has drawn upon.

For an excellent example of developing learning beyond the classroom, read Jeff Utecht‘s Reverse Instruction in SL IB English. I have drawn inspiration from his model and hope to pursue it with my IBDP Language and Literature classes next year.

Posted in Course 4 | Tagged film, play | 6 Comments

The Directors

Posted on April 29, 2012 by coxm

Think back to what you remember learning at school or university. What forms the most powerful memories? Was it a particular lesson, or a particular project?

Irrepressible G6 students. Image: my own

Project-based learning

The focus of project-based learning is primarily on the students’ abilities to drive their own learning, rather than be solely teacher-led. The Buck Institute of Education is recognised as bringing the practice to prominence and its website both defines and promotes the pedagogy.

I am fortunate to teach at a school with enthusiastic students and staff, engaged parents and a supportive administration. There is much to support project-based learning in my classroom: relatively small classes, high level access to technology and 1:1 laptops, and a curriculum emphasis upon interdisciplinary approaches.

However, there lie many challenges ahead. Working at an international school in a built-up urban area (and it doesn’t get much more built-up than Japan’s Kanto Plains) means space can be extremely tight. I have watched the extraordinary model for project-based learning, High Tech High in San Diego, with both admiration and, well quite frankly – longing – for its tremendous amount of space.

I also worry about the time needed for effective collaborative planning, in addition to the acceptance of this approach by colleagues. Not only this, but how do you implement project-based learning in 35 or 40 minute single lesson blocks?

The final obstacle I should consider is myself. I love teaching, yet the danger of this is also being too in love with the sound of my own voice. The tendency or urge to lead every activity and every conversation is probably familiar to many teachers. With a greater emphasis on project-based learning, I could not only reduce my own interference but also enable students to pose their own questions, investigate as a matter of habit, and to also reverse the roles and teach me, another learner in the classroom.

Project-based learning in Middle School English

Open Clip Art

Earlier in the year I wrote about a Grade 6 film study, thinking ahead to ways of adapting the unit. The students get started this week and hopefully they will benefit from some of the changes I’ve put in place. We’ll be trying out different camera shots and techniques before studying them onscreen. Several keen directors in the making have already bounced up to me in class, excitedly flourishing examples of their filming and the effects they’ve added.

Weather permitting, we should be able to go outside and explore the environment, in addition to setting up our own – as each student becomes, albeit briefly, a movie-maker. If I can just get my hands on a megaphone or two that would be splendid.

Challenge-based learning

It’s interesting to read the Wikipedia definition of this term. A key aim is stated as being to “increase student engagement, especially for students most at risk of dropping out”. This, as with much web-based pedagogy, focuses more on a national education (usually U.S.) than international. Every school has disengaged or disaffected students, but I would not describe the majority of those I teach in this way.

The Apple-initiated pedagogy inevitably promotes the use of technology yet does so persuasively. There is also a much needed emphasis on reality and our increased ability to connect with different people and nations. The buzzword of “real world” – issues, connections, experiences, experts, – is directly linked to meaningful and relevant learning. The dull cliche of “with power comes responsibility” suddenly shines when applied in this new way, to the students.

I view challenge-based learning as being well suited to Humanities, particularly when looking at the examples offered in the New Media Consortium (pg. 11). However, I also see it as being a potential way of strengthening links between my subject and others at school. A future High School Language and Literature class could work alongside Theory of Knowledge in a language ‘investigation’. The project could be to plan and prepare for a legal trial, with the objective of ‘cross-examining’ language used by a particular reporter, politician, or other influential person. Perhaps I should see if we can arrange a video conference with a lawyer or two…

Redesign, Redefine

Posted on April 19, 2012 by coxm

One of several similar images if you type 'exam' into flickr CC images... Exam exhaustion by Felix Neumann (flickr)

Exam season: not usually a prime time for shaking up the curriculum. But this year I have a rare opportunity: lesson time with students not taking the full range of papers. With a more flexible curriculum, I can use the time to work with the students in redesigning approaches to their learning. We can reflect on the uses of their school blogs this year (which I feel I’ve not encouraged enough) and consider ways in which they can develop their blogging skills to enrich their learning for next year. Most importantly, once the rest of the class returns from study leave our small group can act as guides and teachers for their peers.

If I’m to truly think about what technology integration looks like in a school, I have to start with what I know – my own classroom. Students must also play a major role in this reassessment, redesigning and, to echo Maggie Hos-McGrane‘s emphasis, redefinition of the curriculum. This is already happening on a grand scale at my school, which reevaluates its curriculum both independently, by pioneering its own integrated model, and collaboratively, through its ongoing conversations with other schools and educators.

The more I read about tech integration, the more I reevaluate my own teaching and learning. I’ve started to explore ways to change the learning opportunities for the students. This might be as simple as taking photographs of the whiteboard to share with students, or using Google Docs to collaboratively annotate a speech:

Grade 12 'Medea' collaborative annotation

The above example is a way of transforming a learning experience. Previously students would have annotated their speech copies individually and then discussed their responses. Changing to using a Google Doc enables them to annotate, discuss, link and enhance their literary analysis by sharing their knowledge – all in real time. If we publish it to the web and open it to other learners and educators, even greater possibilities are created.

Both the SAMR and TPACK models are a way of reflecting on, then perhaps redesigning and redefining our school curriculum. Jenny Luca’s comprehensive wiki offers definitions, examples and a range of resources to approach technology integration in education.

When I examine my teaching, these models are a way of clarifying not only whether my approach is making best use of the technology, but also justifies its integration. I believe we should encourage our students to be asking the same questions of the curriculum and the lessons we offer them. Perhaps in a future springtime we’ll have less of the exam fatigue, more of the redesign.

Posted in Course 4 | Tagged collaboration, curriculum, design | 1 Comment

Every Teacher is a Technology Teacher

Posted on April 14, 2012 by coxm

“Every teacher is a language teacher” is a commonly heard school philosophy. Do we also believe that “Every teacher is a technology teacher”? This seems especially important when considered in relation to the High School, where the demands of an externally examined curriculum can lead subjects to view technology more as a functional tool than one for creation and collaboration.

David Warlick‘s thoughtful blog post, What Difference might one “S” make? notes the limitations of treating technology purely in this manner.*

Yet internal school curriculum isn’t rigid – we can make international technology standards part of learning and philosophy. The National Educational Standards (NETS) from the International Society for Technology in Education are key to this.

Source of Inspiration

Whilst enjoying the process of incorporating technology into Grade 6 English classes this year, I’ve struggled to apply it to my High School teaching. Some of the challenges were probably more insurmountable in my own thinking than in reality: I just needed a bit of a ‘push’. Much of the inspiration has come from colleagues and workshop leaders in COETAIL.

At one session I was part of a group that created a connected digital story searching Creative Commons images and using Google Presentation. It was only through having time to play and create with the technology, learning new skills in the process, that I truly thought about its practical application for my students. And the first class I thought of was a High School group: Grade 10.

Case Study: Grade 10 English

The class had been studying Shakespeare’s play, Julius Caesar and focusing particularly on the rich imagery of the first three acts. We were exploring the impact of Mark Antony’s speeches in Act 3 when I realised that this was a good opportunity to incorporate a new approach to the text. I set the students the task of finding images relating to one of Mark Antony’s speeches in Act 3, scene 1. The example I created focused on the brutal visions of his ominous prophecies, as he vows vengeance on the assassins of Caesar.

The goal was for students to show creativity and interpretative skill and to learn new digital skills and apply them. Some students’ interpretative ability was shown more through speaking in class, and others in their blog reflection. It was important to offer different approaches for the diverse learning styles of a class that contains a range of creative students, both extrovert and introvert.

The presentations in class also helped the students prepare for an assessed oral which took place a few weeks later. Their blog reflections helped me understand both the frustrations and the benefits of the task, as well as offering useful suggestions for ways to improve their learning.

Conclusion

Whose job is it to teach the NETS to students? As teachers of technology and not just distinct subjects, it’s every teacher’s job.

If every subject adds the NETS to their own curriculum ‘maps’, every rubric we use incorporates the relevant standard(s) and they are used in the language of instruction and the reflections the students make, we ensure they are being met in an integrated model. They become a familiar, integrated part of the school’s established curriculum, rather than a novel formality or ‘add on’. If external curriculum bodies, such as the IBO also reflect the importance of digital age learning in their philosophy, this would further aid integration in international schools.

Together, with a little help from our friends, we can wisely embed technology in our teaching.

*There are also some excellent points posted by Ryan at #7 in the comment thread regarding the misleading concept that all students are “digital natives”. Obviously this can be as much a generalisation as assuming that all teachers are limited in their use of technology in the classroom. He notes the importance of teaching basic skills in areas where students are unfamiliar. I noticed this in regards to the uncertainty my Grade 10 students showed when initially conducting an advanced search.

**Several students met this without needing much encouragement! Three diverse examples: Nicholas (original work), Maria (close analysis and interpretative skill) and Alisa (strong sense of reflection on the entire process).

Posted in Course 4 | Tagged copyright, Image, NETs, Shakespeare | 6 Comments

The Course Ends, The Project Starts…

Posted on March 14, 2012 by coxm

297/365: ghost story by malik ml williams (flickr)

…and my Grade 10 students are soon to become digital storytellers!

After generating an idea for their project in Poetic Digital Tales, I’ve been working on the concepts behind the three week unit. I already had the goal and ultimate aim in mind – it was just a case of working backwards (see unit plan below).

In brief, I’ve loved this course. It has:

Given me time to create and collaborate with a variety of people.

Offered me a chance to benefit from the expertise of my colleagues.

Finally, it has given me greater confidence to bring visual media into my lessons.

Posted in Course 3 | Tagged reflection, storytelling | 2 Comments

The Remix

Posted on March 10, 2012 by coxm

Breakdancing on Trocadero by Stu Willis (flickr)

When I was younger, I saw breakdancing for the first time on T.V. I remember moments later enthusiastically spinning on the floor and crashing into furniture.

Some things are just irresistible.

I took the moves I (thought) I could do but my amateur copying was definitely not a mirror: I made it into something new. The music just kept changing, too – as the dancers mixed their styles, the DJs mixed their samples.

That fearlessness – to try something new and creative, to put together and mix up sounds and styles – has taken on a new form since the mid- 2000s.

Remix vs. Mashup

Instead of the usual reading, pondering and procrastinating, I thought back to my impromptu breakdancing. It suddenly made sense to just go ahead – experiment and make my own remix before doing any reading. I took an old Betty Boop episode, The Scared Crows from the Internet Archive and edited its footage with a track from Funky Remixes. Both the film and the music are free to use and remix. This is the result:

After finishing what I thought was a rough ‘mashup’ I settled down to read an Educause review by Brian Lamb. This made a strong case for clearly distinguishing between mashup and remix – and helped me work out which I’d produced. Lamb defines mashups as involving “the reuse, or remixing, of works of art, of content, and/or of data for purposes that usually were not intended or even imagined by the original creators.” I appreciated the clarification. I’d interpreted a mashup rather narrowly, associating it primarily with moving image and music. It wasn’t, for example, a term I’d have given my Grade 11 project: The Great Gatsby locations on Google Maps.

Lamb also offers a helpful definition for a remix: “…the reworking or adaptation of an existing work. The remix may be subtle, or it may completely redefine how the work comes across. It may add elements from other works, but generally efforts are focused on creating an alternate version of the original.”

Image by welcometoalville (flickr)

So why remix? – And why bring it into the classroom?

As Wired brilliantly points out in 7 Essential Skills You Didn’t Learn in College, “Knowing how to read a novel, craft an essay, and derive the slope of a tangent isn’t enough anymore.”

The remixing of different works has been with us for a very long time (Shakespeare’s source use is a prime example). Every work we’ve traditionally responded to in school is connected to another work. If I teach a novel, it’s rare to do so in isolation. Digital remixing should be included on the curriculum and strong examples used as texts to study. In addition, if we are to support students’ creativity, we need to offer them the chance to express this in a wider variety of ways. Any one of the videos below could be a class ‘text’:

Introduction to the concepts: Everything’s a Remix (Parts 1-4)
Copyright & fair use: A Fair(y) Use Tale*
Entertainment: “Poker Face” – Julius Caesar
Social commentary: Breakdown or Story Without End
*Found via Fair Use: Remix Culture, Mashups, and Copyright – lesson plan
Paying tribute (I had to get breakdancing in there somehow): Theme from Shaft

Still: Theme from Shaft

Posted in Course 3 | Tagged copyright, language, remix, visual literacy | 8 Comments

Infographics: Defining, Using, Analysing

Posted on March 4, 2012 by coxm

Satirical definition

Boring definition

Infographic = information graphic

Information = facts / factual / data

Graphic = visual representation

Visual definition: An Infographic of Infographics

When I first heard the term ‘infographic’ I thought along these kinds of lines:

Mathematics: abstract concepts
History: chronology
Science: processes, anatomy

This is a rather limited interpretation, especially when contemplating the range of uses an infographic might have. For example, an infographic could be used in Art class to question its status as an art form. Imagine presenting this to your students, stripped of its context:

How about infographic use in English? My instinctive response was to think of studying the use and impact of infographics as a medium. IBDP students undertaking Theory of Knowledge would apply this critical approach within any subject. As for the new IBDP Language and Literature course, it’s a perfect fit.

What if the ‘information’ in an infographic appears to contain no quantifiable facts? What if the graphics I use are supplementary, rather than integral, to the ‘information’ being shared? Do we expect all infographics to contain their sources of research and information? With these questions in mind, here’s an infographic I’d use with my Language and Literature students:

When presented with a text, students should consider the reader, context, audience, and purpose. I’d ask the students to establish the context first, before more closely analysing all aspects of this infographic. The possibilities for what is defined as a ‘text’ on this course are wide ranging. After teaching it since the start of the academic year, I’ve noticed how few students research or explore the source of an online text. They are often busy questioning the language and images used, without considering the full context. An infographic requires just as much critical thought as other texts, in appraising not only its creator, but also the sources it uses.

*The Motion Graphics video, Bring Your Story to Life, defines some of the uses of infographics in video form, while Visual Literacy have created a Periodic Table of Visualization Methods.

Posted in Course 3 | Tagged criticalthinking, design, infographic | 4 Comments

Poetic Digital Tales

Posted on February 27, 2012 by coxm

In early summer, my Grade 10 class return to lessons after the excitement of a few weeks’ external examinations. Due to a change in the school’s calendar this year, the students have a little more time than in the past. I’ve been animated about the multitude of possibilities for using technology in education for the past year and so naturally the Grade 10 ‘extra time’ came to mind when considering one of them: digital storytelling.

When digital storytelling, what’s a good way to start simply?

Photo by Jurvetson (flickr)

Choosing a simple form and offering a restricted task and time limit may encourage students new to the tools to focus more on the quality of their narrative. After many bleary-eyed hours fiddling around online, submerged so deep in the cyber sea that bubbles began escaping from my surprised mouth (there’s much on a glowing screen to gape at), I found this to be a helpful approach.

I initially explored the wiki of Alan Levine, which offers a hefty array of tools and resources to get started with your digital storytelling. Whilst I’m in great admiration for the amount of passion and work which has gone into the wiki, I felt a little like I’d entered a restaurant to get a salad and instead found myself at the ‘all you can eat’ table. Nonetheless, his 50 tools for storytelling led me to a superb story on SlideShare:

Intothestorm

If the suggestion is ‘write what you know’ to begin with, I opted to take a parallel course of ‘use what you know’ when selecting a tool for digital storytelling. I’ve used slide presentation in the past, but never for particularly creative purposes. Having recently read A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan, I recalled an entire chapter composed using PowerPoint slides… and lo and behold, the chapter’s on SlideShare. Despite the nightmarish vision of pie chart and earnest narrative becoming acquainted, fear not – it’s one of the most captivating parts of the book.

With Grade 10 in mind, I realise that the time will be extremely short, and may preclude filming and editing, as well as the time needed to develop a meaningful story. It was upon looking again at Levine’s wiki, in which he suggests a Five Card Flickr approach to a story that I realised that a restricted form can be as creative as an open-ended one. Why else do we have fifty (and sometime six) word stories? (There’s a six word story Flickr group, too).

As Grade 10 will continue building their electronic portfolios and developing their own ways of expressing themselves for life beyond school, it makes sense to give them the opportunity to tell their own story. I want them to be able to produce a simple slide show which uses their own images and words to tell one story (of many) about a particular passion. It might be anything, from their specialism in a particular sport, to a love of magical tricks, or their involvement in community service.

I’d also like them to choose whether they script this as a narrative poem, or a story. Personally, I’m happier dabbling with amateur approaches to poetry. Here’s one that recounts a time and place I remain passionate about. All the photographs and words are my own. This poem partly narrates my arrival by boat at Gombe Stream in Tanzania, thrown to its shores by a storm which swept across Lake Tanganika. My five frame poem is inspired by Intothestorm:

Five frame storm

Posted in Course 3 | Tagged creativity, poetry, slideshare, storytelling | 3 Comments

Rethinking Time and Space

Posted on February 24, 2012 by coxm

Last year I made a PowerPoint presentation in response to Kurt Vonnegut’s novel, ‘Slaughterhouse Five’. This was to introduce Grade 11 students to the concept of forming a key focus in response to a summer reading book.

I recently revisited the above presentation, which was saved on SlideShare and embedded in my school blog. Upon viewing it again I wryly reflected on the discrepancy between content and form: here I was, focusing on an author’s unconventional use of style and structure, without much thought to my own. Why take a linear approach to a novel which uses the very opposite structure?

So, after viewing the tutorials, signing up and having an evening of experimentation, here’s the change – from PowerPoint to Prezi:

I have yet to share the presentation with my students, so it will be interesting to see their reactions. My own analysis is that by reshaping the presentation, my choice of tool affected its content. By reconsidering the way in which I would present, I naturally sought to simplify, and thus changed its focus to be solely on Vonnegut’s unconventional structure. This then led to one of the most discussed parts of the novel, where he writes of a war movie that the protagonist sees in reverse. Appropriate to the filmic focus, Vonnegut creates a series of vivid images, all moving backwards. It therefore seemed apt to incorporate moving image corresponding to this. The flexibility of Prezi’s form allowed for much experimentation and creation; I uploaded self-created images and also used its search tool to add an image of stars and space.

So, perhaps not rethinking the design of my presentation within the framework of PowerPoint* but instead a rethinking of content and style in the unknown territory of Prezi. After laughing helplessly through Don McMillan’s Life After Death By PowerPoint, I hope he would approve.

*For reflective points on this topic, check out Garr Reynolds’ blog post, What is Good PowerPoint design?

Posted in Course 3 | Tagged creativity, design, prezi, slideshare | 7 Comments