communICTy

JISC initiated a study involving a combination of examination of data from longitudinal studies and new research to see whether the “Google Generation” (post-1993) approached research tasks in a significantly different way to people from previous cohorts.

They define six types of behaviour:

• Horizontal information seeking. A form of skimming. “Around 60 per cent of e-journal users view no more than three pages and a majority (up to 65 per cent) never return.”
• Navigation. People in virtual libraries “spend as much time finding their bearings as actually viewing what they find.”
• Viewers. Users spend typically four to eight minutes looking at e-books and e-journals. “New forms of ‘reading’ are emerging as users ‘power browse’ horizontally through titles.”
• Squirreling behaviour. Research shows academic users “will squirrel away content in the form of downloads [but] there is no evidence as to the extent to which these downloads are actually read.”
• Diverse information seekers. One size does not fit all, in terms of attributes such as gender or status.
• Checking information seekers. “Users assess authority and trust for themselves in a matter of seconds by dipping and cross-checking”.

The report suggests “There is little direct evidence that young people’s information literacy is any better or worse than before.” However, it finds important themes:

• The apparent facility of young people with computers “disguises some worrying problems.”
• “The speed of young people’s web searching means that little time is spent in evaluating information…”
• “Young people have a poor understanding of their information needs and thus find it difficult to develop effective search strategies.”
• They tend to use “natural language rather than analysing which key words might be more effective”.
• Faced with a long list of results, they find it difficult to assess relevance and “print off pages with no more than a perfunctory glance at them”.

Although they begin to focus on the use of “virtual libraries”, many of the insights have wider implications, such as:

“Children (especially) tend to make very narrow relevance judgements by considering the presence or absence of words exactly describing the search topic: as a result they miss many relevant documents and end up repeating searches. Information seeking tends to stop at the point at which articles are found and printed, especially for younger users, with little regard to the document content.”

They also examine some of the suppositions about the Google Generation (p18-20), finding many are myths. For example, “They prefer quick information in the form of easily digested chunks, rather than full text” is just as true of older people. The researchers brand the idea that “they are expert searchers” a “dangerous myth”.

The report goes as far as to question the whole notion of a Google Generation:

“A 2007 survey by Synovate finds that only 27% of UK teenagers could really be described as having the kind of deep interest and facility in IT that the label implies. The majority (’average Joes’, 57%) use relatively low level technology to support their basic communication or entertainment needs and there is a substantial residuum of 20% (’digital dissidents’) who actively dislike technology and avoid using it wherever possible.”

To summarise, “Our overall conclusion is that much writing on the topic of this report overestimates the impact of ICTs on the young and underestimates its effect on older generations. A much greater sense of balance is needed.”

See www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/programmes/reppres/gg_final_keynote_11012008.pdf

From Naace Newsletter 8/2/8

For my Lead Practitioner Seminar I wanted to demonstrate how the internet is changing and consequently the ways that we communicate with each other. In order to ‘walk the talk’ I challenged myself to give a 45 minute presentation without a single powerpoint slide! Instead I explained my ideas by using a wide variety of different web2.0 tools.

The main idea I was trying to explain was that the way we accessed information when we were teenagers was very different to today. If you asked a class of students in the 1980’s who was at number 1, nearly everyone could tell you. If you ask the same question today, only a minority of children will be able to give you the answer. Instead of using push media such as TV and Radio for entertainment, they use the internet as a pull medium. In this way they reach out to things that interest them and personalise their learning.

I showed how the following tools can be used to pull information into the classroom:
Survey Monkey – for creating online surveys and generating real data
bubbl.us - for creating mindmaps and sharing ideas
Edublogs – for enabling students to share moderated comments
VoiceThread – for sharing images and discussing what they show
FlashMeeting – for basic video conferencing

The delegates to the conference responded really well to this more dynamic way to learn. Are you ready for the challenge to give PowerPoint the push? Visit www.ictnet.ning.com .

‘Raise the bar, narrow the gap’. This buzz phrase during the 4th iNet International Conference in Beijing had particular resonance in the city preparing itself for the next Olympics. For me, the main focus of the conference was sharing new ways to help all our students achieve their personal best.

Wherever the speakers came from in the world, the message was the same. If we want our school to perform better the main priority is not concentrating on what we teach, but who we are teaching it to. James O’Neil, Principal of Carmel RC Technology College summed this up really well. He explained that analysing student data is often like seeing the terracotta army. It is only when you view each soldier individually that you realise that every one is unique. At his school they have a consistent tracking system to build up a more detailed picture of each student’s progress in every subject. Students also have focussed conversations with their learning mentor to make better sense of their data and set targets for future progress.

One of the most important Olympic ideals is the need for team work to succeed. The students of Greenford High School are a shining example of this. Like all schools they have a Senior Leadership Team, but they also have a Junior Leadership Team comprising of students. Each member of the SLT has a JLT buddy and they have a wide variety of responsibilities including observing lessons and interviewing job applicants. New initiatives such as moving to a three year KS4 are also discussed with the JLT. In this way the student population not only have a voice, but are able to have an impact on the the whole school community to work together as a team.

At the opening ceremony of the Olympic games the athletes will march in as separate nations, each with their own flag. The closing ceremony brings all the participants together to unite under one flag. The iNet Conference promoted a similar message. Schools should not innovate in isolation. They need to reach out and become global enterprises. If schools are to become a model of how the world should be, it is vital that enable teachers and students to share ideas with their peers in other countries. It was therefore very encouraging to see the enthusiasm of delegates to seize the potential of the internet and websites such as www.elanguages.org to bring this about.

The motto of the Beijing Olympics is ‘One World, One Dream’. The iNet conference showed how different education systems and individual schools can come together to improve learning for all. It is now up to the returning delegates to make the dream a reality.

My presentation at the conference:
iNet07 – A powerpoint presentation that I gave
iNet07_handout – A handout of quotes and website links to go with the presentation

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I’m always on the look out for ways to bring more relevant themes into ICT. I’m also keen to bridge the gap between the ways students use computers in school and at home.

A project that my school is doing on SEAL (social, emotional aspects of learning) provided the ideal opportunity to update our first unit in Year 7. They used to create presentations about their family and hobbies, but this was rather dull and the content of what the students produced did not teach them anything new. Instead we used an emotions tree diagram with people showing a variety of different emotions and asked the students to create presentations showing which five characters best summed up their own personality.

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I needed to find a way to enable my pupils to share their ideas and use the best language to describe their emotions. The solution came in the form of edublogs.org. This free, educational blog site allowed me to quickly put up an idea on the web and then invite my students to contribute comments (see examples). This is a safe and easy way to use web2.0 as there is no need to generate accounts and the comments are moderated by the teacher before they go live on the Internet.

To add a global dimension to our research, I created a project page on elanguages.org. This DfES funded website enables teachers around the world to link up and collaborate ideas and resources. I soon had a response from Apeejay School in New Delhi. You can imagine the cries of excitement when my students were reading their comments and found phrases written by Nikita, Dhruv, Eashan and their classmates in India! They were also surprised to find out how similar they felt about school life in both countries.

Here are some examples of what the students wrote to describe the person who is scared to climb higher up the tree:
I feel like this person when I am in a class that I am not so good at, so I must cling on to hope that I will still get a good result! Krissi, UK
I feel like this image when I am feeling low, because then I feel helpless and alone in this world. Kavisha, India

Here are some examples of what the students wrote to describe the person at the top of the tree:
I feel like this person when I do well at lessons and get it right because I have tried really hard. Zak, UK
I feel like this person when I’ve overcome all the obstacles in my work and I feel on the top of the world. Ujval, India

There has been a marked difference in the engagement of my students in creating presentations about their emotions towards school life rather than their families and hobbies. I have also been surprised at how personalised their phrases are. I have realised that SEAL is an interesting theme to explore with my students. It also teaches them valuable lessons about positive attitudes towards learning and the need to understand themselves better.

Often in ICT, we concentrate more on how to create a product rather than the message that it is trying to communicate. However, I am convinced that allowing students appropriate time to generate quality content on a theme that is relevant to their own lives leads them into producing a better end product and consequently better progress.

Click here to view the lesson plans.

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Whilst in London for a SSAT conference with Joe Dale in June, we met Leon Cych at our hotel. He heard that we were in town and asked us to do an interview for his blog, Learn for Life. We managed to smuggle Leon’s camera lights and video equipment into Joe’s room (despite a lot of giggling and what must have looked like quite a dodgy sight!).

We chatted about how we use web2.0 in education. Including:

Spellmaster
Hot Potatoes
TaskMagic
Making PowerPoint interactive
PieCast
VerbCast
Ewan McIntosh
The Language Show
TES ICT Blog
Linguanet forum
MFLresources
Flashmeeting
Notre Dame High School blog
MFL blogs
Scotedublogs
Interviews
Skype
Pretty May
Flickr
YouTube
Keepvid
YouTube goes international
Moderating comments
Nodehill Bloggers
Breaking down the classroom walls with technology
How local blogs can create communities
Blidgets
Ning
Google Reader
Feedwhip
eTwinning Ambassadors

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This September, Alex Savage (ICT LPC) attended the 4^th iNet International Conference in Beijing. He gave a seminar on how to bring the real world into the curriculum using ICT. The conference also included presentations on themes such as personalised learning, globalisation and student voice.
The main message of the conference was that successful schools in the future will be those who reach out to other schools to share expertise and collaborate to develop a better curriculum.
Alex also learnt that scorpions on a stick are not as tasty as they sound!

In the news
The role of assessment in the National Curriculum has been the hot topic in the educational press recently.
In December, IPPR produced a report stating that regular teacher assessments of pupils’ work should replace the testing of pupils aged 11 and 14 (bbc article).
This month the Gilbert Review said that England’s school tests and exam league tables should be changed radically as part of a drive to put more focus on individual pupils’ progress. (bbc article)
Then it was announced at the BETT show that the KS3 ICT online test was no longer to be statutory (bbc article).
So what role will assessment play in the future of our education system?

Can we assess it? Yes we can!
It seems that we are moving away from high stakes summative assessment of learning to ongoing assessment for learning. We need a system which conforms more to the needs of the learner, rather than the learner to the system. Did you know that Bob the Builder is based on effective uses of assessment for learning? If not download Bob’s guide to A4L.

Practical examples of A4L in KS3 ICT
I’m sure that most teachers, students and parents would agree that personalising the curriculum is a good idea in principle. However, how can we enable learners to play a more active role in how they are assessed?
A basic, but fundamental idea is to ensure that students have a clear understanding of lesson aims and objectives. We show students a welcome presentation at the start of the lesson to explain what it will be about. If an activity is to be assessed we also show the marking criteria (slide 3) and how it relates to NC levels.
It is also very important to give students clear instructions on what work they will need to produce to show evidence of a specific level such as in this excel activity.
When students have completed the first draft of a product, they can receive not only teacher, but peer and self evaluation. However, peer and self assessment only works with clear guidance such as this checksheet.
In order to give our students an overall picture of their progress we have created an assessment grid that either they or the teacher can fill in at the end of each unit. We also use a level table with targets specific to the unit, so that students can see why they achieved a certain level and what to do to improve.

E-assessment, vision or reality?
According to a recent futurelab report ‘The issue for e-assessment is not if it will happen, but rather, what, when and how it will happen.’ The Government’s goal of producing an online KS3 ICT test that marks itself was a very ambitious goal. The application that has been produced to do the job is very sophisticated and cost over £20 million to develop. However, can a computer identify a learner’s creativity and whether what they have produced has a clear sense of audience and purpose?
This short presentation explores why we need e-assessment and what forms it could take.

Examples of basic e-assessment
E-assessment tools such as Hot Potatoes and Blockbusters can be used to quickly create a variety of self marking activities. These are very useful to either refresh learners’ knowledge or to identify areas that require more work.
Yacapaca has some very good baseline tests specifically written for KS3 ICT. The students can choose which level they wish to attempt and give themselves a target of how many to get right. It also has an eportfolio feature in which students can submit work to their teacher to be marked. See flash demo
Joint Assessment Systems also enables students to submit work to be marked. It also enables students to assess their own work by unit specific criteria and then the teacher can use the same criteria for their feedback. From this a complex picture can be produced of each individual learner’s strengths and areas for improvement. See flash demo.

Additional Resources
Assessment for learning: Beyond the black box, QCA
Interview with Prof. Paul Black on A4L, GTC
Futures, Meeting the Challenge, QCA
KS3 ICT SoW, Notre Dame
Biography of Bob the Builder, Wikipedia
Bob the Builder images to print out and colour in, BBC

How much does it cost to feed a penguin?
Creating a budget for a zoo is how many schools teach students to create and use a spreadsheet. It is an easy way to demonstrate how formulae can be used to calculate totals and work out how to make a profit. However, why study a place that does not exist and data that is probably made up?

According to 2020 Vision Gilbert Review and research produced by EPPI Centre ‘pupils are more likely to be engaged with the curriculum they are offered if they believe it is relevant and if they are given opportunities to take ownership of their learning.’ To make the vision a reality, teachers need to shift their focus from what they teach, to learning more about who they teach it to.

Achieving the vision with ICT
In fact, many students are already personalising their learning. ‘By the age of 21 the average person will have spent 15,000 hours in formal education, 20,000 hours in front of the TV and 50,000 hours in front of a computer screen’ (Futures of learning Seminars, Future Learning Practice; seminar report June 2005). Young people are using technology informally to learn about real issues that interest them. The challenge for schools is whether they can catch up with their students!

Using real data
Instead of creating a model for an imaginary zoo, our students research all the ways they use water during an average day and calculate how much they actually use (see water unit). We then tell them that the water budget for a child at our link school in Malawi is only 20 litres. They then interrogate the model to find out ways to reduce their water budget. This really engages the students, as they are keen to find out how much water they use and the importance of using less.

We used to teach correlations by showing how to make scatter charts plotting height against shoe size of 100 children that did not actually exist. Trying to make sense of the data also led to rather embarressing questions such as what else can relate to your shoe size?! Instead, our students now use web sites such as the World Factbook to access a wide range of up to date national statistics. They explore the data independently to look for possible correlations such as life expectancy and GDP, or literacy rates and GDP etc. (see national statistics worksheet).

A good way of generating real data is by using an online survey tool such as SurveyMonkey or SurveyAtSchool. Our students create their own surveys on energy use at home. They analyse the data, then suggest ways to use less energy. They also create a survey to compare the lives of young people in the UK and USA. This year we had 1298 children in both countries complete the survey (see blog post).

Our KS3 students learn about confusion marketing in mobile phone contracts (see modelling unit). They are able to create models and use online databases to work out the best deal for the number of minutes they use. At KS4 we go on to teach students about personal finance using software called Adding Up To A Lifetime. Activities such as how to understand interest rates and compare bank accounts have also proved useful, not only for students but their teachers too!

Making the 2020 Vision a reality
It is clear that technology has a significant role to play to inspire and motivate our learners. WWW stands for World Wide Web, however, many schools have yet to realise its true potential for bringing the real world into the classroom.

Our Y7 students created leaflets in ICT about the right to education and learning to learn using our 7.3 online unit.

Before finishing the project they gave each other feedback in order to refine their work using a differentiated worksheet.

We sorted the class into low, middle and high achievers and then created a seated plan to alternate them. This ensured that everyone had their work evaluated in detail by a high achiever (roughly half the class). The middle and low achievers gave more focussed feedback on areas they could judge more easily.

The most valuable part of the exercise was enabling the students to look at a variety of other children’s designs. Trying to explain good design is very difficult, but showing examples seems to get the point across much more effectively.

At the end of the unit we did an online student voice survey on the project. 82% of the students agreed that the peer feedback had helped them to improve their leaflet.

Here are some examples of their finished leaflets: learn1 | learn2 | learn3 | learn4 | learn5 | learn6

Click on image to view a pdf of the leaflet

It is clear that technology has a significant role to play to inspire and motivate our learners. We all know that WWW stands for World Wide Web. However, many schools have yet to realise its true potential for bringing the real world into the classroom. Communication is literally at the heart of ICT. Sadly, students are often given tasks involving made up situations rather than being given the opportunity to communicate with a real audience for a real purpose.

In the past students at Notre Dame High School, Norwich did a project to research and create leaflets about their school. They included information about the history of the school and subjects they learn. The ICT skills they demonstrated were fine, but their sense of audience and purpose was very limited.

This year we adapted our leaflet unit by making it more personal. We asked the students to think about how they learn best and what makes a good teacher. They shared their ideas by adding comments to a blog post set up for free on edublogs.org. We also invited children at our link school in the USA to contribute their ideas. We gave our students a digital camera and asked them to take images of the school from their perspective. Students at our link school in Malawi took photos of their school using disposable cameras and we uploaded them into a digital gallery using bubbleshare.com. Our classes then did some basic research about the universal right to education and why it is such a valuable part of our lives.

With all of the ideas and information they had gathered themselves, the students created leaflets on the right to education and learning to learn (see examples learn1 | learn2 | learn3 | learn4 | learn5 | learn6). The best examples have been sent to our link schools. The students helped to make the selection, thus providing a real reason for peer assessment. The project culminated in a flashmeeting video conference between children at both schools to discuss and compare school life. A recording of the conference was put onto a blog post and the students contributed comments to give feedback on the experience.

We did a student voice online survey using SurveyAtSchool at the end of the project to research whether giving their work a real purpose and audience motivated them to produce better quality work. According to the analysis 78% said that sharing their ideas on a blog helped them to write better ideas. 88% said that having a real audience gave their work a clearer sense of purpose.

Enabling students to research real issues, create real resources and communicate with a real audience gives their work a real purpose. The improved quality of our students’ work proves that this motivated them to produce their best. So, if you want to inspire your learners, remember to Keep IT Real!

Click on image to view a pdf of the leaflet