JamesEd.com » school

Why We Need to Give Students a Voice

James — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 13:41:09 +0000

I am very lucky to be an educator who has access to the mass media as a talk show host.

I can be a real pain in the neck as an educator with a voice that can reach many people through the mass media.

Recently I asked myself why there isn’t any student radio on the UAE airwaves.

Sure you can find hybrid student radio online but what about students from a high school doing talk radio? Nothing.

Until now.

Twice a month the students of Wellington International School in Dubai take over my Nightline show for an hour.

The students not only create the content, this is talk radio, but they also run the board making sure that the technical side is perfect.

The result is arguably the best student radio you can hear in the middle east!

If you give our youth a voice it is incredible what you will hear.

Finally! The teaching tool I need is here!

James — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 11:04:00 +0000

SmartBoards, SmartPhones, GoogleDocs, DropBox, Web, Wiki…. there is an ever growing number of tools available to educators today to help make the information exchange process easier.

And I am sorry to say 95% of the technology enabled tools, my estimation, are useless.

Sure 95% of those technology enabled tools are cool, sexy even, but they fail for 1 big reason, they fail to make the job of information exchange/learning any easier or faster or convenient.

Take note taking and exchange.

There are many individualized tools for note exchange but what if you want to combine/converge many different types of information?

By converge I mean bring together audio, video, web, text and more? The usual tools make more work and are often difficult to use across devices.

Well today I was introduced to evernote.

For weeks I have been telling people that what I need is something that can combine what I am doing on a whiteboard, even if it is only a static image because that is all that is needed in the end, the ideas of the class, some web stuff and the conversations on twitter!

Evernote does it all!

For me in the classroom this could be a total game changer!

Take a look at what I am talking about.

Click here to view the embedded video.

All I can see is possibility!

Now the question is how do I link and merge the notes that all my students will be taking to create a cumulative piece?

We got education wrong!

James — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 08:00:40 +0000

I really do think we are going about the art of informing and developing our children on the wrong way.

Not that the whole process is broken, but it does need a serious renovation.

So where do we start?

I think the starting point is a huge issue.

We have old school administrators looking at the problem with old school tools and to craft an old solution.

1st we need to admit that we have got it wrong!

Here is a nudge from TED.

So what do we do next?

The hard part is looking at the problem and not falling back into the old ruts of funding, training and building design to make things right, or better.

What we need to do is have a community conversation.

Parents, teachers, employers, higher education and the students!

We need to ask what is working and why!

We need to ask what is not working and consider why.

The start may be as easy as a little Facebook time!

I really do believe that the way we teach is an issue as is the physical building!

School is to removed from reality and that has to change.

We need to radically rethink teaching and the place we teach.

FastCompany asked a similar question and here is what came back.

The best part are the 13 ideas!

13 Radical Ideas from FastCompany to Fix Education

How would you spend $100 million? the answers are as varied as the edu-experts we asked.

Radical Idea #1

Radical Idea #2

Radical Idea #3

Radical Idea #4

Radical Idea #5

Radical Idea #6: Rethinking Teaching

Radical Idea #7

Radical Idea #8

Radical Idea #9

Radical Idea #10

Radical Idea #11

Radical Idea #12

Radical Idea #13: Build a Better Classroom

So how do we start now?

Here is another idea.

One day of each month we create a reverse mentoring scheme, a work study of sorts but the idea is not that the student learn from you but that you also learn from the student. A conversation takes place. What are you seeing that the student is not seeing? How did what you do get to this point?

Every student KG through High School goes on a reverse mentoring assignment each month!

The format will change to suit the student but the theme is the same.

We are making education real and we are making it work based on the environment!

Is the start easy? No but it has to happen!

Maybe we need to think of the reverse mentoring in terms of the Tinker School format?

The reality is we need to start NOW.

And that will mean throwing a little caution into the wind.

I think we need to think big and think now.

We have talked enough now lets do.

What are your thoughts?

Designing a Convergent Media Space

James — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 12:36:38 +0000

If you could dream big and design the ultimate learning/lab space to transform the way we think and do communication today what would it look like?

The problem, and there is a problem, is that the space needs to function as a classroom, lecture hall, studio, think tank, recording facility, technology incubator, and new convergent media showcase all at the same time.

So who do you talk to?

Journalists have one idea.

PR people have another idea.

Academics have yet another idea.

Designers are thinking different,

The architects have a vision.

Nobody has asked the students.

And in the end what you can end up with is a pretty traditional space that might look like a CNN/BBC/CBC newsroom.

What are we looking at if we dream of a new space configuration?

A big open space with scattered technology in different corners to satisfy specific and rather non converged needs. This is the old way of thinking without a doubt.

One of the big issues with convergence is are we talking form or function. What we really need is a bit of both.

The form of convergence is the bringing of different, often old school technology, into one place, not very new thinking at all and really not very convergent.

The function of convergence is a way of thinking and this is the clever side, the paradigm shift, the bringing of content to different platforms simultaneously for focused, yet mass, dissemination.

So what will the space to teach and practice convergent media look like?

Click here to view the embedded video.

The d school at Standford has not only invented the space, with the proud insight of IDEO’s founders, but I would hasten to say perfected it!

As an academic and practitioner of convergent media when I am asked how I would design the ideal space to teach, learn and practice convergent media I say look at the d School!

Do and be International Baccalaureate (IB)

James — Fri, 14 May 2010 06:43:33 +0000

Don’t get me wrong I think that the idea behind an IB education is grand.

Hey my own children have gone through an IB program at the PYP level!

In fact last night at Uptown School the grade 5s did a fantastic Exhibition with acting, dancing and the whole 9 yards to really demonstrate what they have learned and how they have learned about the environment!

And this was just one of the units of enquiry, imagine!

Here is a sample of the goods!

But I have a few question when all is said and done.

Is it possible to teach in an IB manner without doing in an IB manner?

Odd question you might say but one we need to ask.

Here is what the PYP is all about.

Six transdisciplinary themes

Six transdisciplinary themes of global significance provide the framework for exploration and study:

who we are
where we are in place and time
how we express ourselves
how the world works
how we organize ourselves
sharing the planet.

Teachers are guided by these six transdisciplinary themes as they design units of inquiry that both transcend and articulate conventional subject boundaries.

The programme can be illustrated by a hexagon with the six transdisciplinary themes surrounding six subject areas:

language
social studies
mathematics
arts
science
personal, social and physical education.

The transdisciplinary themes and subject areas outlined above form the knowledge element of the programme.

Five essential elements

The five essential elements—concepts, knowledge, skills, attitudes, action—are incorporated into this framework, so that students are given the opportunity to:

gain knowledge that is relevant and of global significance
develop an understanding of concepts, which allows them to make connections throughout their learning
acquire transdisciplinary and disciplinary skills
develop attitudes that will lead to international-mindedness
take action as a consequence of their learning.

Curriculum model

The curriculum is expressed in three interrelated ways:

the written curriculum—what do we want to learn?
the taught curriculum—how best will we learn?
the assessed curriculum—how will we know what we have learned?

Under certain conditions, schools may deliver the programme in any language, although the IB provides services in:

English
French and Spanish

So, my question is can we teach IB without doing IB?

Can an administration administer an IB curriculum without itself living by the very tenants it is asking its students to embrace?

And here in lies the problem with all but a very few schools today, our schools are teaching one thing but acting very different.

Sure there are a million reasons to justify a school operating as if it was the turn of the century, the 1st being that that is they way it has always been done.

I believe it is time, yesterday, for teachers and administrators to take a good hard look in the mirror and ask whether they are doing what the student needs or what they are comfortable with!

If teachers were unbridled from administrators I am sure the classroom would be a very different place!

What we need in our schools today.

1. teachers who understand children, parents do make better teachers

2. administrators who work for the school not the board of company

3. to be engaged with the community not walled off and segregated from the reality

4. parents MUST engage

5. a work/education harmony

6. realistic expectations of teachers

7. honesty

To be young and foolish!

James — Thu, 06 May 2010 07:18:24 +0000

I often ask myself if it was a perfect world how would I build a team to actually make change happen!

And I keep coming back to the idea of being young and foolish!

The people who we charge with making change, on the whole, are old, tired, jaded and pretty much worn out as far as creative thought goes! But the old goats have a whole bunch of experience.

The young on the other hand have no experience and pretty much no fear!

So, how do we change the world, start with something small of course, we need to bring the old and young together!

Sounds simple but it does not happen that often, and look at the mess we are in!

Gemma Sisia set up a school system in Tanzania that is the product of being young and foolish and well, it is amazing to see what has happened!

Free education for the poor and a chance to make a change in Tanzania for Tanzanians!

BUT if Gemma had asked a school head in Dubai about doing this what would they say?

IMPOSSIBLE, money, students, teachers, politics, can’t be done.

Gemma is the example of how being young and foolish and not having baggage can actually facilitate global change.

Yes global change!

But you need to start with what you can do, you need to start!

Gemma Sisia and the school of St Jude, be amazed at the power of acting on your ideas!

The power of youth!

James — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 09:32:33 +0000

The single greatest problem today is not listening to our youth!

Why is that an issue?

We professors, we bureaucrats, we parents, we …. are truly bankrupt of creative ideas.

What we do have is a means to implement ideas but what we lack are ideas, new innovative,creative ideas.

Look at Greece! How do they fix their financial problems? Loans! Throwing more bankrupt ideas at a problem is no solution.

The environment! We have big problems! How can we fix it?

Has anyone bothered to ask our youth? Does anyone want to listen to our youth? NO, what do the youth know!

I spoke with 7 kids aged between 10 and 12 about their take on the environment and how they are looking at things, the conversation gives me hope!

Uptown Primary School Students Go Green

Nightline a Conversation

Journalists need retraining, sort of!

James — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 12:12:04 +0000

Today more than ever journalists need to be retrained on how to connect their stories to their multiple audiences.

The problem faced by journalists today is very simply that their occupation is transforming and they do not know how to transform along with it.

When we academics talk about the changes taking place to journalism we love to use the word converging!

I hate to break it to those academics but the convergence had happened and we are already on to the next thing!

One academic I spoke to today suggested that there are different understandings of convergence, no there is not!

Convergence as the 1st hit on a Google search suggests is a simple and I might add dated concept!

Search Results

Technological convergence – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to Media convergence?: Convergence of media occurs when multiple products come together to form one product with the advantages of all of them, …
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_convergence – Cached – Similar

In 1990 YES convergence was easily a newspapers website with audio, video and links on it.

Today we have a whole new journalism emerging because technology has advanced in a way that was never expected, control and creation have been very broadly moved from the hands of the few, the controller’s, to the hands of the many, the consumers.

And then along came WEB2.0, the whole convergent model was then thrown into the wind!

But there are plenty of academics and media organizations who are holding onto the old school convergent model much like a security blanket.

I would suggest the reason we see journalists and journalism organizations holding onto the old ideas of convergence, remember I am suggesting we already converged and have moved on, is because they are unsure what this means for them.

We hear a lot about citizen journalism, which is not convergence but a means of communicating information among the mass audience.

We read a lot about WEB2.0 and which is also not journalism but a delivery system for conversations and stories.

So where are we if convergence has come and gone?

We are in a new place, a place that sees the simultaneous existence of old media (with their converged offering), citizen journalism with everyone telling a story and what I am calling the iJournalist.

So where are we today then?

We are in a place where the writing, research, editing and presentation skills of journalism are as important as ever.

We are in a place where the variety of sources available to the journalist have changed and now include the immediate interaction of the public on the ground, the citizen journalist.

We are in a place where speed is important and deadlines have gone from being in hours to literally in minutes.

We are in a place where editing and production takes place during an event and the story is posted before, during and after that event.

We are in a place where there are multiple and simultaneous delivery systems that may but often do not reside in a single place although they can and often are collected.

We are in a place where journalism takes place using a smart form and is consumed using that same phone.

So what does this mean for journalism and where does the retraining fit in?

Journalists need to be trained for speed.

Journalists need to be trained on the new art of sourceology.

Journalists and editors need to be able to communicate fast and efficiently and both might today find themselves in the field.

Journalists need to understand the different delivery systems for their stories.

Journalists need to understand the new configuration needed for stories and the fact that this will influence the audience.

Journalists need to understand that their audience is no longer static but dynamic.

Journalists need to understand that their work is being consumed,in many cases from a phone!

I believe what we are about to witness is the resurgence of journalism as a career!

And for those who are not part of the 4th screen generation, wed to paper, it is time for a bit of retraining!

problem with education is in plain sight!

James — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 15:30:23 +0000

I had an opportunity to speak with some people who really have some strong feelings on education.

We did 2 hours last night on Nightline and it really got me thinking.

I think the problem with our schools, with few exceptions, is the fact that we take our best teachers and promote them to administration.

So we take a person who inspirtes in the classroom and expect them to work magic in a different setting that they have no experience in!

Why would a great teacher be a great administrator?

Your Mum is a great cook right?

But would she be great at running a restaurant?

Probably not, and she doesn’t.

So why do we expect teachers to be great administrators?