ETL411 2012 Assignment 1 Part 1

Leanne Wheaton 243072

The digital revolution is far more significant than the invention of writing or even of printing. Douglas Englebart This is a contentious statement to say the least, but made by a man who has significantly contributed both materially and philosophically to the scaffold on which we are building our brave new digital online world. Famous for inventing the computer mouse, hypertext language and bootstrapping strategy, Englebart is a vigorous advocate of using computers and networks to connect people and thinking in order to solve the worlds increasingly complex and critical problems (Englebart, D. 1958-present collected writings). Many people may see his contention as a substantial overstatement but there is no doubt that technology and digitization are revolutionizing our world and changing the way we act, think, teach and learn. Just as mastering writing and the dissemination of information in print enabled huge advances in civilization, it is critical we embrace the opportunities afforded by this current revolution by equipping ourselves with the required knowledge, skills and resources. Educators must play a critical role in this by connecting people, ideas and information in meaningful and authentic ways. Just as 19th century teachers taught vital reading and writing skills, a 21st century educator must model and teach the skills required to use technology, navigate, filter and scrutinize content, discover, learn, problem solve and ultimately contribute. Digital resources and learning should be meaningfully integrated into teaching and learning at every opportunity. Done effectively, this can promote engagement, social interaction and cross-disciplinary thinking. In this essay, some specific digital resources will be evaluated and their use in a pedagogical setting discussed. They have been chosen to target three specific learning content areas, literacy, maths and science using a cross-curriculum approach. The target class is comprised of twenty-nine year four students with a greater ratio of males to females from a middle class Adelaide suburb. The class has some male students with observed learning difficulties and attention deficits as well as one female student with 6/18 corrected visual acuity. There are also eight ESL students represented. The materials are: BBC KS3 Bitesize Probability object: http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks3bitesize/maths/handling_data/probability/activit y.shtml The Learning Federation Spinners (L3546) http://econtent.thelearningfederation.edu.au/ec/viewing/L3546/index.html Search engine Google find weather sites http://www.google.com.au http://www.bom.gov.au

Leanne Wheaton 243072

ETL411 Assignment 1

The key concepts to be explored and linked through lessons using these resources are probability, prediction and weather covering the learning content areas of literacy, mathematics and science. The Melbourne Declaration On Educational Goals For Young Australians highlights rapidly evolving Information and communication technologies (ICT) as an environment in which young people need to be highly skilled (Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, 2008). Goal two in part, advocates all students should become successful learners who have the essential skills in literacy and numeracy and are creative and productive users of technology, especially ICT, as a foundation for success in all learning areas. These principles are encapsulated in the unfolding Australian National Curriculum. The ACARA website states: Twenty-first century learning does not fit neatly into a curriculum solely organized by learning areas or subjects. That is why the Australian Curriculum has identified a comprehensive set of knowledge, skills and dispositions or general capabilities that will assist students to live and work successfully in the twenty-first century. (ACARA 2011) This supports the Melbourne Declaration On Educational Goals For Young Australians aspiration that learners are creative, innovative and resourceful, and are able to solve problems in ways that draw upon a range of learning areas and disciplines (Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs, 2008). It is the role of schools and educators to become ITC enablers, creating rich learning environments based on appropriate pedagogical models. Many contemporary Australian classrooms are based on foundations of learning theories such as Cognitivism and Constructivism. Jean Piagets stage theory of learning and cognitive development postulates children advance through four invariant, universal cognitive stages. He perceived the child as on a fairly solitary journey of independent discovery, facilitated by adults passively providing discovery and learning opportunities (Berk, L.E. 2009). His ideas are largely discounted now however, his theories are the basis for many others since, which build on the idea of the child as an active engaged learner and include a stronger role for context (Berk, L.E. 2009). Consistent with this, another significant contributor to child development and learning theory, Lev Vygotsky, did not consider the child in isolation but as responding to the environment, objects and people (Vygotsky, L.S. 1934/1986). A prominent role for instructional digital resources is well supported by Vygotskys Constructivist theories where learners within their Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) are supported and extended at each stage of their learning by more knowledgeable others who maybe fellow students, parents or teachers. Expanding on Vygotskys theories in the context of learning supported by digital resources, there is a particular role for peers and networked communities in an increasingly connected world to engage in scaffolding, reciprocal teaching and cooperative learning with learners as they interact with Leanne Wheaton 243072 ETL411 Assignment 1 2

and explore the online world. Indeed, access through online resources to extremely more knowledgeable others through blogs, discussions, and webnars or podcasts for example, provides unprecedented learning opportunities for those equipped to embrace ICT. In response to this, George Siemens has proposed a new paradigm in learning theory to account for how individuals and groups learn in the digital age. He argues historical models have become so dichotomous and convoluted they no longer reflect the link between theory and reality in a meaningful way (Siemens, 2005). His proposed new model, Connectivism describes disciplined learning in an online environment facilitated by interaction with networks, nodes and connections on multiple levels, now possible through a multitude of devices. As Ray Kurzweil, author and futurist has noted Mobile phones are misnamed. They should be called gateways to all human knowledge. Given this unprecedented access to all human knowledge, it is vital all learners have the critical thinking skills to refine, decode, filter and utilize that knowledge. These skills must be modeled authentically and learned in order to be valued, relevant and have broad application. With such a wealth of resources published, there are great benefits to the educator who can unearth and utilize interesting instructive digital resources. Material production can be a time consuming activity for teachers and naturally takes time away from other pedagogical activities such as, planning, curriculum development, assessment and pastoral care. Digital materials can usually be easily accessed, shared, evaluated and rated taking some of the unpredictability out of using bespoke materials for the first time. Furthermore, intelligent inclusion of quality instructional digital resources may also benefit the educator by reducing the time needed directly explaining concepts to the whole class, allowing greater time for observation, authentic and or formative assessment of individuals or to focus assistance on small groups. Probability, Australian Curriculum content strand Statistics and Probability, (ACARA 2011) can be a mystifying and intangible concept for children in the described age group. Predicting the likelihood of an event based on minimal information can be daunting so it is important to introduce the concepts using appealing materials and engaging students in all learning modalities, visual, auditory and kinaesthetic. Using the first selected resource presented on the smart board, an object published by the BBC, students are introduced to the maths concept of simple probability, particularly the concept; the sum of all probabilities always equals one. This short engaging audiovisual presentation has animated graphics to capture attention and appeal to this age group while the audio explanation is clear and uses concise language. Additionally, there are optional subtitles, which may be used with or as an alternative to the audio. These options presented on the smart board support children with vision or hearing impairment. The audio, subtitle combination will also support ESL learners who may need different prompts to aid comprehension. Success for Boys, an evidence based initiative focusing on teaching boys presented in the Australian Government report Motivation and Engagement of Boys: Evidence-Based Teaching Practices, states a main key intervention area Leanne Wheaton 243072 ETL411 Assignment 1 3

is, The use of information and communication technology (ICT) as a means of improving boys engagement with active learning (Australian Government Department of Education, Science and Training 2006). Evidence presented in the report suggests boys in particular are highly responsive to and likely engage with appropriate digital resources. In this target class, there are a greater proportion of boys to girls and some of them have attention deficits and learning difficulties. This resource is very short, includes some opportunities for interaction though simple, multiple-choice questions for assessment and can be repeated or stopped if necessary to reinforce comprehension and understanding. Additionally, the teacher can revise and practice by introducing tactile materials for the students to practice with if necessary, by rolling dice or recreating the coloured apple experiment and recording out comes. Following on, there are also associated revision and assessment activities and materials that may be undertaken as a class or group task lead by the students Once the basic concepts have been introduced, there is an opportunity to use the second resource, an animated colour pinwheel simulator to further explore probability and initiate discussions about prediction using language such as impossible, unlikely, likely and certain. This reinforces the literacy cross-learning content of the unit plan referenced to the Interpreting, Analysing and Evaluating section of the Literacy Stream of the Australian National Curriculum (ACCARA 2011). Students can design and run the simulations and practice making predictions using target language and also focus on expected or predicted outcomes versus observed ones. This could also involve enquiry about the nature of statistics in reference to sample sizes and voracity of results. That is, predicted outcomes more closely resemble observed ones (using the simulator) as n (the number of spins) increases. The simulator allows the number of spins to be set and presents the results as an easily visualized column graph. This is an important concept for interpreting statistics and scientific experiments and fits with the Australian National Curriculum Year 4 Science and Enquiry Skills strand, Questioning and Predicting (ACSIS0674) and Processing and Analysing Data and Information, Compare data with predictions and use as evidence in developing explanations (ACSIS218) Finally, the concepts and language of probability and prediction can be linked with a real world concept of prediction of weather which links to the Australian National Curriculum through all three learning strands, Science Understanding, Earth and Space Sciences (ACSSU075) and Science as a Human Endeavour, Nature and Development of Science (ACSHE061) and Science Inquiry Skills. Students will be guided to use search engine sties such as Google to access and evaluate weather websites such as the Bureau of Meteorology or Yahoo and discuss general concepts of how meteorologists predict weather based on measurement and tracking of air masses with respect to geography. Students will look at the different forecasts available and animated radar loops as well as some of the data and detailed weather observations to gain an understanding of the many ways probability is used by meteorologists to make predictions, once more reinforcing the vocabulary of chance; impossible, unlikely, likely and certain. The students will gain an understanding of the underlying level of uncertainty inherent in predicting the weather reinforced by the rules of probability. This topic would be a natural lead in to a highlighted crossLeanne Wheaton 243072 ETL411 Assignment 1 4

curriculum priority, exploring concepts such as climate change, sustainability and prediction of long term weather effects and outcomes, however this extends beyond the brief for the set of materials discussed here. In todays diverse classrooms, with an array of stake holders and factors to be accounted for including student diversity, administrative, legislative and policy constraints, curriculum considerations and theories of teaching and learning, there are many compelling reasons to use quality digital resources as a routine part of pedagogical practice. Not only is this mandated in documents such as the Melbourne Declaration, but evidenced by research outlined in documents such as Motivation and Engagement of Boys: Evidence-Based Teaching Practices (2006). The resources chosen and discussed here, when used to teach the concepts of probability, prediction and weather in the learning content areas of literacy, mathematics and science will form the basis of some interesting, engaging and successful cross curriculum lessons. These lessons will have wide appeal, particularly to boys and will cater for diversity in this classroom with many ESL learners and a vision-impaired student. Constructivist pedagogy places the learner at the centre of the learning environment equipping them with the tools and intellectual and psychological supports to acquire knowledge and learn. Siemens proposed theory of Connectivism takes this a step further by recognizing the online environment and community network as the ultimate evolution of Vygotskys more knowledgeable other whereby learners once equipped with the skills and tools to navigate the environment can choose to access infinite pathways of information by various modes of engagement, challenging themselves to actively participate in their own scaffolding while escalating their Zone of Proximal Development. As 21st century educators, it is our obligation to equip ourselves with the skills and knowledge essential for assimilating this new paradigm. Our confident application of ITC not only informs our practice but models positive interaction and engagement with a digital revolution which may indeed yet prove to be of far more significance than the invention of writing or even printing!

Leanne Wheaton 243072

ETL411 Assignment 1

Bibliography Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). (2011) The Australian Curriculum: General Capabilities. Retrieved from http://www.acara.edu.au/curriculum/general_capabilities.html Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA). (2011). The Australian Curriculum (3.0 ed.). Sydney, NSW: ACARA. Retrieved from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/Home Australian Government Department of Education, Science and Training (2006) Motivation and Engagement of Boys: Evidence-Based Teaching Practices. retrieved from http://www.deewr.gov.au/Schooling/BoysEducation Berk, L.E. 2009 Child Development (8th Ed pp20-21) Illinois State University Englebart, D. summarized from information on his personal website retrieved from http://dougengelbart.org/ Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs. (2008). Melbourne declaration on educational goals for young Australians. Carlton South, Vic: Curriculum Corporation. Retrieved from http://www.mceetya.edu.au/verve/_resources/National_Declaration_on_the_Ed ucational_Goals_for_Young_Australians.pdf Siemens, G. (2005, August 10). Connectivism: Learning as Network Creation. e-Learning Space.org. Retrieved from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/networks.htm Vygotsky, L. S. (1934/1986) Thought and Language. Cambridge, MA:MIT Press

Leanne Wheaton 243072

ETL411 Assignment 1

ETL411Assignment1 Part 2

Leanne Wheaton 243072

Like most students returning to study after a long hiatus, I found this assignment daunting. I procrastinated for quite a while during the planning period and found selecting the materials particularly challenging. I chose to combine Science, Mathematics and Literacy but settling on the specific content areas was difficult as was finding sensible materials to use. I initially tried to find a useful random simulator app that might allow me to run and replicate fun experiments to link probability and science but after not finding anything I felt would fulfil the task, I came across a site, somewhere in the thousands of pages I had open in my browsers linking probability and weather and I was intrigued. Narrowing down the topics and understanding how they could be linked was definitely the most difficult part of this task for me. The vast amount of material out there online is both a blessing and a curse. It takes a disciplined mind to set out on a hunt for appropriate instructional materials and not get swamped by the sheer amount available. There is certainly potential to waste a lot of time searching if you are not efficient and discerning. This will be key if educators and learners, as I argue in my essay, are to successfully embrace the use of digital and online instructional materials. When it came to writing the essay, I was struck by how different the process of research now is. In the past, before the internet, the library and a photocopier were an assignment writers best friend. It was a time consuming and limiting experience. Now, with the benefits of Siemens Connectivism, I really did feel myself being lifted and extending my ZPD as I instantly accessed almost any information I desired from my desk. As mentioned above however, the trick lies in being able to sift through all that information to craft a coherent essay, which I think in the end, I may have achieved.

Leanne Wheaton 243072

ETL411 Assignment 1