Time Honoured Tradition or the Modern Way?

Strathpeffer was the centre of attention yesterday: Doug Dickinson was in town (village just doesn’t sound right!) and tickets for two Kaiser Chiefs‘ gigs went on sale. I think whoever secured the Kaisers’ gig for the rejuvinated Strathpeffer Pavilion is very smart - injecting new life-blood and providing what young people want into such a historical, and perhaps, perceived traditional building must be one of the best ways to maintain it as a venue and secure its future. It made me ask what we are doing, as agents of educational development, to keep abreast of and maintain the interests of young people in our schools?

I had ‘booked’ Doug to talk to some of our school leaders about the use of ICT for today’s learners and the ways in which it may help them meet futures that are less predictable than ever before. The talks were, in equal measure, frank, provocative, interesting, and amusing. Doug raised many issues and challenges, as well as suggestions for our school leaders about how we can maintain our schools as relevant, exciting venues for learning.

Using the recently published outcomes for literacy and technologies from Curriculum for Excellence, Doug exemplified ways in which teachers and students could utilise a variety of tools to develop a multimodal approach and to capitalise on the ‘white space’ for learning that exists within the new structures. The new guidelines make specific mention of the use of text messages, blogs and social networking sites, web pages, catalogues and directories, and that, It is essential that all practitioners, in each sector, in each department and in all settings, find opportunities to apply reinforce and extend ICT skills. Accordingly, there needs to be serious reassessment of attitudes to, and practice in the usage and overall place of ICT in our schools. Teachers need to be better equipped, i.e. know the right techniques and have the correct equipment to make use of ICT for teaching and learning within their classrooms. This necessitates teachers making the decisions about what ICT they need rather than technical support teams specifying equipment and the levels of availability of software tools and content on their behalf.

Doug suggested that students will find ways to bypass any technology barriers schools put in their way - if they haven’t already done so. Current ‘block and stop’ practices such as overbearing Internet filtering, and a limited range of appropriate tools will make them look elsewhere for the information they need and for ways to use their chosen methods of communication. It is through educational support that children will learn how to appropriately use and be safe on the Internet rather than by, as he put it, ‘removing all the knives from the kitchen’.

I’m looking forward to the formal feedback from the day, but from discussions I had over coffee and lunch with a number of those present, there didn’t seem to be much disagreement.

Read Doug’s own blog here.

Notes, links, files mentioned or used during Doug’s presentations in no particular order.

As previously mentioned - also appearing in Strathpeffer (although not everyone’s happy about it): Kaiser Chiefs - Listen here: Time Honoured Tradition or Modern Way

Book your tickets here.

ps - Good luck to Doug with his participation in the British Orienteering Championships being held in Culbin Forest (by Nairn).

pps - Well done