What are your kids learning when you're not looking?

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Miles Berry has emailed me about a short survey for students about their use of technology. Miles and Terry Freedman are running a seminar at BETT 2009 (as titled above) exploring children’s informal learning outside the classroom and what implications this might have for teachers and schools. For the seminar they will be discussing:

 a number of areas in which young people are using web-based and hand held tools for creativity and social networking across text, graphic, music, game and video media. 

As well as a literature review and some case studies, they have also put together a Google form that will allow them to collect some quantitative data of their own. I would encourage you to help Terry and Miles with their seminar by finding a little bit of time to allow your classes to contribute their thoughts.

Wii in my Classroom

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Wii comes to my classroom

I am delighted to get our Nintendo Wii installed and setup in our classroom. To get the audio working I used a small jack for the connections and ran it from the Wii into the PC’s Line In and then out again to speakers. We have one for each of the Year 5 and 6 classrooms. Not only will it obviously be lots of fun, I am hoping to make the most of the games to support learning. We have the Sports game and also Big Brain Academy which looks good. Soon I will take a closer look at BBA and see what more it has to offer in terms of classroom use, so look out for that soon.

Here is one sketchy idea already: Addition and Subtraction using Wii Golf (part of the Sports game) Use as a maths starter, an engaging way to generate whole class sums or even a small group activity – children take a shot, we subtract from the total yardage for that hole. Written addition of the yards for different shots. Total yards of shots around a short course. The yardage will only ever be into three digits for a single shot – unless I get a go and it will be less! Perfect 2 and 3 digit addition and subtraction for the age group of our class.

So much more to explore!

Next week we will be getting the children creating their Mii avatars and I will try to find a way to export those images for use elsewhere. I wish that back when I was ten my classroom was this much fun.

Single Touch, Multi-Touch, Spatial?

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For the first time in 2006 I saw a multi-touch device in action in the labs of Philips in Eindhoven. Just recently the wave of multi-touch devices has grown and this is especially clear in the use of mobile phones (also my iPod looks different). I suffered from iPhone envy when I was in Glasgow for the SLF as so many people had them, pinching and flicking their way through mobile content. A month or so after I returned from Eindhoven I wrote that perhaps the IWB had past it’s sell by date. What I am aware of now, that admittedly I wasn’t at the time of that post, is how much research and development needs to be done for multi-touch to be a strong enough technology for the average classroom.

Multi-touch technology in phones such as the iPhone, G1, Samsung Anycall SPH-M4650 and the new LG KF900 places it in the mainstream and can only accelerate the advancement of similar learning technologies.

The first consumer oriented multi-touch PC (ready for Windows 7) in the shape of the HP Touchsmart tx2 is available now and has a whole raft of gestures for the user to take advantage of:

  • SINGLE, DOUBLE TAP: Select objects by touching them once (single tap), or double tap to open objects/programs.
  • FLICK: Scroll or pan within an application either horizontally or vertically. For example, in MediaSmart Photo, flick your finger to the left on the display and the inertia from your flick will move the photos leftward, just as if you pushed a piece of paper to the left on a table.
  • PRESS & DRAG: Touch an object on the display and hold and drag it to the desired destination.
  • ARC: Allows you to move tracks to/from playlists without having to make a straight line.
  • PINCH: Touch an object on the display once to select the item then place 2 fingers on opposite corners of the object, then move them closer together to decrease the object’s size or to zoom out. Move fingers away from one another to enlarge the object or to zoom in.
  • ROTATE: Rotate photos by touching the object once to select the item then use 2 fingers on opposite corners of the image and rotate the image either clockwise or counter-clockwise.
  • LAUNCH MEDIASMART: Touch the screen with two fingers together and write the letter m on the display to launch the MediaSmart Smart Menu.

My involvement with Durham University has made me realise that multi-touch is still a fledgling in terms of mainstream classroom technology. They are at the very beginning of four years of research into what multi-touch means for the classroom, so I was surprised to see the SMART Table being released.

On one hand you have an expensive device available for the classroom now and on the other academics still trying to find the answers questions about multiple touch interactivity and how this impacts on collaborative learning and pedagogy. I hope that soon I will be able to see the SMART Table in action and perhaps sound out Steljes, the SMART distributor here in the UK, about the future of multi-touch and what they foresee,

I have had a SMARTBoard in my classroom for five years and I think that multi-touch devices will become a standard for mobile technology, more and more PCs will take advantage of it, to the benefit of future classroom technology. But what is beyond that? Will mainstream multi-touch devices just remain in the hands of our students and be brought into our schools? Will it take so long for all schools to actually be able to afford multi-touch devices that the next development for user/learner information interaction is already becoming a reality?


g-speak overview 1828121108 from john underkoffler on Vimeo. 

TweetMeet Nottingham 6/12/08

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customLogoThis year has been wonderful for me in terms of meeting people face to face who I have either followed on Twitter or who have even inspired me to begin writing this blog in the first place. TeachMeet at the Scottish Learning Festival allowed me to meet a whole bunch of brilliant Scots amongst others, which was a great pleasure. With Amplified’08 and MirandoMod2 still to look forward to I hope that 2009 will be just as fruitful in terms of matching avatars to real faces.

TweetMeet Nottingham on Saturday 6th December 2008 is another opportunity to meet fellow edubloggers and teachers making the most of technology in their classroom. Perhaps TweetMeet could be classed as the informal younger brother of TeachMeet, but we are meeting in a pub so it has much the same origins. Take a look at the site and sign-up if you can make it. I am pleased that Doug Belshaw, Lisa Stevens and Jose Picardo are already enscribed on the list so I won’t be talking to myself.

Google Teacher Academy UK?

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Swim the Atlantic...
I have followed the last 3 Google Teacher Academies from afar and as I currently write this the New York event is in full swing. They always sound like positive experiences for all who have been involved and I am very grateful that the work in our school has been featured at both the Chicago and the New York events.

Although I am pleased to see references to the resources and work I have been doing, I’d much prefer the opportunity to talk to fellow teachers about it myself. I would greatly value the opportunity to spend time with 50 other teachers from across the UK and Europe, talking about the powerful tools that Google offers, the ways they impact on learning and the innovative classroom approaches it can open up. Chewing over ideas for the implementation of Google tools to support learning would be a great way to spend a day.

You may ask: why have I not applied for any of the academy events as they accept international teachers? Put simply it is the cost of travel that is completely prohibitive to me or many other teachers even applying. Most schools would (a) not be able to help with the cost of international travel / accommodation and (b) incur more costs due to the extended absence from a classroom.

That is why I am calling on Google to hold a Teacher Academy event in the UK.

A London based event would allow UK and European based teachers the opportunity to gather together and participate by sharing their ideas and experiences of Google tools in the same way our US colleagues have done. In my opinion there is highly innovative practice in the UK with educational technology in the classroom – you only have to look at the TeachMeet events and some of the topics presented. 

50 certified trainers in the UK and Europe taking innovative ideas with them back to their schools, districts and counties would help other teachers to begin to better understand Google tools and the potential they have. Admittedly Google tools are not the only thing available, but in my opinion used in the right way they hold a strong place in any classroom toolkit.

I know it sounds like sour grapes but I genuinely think it is time that the innovative work with Google tools by so many UK educators is celebrated, championed and recognised.

Do you think a GTA should be held in the UK? What can I/we do to help bring the Google Teacher Academy to these shores?

London to NYC: Swim the Atlantic…