Day 1 Q&A – Reflecting on ‘Thinking the Unthinkable’

We put a lot of our education resources into our buildings. What if we look far beyond that – beyond ‘school premises’, to a science fiction world where a child sits in a ‘personal learning cubicle’. Is that where we are headed? Is that where we would want to go?

Sir Geoff Hampton sees a ‘blended’ future. Learning is and will continue to be a social process and we are social things – we only need to look at our cities and villages to see the evidence of that. He also highlighted the risk in relinquishing the link between a teacher and a learner through technology.

Tom Greaves offered that when computers first appeared in schools there was a great worry that it would break down and reduce the level and quality of teacher-pupil interaction – but the research actually indicates the opposite. It is clear that the presence of certain types technologies actually creates much higher levels of discussion and debate.

Sir Geoff finished the day with a serious observation. Too many teachers still focus on WHAT they are going to teach. Instead of knowing WHY they are teaching it and trying to understand HOW their teaching will work! 

Day 1 Q&A: The Role of High Stakes Assessment

A recurring theme from the first day was the fact that one of the main challenges in implementing any ‘flexible, personalised curriculum’ is clearly in its assessment!  

Is the nature of how we measure the outputs of our education systems fundamentally determining the inputs?

A delegate from the North East of England raised the issue of how OFSTED judge schools. Although it was highlighted that there was a massive will to change and adapt from the teachers themselves, they felt that the only ‘roadblocks’ left that stop them putting their radical ideas into practice lie outside the school itself.

Clearly we have to continually question the purpose of our assessment system and who it needs to serve – the learner or the institutions. The Parlimentary session on Wednesday will focus on this critical issue.

“What about the Curriculum?” – Mick Waters QCA

In his role at QCA, Mick is facing the challenge to ‘develop a modern, world-class curriculum that will inspire, challenge all learners and prepare them for the future.’ It means facing fundamental questions, including:

• How do we make a curriculum special for learners?
• How do we create a curriculum that is something that unfolds and evolves with the times?

He claims that problems in the past have been in documenting and listing the curriculum forcing regimentation and inflexibility on the education system and that things need to move on. A new curriculum must reflect the changing world and the nature of a modern, technologically rich society.

To do this means addressing key issues coming from learners:

• Why do I get taught at the speed of other pupils?
• Why do I take exams in the Summer?
• Why must I fail an exam this year when I could pass them next ?
• Why do I have to remember things when I can find out on a mobile phone?
• Why are there so few subjects when I have hundreds of TV channels?
• Why do I have to write in school when everyone types in life?

He went on to describe a vision of ‘Lifelong learning’. Learning that means more than just developing subject knowledge – Learning means developing enterprise and initiative, individual maturity and a sense of self and belonging. Schools also must adapt. In schools everyone will be learning, teachers and pupils – even parents.
The curriculum will be purposeful and authentic. Technology will be pervasive. Assessment will become ‘on demand’ seeking ‘achievement routes’ that matter to individual learners. Lessons will also persist – captured online or on a personal device – so a learner can relive the experiences.

A final presentation provided a big picture of the UK curriculum – what it is trying achieve and how it might be organised? Mick presented a picture of Successful learners, Confident Individuals, Responsible Citizens where their Skills, Knowledge and Attitudes are all equally important.

• Does this make sense to educators around the world?
• Is addressing this why we came here to the Symposium?
• What questions does it raise for you?

Co-located publisher event attracts large numbers

The rapid international growth of interactive technologies such as learner response systems and interactive whiteboards has led to a requirement for new forms of content to exploit the pedagogical approaches they provide.

In recognition of that, over 50 national and international publishers are attending a publisher event that is co-located with the Symposium on the 10th of October.

Some of the questions that this event hopes to answer are:

• Is there a new blend of technologies that can make the best of group teaching and independent learning opportunities and what does it look like?
• What technical support and authoring tools do publishers needs to maximise the infrastructure that is actually going into schools and being adopted by teachers?
• What options exist for a publisher or software developer to create completely new tools and services by integrating learner response hardware and multi-user interactive whiteboards into their own products?

It certainly looks like there will be many questions and hopefully many answers. Expect to see a range of interviews and comments in the blog…