Techgirls and Makerspaces - two recent events

Summary of two professional development occasions attended recently. Both are initiatives to increase children's exposure and interest to science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) subjects, although the sessions attended were focused mainly on technology.

Firstly, a lively evening session with TechGirls are SuperHeroes with Jewella (aka Dr. Jenine Beekhuyzen). Held at Ara on 15th March. The main objective of the session was to launch the Techgirls movement's main international event. NZ will participate in the annual technovation challenge for the first time this year. Teams of primary / secondary school girls are mentored over a 12 week period to develop and pitch an app, to solve a real world problem relevant to their context. Technovation is looking to sign up not only teams of girls, but coaches and mentors as well. Coaches could be parent, teachers etc. who assist with the logistical and support issues. Mentors are women or men from industry who will be able to help the teams meet the technical challenges.

Secondly, a session with Dr. Kylie Peppler from the University of Indiana who is in NZ for a 6 weeks Fulbright visiting scholar to Otago University. She was in Christchurch briefly to provide a session, organised by Professor Nicky Davis at University of Canterbury. Dr. Peppler shared her work on Maker Spaces. She provided background on the Maker Movement and provided examples.

Quoted the work of Resnick & Rosenbaum (2013) extensively - Designing for Tinkerability including the following:
Process over product; themes not challenges, diverse examples; tinker with space; engage with people not just materials; pose questions, not just seek answers; combine diving with stepping back.

Examples included the use of Arduino based sets; working on e-textiles to learn how circuits work; using 'scratch' to learn basic programming principles.

All in, two interesting sessions to provide some background on what is happening in the junior school sector. These students will be coming through into tertiary study within the next few years. Tertiary educators need to tap in to students' prior learning rather than be continually focused on treating students as 'blank slates'.

21st century learners

Last week, one of our CPIT staff developer Robin Graham ran a lunch time Better Teaching session on learning design.

The concept was part of Robin’s work at the University of Gloucestershire on extending her work on ‘design for learning’. Design for learning was a project supported by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC ) in the United Kingdom. The evaluation for the project provides an overview of what took place & some of the findings. The Australian Universities Teaching Council also conducted a project on learning design. Some exemplars for various activity focuses provide examples of the visual way in which a focus on learning activities removes emphasis on content & channels lesson plans towards assisting student learning.

One of the books recommended as a background to learning design was ‘Rethinking pedagogy for the digital age’ which has limited reviews on Google books . This book is by Helen Beetham & Rhonda Sharp provides a good overview of how teaching & learning has moved from associative to cognitive / constructive towards situative / participative paradigms.

Siemen’s latest blog provides a link to A Handbook of emerging technologies in learning which is also available as a wiki. Again a good overview of how society is moving but education is still stuck in an increasingly disjunctive model. Learning is moving from ‘content to process' & from 'knowing to being'. Education is still premised on teaching content.

Then this week, via Will Richardsons’ blog comes an article by Margaret Weigel, Carrie James, & Howard Gardner in the inaugural issue of the International Journal of Learning Media on Learning: Peering backward & looking forward in the digital era. It’s one of the many projects emanating from Project zero a long term research project on how people learn. The article contains a good table that summarises the way in which learning has changed along with the associated shifts in pedagogies & instructional & cultural media. In summary, the article proposes:

“Going forward, learning may be far more individualized, far more in the hands (and the minds) of the learner, and far more interactive than ever before. This constitutes a paradox: As the digital era progresses, learning may be at once more individual (contoured to a person's own style, proclivities, and interests) yet more social (involving networking, group work, the wisdom of crowds, etc.). How these seemingly contradictory directions are addressed impacts the future complexion of learning.”

youth hostels and learning about the use of technology by young travellers

Since receiving the nice amount of money as part of my award for tertiary excellence, I have had some light hearted ribbing from my colleagues about my predilection for staying at backpacker type accommodation when I travel out of town for work related conferences (in NZ & overseas). So this is a good place to explain my fondness for youth hostels.

The major reason I enjoy staying in youth hostels, is the opportunity to indulge in some serious people watching. It is too good an opportunity not to make use of as a mLearning researcher! The majority of people who turn up at backpackers are young travellers, usually in their twenties. Over the last five years, I have noted the increase in and a change in the types of technology that young travellers carry with them. Digital cameras used to be standard, but now, not everyone carries a digital camera, instead mobile phones and an mp3 players seem to be the de riguer. There is also an increase in young travellers who travel with a laptop.

Asking questions about a young person’s mobile phone, or mp3 player is a good conversational starter. From my travels, I have found that NZ is not mobile phone friendly for the foreign visitor. However, most young Asian travellers now use their mobile phone as a camera, so loosing the use of the mobile phone as a communicator is not too much of an inconvenience. I have also seen the mobile phone used as a calculator, currency converter, translator / dictionary, memo pad, map, torch etc.

Internet linked computers at most youth hostels are in use 24/7. Many young travellers make use of computers to organise all of their travel, completing their bookings for transport, accommodation and activities via online bookings. Savvy backpacker entrepreneurs have websites not only in English but in Spanish & Japanese. YHA’s that I have used in NZ, Australia & Canada all have computers that run off a standard cash card so that travellers can use these cards to pay for the time used on youth hostel computers within each country.

Travellers keep in touch with friends (& family) via email but many I have met recently (especially North Americans & Europeans) maintain their own blogs or social websites. One page on my memo pad in my Treo is filled with hotmail / gmail , blogger / facebook & myspace addresses (plus their Japanese / Korean versions) of people I have struck up conversations with at backpackers. Social site addresses have increased over the last couple of years. The use of moblogging is rare (due to mobile phones being linked to the travellers' home telecommunications provider).

I suppose I might be able to observe similar things if I stayed in a hotel as business ‘road warriors’ are now a common sight in hotel lobbies with their wireless laptops and mobile phones. However, the culture, architecture and organisation of the average backpacker’s, encourages the solo traveller to interact with their fellow travellers. A nosy middle aged woman who asks questions about what sort of mobile phone one uses does not seem too out of place :)

Issues in mLearning & Zooming in on learning in the digital age

Another bit of ‘Easter holiday reading’ from the University of Nottingham. It’s a report of a workshop by the Kaleidoscope Network of Excellence Mobile Learning Initiative. The report collates ideas thoughts and discussions and is a good resource cum update of the current developments in the mlearning area.

I found reading through the report a good refresher plus a good anchor for reflection on the pros and cons of mlearning. I especially found the statement that ‘mobile learning applications are best viewed as mediating tools in the learning process’ to be very much where I had based my mlearning project.

Also good to see so many practitioners involved in feeding back their thoughts and perceptions. In the long run, educators still have to be the ones to lead the use of mobile technologies in learning. Our students are extremely competent users of technology for their own, usually leisure and social objectives. Some of them may baulk at educators capturing their social networking tool to use for class based exercises. However, feedback from my own students indicates that they are often curious to try out new things as well. Also anything that helps them learn more effectively in a more efficient and convenient way appeals to their way of living. I think that our role is to use their phones as a conduit for helping students to learn but that we also need to be careful how we use the phone.

I also had a read through a NZ Council of Educational Research report that studied the young NZ ‘digital age’ learner. The report is the first one of a series that will be looking into learning in the digital age. One of the findings that I have found to ring through is that digital literacy in young people spans a wide range. Some of us early ‘digital immigrants’ may actually be more digitally literate that the generation Y digital native. Just because a young person is born into a world surrounded by digital technology, does not mean that they are conversant with the whole spectrum of digital technology use. However, on the whole, young people are more comfortable with digital technology, they are not afraid to fiddle and experiment with a new piece of equipment. Therefore, before beginning on sorting out a ‘learning scafffolding’ / personal homepage / portal / dashboard project for the school, I will need to do a survey of the students to find out their depth and breathe of interaction with current digital technology.