An opportunity for educational change

Via Derek Wenmouth, comes a link to this blog - not just any 'new normal' will do - by Lesley Murrihy a NZ primary school principal. It is a call, like several other blogs/articles, for the current Covid-19 'rapid change in educational delivery' to be a lever for change within the educational system. Lesley, writes well about the need to use the learnings, wrought by the pandemic on society across the globe, to be an opportunity to sit back and think about what the actual objectives of education are. In particular, the role of education in addressing the societal equities brought about by the shifts in the last several decades to globalisation and marketisation of everything.

As someone who has benefited through the social mobility availed through access to education for my parents' generation through the sacrifices undertaken by my grandparents, I have always been aware and a supporter of the advantages conferred by being literate and 'educated'. We the benefits, also come the responsibility to 'feed it forward'.

In NZ, the reform of vocational education (RoVE) has provided a once in a life time opportunity to create a vocational education system which 'puts learners at the heart' of their learning. Due to the 'Level 4' restrictions in NZ across April, the formation of one of the pillars of RoVE, the merger of all the polytechnics and institutes of technology in to one NZ Institute of Skills and Technology (NZIST - interim name) was decidedly low key. There were no major announcements apart from the main NZIST board being formed and individual boards appointed for all the 'subsideries'.

The need to rapidly then shift to distance learning, due to having to be in 'lockdown' and work from home for over 5 weeks, created a mass professional development objective across the entire educational sector. Therefore, we now have two unique 'once in a lifetime' opportunities to go forward with.

The blog by Lesley, indicates the need to be circumspect and to identify the objectives of education. In NZ VET, some of this was completed through the RoVE process. It is now important to perhaps review these objectives, in light of what has now taken place across the pandemic. NZ will have to remain, for the near future, 'an island of itself'. The NZ government's decision to 'go hard and go early' has led to the possibility of eliminating the virus. However, to keep the virus at bay will mean keeping external borders closed and strong social distancing measures. High earners of income like tourism will struggle and other parts of the economy, will have to shift to meet new challenges. VET's role is to support training and education and be 'agile' and flexible to meet industry needs as many may have to seek retraining.

The mass 'training' of the VET workforce to be able to 'deliver' to learners remotely, will now be an advantage. How this is leveraged will be important. The opportunity is now there to provide education 'when and where' learners require the learning. Instead of institutionally directed learning, the possibility of co-created curriculum with learners, is now even more achieveable. What is now required is time to think through the best ways to meet learners' needs given the access we now have to wider understanding and capability of technology-enhanced learning.

Returning to LinkedIn as a resource - distance/remote learning

I joined LinkedIn quite a few years ago but never really participated until a couple of months ago.

The reasons are many, but one would be the 'corporate' or 'organisational management' focus for many of the posts in my feed due to the people I am linked in with.

However, the international effects of Covid-19 has meant everyone has been affected as people scramble, in their own contexts, to cope with the need for rapid change.

The effect on having to shift education online has therefore created a large amount of activity and LinkedIn has been a source of many good articles, resources, think pieces and guides on how to cope.

Here is a small selection, gleaned over the last couple of weeks:

- Inge de Waard has provided some 'quick guides' on shifting from f2f to remote/distance learning, albeit from a higher education context, but still good templates to customise from.

- Alison Miller who consults in the elearning arena, provides links to a range of resources.

- Mark Nichols work on distance learning is always good to keep up with.

- Derek Wenmoth often helps educators see beyond the present and presents implication for current decisions.

- Michael Sankey's work is focussed on bigger picture and organisation strategy  related to on-line learning.

- Peter Mellow often links to useful resources for educators.

- Joyce Seitzinger is a go to for learning design in the area of distance/online learning.

- Mark Brown provides a mix of links to the big picture and educator practice.

Therefore, tapping into the present social networking opportunities, provides for a way to benchmark what we are doing at Ara. In particular, some idea of what others are doing, the important theoretical underpinnings for decisions made on curriculum and learning design, and reflections on things that have worked and challenges. All in, a good way to be supported and not feel that we are not the only ones caught up in a massive shift from the known into the unforseeable.

Holding on to institutional learning in response to swift change

We are now into our third week of Level 4 'lockdown' in New Zealand, with another week to go. Indications are promising, with a decline in number of covid-19 cases in the last several days. A decision will be made Monday next week (20/4) on what will happen next. Whether the country will continue at L4 or move progressively to L3. Even at L3, most schools and VET institutes and universities will likely remain closed for the short term.

Therefore, we continue with distance/remote delivery for the short term, with plans to move back into normal delivery soon. Planning for the next month or so, will therefore be difficult, given the uncertainties. At the moment, after 3 weeks of intense activity providing professional development and support to our lecturers to move to distance delivery, we move into the next stage of ensuring distance delivery challenges are provided with sufficient advise and information to solve these. Coupled with this work, is the next step of ensuring learning and teaching for the rest of the semester is also well resourced and supported. One key task will be to help lecturers re-configure summative assessments to allow for distance learning. We have begun looking into on-line invigilation/proctoring platforms. These tools come at some costs and summative assessments online have not been encouraged. However, there will be a few programmes requiring traditional exams, due to registration board requirements and we will need to find, evaluate, test and implement a process very quickly, if exams have to be run online.

The Easter 'break' has also provided some time to reflect on the swift changes. I have been ambivalent about the range of on-line tools we have been supporting our lecturers to use. In the main, these tools (LMS, video conferecing, video lecture capture), provide a way for our lecturers to replicate f2f teaching on-line. The 'push' content out to learners model, is still the majority approach instead of a 'pull' and co-constructed model of learning which is possible. Digital literacy challenges and some equity issues with learners access to hardware and infrastructure (wifi) mean some programmes have been able to move into a holding pattern of sorts. However, in the main, we still see the teacher directed model as predominant. Therefore, in a way, as with the earthquakes, the opportunity to sift practice has been lost, due to constraints of time and capability.   However, there will be pockets of innovation, these we need to record, evaluate, celebrate and disseminate.

Derek Wenmouth provides some ideas for moving forward. There is need to think through what is to be emphased, going forward. Is education to meet compliance/'quality'/learner outcomes? or should we transition to something better? In the VET sector, the combination of the sudden move to another mode of delivery, unfamiliar to many institutes, and the formation of the NZ Institute of Skills and Technology, provide a once in a generation opportunity to shift practice. We learnt much from coping with the earthquakes, almost a decade ago. However, may initiatives moved back to the status quo once the market driven model of education took precedence. After all, Canterbury providers had to compete with all the other institutes and 'doing thing differently' was often 'less cost efficient'

Hopefully, this time around, some of the learnings from having to move to another form of delivery, will provide the nucleus for really actioning the mantra of 'the learner at the heart of learning'. As meeting the covid-19 challenge has shown, we have the technology and much of the capability with some innovation being shown. These need to be tapped into, going into the future, to ensure VET is 'seamless' as far as the learner is concerned and that 'delivery' is driven by the learner, not by the educational provider, as has been the case thus far.

Are you zoomed out?

I think I can speak for many when I say 'I am zoomed out!'. Last week, our team ran 4 workshops for our lecturers as they prepare to embark on distance learning. We had daily zoom team meetings to coordinate the workshops, debrief and additional meetings with our learning technologies to work out the technology. Average number of video conferencing meetings - 4 per day! All of this activity, left little time to do actual work.

This week, we are only offering one workshop this morning, to tie things together and bring the series of 'distance learning teaching' workshops to a close. However, we will be supporting the learning technologies team with their workshops covering our core learning platforms, Moodle, Panopto (for video sharing) and zoom (for video conferencing). They are offering 5 workshops this week, Taking that is a short week as Friday is a public holiday, it will be another busy week on-line in virtual meetings.

Therefore, it was good to read through this blog by Daniel Stanford on iddblog on alternatives to video conferencing. Our lecturers have become attached to zoom as it provides an easy entry into distance teaching. However, the 'stage on the sage' delivery approach is prevalent when all you do when you move to teaching on-line, is replicate the lecture. Therefore, the blog provides a platform for thinking through, more critically, the other ways possible to connect with and engage our learners.

A week of working from home and 2 days into NZ 'close down'

It's been a hectic week. After a series of meetings on Monday, my division headed home due to NZ being put on L2 which required as many people as able, to work from home. Levels 1 - 4 are NZ responses to the spread of covid-19 into NZ.

Then, just after lunch on Monday, NZ prime minister raised the level to 3 - requiring as many people as possible to work from home and a shutdown of all non-essential commercial activity (Level 4) as from midnight Wednesday.

So today, is day 2 of the 'shut down' which sees all schools, community facilities, non-essential commerce closed. The entire population is not to venture from their homes except to shop for groceries or pick up meds at the pharmacy. Going for a walk is OK but has to be within your neighbourhood. Driving to the Port Hills for a walk is not allowed :( Today, it is wet, so staying at home, warm and dry, and getting lots of work done is not a hardship. It is the sunny, blue sky days which are difficult, when the hills or beach beckon.

The shutdown is to last 4 weeks. With Ara closed, my work team will be working with our teachers to get their courses running as distance learning courses - by just after Easter. Hence, we have been busy setting up resource sites and there will be a series of workshops on 'how to teach from a distance', next week.

I checked linkedIn just after lunch and see some of our heads of department have posted. Nigel Young, head of department of business and computing, who is relatively new to Ara but with a strong background in developing elearning posted good hints.  Michael Edmonds, head of department for engineering and architecture, reminded us about how we in Christchurch are well practiced in dealing with the unexpected due to shared experiences from the earthquakes and mosque shootings.

Also from linkedIn is Mark Nichols advise on shifting modes of learning.  Mark was elearning leader for the Open Polytechnic in NZ for a time and well-recognised for his expertise in 'distance delivery'. He has practical advise for 'administrators' and 'educators'.

Derek Wenmouth posted on 'connectedness' and some tips on ensuring that 'remote' discussions can be undertaken by being prepared and a summary of the protocols for non-f2f interaction.

So, time away from the physical busyness of the workplace, has allowed many to also do some reflection and consolidation. It will be interesting to see how things are, at the end of next week :)

Working from home

We live in challenging times. Although the number of covid-19 cases in NZ is still low and almost all originating from returning Kiwis or tourists, the government has raised alert level to 2 on Saturday, out of a 4 level scale.

Following have been persistent calls to raise the level to 4 , basically to snuff out any possibility of virus spread NOW rather than wait until there is clear evidence of community dispersal.

Given the dire experiences in China, Europe and now Australia (with a lockdown imminent in NSW and Victoria), it is perhaps best to pay attention to the calls for lockdown now rather than later :(

As part of level 2 alert, all employees who are able to are called to work from home. So today, after a series of planning meetings, all of my division will be working from home. We have had several 'tryout' days in the past two weeks. Zoom, our video conferencing platform and microsoft Teams have been mainstays for work productivity along with email and the Teams 'chat function'. As an institution, we are better placed than nine years ago, when the Christchurch earthquake struck and we lost all access to our internal networks and physical entry to our main campus for a whole semester.

However, many of our programmes, due to their vocational nature, will be hard pushed to go fully on-line. The practice-based / hands-on emphasis for our courses makes going fully into on-line and distance delivery, a major challenge. The focus for these courses is to develop small and well-structured 'projects' or inquiries for students to apply what they have learnt so far, to complete. We will evaluate how this approach has worked after things calm down.

For the moments, it will take some adjustment for all our team and the wider Ara community to adjust to working from home, whilst still being able to support each other as we move through the challenge.

Identity, pedagogy and technology-enhanced learning: supporting the processes of becoming a tradesperson -- previews access

Apart from the short previews of each chapter on my book's publisher's website, other means of access include:

• Amazon - hardcopy of book - has preview of parts of the Foreword written by Professor Stephen Billett and the preface which has summaries of chapters.
• Google books - has portions of chapter 1 and 2.

Happy reading :)

Horizon report 2020

The latest issue of the Horizon report is now up on the Educause library.

There is a good infographic, summarising the various emerging technologies and trends.

This year, there is a change in how the report is structured. The familiar 'horizons' of xx years to adoption, anchoring past reports, are not used. Instead, wider social/global trends - political, economic, social, technological, and higher education trends are reviewed as the influences and future trajectory for emerging technologies and practices.

The usual suspects featured in pass reports show up but this time around, rationalised better against the wider influences listed above.

The main technologies are also reported in a broader sweep. These are:

• Analytics for student success
• Adaptive learning technologies - related to above of applying analytics to enhance learning
• artificial intelligence and machine learning - ditto
• Open education resources 
• extended reality - ie. XR = AR/VR/MR (haptic)
• Elevation of instructional design - to bring pedagogy into the planning, development and deployment of promising technologies.

All in, a good summary, as always of potentialities. This time around, better linkages to the many societal influences on how technology may assist learners. Plus the need to attain expertise in understanding the pedagogical issues related to introducing the many enablers of technology enhanced learning.

Identity, pedagogy and technology-enhanced learning: book now published

My book, a product of last year's academic study leave, is now published and available on Springer website. The book's subtitile: supporting the processes of becoming a tradesperson, draws from my framework of trades work learning as being a phased journey of belonging to a workplace, becoming  and eventually being a trades person.

It's a significant milestone for me, being my first monograph. I enjoyed the process of writing the many chapters and am grateful to my colleagues and my ex PhD supervisor, Professor Stephen Billett from Griffith University. for support as proofreaders and advisers.

I am hopeful the book fills a gap in the literature of work derived from a practitioner's perspective, both as a tradesperson and a teacher of trades work. No doubt large component of scholarship is also consolidated in the book. However, it is the learnings attained through my apprenticeship and work as a pastrycook/baker that inform the direction and premises woven through the book. My aim through each chapter being to answer the query - how is this useful to a trades teacher? and what can be applied to teaching trades work from these concepts?

I am now working towards bringing together a collaborative project to leverage off the coming merger of all the polytechnics in NZ into one entity - tentatively called Pukenga Aotearoa/Skills NZ. A 'small' project to gauge the digital literacy and affordances of vocational education learners will help be bring together a team of vocational educator researchers. I am hopeful this initial project will pave the way to a larger, externally funded project to implement and consolidate the system/process of consolidated off and on-job support for trades learners. In essence, if we are to 'put the learner at the heart of the learning' then we seriously need to 'hear the learners' voice' and to support their learning from their perspective (i.e. the experienced curriculum) and not impose from logistical/institutional/funding requirements.

Slow adoption of VR in education

A follow up on a blog written in 2016 on slowness of VR penetration in education with some discussion on potentialities for Vocational Education.

BBC has a good summary from the business point of view on 'What went wrong with VR?

Reasons reiterated by livemint as to difficulties with headsets, costs and availability of relevant VR content. Fortune magazine has a similar article, discussing the issues in some depth.The main challenges are costs of hardware and software development.

From the vocational education perspective, the main challenge is to provide authentic learning experiences. VR has a role, as evaluated recently through two of the sub-projects on the e-assessment project. In these projects, VR was used to support novice learners with learning welding skills and pre-trade training carpenters with acquiring 'safety' awareness.

The challenge with both sub-projects was maintaining authenticity. Even though students were new to the trade, small differences between virtual and real could be discerned. Leading to inconsistencies of 'object behaviour'  as described by Fowler. The specialised aspects of vocational learning require constant updating as equipment and contexts change, adding costs to the already expensive investment in developing VR scenarios. Trying to maintain currency is therefore a continual cost to ensuring VR does not appear to be 'dated'. Humans have learnt from birth, how to gauge authenticity in the environments they interact within. Many of the signals denoting authenticity are tacit and individualised leading to a wide range of aspects ot consider when developing authentic VR environments. With applications exampled by gaming, slight inconsistencies can be waived as the gamer accepts the 'fictional' aspect of the VR environment they have entered. Applying VR to authentic lived worlds is therefore a much more daunting challenge.

Therefore, still work to be done to bring VR into education. There are promising advances and increase in computing power can only improve authenticity of VR experiences. There is a need for VR developers to be cognisant of the human experience, with its myriad variety, to ensure VR experiences support learning outcomes.

English for vocational purposes: Language use in trades education - book overview

This book, written by Coxhead, A., Parkinson, J., Mackay, J., and McLaughlin, E. and published by Routledge in 2019, is the academic output from the Language of the Trades project funded by Ako Aotearoa as a National project.

The Ako Aotearoa project report provides the 'nuts and bolts' descriptions along with the various outputs, including word lists and guides for trades teaching practice.

The book, along with several articles, are the academic outputs, providing deeper details of the scholarly underpinnings and findings from the project. As there is very little literature on the topic of literacy pertinent to the learning of trades work, the work is of great importance. Of note, is the project's work in identifying 'key words' or most commonly used words in a range of trades - building/carpentry, automotive engineering and engineering (fabrication and tool-making). The corpus of vocabulary is also extended into Pacific languages exampled by Tongan.

First chapter summarise the rationale for undertaking the project. The rationale include the importance of understanding the complexities of the specific language, used in the trades and the specialised terms prevalent in trades work but not often recognised as being difficult to learn.

Chapter 2 provide an overview of the project as per the Ako Aotearoa report. 

Chapter 3 uses a case study of automotive technology classroom practice and the ways tutors in NZ engage students in the trades language discourse. In short, a summary of situated learning as undertaken in workshop based learning across Aotearoa. 

In the fourth chapter, the builders diary is used as the data to better understand the writing requirements of trades learners.The builders diary is often used in NZ to track the learning of carpentry students and includes diagrams and 'reflective learning' collected as work-based learning progresses through apprenticeship.

Chapter 5 surveys the visual literacies requires in trades learning. How diagrams are prevalent in trades text – manuals, brochures, textbooks – and how visual literacies are taught and learnt. The spatial awareness required to match 2D diagrams to 3D objects is important in many trades. This is an area for extensive follow up and study.

The sixth chapter discusses the technical vocabulary of trades work. The specialised terms and the learning of these, provide opportunities for learners to become part of the trades community. Learning a trade is therefore not only learning the skills and knowledge but also learning to 'be' through learning and adopting ways of speaking and communicating which include the ability to use trades language in context.

Chapter 7 explores the listening and speaking skills required in trades work. Communicating whilst engaged in trades work is again, a vocationally/occupationally specific form of language use. Not only listening and speaking, but understanding the underlying body language and 'response' are learning requirements.

The eight chapter looks into reading in trades – what is required, how this is being taught within the situated learning context of trades classrooms and how this can be improved.

Chapter 9 draws the threads together to recommend how to apply the learning from the project into actual trades teaching and learning.

The last chapter draws the book to a conclusion with reflections, implications and proposes directions for future research.

All in, a worthwhile read covering a neglected aspect of literacy research. The research team has many possible follow up and extension projects. All to add to a better understanding of 'learning a trade' as more than just learning how to do, but to also learnig bow to become and be tradespersons.

Neurogastronomy - book overview

Brief book overview of book read over the weekend to inform the writing of an article on 'learning to taste'.

The book is by G. M. Shepherd, Professor of neurobiology at Yale and published by Columbia University Press in 2012.

27 chapters in 4 parts. All chapters are short and pithy with good supporting diagrams. Short references for each chapter are provided at the end of the book for further follow up.A good introduction to the neuro foundations of human/mamalian senses. 

The book argues for the due recognition of the role of smell in tasting. Hence, parts 1 and 2 are related to smelling. 

Part 1 provides the background on the evolution of smell and flavor. Uses the comparison between how dogs and humans smell to explain how smelling works. The contribution of the mouth is then summarised along with the molecular basics of flavor.

Part 2 delves into the workings of smell. How do smell receptors work? Leading on to how the brain forms sensory images of smell, which is actually difficult to describe due to its multivariate nature and the personal biases and social expectations surrounding how smells are perceived, appreciated or disliked.

Part 3 brings in the roles of taste, mouth sense, seeing, hearing and flavor. 

Part four draws the various topics together through discussions on flavor and influences through emotions, role of memory, contribution to obesity, neuroeconomics effect on flavor and nutrition, brain plasticity and the human brain flavor system, contribution of language, consciousness and human evolution.

Comprehensive review  of the book found here.

NZIST establishment board regional briefing

This morning, I attended a briefing offered by the NZIST establishment board, itself an outcome of the Reform of  Vocational Education (RoVE) in NZ. The roadshow began last week with the intention of briefing every ITP (Institute of Technolgy Polytechnic) in NZ as all will become one entity - provisionally called NZ Institute of Skills and Technology -NZIST and with a recommended name of Pukenga Aotearoa.

The briefing was presented by Murray Strong appointed as Executive Director to lead the establishment process. He provided an overview of what lead to the formation of the NZIST establishment board - being one of 7 key changes to come out of the ROVE process -, what is currently now taking place to ensure that the new institute is up and running on the 1st of April and some indication of the impact / implications following the 1st of April.

On 1st of April, it is envisaged there will be no real change to the day to day running of ITPs. All will become subsideries of NZIST / Pukenga Aotearoa. There will be one academic board, and the ITPs will have sub-committees of the NZIST academic board. The new board will take over governance with the newly appointed CE, Stephen Town, to begin in July. Business as usual with regards to marketing, finance, teaching and learning, research etc. with an emphasis on collaboration across the ITPs replacing the 30 plus model / mindset of competition.

ITOs - industry training organisations - who will morph into Workforce Development Councils (WDCs) are working on a transition plan to ensure a smooth shift of learners supported by ITOs to the ITPs. Centre of Vocational Excellence (CoVEs) have been set up in two sectors but many more will be forthcoming. NZIST / Pukenga Aotearoa will work with WDCs, CoVEs and Te Taumata Aronui to ensure the learner journey is supported and there is a seamless/ 'joint up' vocational education system for all NZers.

A positive briefing, with Q & A from the floor addressed well and respectfully. The briefing was well attended by Ara colleagues and a follow up briefing was also provided for stakeholders. The higher level strategy and management of the new entity look to have been thought through, despite the short timeframe. No major changes really for teaching and learning delivery to students. The devil will, as always, be in the implementation. Leadership and communication will be key to bringing everyone on board and working collaboratively.

40 years of teaching, scholarship, research and learning

Last week, my colleagues put on a surprise morning tea to celebrate 40 years work at my institute. How the time has flown by! I arrived from Wellington in 1980, a week before starting work, still in the process of settling into a flat, found for us by an ex-colleague of my mother. They were the only people we knew in Christchurch. Through them, we gained a ready-made community of support and for that I am eternally grateful.

I started teaching a few days after starting at the institute, at that time, probably only 1/5 or less in size. Everyone was very welcoming and supportive. My initial teaching sessions were often challenging but my students were forgiving and I could fall back on my trade expertise. So, began 25 years of teaching a trade. Apart from a couple of years off when my kids arrived, I have worked full-time. The changes over the 25 years have been immense in terms of digital technology enhanced teaching and learning, the shift in focus from teaching to student centred learning and various changes in how qualifications are structured.

From early in my teaching I found the lack of easily accessible resources to inform vocational education to be a challenge. To try attain a better understanding of how ‘learning a trade’ occurred and could be supported meant engaging with formal education in teaching and learning. Starting in the mid 80s with a Diploma in Tertiary Teaching and culminating a decade ago with a PhD, the journey into scholarship and research has been personally enriching. Of importance was not only the attainment of a qualification and title, but the application of learning to practice and the gradual transition into research.

So where to next? ROVE affords opportunities, through collaboration across the entire ITP sector in NZ, to actually truly attain the mantra of ‘the student is at the heart of learning’. Learners should have access to the combined expertise and resources across the country. Large numbers in each cohort, especially for trades apprentices, will bring economies of scale and allow for personal learning environments (PLEs) to be availed to each learner. Shared resources will also provide for well designed, pedagogically effective and engaging supporting learning resources, whether digital, virtual or f2f, to be developed and deployed. I am hopeful that the larger organisation will not be bogged down in red tape! If it is, it will be time to retire ☹ If not, the expertise, will, enthusiasm and tools are there for the taking. Let’s see what the next few years hold 😊

Pukenga Aotearoa - up for discussion, the proposed name for the joint NZ polytechnics from April

Via the Tertiary Education Union's  this afternoon, is the link to the NZ Institute of Skills and Technology's  (NZIST)establishment home page update. An embedded 4 minute video with the proposed name of the new entity as - Pūkenga Aotearoa. The many meanings of pūkenga include skill, skilful, versatile, intellectual and technique.

The video also lists many other alternative names both in Maori and in English, but Pūkenga Aotearoa is the preferred choice from the establishment board. There will be consultation from mid-February across the sector and with the many stakeholders involved, to come to consensus.

Techological change and the future of work - NZ Productivity Comission draft reports

The NZ Productivity Commission has released 4 draft reports on Technological change and the future of work.

The reports are informed by two pieces of work carried out by the NZ Council of Educational Research (NZCER). The reports are titled - Subject choice for the future of work - insights from the research literature carried out by Rosemary Hipkins and Karen Vaughan and an accompying report featuring data from focus groups by Jan Eyre and Rosemary Hipkins.  The findings from the report are not unexpected. At the moment, there is still a wide gap between formalised education and the needs of industry. Students from lower socio-economic backgrounds struggle with the culture and practices of school. Schools lack flexibility in offering a range of pathways to learners. Parents are not always well informed about pathways and the future of work. Thus, rather a lot has to be done to the structure of school and to 'careers education' across NZ society.

The four reports were released at the end of last year, with submissions required through the beginning of this year. As always, a short timeline challenged with the Xmas/New Year summer break in NZ.

The four draft reports are:

- NZ, technology and productivity - technological change and the future of work.
- Employment, labour markets and income - reports informing this include 'measuring the gig economy', occupational drift in NZ, the impacts of job displacement on workers by educational level, and unemployment insurance - what cant it offer NZ
- Training NZ's workforce 
- Educating NZ's future workforce

All interesting reading. Will keep track of final reports as these influence NZ political decisions down the track.

Technology enhanced learning - into another decade

Put some time into catching up with various 'readings' on how technology is moving along and how this will impact education.

Edsurge provides a series of short articles reviewing the past 10 years of technology introduction and use within the education sectors - with a US of A K-12 slant. The overall premise is that is is NOT about the technology but about teachers and human connection. Therefore, technology is the tool, not the destination.

The World Economic Forum provides an overview of the effects of 5G on the world. There has been mixed views on 5G ranging from warnings that the pervasive effects of 5G will lead to poorer health outcomes for people exposed to 5G continually and the 'big brother' possibilities afforded to governments for observation and control of citizens TO the benefits of the Internet of Things (IoT). As usual, there will be a 'balancing out' and some of the hyped up possibilities may never eventuate. For education, 5G brings many possibilities and promises but as with the Edsurge article, it is the human factor which will and should prevail. 

311 Institute provides an overview of smartphones and the future developments over the next 50 years!! 120 pages with some good discussion albeit mainly supporting forward momentum rather than critical take on what may actually occur. The usual promises of 3D printing, AI, blockchain, quantum computing, robotics, synthetic biology and VR are rolled out as drivers informing where smart phones possibilities will go. 3 horizons are proposed for the next 10 years. Then the following decade and a more 'future gazing' 2040-2070 horizon.

Possiblities for 3D printers are summarised in this video including the 'printing' of houses, boats and complex / intricate components. However, plastic is still the key material and environmental concerns around the use of plastics need to be thought through.

As it is, education is still, as always, ,many steps behind the introduction of technology into supporting learning and teaching. Articles in this blog provide a summary of possibilities but also the important need to remember that human learning is founded on sound relationships. Technology may assist the building of relationships and access but is still someway from providing 'authentic' learning environments, especially with regards to vocational education contexts.

Using inaturalist - citizen science and vocational education

As blogged earlier in 2018, I have been using inaturalist(previously naturewatch) to archive photos of plants found on walks in the NZ outdoors. Photos are taken on my phone (currently a Samsung Galaxy s5) which automatically transfer to my Google photos. I sort these when I have wifi access and shift the best shots / notable plants into my flora and fauna album.

I then work through the photos, providing an indicative identification. The date and location is captured on the phone although I input locations manually when the phone is used off line.

When I get home, I transfer the photos along with my ‘best guess’ identification on to inaturalist. The site has a ‘suggestion’ feature which is about 50% accurate. Given photos of plants are often ‘busy’ with lots of other plants lurking in the background and being photo bombed by strands of tussock /ferns or lichen, the AI on inaturalist is actually quite good at honing in on the target plant.

The version of inaturalist on my ipad has a google lens feature which does a similar thing but is perhaps not as focused as google lens is not specialised on plants only.

A check on location is also important as many plants have regional specialisation.

Once the post is up, there will usually be affirmation or suggestions within the hour. The main identifiers on inaturalist NZ are more often then not, professional botanist. Some plants, exampled by orchids, are shifted automatically into the NZ native orchid site. No doubt, many botanist use the site to build distribution maps of the species they are studying / interested in. An example of citizen scientists' contributions is provided in this article and a NZ example from NZ Geographic. Therefore, for novices / amateurs like myself, there is ready access to expertise which is timely and collegial. I have learnt much about the nuances of plant identification, along with the challenges of identifying plants which are comparable.

Field trips, bio blitzes, nature 'weeks' etc. are all hosted on inaturalist, providing a means to archive a portfolio of learner generated data for later reflection and reference. Therefore, inaturalist provides a good exemplar for similar endeavours in other fields. Vocational education project-based learning approaches will be well supported if there is availability of related platforms. 

Plans for 2020 - a new decade to look forward to

Its back to ‘normal’ after 4 months on study leave and the annual Xmas / New Year break. 

2020 promises to be an interesting year, with all of the NZ ITPs being brought together into one entity from the 1stof April. Details of the general workings of the new institute are still hazy but one certainty is that there will be changes, all with major and minor consequences on my work into the foreseeable future.

For the moment, I will pick up ‘new’ projects as they begin to accumulate on our work register. The projects I handed across to my colleagues when I embarked on study leave last year, are now either complete or progressing well. Therefore, best to make a fresh start with programme development and other support projects.

I have submitted an abstract for the annual AVETRA conference,to be held in Melbourne at the end of April. No other conferences planned for the moment accept for the end of year Talking Teaching conference convened by the Ako Aotearoa Academy.

There are now articles to be honed for submission to various journals and networking across the ITP sector to gauge the likelihood for joint research projects in the VET space. The plan will be to scope up a worthy approach and direction for submission in the 2021 year. By then, some of the details with regards to my educational development work and possibilities for VET research will be better known.

Review of 2019

This has been the year of the book. The book, titled 'Identity, pedagogy and technology-enhanced learning: Supporting the processes of becoming a tradesperson' will be published by Springer early next year. Almost all of my time, not taken up with educational development duties, have been devoted to writing the book. In a way, the work has reminded me of the two to three years of concentrated effort put into completing my PhD thesis. I hindsight, a productive period of intense scholarship. Much of the writing for the book has come from the studies completed over the last decade. My main task has been to refresh the work and to collate the various studies into themes which come together into a smooth narrative. It has also been a good opportunity to re-engage with newer literature. The experience of being steeped back into scholarship has been enjoyable J

Apart from the book, the final report for the eassessmentsfor learning report now completed. Several conference presentations and papers have been completed in disseminating the findings and guidelines. The 4 months of sabbatical has also provided time to do some in-depth reading, the completion of a book chapter on ‘tacit knowledge’ and to draft several articles coming out of the e-assessment project.

The writing has been interspersed with short 3 – 5 day rest and recreation opportunities. Time out in the outdoors, biking, tramping or travelling has provided for much needed thinking time. In particular, to workout a strategy for moving on ‘post-book’ and to make some decisions about the future. Included in the decision making process will be how long I will engage with work before retiring. There are many personal reasons for retiring, not least of which has been the arrival of a grandchild. However, it has taken several decades to amass sufficient competency as a scholar and researcher. The sabbatical has provided some weeks when work and study have been put on hold, to think about life beyond work.

So, this year has provided an opportunity to take stock and to reflect on and refresh the work undertaken over the last decade. The outcomes of the NZ review of vocational education (ROVE) will colour any future prospects of VET research and funding. These will influence my short term decisions regarding research direction and work. The two weeks of leave over the Christmas and New Year will provide for another opportunity to reflect on and plan for the year ahead.