Education Theory

Sep 27 2006

Weblogs, Critical Studies and Cynical Thoughts…

Well I this is my second year of using weblogs within teaching and I can safely say this year is appearing to be much more successful. I am using weblogs in three ways really:-

  1. Information Portal – I have a weblog for Year 10 and Year 11 ICt students – www.constructict.com/studentblog . This has been a reasonable success as it becomes part of students lives to check and use the information, links and resources placed upon the blog. The students can also link up to recieve each post as an email. BUT it has been a struggle with Egyptian students to get them to use electronic resources, which I was initally surprised at. The crucial point to the site is that it must have resources and information that makes those students who use it, better able to think and succeed in the course.
  2. Student Work Folio – I have just set this up this year – www.constructict.com/year7. The blog is almost a kind of competition, where students from two KS3 classes one a year 7 and one a year 9 place work whether it is a podcast, file, text or graphic each week. Over the months there are pages setup for Best Student and for allowing the addition of other student work. Problems so far are time….as I only see KS3 classes for a double lesson a week. A solution is maybe to link with there other class teachers – to add work from a variety of classes that uses ICT within other subjects. It will also be interesting the parents responses as this week bloggin letters and policies will be given out.
  3. Student blogs to show progress – On the AS Applied ICT course, where they have to produce an eportfolio, students are asked to upload their research and plannign each week. And this will be included as a link within their eportfolio to show evidence of planning and testing. They are then linked in a blogroll of my GCSE blog. So far this year it is working much better – with students seemign to have a much better idea of using the web and its tools (they are also using del.icio.us and bloglines to less success.)

Interestingly last week I presented my first INSET in this school on the use of weblogs within schools to enhance teaching and learning. The actual INSEt which was completely practical went well, although I found it interesting and slightly bewildered the level of computing practical knowledge within the group. The initial success and interest though has not led to anybody takign up the use of blogs so far – is this due to time pressures, lack of interest or lack of facilities within an egyptian establishment? I don’t know.

Beyond the INSET, it has made me think of how difficult it will be to do research within my schools environment with such a natural resistance to ICT as a teaching tool, or with students so academically focused that anything that does not receive a grade towards their GCSE is not of interest?

Am I being cynical? I don’t know……

By drtech • Education Theory, WordPress • Comments Off on Weblogs, Critical Studies and Cynical Thoughts…

Sep 25 2006

The first to post a Read Review Respond…

Well finally I managed to be first to do something on my M.A. course by posting the first RRR on EDUC5251. It won’t last but at least its a good start. Not looking forward to meetings at the end of the week when I would rather be realxing over a shisha and ‘awa masbout’…but such is life.

Must now post my old assignments to the repository seeing that it was my idea and Aisha was kind enough to set it up.

Have decided to look in detail at three chapters that seem to show interesting research:-

  • Allegories of Creative Destruction: Technology and Organisation in Narratives of the Economy
  • Virtual Society and the Cultural Practice of Study
  • Abstraction and Deconceptualisation: An Anthropological Comment

Heavy titles as you can see. In the meantime I am still looking at ideas for my Critical Study. The work on Web 2.0 and its actual ‘nitty gritty’ effects on learning could be an interesting one. Although there has been lots of research already. I have even maybe thought of looking at how the use of Web 2.0 technologies could improve distance learning maybe on the course I am working on, or with another group of students starting their first year? Will mull this over further. There is an interesting post here from Tony Karrer on the take up of Web 2.0 beyond the inital hype into actual use.

By drtech • Critical Study, Education Theory • Comments Off on The first to post a Read Review Respond…

Sep 20 2006

Back to College, EDUC 5251 and the Virtual Society?

Well to start off the term I have been reading the introduction to a book of research articles called – Virtual Society? Steven Woolgar – Five Rules of Virtuality. Interesting and shall I say very much like the ‘technocentric’ papers of Papert this has already attracted me to its strong ideas…. It must be noted that this introduction to a series of research projects was written around 2001/2002 and although as Steven says the speed of technology and its supposed impacts is exaggerated it must also be considered that 5 years is a long time in research into technology and its social effects…

Summary

Why Study – ‘Are we now beyond the hype?’ –
Steven introduces a very skeptical eye – to the whole idea of ‘epithetised phenomena’ (e-, virtual – , cyber- …) and how just because you add this to the front of a word the technology has a major and undeniable change to the activity – after a ‘utopian’ enthusiasm with early research maybe we now need to sit back and say technologies are affecting us but lets be sensible and actually see how with a sensible eye to see the reality of these changes…

Rationale / Introduction and Problems with It –
Steven returns to his opening paragraphs and analyses them in the following terms

1. ICT research often has ‘sweeping grandiloquence’ e.g. is over the top and ‘clumps’ all users together as a royal we, to which it suggests ICT will ….and so we need to ask which particular peoples and how it will effect them…

2. ICT research often looks on ‘macro’ levels rather than how they are used in everyday practice, and so he suggests they must be researched more in a bottom up way – the nitty gritty – how ICT is affecting employment, social aspects and more…

3. ICT research seems to have such confidence with 100% ‘declarations of effect’…concentrating on ‘effects, outcomes, impacts and changes’ …which needs to change and be more fluid waiting for maybe less ‘presumed’ and more surprising outcomes and effects…

The Question Mark?–
‘…statements of enthusiasm or criticism leave little room for moderate mixed situations that may be reality’, Steven suggests that if a middle line is not taken on the research which allows for the enthusiasm of ‘cyberbole’ but underlies this with a simple real look at if it works that the research becomes either useless or is not pushed forward…and so a? rather than rewriting the initial open cyberbolic paragraphs so as to imply scepticism while allowing for enthusiasm…

Organisation and problems –
Outlines problems of the fact that ‘there is barely any aspect of modern society potentially untouched by the effect of new electronic technologies’ and so research can never even try to cover all the specific questions and studies related to each issue although if research allows for it to be ‘applied to’ other issues then it will be more successful and useful. He outlines organising research by substantive /work area focus, social / political themes, typology of technology ….all are viable but Steven then goes on to outline what he perceives are better rules (see below.) He also suggests it must be acknowledged that rate of technology change can effect research especially over long periods of time. However the ‘obsolescence of technologies’ is often amongst specific ‘nerdy’ groups and ICT sales so be careful.

Five Rules of Virtuality–

  • ‘…depend on social context’ – ‘a social setting separate from both domestic and economic spheres – provide a key to the successful integration of the real and the virtual’ , looks at and says that without specific local social and maybe physical contexts / environments for each person then the virtual cannot hope to work well and affect uptake * ‘..fears and risks are unevenly distributed’ – that due to different parts of the community and different personalities – old, young, rich, poor all look on technology very differently and have very different expectations often ones that express very fearful views or very accepting views..
  • ‘…virtual technologies supplement rather than’ – expresses the idea that the virtual will never fully takeover but will work side by side with the actual e.g. memos, and email or that more televised football leads to more people attending football matches …’virtual social life provides a further dimension to a persons real social life, not a substation for it.’
  • ‘…the more virtual the more real’ – weird one this, that actually using virtual technologies alongside actual ‘stimulates’ more real activities ……e.g. email communication actually promotes other usual forms of communication
  • ‘…the more global the more local’ – ‘Globalisation is quintessentially about the death of distance’ , similar to first idea but looks at the fact that to have a global virtual identity relies on ‘local ways of managing technology’ another words people enjoy their local existing working practices and virtual identities and technology use must be based on this…
  • ‘Counter Intuitive’ – The author found it incredibly interesting that almost all research went against what the researchers thought would be the outcome, even though the findings were not necessarily bad but simply different…… Phewwwww….a heavy starter to a book, so as I have just finished reading it and getting back into the swing of this academic life and study give me a few days to come up with a visualise my thoughts…

Personal Thoughts /Brainstorm –

Strengths of article/ Thoughts –

Weaknesses of article /Thoughts –
(See Post Soon for my thoughts e.g sections above)

P.S. Hmmm…just seems that immedi.at has gone the way of the fairies, which is a pity I liked the idea of RSS feeds going to Instant Messenger accounts. Will keep you posted to see if its gone for good.

By drtech • Education Theory • Comments Off on Back to College, EDUC 5251 and the Virtual Society?

May 23 2006

Gliffy Static and Grazr Crazy:)~

Well now following along with my trial student, ironing out problems in my Moodle course. Of which there are many. The student has a dial up connection and so the ‘screencasts’ are very difficult for him to access, so I am going to place them as a zipped resource hopefully which will allow him to download them over a period of time.

Apart from that I am finally about to start my Outline draft for the assignment, and hopefully will be able to get that done soon.

At the moment have made the joyful discovery that Gliffy Beta is finally up and running, and I have had my first play. Its a great flowchart drawing Web 2.0 application with great collaboration features and ability to embed into any site or of course Moodle. It will be of great use in the future especially for those students on the AS who don’t have access to the likes of Smartdraw. It will definitely form part of the second projects tasks.

And also apart from the fact that it does not work in Moodle – aarrgghhh (need to find out why) – Grazr takes a OPML for RSS feed and places it in a mini browser window that is interactive, not only displaying the links but also able to link to more information. Check it out where that horrible TAGBOARD used to be!

By drtech • Education Theory, Moodle • Comments Off on Gliffy Static and Grazr Crazy:)~

Mar 14 2006

Blog-jects and more….

Well my tutor keeps on telling me to read, so I’ve been devouring a few articles recently and transcripts from presentations that I have found incredibly interesting from Bruce Sterling, Julian Bleecker and George Siemens. You will find all the links currently in my delicious feed, click on the RSS feed link above. Otherwise click on more and you can get the links in the extended post. I hope to be able to include some of their ideas practically in my WIBBLY. Have a read the articles are at least food for thought.

Here are the links:-

EmergingTechnology Speech -Bruce Sterling,
Connectivism:A Learning Theory for the Digital Age
A Manifesto for Networked Objects – Cohabiting with pigeons, Arphids amd Aibos in the Internet of Things – -Julian Bleecker

By drtech • Education Theory • Comments Off on Blog-jects and more….

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