Are Students Really Digital Natives?

Please check my first podcast about the usage of technology in my students' lives.

Evaluating 21st-Century Skills

Today’s education system deals with irrelevance if we do not link the break between how the students experience and they learn. Schools are wrestling to maintain tempo with the surprising pace in students’ live outside the school. Students will occupy their adults live in a multitasking, various, technology –driven, dynamic world – and they must show up supplied to do so.  Literacy in the 21^st- century means more than just reading, writing and computing skills. It means understanding on how to apply the learning and talents in a situation of modern life. To deal with the expectation of the21st century, students have to understand more than the core subjects. They have to know on how apply their learning and talents – by reasoning sharply, using learning to new circumstances, evaluating material, assimilating new ideas, corresponding, working together, solving problems, and making decisions.

Productive educators always have integrated learning skills into their instructional methods. Today, educators have the chance to assimilate learning skills, 21^st century tools, and core subjects to create a dynamic education for their students. When we integrate learning skills like thinking and problem solving skills with the 21^st century tools like problem solving tools (such as software, decisions support, design tools), it means we have the ICT literacy because we are using ICT to handle complexity, solve problems and analyse sharply, creatively and systematically.

The 21st century is here. Is our education system preparing our students with the skills that they will need to thrive in this century? With the increased focus on high-stakes testing and school accountability, whose job will it be to teach these critical skills that may not be specifically defined through the core content standards? How can teachers go beyond the content standards and incorporate the teaching of these skills and dispositions into their classrooms? How well do you currently address these skills, and what changes can you make to your teaching practices to further foster these skills in your students? When we explore a web site called Partnership for 21^st Century Skills, we may get answer of all those questions.  Their mission statement for partnership for 21st century skills are described on the web site, that is “to serve as a catalyst to position 21st century readiness at the center of US K-12 education by building collaborative partnerships among education, business, community and government leaders” (http://www.p21.org/about-us/our-mission).  They presents a holistic view of 21st century teaching and learning that combines a discrete focus on 21st century student outcomes (a blending of specific skills, content knowledge, expertise and literacies) with innovative support systems to help students master the multi-dimensional abilities required of them in the 21st century and beyond. The key elements of 21st century learning are represented in the graphic and descriptions below. The graphic represents both 21st century student outcomes (as represented by the arches of the rainbow) and 21st century learning support systems (as represented by the pools at the bottom). 

This is quite interesting website. Since I am working at an International Baccalaureate (IB) school, we also implement the 21^st century skills. When I take a look at the skills mentioned at the web site Partnership for 21^st Century Skills, I found out that we have implemented similar skills. In IB schools, we have five transdisciplinary skills. They are social skills, communications skills, thinking skills, research skills and self-management skills (Primary Years Programme Making the PYP Happen: A curriculum framework for international primary education, 2007, 2009).  So, the skills mentioned on Partnership for 21^st Century Skills is not something new to me. Even though it is not something new, I still find it challenging to implement the skills onto my teaching and learning process. In addition to that, I think the IB transdisciplinary skills are clearer because have a better explanation or grouping for the skills. What surprised me was about the core subjects. In IB, we implement an integrated subjects. We do not individualize the subjects. All subjects are important. When we individualize the subjects, I think this will confuse us. What I meant is like this… when we individualize the subjects, we think that there are many subjects to cover. When we think that there are many subjects to cover, we will be confused because we have so limited time. That is why, I disagree with the core subjects. We should not individualize subjects into core subjects. But, this is my opinion as an elementary teacher. May be as a high school teacher, it is better to have core subjects instead of integrated subjects. As I have said that these skills are not new to me. I implement the skills onto the teaching and learning process when we have unit of inquiry subjects. The skills are taught inside the unit of inquiry. I think when we teach the skills inside the unit of inquiry, the students have a better chance to learn and directly apply the skills. So the skills are not being taught separately. When I design a summative task, I have to make sure that the students will show the transdisciplinary skills that we focus on.

Reference

Making the PYP Happen: A curriculum framework for international primary education. Cardiff, Wales GB CF23 8GL, United Kingdom. International Baccalaureate Organization. Retrieved from http://occ.ibo.org/ibis/documents/pyp/p_0_pypxx_mph_0912_2_e.pdf

Partnership for 21^st Century Skills. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.p21.org/ 

Good Resources

Technology Embedded: Living, Learning and Teaching
http://technologyembedded.wordpress.com/

Author/Owner: Sean Thompson
A brief description of the site:
The resource acts as his blog. He uploaded ways to improve his practice of ICT integration across the curriculum, learn and share new things. He is presently involved in a course of study for a post-graduate certificate of educational technology and information literacy. His studies have illustrated to him the importance of new media in education and the necessity of empowering students with the skills to both use them effectively and to learn how to better direct their own learning.
A brief description of the types of resources:
There are Wikis, Poster-style links, Slide Share, YouTube channel.
A brief evaluation of its utility: This blog is quite useful because this blog connects to another useful resources.


The PYP at COE
http://pypatcoe.blogspot.no/

Author/Owner: Erin Lundie
A brief description of the site:
The resource acts as blogs. She is the PYP Coordinator and Instructional Technology Specialist at Chandler Oaks Elementary.
A brief description of the types of resources:
The resources listed there are very useful for teachers who kows about International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program (IB PYP).
A brief evaluation of its utility: This blog is quite useful because she shares her expertise in teaching and learning using IB PYP standards and practices.


PYP ICT Blog
http://cispypict.blogspot.no/

Author/Owner: Kathy
A brief description of the site:
The resource acts as blogs of some activities and resources done at Copenhagen International School.
A brief description of the types of resources:
The resources listed there are very useful for teachers who kows about International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program (IB PYP).
A brief evaluation of its utility: This blog is quite useful because she shares some expertise in teaching and learning using IB PYP standards and practices.


Educational Technology and Mobile Learning
http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/12/10-great-resources-on-21st-century.html?goback=%2Egde_3970584_member_278454521#%21

Author/Owner: Med Kharbach
A brief description of the site:
The posts are mainly reviews of educational web tools and mobile apps, app suggestions, educational infographics and posters, guides and video tutorials, and tips on integrating technology into education. The sources of the content are multifarious: from feeds on his personal/professional learning network to direct emails suggesting potential content for his blog.
A brief description of the types of resources:
The resource acts as a blog. There are iPad Resources, Teacher Guides, Youtube 4 Teacher, Teacher Tools and all other categories.
A brief evaluation of its utility: This blog is quite useful because this blog connects to another useful resources.

Wiki in Education

More and more Wikis are being used in educational settings. Today’s economy has evolved from a mechanical economy to a system of connections economy. Because of that, students will need to have earned skills in a collaborative and creative project-based work and to have developed analytical, thoughtful practices. Wikis are an ideal tool for guiding students achieve these skills.

Wikis can be a challenge for IT to control. Because everyone is putting in data, you end up in a mess. Wikis can be a challenge for users to learn. Even though it is quite easy to create wikis, it is not always so simple for users to take advantage of them. So for nontech workers, using wikis does require upfront training. Despite wikis' rough user interfaces, it took me just a couple of hours of training to get started with them. Wikis help distribute information, not control projects. Although wikis aid in project management, they do not actually give tools for project management. It is important to think through the information structure that your wiki will use before you start it. Everyone must be on the same page in creating the criteria used to arrange information. Wikis are not safe. Even where IT uses wikis wisely, there is an underlying risk to having project information kept on wikis. So wikis are not appropriate for editing sensitive documents.

Why you should still use wikis despite their issues? Although wikis are not perfect, they do have powerful advantages. Foremost is the fact that documents are edited in a very visible way, which adds responsibility. Members of a team have to support the changes because everybody can see it. A technical advantage of wikis over other document management tools is that there are plenty of good open source versions available at little or even free. Plus such wikis are usually extensible, so you can customize them to your needs. Yet you do not need an expert administrator or extra hardware resources.

Kidblog

I found out about this blog when I did my research on blogging.

Creating Your Digital Portfolio Page

I think it is a good step by step of showing on how to create digital portfolio page.

Utilizing Blogs In The Classroom

 The first time I used a blog was on March 2009. My grade 5 (five) students were having the Primary Years Programme (PYP) Exhibition. I thought I would like to include blogging as one tools to show the process of the exhibition. I did not realize that considering blogging by just posting assignments or journaling is not blogging. At that time, I used Blogger (www.blogger.com). I was new at blogging at that time. I found out that the structure is too difficult for my students to use it. I was confused, too at that time. Then, I searched another platform that provide the same service, Kidblog (www.kidblog.org). I found out that this blog site is easy to use and safe for the students. I remembered that safety was my first priority when I decided to include students in blogging. I can manage the setting so that I can restrict the level of visibility of my students’ blog from completely private, only the teacher can see posts, to completely public, like a regular public blog. As a teacher I can leave students "private" comments that only they can see and I can edit comments others leave if I feel the need to. By using Kidblog, my students can log in easily. I registered students by uploading a spreadsheet of user names and passwords.  This makes it very simple to get my students on the site without the hassle of remembering which email was used or the barrier that many my students don't yet have email accounts. Another plus of having Kidblog is that this platform is free.

  As I have said before, I thought that blogging is just by posting assignments from meas a teacher or journaling from my students’ point of view. Now, I realized that posting assignments or journaling is not blogging. For me, the intention of using blog is to provide my students to interact about the content which can be done outside the classroom or school hours. I remembered at that time, since the school where I worked is a state school, there was a strike. All schools community were not allowed to go to work. The students were kept at home by their parents. It was a stressful time since at the same time, my grade 5 (five) students were preparing their PYP Exhibition. During the preparation of the PYP Exhibition, I became a mentor for my students. There should certain times where the students met me and discussed about their progress. Since I was not allowed to come to school, I communicated with my students through Kidblog. I blogged at my blog, then my students checked and followed the directions stated on my blog. When my students created a blog, thier blog was like a showcase for their work. It is a place to share learning because it was not only me as the teacher who gave inputs, but their friends also provide feedback to the blogger.

           

References

Blogger. (n.d.) Retrieved from www.blogger.com

Kidblog. (2009). Retrieved from www.kidblog.org

Using Technology to Do Different Things

Teaching and learning process nowadays have changed. Teaching and learning process are different from the classroom in the past. In today’s world,technology has become very important in everyday life because the integration of technology within the system. Changes in technology in recent decades have greatly influenced the ways in which we work, play, and learn. Today’s students have grown up in a digital age and technology is part of their daily lives. There are more and more teachers, administrators, parents and students are beginning to understand how learning is changing because of the connection we can make using technologies (Richardson, 2010). Learning technologies is easy but learning with the technologies is more nuanced. We use technologies in everyday life differently. For example, in the past we used a typewriter to write a story. Nowadays, we use a computer to type a story. In this case, the computer is replacing the typewriter. Our usage of technology, in this case, can not guarantee the interaction and connection with the audience. This is what Dr. Thornburg (2004) meant when he explained about doing things differently. Things that we used to do it one way, now we do it another way. In order for us, teachers, to prepare our students for their future, we must do different things. We must use the technologies as tools to do different things. Using a computer is not limited only to write a story. We can use the computer to research, to edit our findings, to present our findings, and to interact with the audience.

When I was a boy, I liked to read books. For me, reading books open a new world to me. I can be in another place without having to be there physically. I learned new things from the books. Reading books expand my knowledge. Books for me are simple technologies. I brought books everywhere I go. As time goes by, it is a bit challenging to bring books anywhere we go. Even more, when the book is thick which make it heavy to bring. When we bring one book, that is ok. What about if we need to bring a lot books and they are all as thick as encyclopedia or dictionary? Books can take more space and add more weight onto our luggage when we are travelling. Luckily, nowadays, we have e-book. With the e-book, I still can open a new world to me. With the e-book, I still can be in another place without having to there physically. The advantage of having the e-book is that we can save it in our laptop or mobile phone. We do not need to bring the thick books. We can organize our e-books into a portable library in our laptop or mobile phones which can be brought anywhere we go. 

I think having e-books will make our life more interesting. As I wrote this discussion, I started to think that e-books are just replacing the ordinary books. When we are teaching using the e-books, we are still using “books.” It means we are just doing things differently while we are supposed to do different things. We are supposed to use e-books for different things. Hopefully by the end of this course, I could learn more about how to use technologies as tools to do different things.

References

Richardson, W. (2010). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin. Chapter 1, “The Read/Write Web”

Thornburg, D. (2004). Technology and education: Expectations, not options. (Executive Briefing No. 401). Retrieved fromhttp://www.tcpdpodcast.org/briefings/expectations.pdf

Laureate Education, Inc. (Thornburg, D.). (2010). The Emergence of Educational Technology. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Societies and Technology

Society and technologies have affected one to another. If we compare the way we use technologies in the past and in everyday life, we can see the big differences. There are increasing number of improvements happen. For example, in the past we used a telephone to call someone who does not live in the same house as us. Then the technology of telephone developed. We had a mobile phone so that we still can make a call to our friends or relatives or anyone while we are not at home. The technologies did not stop there. We combined the mobile phone with a radio so that we can use the mobile phone not only to make a call but also to listen to the radio. The technology still did nt sto there. We started to combine the mobile phone, a radio and a camera. This time, we could use the mobile phone for making a call, listen to the radio, and to take a picture. Then, we started to add the internet technology onto the mobile phone so that we can also surf on the web.

I believe that the development of technologies will keep on moving forward as we need the technologies to develop. By saying that, I believe that technologies are developed because there is a need in the society. We had a telephone because there is a need to make a contact with someone who does not live in the same house as us. A mobile phone is created because there is a need to use the phone in a mobile way. We combined a mobile phone with a radio because there is a need to listen to the radio in addition to make a call in our mobility. There is a camera integrated onto the mobile phone because there is a need to use those two tools in our mobile life. We added internet onto the mobile phone because there is a need to get information in our mobile life.

Dr. David Thornburg (2004), on one of the media segment, reflected on characteristics and examples of technologies in Alvin Toffler’s three waves. The three waves are the agricultural era, the industrial era, and the information era. He also mentioned about the possibility of the fourth wave. It is the communication era. In the agricultural era, time is considered as seasons. In the industrial era, time is very important because there is a need to be on time when we create things. In the information era, we use technology to minimize the time consumed in creating a product. Dr. David Thornburg (200) believes that in the communication era, the technologies are used so that there is a collaboration between the parties. This technology development affects the teaching and learning process. With the developed technologies, we can use them as tools to collaborate in the teaching and learning process. The teaching and learning process is not limited only at the classroom. It opens the door to a new communication era where people can share ideas and participate without having to be at the place (a school or a classroom) physically.

Technology has changed the society. Everything which was hard to do  are becoming more simple to do. Communication becoming easier and faster. On the other hand, I still believe that human still need to have a face to face interaction. Therefore, I am still wondering on the effect of technology on the human interaction. What will happen next? We can only wait because the answer means that there is a need for the technologies to develop more. 

    

References

Laureate Education, Inc. (Thornburg, D.). (2010). The Emergence of Educational Technology. Baltimore, MD: Author. 

Who I am

I am a home room teacher of PYP 5 at an international school at Norway. I am married and have one daughter. We have been living in Norway for the last 3 years. When I start this blog, we are on the fourth years.

I love travelling and watching movies. I also enjoy listening to music and reading books.