Digital
pedagogies EDSE12024
- Assessment 1: Reflective
Synopsis
This Reflective Synopsis is an account of my
investigation into the use of digital pedagogies in secondary schools. Included
in this Reflective Synopsis are my limited experiences of use of technologies
to support and transform learning and the facilitation of legal, safe and
ethical behaviour with ICT. I will begin with the use of technologies to
support and transform learning.
Use
of technologies to support and transform learning
Advancements in technology have provided new
opportunities for teachers to support and transform the learning of students in
secondary schools. Teachers can now use tools such as blogs, wikis, websites, presentations,
simulations and interactives to engage students and promote collaborative and
cooperative learning.
Blogs and wikis are a way for students to have their
work read by others. This is important because students can use higher order
thinking to consider and comment on other students’ posts. Constructive and
positive comments help students learn, develop confidence and contribute to
learning. I found blogs to be a convenient way to share my work, and read the
work of my fellow students at any time of the day or night. Wikis allow
students to contribute to learning by being multi-authored sites. Students feel
involved in the class by contributing to a group task and can learn from other students’
opinions.
Websites are a convenient way to display information
for students to access at any time. Images, audio and video can all be put on a
website to support learning. I found that putting up You Tube videos of
mathematics on my website was an effective and convenient way to demonstrate
solutions to mathematical problems. Audio can used to record instructions and
images can be used to display tables and charts. Because the student can view
content whenever they want and as often as they want, the student can progress
in their own time.
Presentation tools can do more than just display
slides of dot points. Teachers can make presentations more engaging by
introducing themes, transitions between slides, animations, word art, smart
art, shapes, charts, photos, video, hyperlinked screenshots, and narration.
Although these presentation tools do not rank highly on the SAMR model, they
are still an effective way to present and share information.
Simulations are especially useful for demonstrating
concepts that would otherwise prove to be difficult or impossible to
demonstrate. For example, showing the binomial distribution of one thousand
coin tosses. With so many coin tosses required, using a simulation tool makes
sense.
Interactives make learning more enjoyable. Interactive
learning objects, mapping, collaborative authoring, online concept mapping and
online timelines are all examples of interactives. Interactive learning objects
are essentially any digital object that are categorized and reusable. Because Interactive
learning objects are reusable, they are an efficient way for teachers to facilitate
learning. Mapping can involve students
creating maps for specific purposes complete with text and photographs.
By incorporating these tools into learning at a
fundamental level, teachers will achieve the goals of the European creative
classroom framework. The section which I found to be the most interesting is ‘Learning
practices’. Regarding Learning practices, students who use these types of tools
will:
·
learn by exploring
·
learn by creating
·
learn by playing
·
have self-regulated learning
·
have personalized learning
·
have peer-to-peer collaboration
Technology allows the teacher to create learning
outcomes which come under the higher categories of Bloom's revised taxonomy.
While remembering and understanding information remains essential to learning,
students need the higher categories of applying, analysing, evaluating and creating.
Students also need the higher order thinking skills scaffolded
by de Bono’s hats. Teachers cannot possibly teach students for every challenge
they may face in the future but we can teach them skills to overcome these
challenges themselves.
Finally, teachers need to know their audience. Through
technology, teachers can monitor student progress more effectively. By reading
student blogs, monitoring wikis or other online collaborative tools, teachers
can plan differentiation techniques to assist struggling students and to keep
gifted students challenged.
Facilitation
of legal, safe and ethical behaviour with ICT
As a teacher, it is my responsibility to model legal and
ethical behaviour with ICT and to keep students safe from the dangers of the
internet. The first issue I will discuss is the matter of copyright. In
general, teachers can copy one chapter or ten percent of a work for educational
use. Teachers may also stream, link or embed YouTube videos because this is not
copying, and therefore not subject to copyright. It is unclear whether teachers
can copy YouTube videos. Teachers cannot copy from commercial DVDs. It is very
important to model the correct use of ICT material because this teaches ICT
ethics and copyright law applies to students as well.
I have left the most important ICT issue for last.
That of student safety. The introduction of ICT has dramatically increased the risk
of exposure of students to material that is:
- pornographic
- sexually explicit
- offensive
- hateful
- violent
- encouraging of activities that are dangerous or
illegal.
It is bad enough that adults are exposed to this type of material, but for
children this is totally unacceptable. Teachers must remain vigilant by using blockers
and monitoring what material students are accessing at school and bringing to
school.
Students also need to be taught about the physical and emotional dangers of
communicating online. Services such as email, chatrooms, discussion groups,
instant messaging and web pages all have the potential to expose students to stranger
danger, harassment and bullying. Again, this issue requires the vigilance of
teachers and the education of students. Teachers need to ensure that online
collaborating is private, and regularly monitor the traffic of their
collaboration.
Embracing the benefits of technology will revolutionize the way teachers
teach and students learn. Slowly but surely, lessons are changing from ‘student
see, student do’, to ‘student think, student solve’. It is up to teachers to
support them in doing that.
