The way we are going just now, I think anything is possible!
There has been so many predictions about the future of technology and many believe that the people will live longer because of advances in medicine through technology and what will be possible. Also, there will be less carbon footprint because of advances in car technology and technology as a whole. For education, children will rely on computers and electronics that we can't imagine just now, and teachers will be a mere supervisor rather than a facilitator and inspiration for these children because the technology they use will be their inspiration. This is what I believe!
There is a strong belief that the technology is going to somehow save children from impending doom like the laptop in the movie ‘Independence Day’. There is a belief that a modern citizen has to have an understanding of technology to be able to function, and to be collectively in control of the development of society that is increasingly driven by technology (McCormick, 1999).
There is so many opportunities for the primary classroom in the future of technology, Gibbs(1997), in Sherson(1999), states that if these innovations happen (some that already have), virtual classrooms will become reality, 'Computers exchanging video calls as commonly as e-mail. Three-dimensional windows that open into virtual worlds instead of virtual scrolls. Machines that speak and respond to human languages as well as their own. Personal "agent"
programs that haggle for concert tickets, arrange blind dates and winnow useful information from the chaff of daily news. And everything, from our medical records to our office files to the contents of our refrigerators, hypertextually linked via the great global network.' (page 6)
On the date of the paper, (1999) it is clear that people have had predicitions for the future of technology for many many years and some are becoming a reality. Also, if these were the predictions 13 years ago and these technological advances are becoming reality today, what is technology going to be like in the next 13 years? This is a little insight into what could be our day in 2020....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=bBjvqnKQsTI
Sunday, 26 February 2012
Thursday, 16 February 2012
Mario and Sonic Olympics school visit..
Last week, we were told that we would have pupils from a near-by school coming in to be a part of games-based learning session with us.
We started to brainstorm ideas of what we would use and we were provided with wii's, nintendo ds and many games to try out. We began to try out some of the games and landed on Mario and Sonic Olympics- we thought this would be very relevant with the 2012 Olympics coming up..
Today, (16/02/2012) we had a class of 26 pupils from a primary school in Dundee come and visit us to be part of our chosen games-based context.
Our group chose to do our context as Mario and Sonic Olympics and we used the Wii game as a stimulus for the children. We decided to use the Digi-blu cameras so children could make an animation of the race, all depending on how the race went in the game. We made a race track, audience and also Plasticine models for the children to use in their animation. If I was doing this with my whole class, I would give the the children the challenge of making their own Plasticine models and using them in the animation, but because of time constraints, one of our group made them for the children. The children would also make their own race track and audience and such like for their animation if this was a project with the whole class for a long period of time.
display
olympic rings
track and models
The day went great! Most of the children were motivated and enthusiastic about the activity. It was hard to make the children focus on the Digi-blu activity at first, because of the game being there and being an exciting part of the session, however, we managed to remind the children the game was there as a stimulus and the main activity was working with the Digi-blu cameras. We did this by sharing the learning intentions and success criteria with the children which is such an integral part of the learning and teaching process.
The children were extremely impressed with their finished animation and their feedback showed the majority of them found the activity challenging and fun and would like to see more games based learning opportunities in their classroom, so I believe our games-based learning context was a success!
Today showed me how much games -based learning is important and how much it can act as a stimulus for so many learning and teaching experiences and I will definitely be using these ideas in the future..
We started to brainstorm ideas of what we would use and we were provided with wii's, nintendo ds and many games to try out. We began to try out some of the games and landed on Mario and Sonic Olympics- we thought this would be very relevant with the 2012 Olympics coming up..
Today, (16/02/2012) we had a class of 26 pupils from a primary school in Dundee come and visit us to be part of our chosen games-based context.
Our group chose to do our context as Mario and Sonic Olympics and we used the Wii game as a stimulus for the children. We decided to use the Digi-blu cameras so children could make an animation of the race, all depending on how the race went in the game. We made a race track, audience and also Plasticine models for the children to use in their animation. If I was doing this with my whole class, I would give the the children the challenge of making their own Plasticine models and using them in the animation, but because of time constraints, one of our group made them for the children. The children would also make their own race track and audience and such like for their animation if this was a project with the whole class for a long period of time.
display
olympic rings
track and modelsThe day went great! Most of the children were motivated and enthusiastic about the activity. It was hard to make the children focus on the Digi-blu activity at first, because of the game being there and being an exciting part of the session, however, we managed to remind the children the game was there as a stimulus and the main activity was working with the Digi-blu cameras. We did this by sharing the learning intentions and success criteria with the children which is such an integral part of the learning and teaching process.
The children were extremely impressed with their finished animation and their feedback showed the majority of them found the activity challenging and fun and would like to see more games based learning opportunities in their classroom, so I believe our games-based learning context was a success!
Today showed me how much games -based learning is important and how much it can act as a stimulus for so many learning and teaching experiences and I will definitely be using these ideas in the future..
Tuesday, 7 February 2012
Contextualised learning and teaching using ICT..
Today we had an input from David Miller about using a game as a context for many learning and teaching opportunities in the classroom.
I found this extremely interesting and can't wait to try it out with a class I have in the future!
David and his colleague used the game Dr. Kawashima's brain training with the children to carry out a study about how this would help them raise their attainments in mathematics.
David told us an interesting fact about these sort of games, that they are called COTS games which means commercial off the shelf games, which means they are not made for the classroom, they are just made for general use but are extremely beneficial to use in the classroom and so to look out for these kinds of games throughout our teaching careers.
The study David and his colleague carried out was with a class of P6 pupils, at the beginning of the study children had to do a 100 number challenge and then had to play the brain training game for 20 minutes each morning. Afterwards, they then did the 100 number test again and compared the scores.
They found that the children's scores improved tremendously, their speed was faster, their self-esteem grew and their collegiality improved.
They then carried on the study with 32 schools and the results were the same. They made it a randomised control trial which means everyone was picked at random, but there was one main focus and that was children from disadvantaged schools.
They found that the children who did the brain training had an improvement of 50% higher than the groups who did not and their speed was twice as fast as the control group. Children also changed their attitudes towards school after the brain training, their academic work improved because of playing brain training, truanting and lateness dramatically improved and more responsiblity was placed on the children. Also, children's interpersonal relationships changed as they were interested in how their friends and peers were getting on and also made new friend groups because of the game.
This highlights greatly that using a game as a context for learning can have so much impact on children and how they act academically and socially. The improvements made because of this game were immense and children were much more engaged in school altogether. Prensky(2001), states that 'Digital Game-Based Learning can play an important role in learning material that is not intrinsically motivating to anyone, but which needs to be learned'(pg 9). This emphasises that games can provide fun, motivating learning in a way that children will be engaged in and the for a great example is this study using Dr Kawashima's brain training as it is challenging, using skills such as remembering and recall, children are engaging in the mathematics aspect throughout but in a fun filled way!
I found this extremely interesting and can't wait to try it out with a class I have in the future!
David and his colleague used the game Dr. Kawashima's brain training with the children to carry out a study about how this would help them raise their attainments in mathematics.
David told us an interesting fact about these sort of games, that they are called COTS games which means commercial off the shelf games, which means they are not made for the classroom, they are just made for general use but are extremely beneficial to use in the classroom and so to look out for these kinds of games throughout our teaching careers.
The study David and his colleague carried out was with a class of P6 pupils, at the beginning of the study children had to do a 100 number challenge and then had to play the brain training game for 20 minutes each morning. Afterwards, they then did the 100 number test again and compared the scores.
They found that the children's scores improved tremendously, their speed was faster, their self-esteem grew and their collegiality improved.
They then carried on the study with 32 schools and the results were the same. They made it a randomised control trial which means everyone was picked at random, but there was one main focus and that was children from disadvantaged schools.
They found that the children who did the brain training had an improvement of 50% higher than the groups who did not and their speed was twice as fast as the control group. Children also changed their attitudes towards school after the brain training, their academic work improved because of playing brain training, truanting and lateness dramatically improved and more responsiblity was placed on the children. Also, children's interpersonal relationships changed as they were interested in how their friends and peers were getting on and also made new friend groups because of the game.
This highlights greatly that using a game as a context for learning can have so much impact on children and how they act academically and socially. The improvements made because of this game were immense and children were much more engaged in school altogether. Prensky(2001), states that 'Digital Game-Based Learning can play an important role in learning material that is not intrinsically motivating to anyone, but which needs to be learned'(pg 9). This emphasises that games can provide fun, motivating learning in a way that children will be engaged in and the for a great example is this study using Dr Kawashima's brain training as it is challenging, using skills such as remembering and recall, children are engaging in the mathematics aspect throughout but in a fun filled way!
Sunday, 5 February 2012
Our visit from Fife council on Moving Image Education..
Our visit from Fife Council on how to incorporate digital literacy and ICT into our classrooms and become more confident using moving image education was engaging and motivating and inspired me to use the ideas given with my future classes and inspire others to use it too.
All presentations were extremely motivating and exciting and the different styles that were used to present their way of supporting the use of digital literacy in the classroom, made them that bit more engaging.
The idea that enthralled me most out of the whole afternoon was the Digital music software- this was magnificent! The music resources we can use today are inspiring and they provide so much ideas for the classroom. I was blown away by the software Erik showed us called Sequel2. This can be used by the children to create their own music soundtrack for a visual presentation or movie they have made. There is so much potential here for so many things. Children can make their own music for their own presentations or such like , giving them much more choice and ownership of their learning which serves itself greatly to the Curriculum for Excellence 'personalisation and choice' principle- where children can personalise their work, making it much more meaningful to them.
An idea I had to use with a class when listening to Erik's presentation was a silent movie. This gives children the opportunity to use sound for emphasising thoughts and feelings without the use of speech and Sequel2 would give them the chance to do this as they have so much choice and opportunities in Sequel2 to be as creative as they can be! This is something I am definitely going to try out with a future class.
This digital music software also gives children the opportunity for challenge and enjoyment- This isn't an easy task and children should be challenged throughout. This allows children to be actively thinking and working, engaging with eachother to make something they are proud of. Curriculum for Excellence states that children 'should be active in their learning and have opportunities to develop and demonstrate their creativity,' and this type of activity does just that!
The whole afternoon with the men from Fife Council was extremely motivating and I now feel much more confident using these things than I did before and I will inspire others to use moving image education with confidence as they have so much potential for great learning and teaching experiences.
I enjoyed reading http://missh29.blogspot.com/'s blog about the skoog in which she talked about using this with nursery children. The part I found most interesting was where she talked about the fact that nursery children rely on a lot of sensory things at this stage and this would be a great resource for this.
All presentations were extremely motivating and exciting and the different styles that were used to present their way of supporting the use of digital literacy in the classroom, made them that bit more engaging.
The idea that enthralled me most out of the whole afternoon was the Digital music software- this was magnificent! The music resources we can use today are inspiring and they provide so much ideas for the classroom. I was blown away by the software Erik showed us called Sequel2. This can be used by the children to create their own music soundtrack for a visual presentation or movie they have made. There is so much potential here for so many things. Children can make their own music for their own presentations or such like , giving them much more choice and ownership of their learning which serves itself greatly to the Curriculum for Excellence 'personalisation and choice' principle- where children can personalise their work, making it much more meaningful to them.
An idea I had to use with a class when listening to Erik's presentation was a silent movie. This gives children the opportunity to use sound for emphasising thoughts and feelings without the use of speech and Sequel2 would give them the chance to do this as they have so much choice and opportunities in Sequel2 to be as creative as they can be! This is something I am definitely going to try out with a future class.
This digital music software also gives children the opportunity for challenge and enjoyment- This isn't an easy task and children should be challenged throughout. This allows children to be actively thinking and working, engaging with eachother to make something they are proud of. Curriculum for Excellence states that children 'should be active in their learning and have opportunities to develop and demonstrate their creativity,' and this type of activity does just that!
The whole afternoon with the men from Fife Council was extremely motivating and I now feel much more confident using these things than I did before and I will inspire others to use moving image education with confidence as they have so much potential for great learning and teaching experiences.
I enjoyed reading http://missh29.blogspot.com/'s blog about the skoog in which she talked about using this with nursery children. The part I found most interesting was where she talked about the fact that nursery children rely on a lot of sensory things at this stage and this would be a great resource for this.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)