E-Learning in the K-6 Classroom

I think the words of Maddie Buras are spot-on when describing the impact digital stories can have when retelling a personal experience. She says “I think the audio visual aspect helped bring the audience into the story. Hearing my voice and seeing my personal photos made it easier for the viewer to feel my experience, rather than just reading an essay” (full article here). That is what I tried to achieve in my own digital story which I created as part of a uni assignment. As my story describes the impact my daughter has had on my view of life, and in compiling it I had to go back and remember what it was like when she was battling cancer, I can relate to another quote from Maddie; “it was definately emotional to go back to the mindset she was in”… yes, sometimes we try to forget the past because it is too painful. I also made my digital story for my daughter, so she can view it for years to come. I am now inspired to make more and maybe refine this one.

The abovementioned article also contains a link to educational uses of digital story telling that is worth a look.

If you are interested you can view my story here (will embed later when edublogs fixes the problem)

Watch this Youtube video about a very inspirational little girl who lives with Cerebral Palsy. She is lucky to have such a supportive family and community and to be attending her school with all its available technology and equipment.
The story has many similiarities to Helen Keller’s story. Unable to communicate and learn until given the tools. The world will be Melissa’s oyster, imagine what Helen Keller could have achieved with the technology available today – and she achieved so much without it!

There are so many possibilities out there for the disabled today. Just look at the software program that is featured in the video; it enabled Melissa to control a computer mouse by moving her eyes around a special computer monitor – amazing! Have a look at it – and have the tissues handy!

This interview is with a US classroom teacher, Susan Silverman, who talks about how the internet has opened up many opportunities for learning in her classroom. There are many academic articles on the topic but it is nice to read one from a teacher’s perspective.

Susan says “The Internet gave me the opportunity to really open the classroom walls, bring the world into the room, and collaborate with the global community.” Susan is known for her collaborative internet projects, for which she has won an International Reading Association award – the Miss Rumphius Award, that is presented by members of RTEACHER  (an online community of more than 1,000 educators from around the globe) to educators who develop and share exceptional Internet resources for literacy and learning.

It contains some good ideas for online literacy learning; you might like to look at the interview with Roxie Albrecht about writing and technology.

The interview was featured in Teachers’ Voices, a Reading Online series which is a freely available, online-only publication of the International Reading Association (IRA), a professional organization of literacy educators. Its focus is literacy practice and research in classrooms serving students aged 5 to 18. “Literacy” is broadly defined to include traditional print literacy, as well as visual literacy, critical literacy, media literacy, digital literacy, and so on.
(From http://www.readingonline.org/about/about_index.asp)

Also, have a look at the Index of articles available on Reading Online, there are some interesting titles relevant to ICT education.

This article is a quick overview on some of the ways blogging can be used in the classroom.
I love the idea of a teacher using them as a sort of online journal of the days activities to keep parents informed and up to date with the classroom happenings. What a great way to make sure parents know what is being studied in the classroom and also has opportunities for parents to post comments or ask the teacher questions that other parents can have access to. It has endless possibilities as a communication tool. Class work could also be featured or perhaps a link to a class Flickr account.

This is a good introductory video to Creative Commons and how it’s licencing works.

During my web-based research I stumbled upon EDTECH: Focus on K-12 , a U.S. based website which contains some interesting articles and resources. The site has various sections such as; Lesson Plans, technology updates and ‘The best of Edtech’, just to name a few. One section is dedicated to “Tinfoil Stars” which are awards that honour educators who use technology to enhance learning. One recipient of a Tinfoil Star was a school in Philadelphia that was recognised for its teacher technology training program. Each summer break the teachers can give some of their time (voluntarily) to refresh their technology skills with the aim of making it easier for them to implement ICT into their programs. Check out the article relating to this school’s award here. The school has an impressive website which has links to individual classrooms where parents can check homework requirements, supplies, etc. Have a look at the bottom section of the schools homework page which contains links to each grade.

The school also has a year-long training program and a dedicated specialist who supports the teachers with their ICT lesson plans and individualised lessons by grade level. They also conduct weekly hour long “quickie-tech” sessions about a specific skill that teachers can take back to their classrooms and use straight away. It appears that this school is very dedicated to supporting its teacher in their own technology learning which follows on with benefits for the students.

After reading Kim’s post regarding this article I had a look at it myself and it had me asking the question; Should ICT be seen as a set of tools for use in the classroom setting or should it also be taught as a standalone KLA? Is it enough that children only have the opportunity for ICT learning when classroom teachers are able to integrate it or should we be making ICT lessons a formal part of the curriculum (while also continuing to use it in other subject areas when relevant)? Some schools already have ’specialist’ computer (RFF) teachers but I am not aware of how common this is. And maybe our ‘computer’ teachers need to be kept up to date through their own continuing education in the area of ICT in schools. I know of a couple of computer teachers who are still in the dark ages and do little more than teach children how to play on ‘paintshop’ or type a story in Word. I can imagine the benefits to education if our ICT teachers had specialised in the area while at university and had the knowledge to teach relevant skills to our children (and of course the schools had enough funding to purchase all necessary hardware, software and connectivity etc. and the extra time in the school week to fit it in)! Then general classroom teachers can integrate the technology where relevant to lessons but children will be receiving formal training that will be of great benefit to their futures.

The article makes reference to The International Society for Technology in Education which looks like a good website for teachers. They have some useful resources (links) listed and it is worth a look around.

One area of interest to me is the role gender plays in the ICT classroom. During the past few months research into E-Learning in the classroom I have noticed several articles referring to the obstacles girls face in this area. As quoted on the NSW Public Schools site, “The Commonwealth Department of Education, Training and Youth Affairs (DETYA) study Real Time: Computers, change and schooling (1999) found that girls are falling behind boys in attainment of advanced ICT skills, despite showing considerable interest in computer technology.” The PDF version of this study can be found here.
An article in the Australian Educational Computing journal, July 2000, about promoting gender equity (see pages 13-16), offers some ideas as to why girls may not be on the same playing field as boys when in comes to IT. The authors also suggest improving teacher awareness on the issues involved and list several teaching strategies that might reduce gender inequality. I would be interested in finding out whether this issue has improved over the past 8 years.

After reading Richards post (following on from Katie’s post) about Online report cards, I considered the implications. As a parent it would be good to be able to have a longitudinal view of how my child is going at school, although it could have me worrying unnecessarily over the nitty-gritty (she has had a bad day and not done well on a particular task). As a teacher I can envisage a nightmare scenario. From personal experience working at my daughter’s school office, I know that there are quite a few parents that are constantly up at the school ‘nagging’ staff because of some minuscule issue with their child. I can imagine if regular, ongoing, online reporting were in place these parents would be camped out on their child’s classroom verandah, teachers would need ongoing counselling to deal with nervous stress! We need to take a step back and look at the whole picture when we are contemplating a child’s progress at school, and address real issues when a teacher sees the need. Having said all that I believe that when I am teaching full-time I will embrace online communication with parents (via email) as a way to keep them up to date informally, and when there is an area of concern or something to celebrate. It will certainly make my life easier if I don’t need to be phoning parents all them time.

My 9-year-old daughter lives with a significant vision impairment. She was diagnosed with cancer, in both eyes, as a baby (Bilateral Retinoblastoma) and endured almost 2 years of chemotherapy, laser therapy and cryotherapy in a bid to save her sight (and more importantly, her life). Sadly she lost her left eye when she was 2 but luckily she still has usable vision in her right eye. She has recently started learning braille and touch typing as there is a concern that she will fall behind her peers when she gets to high-school, due to the volume of reading required. I often think about how lucky we are that she was born when she was as technology not only saved her life, but will also help to make her journey though life much smoother than the road travelled by children with this disease 100 years ago (who would have lost both eyes if they survived at all).

Due to the technology available to her today (along with the support of various specialists and Vision Australia), she has every opportunity to excel at school and go on to any career that she chooses. I treat her the same as a fully-sighted child as I believe she will not be held back by her vision impairment… the world is her oyster and that is largely due to the technology available to her.
If you are interested have a look at this ‘Adaptive Technology Guide’ from Vision Australia which explains some of the devices available to aid people with a vision impairment.