Australia – educating globally

On Friday, the Age newspaper featured a story on how foreign fee paying students have become a lucrative income source for cash-strapped Victorian schools. It’s coincidental because I’ve just caught up reading the February report by the International Education Advisory Council on the challenges and opportunities of Australia’s international education sector.

While the focus is predominately on expanding tertiary and VET sectors, there are some interesting statistics on the demand for quality education both regionally and internationally. For instance:

• Education is the fourth largest export industry – $15.7 billion in 2011
• In NSW – international education and training is the second top export earner after coal
• As a result, Australia has internationalised the design and delivery of its education systems
• China, Rep of Korea and Vietnam had the highest student enrolments in schools in 2012
• Australia is likely to host more than half a million students in 2020 studying across all education sectors.  This will be worth $19.1 billion to the local economy.
• Australia needs to focus on providing high quality education

The report identifies seven key issues to be addressed if Australia is to remain globally competitive.  Three of these are relevant to the work of school systems:

1. Provide the highest quality education
2. Develop strong and diverse partnerships that encourage exchange, capacity building and collaboration
3. Inform educational policy through accurate and timely data analysis and research

In the book ‘That Use to be Us’, Thomas Friedman explains why an average education won’t suffice in a hyper-connected world.  He uses his wife’s old college in Iowa as an example of how competitive education has become.  When Thomas’ wife attended Grinnell there were 1600 students. He says if you want your kids to go to Grinnell now, they’ll be competing against 250 applicants from China.  Even Bill Gates admitted he’d rather be a genius born in China than an average guy born in the US because these days multinational companies look globally for the best talent.

This is the reality of living in today’s world and it’s something that every educator needs to be mindful of. Education is global, it’s big business and technology has made the farm, not just the paddock, the new environment. Those things that used to be barriers are now opportunities for new ways of working in a knowledge age.

Teaching the educators

Jal Mehta, assistant professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education wrote recently that we “have an almost endless list of things that we would like the next generation of schools to do: teach critical thinking, foster collaboration, incorporate technology, become more student-centered and engaging. The more skilled our teachers, the greater our chances of achieving these goals.” Building teacher capacity is both a school and system responsibility.

The role of the teaching educator in our system is similar to what Michael Fullan refers to as coaches.  They are experts in literacy and numeracy who work with the lead teacher to plan, model, observe, reflect and challenge with the intent of improving the learning outcomes of all students.

In the early days the arrival of a TE in schools was often met with resistance and in some cases, their expertise was under utilised.  Over the past few years we have worked tirelessly to articulate and communicate the what, why and how of the TE in schools.  Their role is not to obstruct schools but to build instructional capacity.  The focus shifts from building individual capacity to community capacity.  Once we build community capacity, our schools will be able to link into an ever bigger system of inquiry, learning and knowledge.

We now understand that the most powerful way of building capacity is in situ, in context around the real problems and challenges that arise on a daily basis.  Previous models of withdrawing teachers from their context and transmitting information did little to improve their practice and only served to further frustrate them.  The best approach is to learn the work by doing the work and having someone that you can share and reflect with.  I think teachers respond well to the immediacy and collegiality of this approach.

In 2011, Michael Fullan and Jim Knight wrote an article titled Coaches as System Leaders.  They state that if “teachers are the most significant factor in student success, and principals are second, then coaches are third.  All three, working in coordinated teams, will be required to bring about deep change.”

Some may call it the power of three – we refer to it as the instructional triad (TE, principal and lead teacher) or the teacher-learning triad (teacher, lead teacher and TE).

Our TEs are an important part of our system strategy to improve the learning outcomes of all students and ensure a professionally rewarding working life for teachers.  The how and why of their work represents a shift in education from “I know to we learn” and success for some learners/schools to success for all learners/schools.

A global village

I’ve just returned from the UK where I had been invited to participate in the CSCLeaders conference.  CSC is an annual global conference that brings together about 100 leaders from across the Commonwealth.  The conference is run in partnership between Common Purpose and HRH The Duke of Edinburgh’s Commonwealth Study Conference which began in 1956.

Aside from being a great privilege to participate, the conference was very much PBL for leaders. Here were 100 culturally diverse leaders from all sectors including government, military, police, education, banking and finance, not for profits, religious groups, activists and the arts coming together to tackle a global challenge. This year, the challenge set for participants was how do you get disparate communities spread across the world to become bridge makers in the global networks of the future?

The conference spanned eight days and was structured in three parts.  The first three days we had input from prominent speakers on the political, social, economic, cultural and environmental challenges of the 21st century.  This was followed by discussion within our groups.  The next three days included site visits to one of five cities in the UK which contextualised the challenge by giving us an opportunity to see how local communities were tackling the challenge of becoming ‘bridge-makers’.  Groups were able to then meet with local community, educational, business and faith leaders.  I was fortunate to have spent my study tour in the London borough of Tower Hamlets because Hargreaves and Shirley include it in their book The Fourth Way as a turned-around district for its schools.

Tower Hamlets is one of the most culturally diverse boroughs of London and a stone’s throw away from the financial and media district of Canary Wharf.  There is a huge population of Bangladeshi migrants – the largest community in the UK.  It also has the highest rate of child poverty in London but as Hargreaves and Shirley state the schools in TH were able to dramatically turn around in a decade from one of the worst performing to performing above the national average.  The reason for this dramatic turnaround was the community coming together to create and build new capacity.

According to Hargreaves and Shirley, the schools improved because services were integrated, school leaders were visionary; they were able to attract high performing teachers who stayed and positive partnerships have been developed between schools, business, community and religious organisations. The Tower Hamlets schools became responsible for each other by setting their own ambitious targets for students.  One of the directors quoted in the Fourth Way said “poverty is not an excuse for poor outcomes.”

I spoke to the Mayor of Tower Hamlets, Lutfur Rahman and the head teacher at Swanlea School, Brenda Landers. Swanlea has 1000 students enrolled and was judged by OFSTED to be ‘outstanding in all areas’.  Brenda attributes the school’s success to a sharp focus on the data and an investment in building the capacity of teachers.

The final three days were spent in Oxford where groups shared their reflections of the study tours.  We synthesized ideas and data then tried to identify innovative practices that the Commonwealth nations might adopt to build leadership capacity at local and global level.  We also reflected on how we could collectively try and tackle some of these 21st century challenges.

A major element of the conference was networking opportunities which included lunch and dinner engagements with HRH The Duke of Edinburgh and HRH Princess Royal and business leaders.  These networks aside from creating the opportunity to bring more people into an ever expanding network of critical thinkers, problem-solvers and exceptional leaders will hopefully sustain the work in years to come.  The next part of the conference takes us to Mumbai or Johannesburg in June where we get to explore the challenge in the context of a vastly different city.

In reflecting on this experience, two important things struck me that were neither obvious or explicitly stated.  The first is that CSCLeaders brings together culturally diverse people who share a common purpose of leading  organisations into the 21st century.  Despite the diversity, there are common threads uniting us all. These threads include a passion for the work we do, a drive to seek new ways and solutions to challenges and the recognition that in this century you cannot do this alone, interdependence demands collaboration at every level.

The second is that depending on which nation of the Commonwealth you were born in, your perception of the world is vastly different.  Members from developing nations are looking for the recognition that they have something valuable to contribute. They do not seek “a leg up” but want to be active citizens in building better societies.

The above made me think about how we go about the work we are doing with our school communities here in Parramatta and raised so many questions for me. Have we have tapped into the rich diversity of our school communities and started from where they are rather then where they should be?  Are we stifling innovation or failing to nurture it? What are the new models we need to explore to build leaders capacities and so on.

This conference taught me many things but key was the value of multiple data sets and the evidence it draws as well as the critical need to interrogate the data from several different points of view. Listening to other leaders and hearing what the data and evidence says to them was a real eye-opener and often altered my own understanding.

For me the most important message I can share is that no matter your experience or expertise base, there is always something to learn.  Living in a global village demands that I need to be a life-long learner as well.

‘Sew’ your own success

There is a proverb that says ‘borrowed garments never fit well’.  This is particularly apt for education systems on the journey from good to great.  I believe there are two roads that can be travelled when it comes to school improvement – pay someone to do it for you or ‘sew’ your own success.  One of my favourite quotes is from Richard Elmore and co’s book Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning: We learn to do the work by doing the work, not by telling other people to do the work, not by having done the work at some time in the past, and not by hiring experts who can act as proxies for our knowledge about how to do the work.

Many education systems from around the world look to Singapore, South Korea, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Finland for the answers but if it were as simple as borrowing their models, then educational improvement would literally happen overnight.  Countries such as Finland have taken years if not decades to build a high performing education system.  What we can do is look at what works, learn from their success and weave some of these ideas into our own educational narrative.

As Pasi Sahlberg, author of Finnish Lessons: What Can the World Learn From Educational Change in Finland? acknowledges that “the Finnish school system cannot be transferred anywhere else in the world.  Many of the successful aspects of Finland’s education system are rooted deep in our culture and values.”  He goes on to say that “what we can do…is take a look and learn from one another.”

Earlier this month Sahlberg was interviewed for the Huffington Post - the responses

were ideas worth thinking about:

1. Primary school teachers put well-being and happiness of their pupils before measured academic progress
2. Urge parents to take more responsibility for their children e.g giving more time and attention to them at home
3. Flexible learning pathways that provide personalised options to study what individuals believe will help them become successful in life
4. A universal standard for financing schools so that resources are channeled to schools according to real needs
5. Align the vocational schools curriculum to the standards of academic high schools
6. Elevate schools as places for social learning and development skills
7. Celebrate national achievements, rather than high rankings in global education league tables
8. Ensure a universal standard for teacher preparation that follows standards in other top professions

Systems around the world can learn from each other about what makes the most difference and while each system reflects its own political, economic and social context, the key driver I think, is a relentless focus on quality learning and teaching. This learning recognises the needs and capabilities of every student and the critical importance of good teaching and teacher capacity building.

We will never bring about the changes required in building quality schooling  by continuing to use the stale rhetoric of the school improvement agenda. With its narrow focus on high stakes test scores, programmatic of the shelf solutions , driving achievement through competition and so on, this agenda ignores the experiences that do make a difference.

It’s a small ‘virtual’ world

I’m not sure if you have had this experience, but the last thing I expected while travelling in Greece on a pilgrimage with Catholic Education colleagues was to be approached by two fellow Australians who recognised me from my Twitter profile.

A 21st century encounter with my colleagues developed through social networking.

It was a powerful moment to connect ‘face to face’ with people who had become my professional colleagues in a very 21st century kind of way. Social media is a phenomenon that’s here to stay and one that has made it possible to connect with people outside your physical sphere on a daily basis to share thinking, learning and ideas. This chance encounter helped me realise that the professional learning community we are a part of via Twitter or other online tools might feel mostly ‘virtual’ but it is real. It’s not just a world of ideas, it is a community of educators who share a common interest to improve learning and teaching. What we share online has the potential to encourage, inspire and stretch us to improve the work we do and the way we go about it.

Recently George Couros (@gcouros) wrote about the importance of using Twitter to not only share information, but to listen and to engage. He made the point that it’s not good enough for schools, organisations and businesses to just ‘be online’ and share information alone. They must listen to those they serve. If we don’t use the tools effectively to engage, to collaborate and participate in the conversation, we risk using a ‘Web 2.0 tool in a Web 1.0 way’ and never take full advantage of its capabilities. Online tools shouldn’t be used as a monologue stream, because the technology is designed for dialogue.

For myself, tools like Twitter and Bluyonder allow me to be part of a global professional learning community and is an opportunity to share my own ideas and engage with the ideas of others for my own professional improvement in the work I do as a system leader.

Bumping into my colleagues in Greece demonstrates the power of this online community and is a good reminder that what we share and do in the virtual world does have an impact in the physical world.

Building capacity through strategic partnerships

For a number of years, we have had a strategic partnership with Republic Polytechnic (RP), a tertiary institution in Singapore that leverages problem-based learning to provide an industry-relevant curriculum to Diploma level. It is geared towards students becoming innovative and entrepreneurial professionals with global perspectives.

A number of our schools in the Parramatta Diocese such as Parramatta Marist High School, which introduced project based learning into the school four years ago, have been associated with RP in Singapore. On the way back from the Building Learning Communities conference (#BLC12) we had the opportunity to spend a few hours at the school to further strengthen our strategic partnership.

We saw instructional leadership in action with RP’s Senior Director Michael Koh and Deputy Director Karen Goh very focused on student learning and on implementing processes to ensure that their teachers are continual learners, and hence improving as teachers. Michael and Karen described the needs of students in today’s world as the driver for all their work as well as how the curriculum design of problem-based learning centres upon the experience of learners. We saw that their model of problem-based learning utilises many high effect teaching strategies that have been identified as such by John Hattie’s research (Visible Learning, 2009) such as student self-reporting (1.44); teachers providing feedback (0.73); good teacher-student relationships (0.72); problem solving teaching (0.61); and concept mapping (0.57).

To support their learner focused model RP has created contemporary, collaborative and engaging learning spaces for students to connect, plan and reflect on their learning. They have embraced technology in every aspect of campus life – they don’t have any books or papers but instead have instant messaging, wireless projection systems and their trademark Learning Environment Online. While RP is the fifth polytechnic institute in Singapore, they have the broken the traditional mould in student learning, teaching and learning space design.

Viviane Robinson’s Five Dimensions of Effective Leadership

We also saw that a significant strategy at RP was ensuring teacher quality is highly visible. All teachers are expected to achieve a ‘Facilitator’s’ qualification which entails significant teacher observations and reflection, both personal and via a collegial panel. This aligns with what we know from Viviane Robinson’s research on instructional leadership that promoting and participating in teacher learning and ensuring teacher quality have high effect sizes on student outcomes.

During the visit, we had the opportunity to experience first-hand one of their ‘authentic’ learning environments – a full-scale flight simulator located in one of the classrooms. This amazing facility is used to teach students a wide range of problem solving techniques across a range of disciplines.

A flight simulator at Republic Polytechnic used to teach students a range of problem solving techniques.

We saw the teacher, who is a former pilot and member of crash investigation units, set a series of problems that the students needed to solve by working as a team just as a pilot and co-pilot would. These start off simple and become more complex with students required to draw on both known and new information to solve. The problems required students to utilise knowledge across multiple domains including mathematics, science and geography. For example, working out what ground temperature would be using only the current outside temperature at 30,000 feet; or determining how many degrees it takes to turn the plane and line up for landing. From our experience we could see how this ‘real life’ learning experience was used with students to develop key problem solving strategies. Needless to say this learning environment is in high demand by all students.

Evident at RP was the importance of teachers providing real life opportunities to engage students in learning; in situ teacher observations and reflection to enhance teacher quality; and evidenced-based leadership to drive the focus on student learning. In other words, RP use good theory to support good practice to deliver the best learning opportunities for each and every student.

This is why we have a strategic partnership with Republic Polytechnic because they understand that all students can learn, that good teachers make the difference and that leadership is pivotal in driving continual improvement. Robust partnerships like this build everyone’s capacity and leads to real change and improvement.

It’s easier to tell than to teach

The release of a discussion paper on teaching last week by NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli was not before time.

For too long, education policy has been surrounded by myths. For instance:
•    lift the ATAR for teacher training courses at university and we will naturally graduate better or brighter teachers;
•    pay teachers more and we will automatically improve teaching practice;
•    give principals greater autonomy and we will certainly improve school performance;
•    make class sizes smaller and we will logically ensure better student learning outcomes.

While some myths are falling out of favour – e.g. the lack of supporting evidence is making it increasingly difficult to hold up the small class policy as a key improvement strategy – many are still being propagated as a cure-all to what ails our schooling system with little or no evidence to suggest they will have the intended effect. Unfortunately many of these myths are focused at the wrong end of the problem. If we want to improve learning and teaching it will be in the doing or as Elmore says, we ‘learn the work by doing the work’. Silver bullet approaches or appeals to jingoism e.g. ‘Teach for Australia’ don’t do justice to the important issue that every child in every school deserves a good teacher.

Over the past few months, The Australian newspaper has been running a series called ‘Inside our Classrooms‘ and I have been reading with interest the views of teachers and education commentators on what they see as the key issues facing educators today. Some teachers believe it is becoming increasingly harder to ‘control’ students and are finding they are competing with Google for credibility in the classroom. Others are yearning for the ‘good ole days’ when scholarly excellence was the primary pursuit of the teacher. For myself, the issue goes far deeper than keeping students engaged in class or teachers having exceptional knowledge of their subject matter.

It’s in the relational aspect of teaching that the magic happens.

In the 21st century, teachers don’t just need good subject discipline knowledge; they need to have a deep understanding of pedagogical theory and be able to apply it in the classroom – it’s the profession of the teacher to know the difference and bring the two together. It’s in the relational aspect of teaching – the application of both content knowledge and pedagogical knowledge – that the magic happens; in how well teachers know each learner and personalise learning to accommodate diversity and individual needs.

We need to move beyond the myths to the practice – from the telling to the teaching. This relies on a very different framework; one that highlights the absolute complexity of teaching. And we need to take an honest look at our teacher training programs to see if we are adequately preparing teachers to meet the demands of 21st century schooling because the game has changed.

In the 21st century, we live in a connected world where students have unprecedented access to information and knowledge at their fingertips. It is no longer desirable or sustainable for teachers to be the sole keepers of information. The NMC Horizon Report: 2012 K-12 edition released in June predicts that tablets and mobile phone apps will be widely adopted by schools within the next 12 months with the potential to be prevalent across all academic disciplines because of their pervasive impact on practically every aspect of ‘informal life’. The report highlights the importance, both for teachers and students, of acquiring new skillsets such as ability to assess the credibility of resources, comprehend information, develop capacity for leadership and creativity which come about through ‘challenge-based, active learning’.

We know from Bransford et al (2000) that students are capable of discovering their own knowledge, incorporating that alongside previously learned knowledge and using that knowledge to solve real-world problems. The 2012 Horizon Report signals that those teachers who see themselves primarily as content experts will find it increasingly harder to survive, let alone thrive, in the modern classroom. Subject matter, while important, only goes so far.

On the other hand, a greater focus on accommodating new ways of learning and teaching to suit the changing context in which our students live does not necessarily equate to improved learning. Good teaching candidates require a deep subject knowledge – not necessarily the highest ATAR – and the passion to continue to learn about their subject area; they need to be able to relate well to young people and meet the learner where they are at; to understand and implement learning theory; and employ the right pedagogies to make a difference.

This requires a rigorous model of teacher training that incorporates both theory and practice; that provides quality feedback for teachers on their teaching; and one that links teachers with mentors and coaches while in training. Melbourne University has taken a step in this direction by offering a Master of Teaching where as part of the course, graduate teachers are placed in a school for a full semester and actively teach classes. Throughout the placement they receive quality feedback from experienced teachers and mentors and have the opportunity to build professional networks while learning their craft in situ in a real learning environment.

This model has application for all teachers throughout their careers. In our own system, we focus strongly on teacher collaboration and the use of professional learning communities with a specific inquiry focus because the research shows that teachers learn best when they learn together (Timperley et al, 2007). We need to find examples of teaching innovation and excellence and take them to scale through collegial collaboration and ongoing teacher learning. And to do any of this we need to trust the profession.

My point is that extrinsic factors don’t make good teachers. We have to work on improving teacher quality from the inside out. And while we certainly have to train and prepare new teachers coming through, we also have to work with the teachers already teaching in our schools.

It’s time to move beyond the myths and shift the focus from the telling to the teaching. As I commented in Saturday’s Sydney Morning Herald we need to build teacher capacity, involve teachers in continual professional learning and encourage them to share their practice with each other. Teachers are the ones who have to improve and get better at their craft.

The exchange of ideas

I had the privilege of opening the Building Learning Communities conference (#BLC12) in Boston last week with Alan November from November Learning - an international leader in education technology. BLC started with a group of 20 friends and has grown into an international exchange of ideas with over 90 workshops presented throughout the three days. Despite its enormous growth, BLC aims to maintain its early roots by bringing together thought leaders and educators to share ideas and create partnerships to help expand the boundaries of learning and teaching.

There was a great energy in the room on our first day with over 1,000 educators and teachers gathered from 20 countries. The opening session was designed to change the game plan and rethink our first engagement with students. Alan launched November Learning’s 1st5Days project, with the aim of creating a global, online professional learning community focused on changing students’ experience in the first five days of school. Using the power of crowdsourcing, Alan hopes to start an international conversation about how teachers and leaders can transform the start of each school year for learners, to focus and engage students in learning from the very first moments.

As I commented in the opening sessions, often the first five days of school, even the start of each school term, can be taken up with organisation, administration and management instead of learning. I shared the example of a New Zealand colleague who used local fire fighters to inspire his students on the first day of school. One of our own principals, Attila Lendvai from St Canice’s Primary in Katoomba, does a similar thing by creating a ‘wow’ moment for students and staff to engage them in a new learning focus from the first day of each term.

I think the first five days project will provide a great source of inspiration for teachers and leaders and has the potential to really challenge and transform the way we traditionally approach the start of the year; certainly an exchange of ideas worth participating in via Twitter #1st5Days or to register visit
http://blc.vxcommunity.com

My Catholic Education colleagues, Anna Dickinson, Gary Brown and Paul Meldrum and I led two workshops at BLC2012 on the theme, Learning by Inquiring, which focused on three key elements for schooling: Imagination, Creativity and Innovation.

It seems obvious for learning to always start with a process of inquiry. Too often perhaps, this is not the case and our traditional approach to learning and teacher learning has been focused more on recitation of facts or information gathering rather than inquiry.

Fortunately, as educators we know a whole lot more today about how people learn. Through the work of Bransford et al we now understand that powerful learning requires knowledge of the learner’s context; building connections between concepts; and the opportunity to engage in metacognition or reflecting on what and how we learn. This process enables deep learning and allows the learner to apply what they have learned to a range of contexts – essential in today’s world.

What does this have to do with imagination, creativity and innovation?

If we consider the learning theory in the context of making schooling more relevant and effective for today’s learners we can identify a process for our own work as teachers and leaders – ‘the HOW’ – through the lens of Imagination, Creativity and Innovation.

 

Imagination – is about looking at the current model of schooling; identifying what is relevant and what is no longer relevant to today’s learner/world; and imagining new approaches = RELEVANCE

Creativity – is about exploration and discovery; playing in the sandpit; the testing and trialing of different approaches using a range of tools = ENGAGEMENT

Innovation – is about monitoring and reflecting on what works and what doesn’t; sharing innovative practice; allowing innovation to take hold and taking it to scale = APPLICATION

This can’t be achieved in an adhoc way. We need a clear intent, a well defined theory of action based on sound educational research and practice, and a framework for building capacity within schools supported by leadership. In our own diocese, this has been an iterative process for our schools based on their individual needs and within their local contexts.

‘The HOW’ is about creating the space to consider new possibilities, to tinker with those possibilities and to learn from what fails and to measure and share what works. The beauty of today’s tools means sharing innovation isn’t limited to just across the classroom or the staffroom, but across the globe.

Through collaboration and the exchange of ideas with other teachers and school communities we are able to benefit from the ‘wisdom of the crowd’ and share our own wisdom to benefit our students’ learning. The old adage says ‘it takes a village to raise a child.’ In the 21st Century it takes a global, connected, learning community.

In the closing session with Alan November, I presented the proposition to educators for the need to ‘start yesterday’. In responding to the challenges of schooling in today’s world there is a need for urgency. It’s not simply a question of tweaking what we already have but looking at new models and new approaches. The only way to achieve this is through a process of learning by inquiring i.e. imagination, creativity, innovation. It is key for sustained change, engagement and improvement in learning and teaching.

Building connections for a sustainable framework

The prevailing model of schooling is so deeply embedded in our collective psyche that it’s often difficult to imagine alternate models.

New Tech Network’s Lydia Dobyns and Tim Presiado with myself and Br Patrick Howlett at Parramatta Marist in March 2012

Last Friday, my colleagues and I visited New Tech Network’s president, Lydia Dobyns and senior director, Tim Presiado to look at ways to build a sustainable framework beyond their 100 schools in the US and to identify opportunities to extend their approach to interested schools within our own system.

New Tech Network is a non-profit organisation working with schools, school districts and communities to reframe schooling by creating innovative learning environments using a project based learning (PBL) approach. Students not only acquire subject matter knowledge, but the skills needed to thrive in today’s world such as critical thinking, collaboration, work ethic, content literacy and communication.

One of our own successful secondary schools, Parramatta Marist, has been involved with the New Tech Network for over three years and as a result has reshaped its curriculum offering, invested significantly in the ongoing professional learning of teachers and demonstrated sustained improvement in student learning. Lydia and Tim visited Australia in March this year to announce the inclusion of Parramatta Marist as the first school outside the United States to become part of the network and to share their approach with over 300 educators within our system.

It is important to understand that PBL is not a solution that can be simply taken and imposed on any school. It is a construct to support school communities committed to reflecting on and improving student learning and teacher practice in a contemporary world. Lydia describes the heart of New Tech’s work as building the capacity of teachers and students as part of an educational network through a focus on quality, sustainability and growth. It is through the network – the collaboration within and between schools – that the approach is strengthened and refined.

From our meeting, we identified several issues critical to reframing schooling, including resource implications, a blend of support incorporating coaching and teacher shadowing, the adoption of rigorous application criteria as a starting point for engagement, opportunities for the creation of a PBL professional learning community and an overall commitment to working together to build a sustainable framework.

It is great to see we can broker connections with partners across the globe who are so willing to share their expertise and experience as we meet the challenge to look beyond standardised, off-the-shelf solutions and engage in a process of discovery and learning to improve schooling.

Are we trend setters or chasers?

The New Media Consortium will release its 2012 K-12 Edition of the Horizon Report next month. I’ve read this with great interest over past years as it identifies and describes emerging technologies which will impact on education over the next 1-5 years.

If you’re interested, you can read through the Horizon Project preview – it predicts that mobiles and apps as well as tablet computing be adopted in a year or less. Within two to three years, game based learning and personal learning environments should be adopted across K-12.  And within four to five years augmented reality and natural user interfaces will be the tools of choice for students and teachers.

For many educators, the use of technology is a significant leap in practice but for others, the future is already here. The emerging trends raises an interesting question for me: do we need to institute core competencies for teachers around use of technologies in the learning space?  The answer to this is probably dependent on your worldview of schooling, its purpose and processes.  If you see schools in an industrial model, you’ll have a certain response.  If you are pushing the boundaries and exposing students to emerging technology, you’ll have a different response.  Too often however, we take the default position of limit and control.

This question has been at the front of my mind this week ahead of my keynote and participation in a debate on BYOD at the Technology in K-12 Education National Congress 2012. I find it interesting that in light of the Horizon Report, we are still debating the pros and cons of BYOD in schools. Technology is only going to stretch us as educators as we look for ways of ensuring the tools can adequately support personalised learning.

I’m not sure if any of the local readers have seen a series of stamps released by Australia Post  titled ‘Now and Then’.  These stamps depict how the ‘technological revolution has touched the daily lives of most Australians’ from phone boxes to mobiles  from record players to iPods.  What I noticed when I saw these stamps was the relatively seamless transition of technology into our daily lives – yet it hasn’t occured in every school environment.

If you think back to the seventies, there was little difference between home and school ‘technology’.  For example, if you had a colour TV at home and a cassette player, you would probably find these in most classrooms.  Enter the digital revolution and the gap begins to widen between home and school.  Most households today have multiple devices, we’re connected to the web and we can access learning anytime, anywhere on any device yet in many schools the devices are limited or they are not being used to deepen student learning and thinking.  We’re hesitant about building connections or embracing the opportunities of online learning.

This is Prof Stephen Heppell talking four years ago about the role of emerging technologies.  Will we still be having the same conversation in four years time or will game based learning and augmented reality be the norm?  To quote Heppell ‘if you’re an eleven year old today, you’ve only ever experienced life in the 21st century and you’re probably hearing this debate around technology and 21st century learning and thinking get on with it already – an eighth of the century is already gone!’

In the not too distant future, we have become trend setters not trend chasers.