LSDA Week 2 E-Journal

If this is the learning age, why am I doing this course?

The Leading Schools in the Digital Age (LSDA) course looks to develop me as a educational leader and challenge my thinking in relation to the use of digital technologies in education. I already have some strong views in this area and am confident I am well on my way to incorporating progressive, innovative and meaningful use of technology in my classrooms. However, in my current (and newly appointed) position as eLearning Coordinator at my school, I am wondering how am I going to build the capacity of my colleagues and students to incorporate digital technologies with meaningful outcomes in their classes.

So coming back to the question. It is kind of self explanatory. I regard myself as a life long learner. I love to engage in learning and always look to improve myself as an educator. I do have a mantra that there is always room for improvement (although sometimes this does cause its own problems...). As an educator I believe it is my duty to lead learning by example. Also, at this time my school has delved into the digital age with a policy to have one-to-one devices for all students by 2017. While I have embraced this as a late step forward, others are unsure and need much more support to be able to move forward. I hope this course will develop my skills in understanding their needs for assistance in moving into this direction, and give me ideas and a network which will help meet their needs.

It is an exciting time to be an educator. As a student in the late 90's, the internet was just starting to become useful to help learn new information. It has since evolved into almost a life force of it's own.

The opportunities, information and products available to educators allows them to completely change up their classroom from old school to a space which is engaging, enlightening, collaborative, deep thinking and far reaching. It really does allow us to challenge the status quo. 

However, I feel many teachers do not challenge what they have been doing, often for reasons of fear, workload or just contentment with the way things are. For others, the need for proof before they change is holding many back. 

I agree there is a great need for evidence for including technology into the classroom, however the evidence many seek is not available (or hard to find). I feel this may be because they seek it to support the use of technology without a change in pedagogical practice. This is where statements about 21st Century Learning Design (21CDL) in Fullan's Paper A Rich Seem: How New Pedagogies Find Deeper Learning is quite powerful and resonates with me. 

"21st Century Learning Design, or ‘21CLD, ’ provides small groups of teachers with a set of rubrics for analysing learning activities (which range from traditional lesson plans to the kinds of deep learning tasks described above), and a corresponding set of rubrics for analysing the student work that results. Each rubric provides an explicit definition and concrete indicators of progress on a specific competency, such as problem-solving, knowledge construction or self-regulation. Teachers first work together in groups using the rubrics to code example learning activities and student work samples. Each group then uses the rubrics to analyse and code some of their own learning activities, and then collaboratively redesign those learning activities to remake them into powerful deep learning tasks. Teachers then test out the newly-designed learning tasks with their students, and return to share the impact with the group. The process then becomes a cycle of redesigning learning tasks through ongoing collaboration, and collectively analysing the impact on students’ learning. 21CLD thus provides teachers with a structured path for implementing deep learning tasks"

The idea of giving teachers the tools to reflect on the learning tasks they are using, think outside the box about how the learning tasks can be improved and then collaborate to create new, engaging tasks which enable deep learning is very powerful. If teachers were given this opportunity, they could easily create the evidence they so require, but from a firsthand and immersed perspective. 

This also takes into account the Design Thinking approach. However, teachers need theses tools to progress. 

So, in summary, here's three things I hope this course will help me to achieve:

1. Help my colleagues feel comfortable in questioning the status quo.
2. Develop ways (or gain opportunities) to assist myself and my colleagues to redesign learning tasks for "deep learning".
3. Create an environment where my colleagues feel safe to share success and failure with regard to pedagogical techniques when using digital technology for learning in their classrooms.