Learning in the Digital Age - An imperative for change
"An imperative for change" Yep. This message has been advocated for a fair time now. The Melbourne Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians was published in 2008 (the same year I started teaching). We are still saying the same thing in 2015. Where are the actions out of this declaration? The content stated in the document was great, and the urgency of the need for change was also present. However, here we are still seven years later with nothing much to show.Professor Stephen Heppell spoke to us at the first face to face session for this course this week. I can link what he told us to the document above. He is sending the same message!! Yet still nothing systemic changes. WHY?
I have had the privilege to listen to some excellent speakers from the international education sector over the last four years, and the message is clear. There is an imperative for change. Stephen Heppell did not say anything new from my perspective. What is missing in all of this is how to accomplish this change. It is all fine to highlight the great work some pockets of people are doing around the world and say how this should be how education looks in this day and age. But very rarely are these messages given with details of how it was really achieved. Blood, sweat and tears no doubt. However, if governments, high profile education theorists and teachers all are saying we need to change, why does very little wide spread change still happen?
Change Leadership
I was pleased to get started on my Action Research Project this week (although a bit behind...) and have decided to focus on an aspect of change leadership. I am in a new role at school which requires skills in this area, and this project gives me the vehicle to develop them.The importance of me developing these skills was made clear this week during a professional interaction with a colleague. When discussing technology integration in this persons classroom I realised our views on educational philosophy where at polar opposites. Because our perspectives were so different, I found it difficult to help this person find a reason to change.
I think it is important to find a way to help people such as my colleague decide to join the change journey if we are to achieve systemic change.
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DeleteHi Adam, I share your frustration that the declarations made in 2008 remain largely untapped today.
ReplyDeleteChange in education can be so slow....it's been described as "trying to turn around a supertanker"!
And you're right...the WHY is established - and this course now focuses on the HOW. THE FIRST STEP IS BEING ABLE TO ARTICULATE YOUR VISION (derived from your moral purpose) and then to defend that vision...and to then translate this into action. Your ARP will be instrumental in helping build your personal leadership skills (btw I was impressed w what you've done so far and also support the feedback from Alan - keen to see where you head next :) and then your School ICT Change/Growth Plan will provide you some practical steps for moving forward.
We don't like to think of education as being an expression of politics, but unfortunately the influence is powerful. I am not trying to be political here Adam. Just think though about the impact on the efforts to get up and running the sorts of initiatives described in the Declaration, given the conflicting views of our powerful politicians. For example, Pyne says he wants a back to basics approach and that he rejects intellectual fads (referring to modern teaching methods). He also said, "It is perfectly sensible and intelligent for Latin to be on the national curriculum. I did Latin at school. It’s a very, very good thing to do." There is a key problem. Rather than making decisions about education objectively, decisions positively ooze nostalgia! Pyne is almost silent on digital technologies in education. The previous Gov was handing out devices to students, public opinion on this was polarised. Education is a political football and the progress we are seeking gets dragged up and down the playing field depending upon who has power. Frustrating!
ReplyDeleteHowever, while you have been watching seemingly little happening since 2008, Nikki and I can compare where we are now to the early 1990s and for me, a decade before that. There is definitely change happening. The problem is how slow that change is in coming. It is the supertanker turning as Nikki says. I think it is also who we look to for change leadership. We sit in our staffrooms and wait for politically controlled Ed Dept to initiate. They work in a difficult, politically sensitive space. Teachers can stand up and act. Sure, they may not be able to do whatever they want, but teachers are not powerless. The Heppell's and others are correct. We can do a lot if we only want that change badly enough. There is already a fire burning in many teachers. What LSDA is trying to do is throw some petrol on that fire.
Influence who you can influence Adam. If we all did that then change would happen faster and more would see that change that is inevitable, because the kids and the world has already moved into a digital dominant/dependent space.
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You might also want to read this Adam. You think you know what teachers do. Right? Wrong!
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