Reading Writing Responding

creative commons licensed (BY-SA) flickr photo by mrkrndvs: http://flickr.com/photos/aaron_davis/14502665342 I recently got into a discussion about 1:1 devices . My argument was that we needed to be pushing for more devices in primary school as a part of the long term plan, not just in 7,8 and 9. The response I got in return was that 1:1 wasn't viable for the taken on and BYOD simply wouldn't work with our community. I didn't accept this. Fine there are some ideals which are not always ideal , but I still felt that there were better solutions than simply perpetuating the present. One of the concerns that was brought up by some other teachers in our ICT committee was that if you look at the continuum produced by the Victorian Government: Planning for 1-to-1 Learning via  FUSE   We are currently situated somewhere between the past and the present having 1:1 in secondary, but predominantly depending upon netbooks in trolleys. What was disappointin...

creative commons licensed (BY-SA) flickr photo by mrkrndvs: http://flickr.com/photos/113562593@N07/13990305951 In a recent post in his Myths of Technology series, +George Couros wrote about the idea that 'technology dehumanises' . In this piece, Couros suggests that it is a misnomer that technology is anti-social and takes away from our relationships. Instead, technology actually provides the potential to amplify our relationships. Rather than technology, Couros posits that "people dehumanize one another, not technology". This got me thinking about a point +Doug Belshaw made in his book 'The Essential Elements of Digital Literacies' that digital literacies are at there heart social. In a presentation for Promethean , Peter Kent put forward that interactive whiteboards offered an opportunity to modify the way we teach and the way students learn. Instead of merely using the projector to provide information, the interactive nature of the boards all...

In a recent blog , +Vicki Davis  shared about the idea of having an 'App of the Week', where she has a focus each week on a particular application. As she suggests: I want my students to be productive geniuses. They are a human being not a human doing but they carry around a full blown secretary in their pockets, if they’ll learn how to hire it. If you are a BYOD school, you should do everything in your power to help students really “Bring it” using their mobile device and an app of the week is just one way to do it. Using Dragon Dictation as her example, she shows how she introduces a new program and gets the students using it in five short minutes. This is a great example of how to manage 1-to-1 programs. One of the biggest challenges I have had in being a part of the group implementing a 1-to-1 program is how to get the most out of the devices. I have found one of two things happen, either the devices are rarely used, only when they fit a particular need in t...