The entire notion of school 'subjects' needs to be questioned
"In fact, the entire notion of 'subjects' needs to be questioned, [Sir Ken Robinson] says. 'The idea of separate subjects that have nothing in common offends the principle of dynamism. School systems should base their curriculum not on the idea of separate subjects, but on the much more fertile idea of disciplines ... which makes possible a fluid and dynamic curriculum that is interdisciplinary.'
In December, the Rose review, the biggest inquiry into primary schooling in a generation, also recommended moving away from the idea of subjects. Sir Jim Rose said a 'bloated' curriculum was leaving children with shallow knowledge and understanding. The review proposed half a dozen cross-curricular themes instead: understanding English, communication and languages; mathematical understanding; science and technological understanding; human, social and environmental understanding; understanding physical education and wellbeing; and understanding the arts and design.
Robinson believes the curriculum should be much more personalised. 'Learning happens in the minds and souls, not in the databases of multiple-choice tests.' And why are we so fixated by age groups, he asks. Let a 10-year-old learn with their younger and older peers.
We put too high a premium on knowing the 'single right answer', Robinson claims. But he says he is not in principle opposed to standardised tests, such as Sats. Used in the right way, they can provide essential data to support and improve education. The problem comes when these tests become more than simply a tool of education and turn into the focus of it, he argues."
(Jessica Shepherd, 10 February 2009, The Guardian)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism One School at a Time
"BILL MOYERS: But this intrigues me because you've set out over these years to educate young girls primarily. I mean, you do have some boys in your schools, but primarily your goal is to educate young girls. And given the fact that the Afghani and Pakistani societies are so male dominated, that men run the families, they run the government, they run the villages, they run the Taliban, why focus on girls instead of the men who are going to, in that culture, grow up and run things?
GREG MORTENSON: Well, it's obviously the boys need education also. But as a child in Africa, I learned a proverb. And it says, ‘If we educate a boy, we educate an individual. But if we can educate a girl, we educate a community.’ And what that means is when girls grow up, become a mother, they are the ones who promote the value of education in the community. The education of girls has very powerful impacts in a society. Number one, the infant mortality's reduced. Number two, the population is reduced. The third thing is the quality of health improves. And, from my own observation, when girls learn how to read and write, they often teach their mother how to read and write. Boys, we don't seem to do that as much. They also, you'll see people, kids coming out for the marketplace, have meat or vegetables wrapped in newspaper. And then you'll see the mother very carefully unfolding a newspaper and ask her daughter to read the news to her. And it's the first time that woman is able to get information of what's going on in the outside world around--very powerful to see that. And another compelling reason is when women are educated, they're not as likely to condone or encourage their son to get into violence or into terrorism. In fact, culturally when someone goes on jihad, they should get permission from their mother first. And if they don't, it's very shameful or disgraceful. So when women are educated, as I mentioned, they are less likely to encourage their son to get into violence. And I've seen that happen, Bill, over the last decade in rural areas of Afghanistan, Pakistan. I mean, I could go on all day about this, but educating girls is very powerful."
(Bill Moyers Journal, 15 January 2010, PBS)
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Lindsay QuennellSHARE
Defining visual thinking and visual literacy
"Wileman (1993) defines visual literacy as 'the ability to 'read,' interpret, and understand information presented in pictorial or graphic images' (p. 114). Associated with visual literacy is visual thinking, described as 'the ability to turn information of all types into pictures, graphics, or forms that help communicate the information' (Wileman, p. 114). A similar definition for visual literacy is 'the learned ability to interpret visual messages accurately and to create such messages' (Heinich, Molenda, Russell, & Smaldino, 1999, p. 64). The ERIC definition of visual literacy is 'a group of competencies that allows humans to discriminate and interpret the visible action, objects, and/or symbols, natural or constructed, that they encounter in the environment' (http://searcheric.org/). Robinson (as quoted in Sinatra, 1986) describes visual literacy as 'an organizing force in promoting understanding, retention, and recall of so many academic concepts with which students must contend' (p. v). And lastly, Sinatra defines visual literacy as 'the active reconstruction of past visual experience with incoming visual messages to obtain meaning' (p. 5), with the emphasis on the action by the learner to create recognition.
The use and interpretation of images is a specific language in the sense that images are used to communicate messages that must be decoded in order to have meaning (Branton, 1999; Emery & Flood, 1998). If visual literacy is regarded as a language, then there is a need to know how to communicate using this language, which includes being alert to visual messages and critically reading or viewing images as the language of the messages. Visual literacy, like language literacy, is culturally specific although there are universal symbols or visual images that are globally understood."
(Suzanne Stokes, 2002)
[1] The Occasional Wife
[2] Stokes, S. (2002). "Visual literacy in teaching and learning: A literature perspective." Electronic Journal for the Integration of Technology in Education 1(1).
Branton, B. (1999). Visual literacy literature review. Retrieved December 26, 2001, from http://vicu.utoronto.ca/staff/branton/litreview.html
Emery, L., & Flood, A. (1998). Visual literacy. Retrieved September 22, 1999, from University of Canberra, Australian Centre for Arts Education Web site: http://education.canberra.edu.au/centres/acae/literacy/litpapers/vislit.htm
Heinich, R., Molenda, M., Russell, J. D., & Smaldino, S. E. (1999). Instructional media and technologies for learning (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Sinatra, R. (1986). Visual literacy connections to thinking, reading and writing. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas.
Wileman, R. E. (1993). Visual communicating. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Educational Technology Publications.
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Microlearning: learning from microcontent
"We understand microlearning primarily as learning from microcontent - from "small pieces, loosely joined" (Weinberger, 2002).
Microlearning as a term reflects the emerging reality of the everincreasing fragmentation of both information sources and information units used for learning, especially in fast-moving areas which see rapid development and a constantly high degree of change.
While in the past a single authoritative work (or even a single authoritative teacher) may have been all that was necessary to sufficiently acquaint oneself with a given topic of interest, this is increasingly untrue, especially as the necessity to (quickly) learn (a lot) extends into almost everyone’s work life.
Books, magazine articles, a multitude of web resources (like online books, tutorials, encyclopedias, forum and weblog postings, emails and comprehensive teaching material collections as produced by MIT’s OpenCourseWare project or the Connexions effort hosted at Rice University) form essential ingredients of the source mix of almost any non-institutionalized learning effort - and, increasingly, of many institutionalized efforts as well.
Fragmentation of sources has both positive and negative aspects. From a producer’s standpoint, information fragments are much easier to create than larger works. Furthermore, disaggregated content - theoretically - can be re-aggregated to optimally suit an individual learner’s preferences (instead of the needs of an idealized common denominator). The other side of the coin is that a significant fraction of the consolidation and organization effort is shifted towards the learner.
It will increasingly be the task of microlearning management systems to assist the learner (or group of learners) to consolidate information gleaned from such disparate sources into a coherent whole. We see personal knowledge mapping as enabled by combined wiki/weblog software as a first step in that direction."
(Christian Langreiter, Andreas Bolka, 2005)
Weinberger, D.: 2002, Small Pieces Loosely Joined. Perseus Books.
[2] Langreiter, C. and A. Bolka (2005). Snips & Spaces: Managing Microlearning. Microlearning Conference. Innsbruck, Austria.
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Object-based learning for children through Hands On guides
"Hands On is a step by step guide to using object-based learning. Aimed at those involved with the education of early years and primary school groups, the guide demonstrates how this form of learning can be carried out using everyday or museum objects.
The guide points out that working with real objects and paintings, for example in a museum or gallery, sparks the imagination, helping children develop their powers of observation and interpret the world around them."
(Museums Galleries Scotland)
[2] Hands On guide bookmarked PDF (11Mb).
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
