Technology is challenging and changing traditional teaching; giving learning and students a new approach, as we can see at Bedford Primary School, Liverpool in the UK. Social networking has become part of the school’s academic routine, as it has joined Radiowaves, a school-based social network that has 13,000 schools as members in 22 countries. Amy Barton, Assistant head teacher at Bedford Primary says, "Social media is challenging the traditional view of teaching. You can't get away from it; we've got to teach it."
Radiowaves imbibes technology and the use of blogs, images, video, audio and podcasts which can be uploaded and shared, either just within the school, with other schools on the Radiowaves network or with a bigger audience, including parents. It has attracted the British Council’s attention, who has seen the potential for forging real and long-lasting links with schools around the world and has recently funded four pupils from Bedford Primary School to visit schools in China, where the student exchange was recorded using technology in a video diary and relayed back to Liverpool via Radiowaves. Chris Hague, a director at Radiowaves says, "We set up at a time when schools were shutting the door on social networks, we were saying that they needed to embrace them. Our first priority was to make sure it was safe."
All external comments are monitored by Radiowaves staff and remove anything deemed inappropriate; including immediately removing any personal details that a pupil publishes. According to Professor Stephen Heppell, a leading educationalist, things are changing and technology is making the changes. In fact Twitter has been playing a valuable role in one of the projects Prof Heppell is working on, which is to prepare children in Year Six of primary school for the transition to secondary school. He has linked children up with their peers in Australia and connection has also allowed the UK pupils to get first-hand accounts of the current floods affecting Brisbane.
Prof Heppell believes social media and technology can benefit teachers too and has set up a project called Twitcam, allowing new teachers to post videos of themselves in action teaching, inviting feedback on what they were doing, whether right and wrong from more experienced and seasoned practitioners.
He also advocates Facebookand suggests teachers set up Facebook profiles, an account completely separate from any personal Facebook pages. Although, Facebook frowns on users creating two accounts; it has supported teachers who have wanted to do it. Teachers setting up Facebook accounts should not befriend pupils. Instead, Prof Heppell advises that teachers should allow the children to take the initiative. He also recommends not reading their pupils' Facebook pages and never chat via instant messaging. Facebook can be used by giving children reminders about things like impending exams; offering a space for informal chats outside of the traditional school environment and allows parents and children to keep up with school news at a time and place that suits them. What’s there not to like?
For children e-mail is "something your dad does" and their search engine of choice is as likely to be YouTube as Google. But with many of the disruptive technologies that drip-feed children in their leisure hours banned within school buildings, what hope do teachers have of engaging their tech-savvy pupils?
At Bedford Primary School in Liverpool, social networking is embraced as part of the daily routine of school and learning. It has joined Radiowaves, a dedicated school-based social network, which now boasts 13,000 schools in 22 countries. For assistant head teacher Amy Barton, social media has to be part of the curriculum.
"Social media is challenging the traditional view of teaching. You can't get away from it, we've got to teach it," she said.
School websites have traditionally been set up to inform parents but tend not to be the destination of choice for pupils. It is very different at Bedford where children see their Radiowaves pages as "their website". These days any visitor to Bedford School needs be prepared for the full multi-media onslaught of the under-11s as they interview, record and photograph every moment for inclusion on the site.
The platform allows for images, audio, video, blogs and podcasts to be uploaded and shared, either just within the school, with other schools on the Radiowaves network or with the larger world, including parents.
The site has attracted the attention of the British Council which has seen the potential for forging real and long-lasting links with schools around the world, beyond the occasional fuzzy video link-up.
Screengrab of Radiowaves
Radiowaves is offering schools safe social networking
It has recently funded four pupils from Bedford Primary School to visit schools in China. Every moment was recorded in a video diary and viewed back in Liverpool via Radiowaves.
Twitcam
Chris Hague is one of the directors of Radiowaves.
"We set up at a time when schools were shutting the door on social networks, we were saying that they needed to embrace them," he said.
"Our first priority was to make sure it was safe."
All external comments are monitored by Radiowaves staff and take-down of anything considered inappropriate, such as a pupil publishing personal details about themselves is taken down immediately.
Using such technology helps children understand ICT lessons, he thinks.
"Kids get excited when they have a microphone in their hands or make a video or a blog entry. It makes sense of ICT in the school," he said.
Many schools still block access to YouTube, Facebook, instant messaging and other technologies that are the favourite haunts of young people.
But the tide could be turning, thinks Professor Stephen Heppell, a leading educationalist who has been advocating the use of radical technology in schools for years.
"Half of schools have now unblocked YouTube. Five years ago it was one in every 1,000," he said.
Twitter has been playing a valuable role in one of the projects he is currently working on - to prepare children in Year Six of primary school for the transition to secondary school.
He has linked children up with their contemporaries in Australia who are currently on summer holidays, ahead of their first term at secondary school.
The link-up has also allowed the UK pupils to get first-hand accounts of the current floods affecting Brisbane.
Twitter can be a valuable resource for teachers too and Prof Heppell has recently set up a project known as Twitcam, which allows new teachers to post videos of themselves teaching and invite comments on what they were doing right and wrong from more experienced practitioners.
He thinks that teachers should also set up Facebook profiles, an account which should be quite separate from any personal Facebook pages.
"They can call themselves something related to the subject they teach such as 'Geography Steve' or use another form of Miss such as Missy as Facebook doesn't allow Mr or Mrs titles," he said.
Although Facebook generally frowns on users creating two accounts, it has actively encouraged teachers who have wanted to do it, according to Prof Heppell.
Collaborative working
Teachers setting up Facebook accounts should not befriend pupils, rather allow the children to take the initiative, Prof Heppell advises. They should not read their pupils' Facebook pages and should never chat via instant message.
But for giving children reminders about things such as impending exams, offering a space for informal chats outside of the traditional school environment and allowing parents and children to keep up with school news at a time and place that suits them, Facebook is invaluable, thinks Prof Heppell.
That kind of scenario could alarm some teachers who do not want to blur the boundaries between school and personal life and certainly would not welcome the idea of having their teaching scrutinised on Twitter.
There is also a huge fear among teachers that children are simply far more knowledgeable when it comes to technology.
This might not necessarily be so, thinks Prof Heppell.
"Children today may be able to get around a school' s proxy servers to access the sites they want, but they lack the deeper understanding of how a computer works. They use computers but they can't often control them," he said.
He argues that programming needs to make a return to schools, in the way it did when the user-unfriendly machines of the 1980s forced users to learn some basic programming.
For Chris Baker, an ICT teacher at the John Cabot Academy, a comprehensive school in Bristol, teaching programming is likely to "alienate many of the pupils". For him ICT is all about equipping students with skills that they will use in other lessons.
"We show them show to use Google Docs and then they use them in Spanish lessons, writing in Spanish and collaborating with pupils in Spain who mark their work," he said.
And that is likely to scare the traditionalist teachers even more.
The teaching of digital skills in schools should be regarded as equally important as lessons in numeracy and literacy, according to a report published on Tuesday.
The study by the House of Lords digital skills committee calls for a radical rethink of education and says digital literacy should be treated as a third core subject. It also says the internet should be regarded as a utility on a par with water or electricity, in order to ensure unimpeded access for all.
The report says urgent action is required to support teachers who are currently not equipped to deliver the new computing curriculum, and insists no child should leave school without basic digital literacy.
An estimated 9.5 million people currently lack a minimum level of digital skills and the report warns the UK risks becoming “a branch economy, much less prosperous and influential” if it doesn’t pursue a digital agenda.
The cross-party committee also raises concerns about the lack of women in digital studies, science, technology, engineering and mathematics, which it says is holding back UK competitiveness. Of 4,000 students doing computer science A-level, fewer than 100 were girls.
Baroness Morgan of Huyton, chair of the Lords digital skills committee and a former chair of Ofsted, warned that 35% of UK jobs were likely to be automated over the next 20 years, and said the report was a wake-up call to whoever forms the next government.
“While we welcome the introduction of the computing curriculum, we are concerned about the ability of teachers to deliver it – with more than half of our IT teachers not having a post-A level qualification relevant to IT.
“At the higher education level, there is an urgent need for industry input, so that graduates are learning job-relevant digital skills.”
The Labour peer added that it was unacceptable that in some areas as many as 20% of the population has never used the internet.
“Our overwhelming recommendation is that the incoming government creates a digital agenda, with the goal of securing the UK’s place as a leading digital economy within the next five years.”
She added: “We are at a make-or-break point for the future of the UK – for its economy, its workforce and its people. We have a choice as a country about whether we seize this opportunity or whether we fall behind.”
