Evolving Wonder

Posted on December 15, 2020 by Eylan

Video Conferencing is ripe for evolution and, fortunately, change is coming – and it’s wonder-ful.

Video conferencing (VC) tools like Zoom, which have taken over our lives since the pandemic started, have been forced into the service of our many needs. I think it’s not too contentious to say that the worst fit of all is in education: especially in Primary / Elementary education. However, a new breed of video services offers hope, and these are exemplified by Wonder.me – a new platform that puts social interaction first.

Before I share how Wonder works, why I think it works for education, and suggest some ideas of what to do: a few thoughts on why we need change.

Zooming out of the classroom

Video conferencing is built around the phone call model. One-to-one works best, but has been stretched to imagine a ‘conference room’ set up – with a carefully managed conversation around the call. While less than ideal, with some effort, it can work really well for a range of adult interactions- versed as we are with the social norms of conversation and getting stuff done. Hands up works because we understand the convention and know how to manage our enthusiasm (mostly!)

conference room

Can you imagine anything less like the ideal primary classroom?     Unsplash image – https://unsplash.com/photos/Q80LYxv_Tbs

Until recently, I could not see a VC platform that works for Primary children and the adults that work with them. Why? Zoom, Teams, Google Meet, etc…like most tech we use in education…  Video Conferencing platforms are made for adult business users.

Kids are, by definition, still growing, learning, being socialised, understanding power/respect, etc. They need agency to play and learn….  And, put simply, children do not have the adult skills, experience or knowledge required for video conferencing! More than that, Teachers have no experience guiding children through these platforms, which they rarely use and have had little or no training in. Remote teaching is very different to remote learning, as Bob Harrison often says.

It is true that VC platforms have all started stretching towards the needs of education, and there are new features, integrations, and some of them are starting to work better. Services like ClassforZoom look like they are heading in the right direction – though there are key concerns about surveillance capitalism from Audrey Watters we’d all do well to harken to.

However, those concerns aside – the basic model of VC remains – of static interaction, and compliance. How can children learn respect in conversation if they can’t see what happens when everyone talks over each other in a group. In the best classrooms, teachers create an environment where learning happens alongside social interaction, play, socialisation, and all the other things schools do for our communities. However, when being in school isn’t possible – we need better alternatives.

Won’t the vaccines make the need for VC in education go away?
I know lots of people are hoping that the vaccines will save us from lockdowns, but if there is one lesson from COVID, it is that we were not ready. We’ve made progress in #edtech – but we have further to go, and we can’t stop thinking about how to serve children better.

Lots of organisations, including the brilliant Edurio, have conducted research into lockdown tech much of which seems to show that teachers are not keen on remote teaching and learning – ie using video conferencing. But I think this might be a misread of the data. I think what teachers are saying is that they don’t like the existing VC platforms, as they don’t yet match their needs.

Wonder if…
Which brings me to Wonder.me, a new platform that is still in the very early days of development. My thanks to Dr Doug Belshaw for the introduction and encouraging me to play!

Importantly for schools – Wonder is  free – and while it takes time to get your own room – Wonder say they will never charge for this first room in the future. Once you have your virtual space – it’s yours for as long you want it.

What does it do?
Like so many other VC platforms, groups can talk – share screens, mute, chat, etc… but this is much more than a Zoom clone.

Wonder has two features Primary teachers (especially) will love:

1 – Movement is easy! Hosts can set ‘areas’ in your room – shown as white boxes – that work a lot like ‘tables’ – so it is quickly possible to create an analogue of a primary classroom – where children can move to ‘sit’ with different children. The host can see where everyone is, who is talking with whom, and drop into any conversation.
2 – There is a broadcast function that allows the teacher to call the class together. The host/teacher can also rename rooms very easily, assign additional hosts (TAs, group leads) manage the groups… It’s a lot like being in charge of your own classroom!

https://unsplash.com/photos/UqTrGSohyCs

Possible uses

These are initial ideas, and I’m not in the classroom anymore – so I’d love to hear what you think might work. Most of these ideas are based on the feature that you can label areas within your room.

  • I would definitely start lessons with a little game of ‘It/Tag’ to get the urge to play out of their systems – … and learn how to stay in a circle!
  • Label areas for subjects – and allow spaces for children to share their work/projects/thinking/challenges with peers – supported by teachers as needed.
  • Create peer feedback circles, using feedback protocols like those from Expeditionary Learning, to practice being ‘kind, specific and helpful’ when working together on drafts of work. Use the areas for the different stages of drafting, where the last room is for final gallery feedback.
  • By linking to google docs, or remote tasks, children can carousel round a series of group work activities, in a very familiar way to most primary teachers.
  • Label the areas with the same names as the tables in your actual classroom, and use a pic in the background of the actual classroom to maintain ‘normality’ for the younger children.
  • Circle time and PSHE sessions, where mental health (rather than curriculum) is the ‘work’ – can be better supported – as children can pair off, form 4s, then come together as a class to share with the teacher.
  • Normal classroom behaviour rules broadly can apply in Wonder, so this maintains the socialisation for the return to the real classroom. Kids will wander(!) off, go off-topic… chat about the wrong things – just like in a real classroom- but policing this is about recognising good behaviour – rather than using technology to control it.

What’s coming and what’s missing?
Wonder is not designed specifically for education or primary classrooms, though a few of the core team are ex-teachers – and they are still very early in their journey. They’ve just secured a £11m investment to grow their offering, so this a key moment in their story. Wonder say there are new features on the way – including better conversation management, richer chat functions with emoji/polls/Q&As and content search. There are many attractive routes for them to develop towards – education being just one.

That said – The more teachers fill their userbase though, the more they might tilt it towards us! So sign up and be vocal.  As you might be able to guess, I have been trying to talk them into developing/partnering for education! There are so many possible business models and connections that I’d love to explore- but Wonder are taking their time!

Pricing will not start till end of 2021, and they are not looking for partnerships, APIs, or intergrations. It is possible (they say) to embed via iFrame, etc – though they are not actively supporting it.
However, and I find this deeply impressive, they are not reacting to the current competitor space – and copying the moves of players like Zoom/Teams, etc. It’s so reassuring to see a start-up willing to lead, rather than follow.

To use another metaphor, by chasing their own ball, I think Wonder are well placed to help shape the next evolution in video communication – one that supports a more natural social interaction, led by future users needs – rather than the first iteration of telecommunication technologies from a previous century.

You can find out more at Wonder.me

I wonder what you think?

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in edtech | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Corana exposed the Tradio Tzar

Posted on April 18, 2020 by Eylan

This week, the government’s Behaviour Tzar and cheerleader of one tribe of #edutwitter seems to have had a meltdown in front of his 72K followers. (Updated version)

The Emporer’s New Clothes  – Wikipedia

Picking on the very affordances of technology that propelled him into the big time, Tom Bennett has claimed that #edtech hasn’t/isn’t/won’t change the way we teach and learn. 

It’s not that Bennett is just wrong, it’s that he has exposed the raw egoism and arrogance at the heart of his approach to the education debate. Perhaps we are seeing the exposure of a certain type of social media fuelled personality. And it’s not just Tom that’s losing it.

Photo from New York Times article

Whether it’s Madonna, free from her publicists, sending messages from her bath, or celebrities warbling into their phones;  with noone to tell them they are not as talented as they think they are, we are finding out who the truly greats are – those with class and talent. 

Without the writers, editors, producers and creatives that have made them look good, people who have had privileged access to  mass media platforms are now on more of a level footing with the rest of us mere mortals. Families in Kent reversioning Les Mis anthems are showing us more intelligence, humour, empathy and creativity than those paid big money to front daytime TV.

Politico muppets like Toby Young  (who has always been a nasty piece of work) have become increasingly desperate to grab attention – waving the limp vestiges of their humanity – claiming to have the answers to complex questions. 

It’s not that Toby wasn’t right that the Covid crisis isn’t going to force us to make hard choices about saving lives, it’s just that we can’t trust the eugenicist-leaning, misogynist who has always cared more about getting column inches and airtime than moving the debate forward to improve our society.

Which brings us back to Tom Bennett. Let me be clear – I don’t like him. It’s not personal – I don’t know him. I don’t like him because he has made a professional choice to use his platform to squash challenges to his interests, and damage the complex debate of how to educate our children: in a way that I think puts him with the Toby Youngs and Piers Morgans of the world. It’s not what he says that bothers me. It’s how he says it and how he treats those who disagree with him. 

In the silly world of ProgVsTrad, I would not be not on the same side as Tom, but I have huge respect for many who would gather under the Trad banner with him. These people do the hard work in schools, reflect on their practice rigorously, and repeatedly show themselves open to debate. I’m not going to give a list – but it is hard not to respect people like Michael Fordham, for example. 

Of course there should be a debate and disagreement – even strong feelings – but it’s clear to most of us who can do this by showing humility and interest in actually helping others. 

What Tom Bennett has consistently done is to play ‘the game’ to associate himself with Gibb and the small group at the centre of the current government’s education cabal – by saying what ever they want to hear…and whipping up false and discourse killing baiting contests to prevent proper reflection on the work we do in schools.

Of course, he is not the only one to do this, and this is perhaps a historical constant. There  are plenty of wombles on the Prog end of the spectrum, of course. But, in this age of social media, they are not at the end of a ministerial leash. 

As those ministers are now doing the grown-up work of saving lives, and the PR teams at the DfE are busy elsewhere – we can see what people like Tom are like without their friends at Westminster to protect them. And it is not a pretty sight.

Briefly – On to the substance of Tom’s tweets. I know the UK #edtech world pretty well, and I have never heard anyone say that tech can or should replace the human relationship between a teacher and a learner. In fact, even the great satan in the trad’s bestiary – Sir Ken Robinson says that this human contact is the fundamental element of education. The affordances of technology to support learning are real – and, while there are serious issues we should all be talking about (such as the claiming of our classrooms by VC data pirates – read Audrey Watters people!)

Instead, Tom is picking on the very people trying to hold our schools together. The fragility of our education system has been exposed by this crisis and, while much of the edtech being used is a pure substitution on the SAMR model, it is all that many schools have when face-to-face is not possible. 

I’m not here to defend the #edtech world, or to argue for or against any pedagogy. But, when #edutwitter big hitters are deadcatting by making ridiculous claims against #edtech, we should turn off in the same way we do from the sight of Eamonn Holmes spouting conspiracy theories. 

SO, maybe this crisis, awful as it is (and will be for a while to come) will help us reclaim and reframe Twitter, taking the attention from the demagogues and extremists. Optimistic? Yes. Will we make mistakes as we move forward, Yes. Is it time to stop listening to Tom Bennett? Hell, yeah!

Finally – for those who only read this far because of the title of this post… 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8r-tXRLazs

 

Posted in Opinion | 13 Comments

An Open Heart

Posted on September 1, 2019 by Eylan

This is a very personal post about Dai Barnes, who died last month. This is an attempt to write about more complex thoughts … about what knowing someone as a whole can be like – and what death of that person does to that knowledge.

Since the death of my friend, I have found myself in the curious position of helping others to mourn and remember, along with Amy Burvall and Doug Belshaw, who have shared this role with me, and to whom I am in debt. 

There are so many others I should mention here; not least his family –  words and actions that should be referenced; and I know some of what I want to say is said better by others and I should quote them.

But I won’t. Grief is a selfish experience, so I am not going to apologise for that. When it experienced alongside others, it can be more than that – so I hope you will forgive me.

I’ve heard stories that have made me laugh, and deepen the respect that I hold Dai in. It was a bittersweet honour to be asked by Doug to co-host the recording of the last TIDEPodcast – and to help channel the feelings of those who knew him. But, even then, the essence of my feelings keep slipping out of my hands.

Before I say too much more, I want to say that I didn’t know Dai as long or as well as many others. Beyond catching up on social media and at events, that started about 10 years ago, I’d say that my deeper friendship with Dai is only a couple of years old, and I felt that we were just getting started on something. We recently discovered that we had lots of unexpected things in common – and, though we did not always agree, our values were the same. Nights out, joining us on family holidays, and visits to stay over with him… It did feel almost romantic – and there was a depth and intensity that made me feel that our connection was special. 

Except that it wasn’t. Dai was loving to many people. 

Jealousy had no part of his heart and I certainly didn’t feel envious – sharing Dai was easy. My wife and kids loved him too – and understood why I kept going on about him. I struggle with male friendships… (I hate talking about sport, kit, facts&figures, etc..) and yet hanging out with Dai was easy. I could be the friend I wanted to be – not a version of it that meant drinking beer (I don’t like) or arguing about the best album. 

Dai was no saint, and he’d hate it if I wrote this post in a way that denied his faults – as it would be bullshit. But I thought he was special. Someone who I’d have in my life for a long time and who’d bring more colour and depth of feeling (more of that selfishness!). In many friendships, this is a balanced thing – where both parties ‘invest’ in a relationship… and love is often experienced as a transactional thing. 

Most of us spend years looking for somewhere to direct our love.. Except that this limited resource metaphor (where £=❤) shows where my deepest, and now saddest feelings about Dai are.

Dai’s heart was open, and his love was leaking out all the time.  Initially, it seemed that this was a beautiful thing and made us want to open our hearts  wider. However, the closer I got to Dai, the more I realised that his heart was (in part) so open because it was broken. 

There are aspects of Dai’s life story, that are not for public posts, that explain how his heart was broken – and why the hope of reconciliation were the clamps that kept it open. 

There were ways he could have closed it up (at least to safer levels) but he chose not to. I tried to guide him, advise him, support him – to make choices that made him less exposed.

Many of us would have done anything to close up that hurt. He did find deep comfort in many aspects of his life, and this is not a tale of tragedy. 

Like he said about being barefoot – feeling the hurt was part of life – but it was more than that.  I quote here from Dai’s amazing post about walking the Samaria gorge barefoot:

“I knew my feet were so bruised and scratched and abraded that the sandals would only make me think a step was okay, when really the ground is not what it seems, and pain would jolt through my body. Better to remain barefoot and deal with the world as it actually is. This might seem stupid. But here’s a thing I discovered on my trek through the self-enforced iteration of my steps: your feet report pain to your brain, but if you find a flat and comfortable foothold your sensors tell you this is good. The pain sensors do not activate. The pain – the signals – must be endured for the time your foot is in contact with the objectionable object. After that has passed your foot recalibrates and evaluates the next footstep independently. It was amazing. Inspiring. I knew my feet were damaged. I knew each location upon each foot that was damaged…. I am battling to make good choices. Every bleeding step.”

And this is closer to why I am still reeling from Dai’s death. Dai battled harder than most of us will ever have to, to make good choices. He could have shouted about his pain, about the unfairness, his loss, what could have been, what he should have been able to look forward to. I would have done. Most of us would have done. Many do. 

Dai chose, wherever possible, to live and love every step barefoot. Walking and running alongside him was a lesson in life, in love, and respect; for himself, for others, and for the values he believed in.  I am sad because, in the end, Dai did not get the reward for his goodness that he deserved for this. 

I cannot walk or run with Dai any further. This hurts. I am crying as I write this. 

Thanks to Dai, I’ve learned how to step less heavily. Depend less on handholds. Feel the texture of the ground of my life with less fear.  Stand up straighter. Judge less, hope more. Expect less – give more. And, mostly, just keep walking.

I’ll miss him.

Posted in Personal | Tagged | 2 Comments

Three steps to a better EdTech strategy

Posted on May 29, 2018 by Eylan

In my role as Trustee for A New Direction, London’s  creative education agency, I wrote three guest posts  to help their community in creating better Edtech in the Arts, Culture and Heritage sector.

I offered advice in the form of three steps:

Seek Connections       Spread the Load       Share the Risk 

These three posts offer a framework for developing a digital strategy that should be relevant to those in the A New Direction network, and beyond.

I’ve had some really positive feedback, including from one senior voice at the Sutton Trust, as these posts seem to have a struck a chord for the many funding organisations who are looking for more impact over time from the digital projects they are investing in (for Social Impact).

I’ve written quite a bit about Edtech here and elsewhere- for different audiences, but I’d love to hear from those of your in the business of creating and managing digital education for Arts, Culture and Heritage organisations.

What has worked for you ? What did you make of my three steps?

Finally, my thanks to Steve Woodward for his help getting the three posts onto the A.N.D blog!

Posted in edtech | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Digital Governance

Posted on January 10, 2018 by Eylan

Photo by me. Hedgehog provided by @hedgehoghugh CC BY-SA

School governors are a bit like hedgehogs. Our activity is mostly misunderstood, we can have a much bigger impact on the world than you might think, and we are busiest at night.

Stretching this simile even further (with apologies to the Hugh Warwick, stand-up ecologist, author, and friend to both hedgehogs and Ezekiels) I fear that, unless governors adapt and evolve faster than our snuffling friends, we too will become endangered and squished by passing technology and Policy! For those also looking for a way to survive, I think we’ve found an adaptation that works for us, and might work for you.*

Post Summary:

Through using digital tools in the cloud, governance at Larkrise Primary School has been made more effective and easier to manage. Though we’d recommend it, this is not about the technology, but about a shift in culture. There is more we could do and would love to connect with others using similar approaches.

Post in Full:

Why change?

It has been a year since I wrote about our plan to evolve and adapt to improve governance at Larkrise Primary School, and our reasons for choosing MS Office 365 (O365) as our platform.  We moved to O365 to tackle major issues with using Google Drive as an ad-hoc document store, including: eSafety/confidentiality for governors; better administration/coordination with our clerk and between committees;  improved communication with SLT; and better integration with staff tools.

What did we do?

We set up Groups for each committee, (this was before Teams had been fully developed in O365), with a similar structure in each, using common language – giving all governors introductions and access to all areas and to all the services. I ran a series of sessions modelling and enabling live collaboration in writing and commenting on documents. Chairs of committees, including Chair of Governors, modelled failing and persisting with O365, and asked SLT to share on the cloud rather than emails or hard copies. This forced a major change in behaviour and quickly improved communication between staff and governors, reducing misunderstandings and reducing workload.

Where are we now?

As 2017 closes, we now have all committee papers (agendas, minutes, reports, data) posted before meetings, with invitations to review, comment and edit. All three of our committees work more effectively through working online, asynchronously and face-to-face. Our excellent clerk makes great use of the calendar, conversation threads and prompts us into action!

As many of you know, the really detailed, hard work of governors happens throughout the year, not just at Full Governing Body (FGB) meetings. We work on governor business when we can, before work, at a stolen moment during the day, and after the kids have gone to bed. We reflect this reality by doing and recording all this work in O365 – spreading out our effort to when it suits us.

Why should you try this?

The benefits are clear:

  • Committee meetings are shorter (if not short!)
  • There are very few emails, and even less paper to deal with
  • Governors can work when they want, as much as they want to
  • Instead of being reactive in meetings, governors and SLT can be proactive in following up areas for discussion, and bring solutions.
  • Governors feel better able to hold SLT to account and support the school more effectively
  • SLT can manage governor expectations in a timely and appropriate fashion
  • Everything is in one place and easier for everyone to find
  • Communication between governors and with SLT has improved enormously
  • Our work is not in silos, and transparency makes for more joined up strategic overview

Who else benefits?

We’ve done this to help ourselves, the SLT and the children and staff we work with. It has helped build trust with our staff and SLT  – and to model better use of technology for professional use.  However, we are accountable too, and were we to be inspected by Ofsted  they would see that much of the activity of our governing body now takes place on O365.

  • They would be able to find all our minutes, committee reports and related files easily – and we can share those files instantly and securely.
  • They would see a back and forth in comments on documents from SLT, where governors regularly challenge and hold SLT to account.
  • They would see informed, focussed discussions, and clear delegation and agenda building for future meetings.
  • They would see visit reports, budget adjustments checked, policies updated, curriculum discussions, staff feedback discussed, strategic plans adapted, research and blog posts shared, and the discussion around the local / national picture, with  analysis for our school context.
  • They would see minutes noting online discussions, and agenda items linked to specific documents.
  • They would see a changing pattern in our meetings through 2017; from 1½ hours of line-by-line discussion of headteacher reports,  to 30 mins on the main issues from reports and far more time on the living reality of school life and the challenges of doing right by more of our children.
  • They would see us discussing the context and implications of the data, rather than the data itself. We have the time to learn about the children behind the numbers and adjust our strategic work accordingly.

The choice is not whether to join us on this journey – but how you do it! For us, as a highly skilled and involved governing body, using O365 was likely to work well.  I would like to say that it can work for all governing bodies, …

…but….

…it’s not all been plain sailing. The most obvious and predictable problem was that not all governors have found it easy to get on with the technology. For some, this was using cloud tools for the first time and O365 is a lot less intuitive than Google, as it often wants to link to local drives/apps. For others, it was a matter of adding another MS login to their work/personal setup. And,…yes… we had some people who struggled to get to grips with digital tools at all!

CC0 https://pixabay.com/photo-248827/

Don’t expect everyone to get on the bus straight away. Governor are all volunteers and cannot be compelled to do anything. Expect to share screens, email some attachments, and print documents for those who are not ready for the shift yet.

 

 

That said, even when we were still using email and printed documents to meetings, there were lots of problems, with people not getting documents in advance, emails not getting through, wrong versions being reviewed, and people feeling that their contribution was lost in the discussion. So, while depending on technology has issues – I’d argue that the benefits outweigh the status quo!

There were concerns that this would increase workload – and, in the early months of the shift – it is fair to say that governors did not always get the balance right, and expected too much of SLT in responding to questions or requests that often crossed into operational matters. I’d love to say we’ve learned all those lessons, but it’s an evolving area and one we hope to establish new, clearer boundaries with our new headteacher and school business manager.

via GIPHY

However, we have had feedback that SLT have found that, by being able to dampen small concerns as they come up, or manage expectations before they grow, overall workload managing governors has reduced. Quite often, governors will answer each others questions on O365, or point each other to documents already shared- thereby saving SLT time and communication worries.

This is about more than technology platforms. Crucially, this is a  shift towards sharing, collaboration and openness – and requires a shift in culture – but not in the actual work!

Before setting off on this journey it is essential to make sure that everyone is clear that, though the practice of governance will change, the principles of good governance and your school / organisational values must be defended.  

O365 might work for you, but you might also want to look at whether Google Apps for Education is a better fit; or consider project team tools like Basecamp, or specific services, like Slack for discussion, or Trello for task management.

Where might this lead?

(C) All rights reserved Hugh Warwick – used with permission and thanks https://flic.kr/p/RpA5rG

Once governing bodies have discovered the benefits of using digital tools, they  open tantalising and/or terrifying doors  to transforming school governance forever; to better reflect our digitally enhanced society and to better serve our communities and/or  to expose the delicate thread separating operational and strategic decisions to an onslaught of blunt assaults.

Personally, I’d like to see how digital engagement tools such as Loomio, which allow groups of people to make decisions together, could improve the way governors represent the school community better.  

I realise that this is heresy for many governors as it challenges the principle of governance through representative democracy (you elect me because you trust me to make good choices) rather than direct democracy (your vote counts on each issue – like a referendum). I am not sure giving a direct vote on uniform or homework should lead to a change in school policies – but unless we trust children, parents and staff to express their views into the governance of the school, through appropriate and managed channels, then are we really doing all we can do reflect the school community?

Yes, it will mean that we might have to explain ourselves better and it might lead to more open discussions than are required right now. Yes, there is a risk of the Brexiteer/Remoaner type factions emerging  – but schools are public bodies and we have a duty to deal with difficult issues responsibly and transparently. People often suggest that academy governance are less accountable than maintained schools – so those of us not in academy structures should do more to be more representative and accountable to our communities.

We should explore, experiment and engage with technology to improve the work we do, cope with the complexity and rise to the challenge, and put our school values and the best possible outcomes for our children first.

You know what happened to the hedgehog who crossed the road? She got to the other side.

*These are very much my views and though it has been shared with staff and governors, does not represent the official view of the Larkrise Primary School Governing body or staff. 

Posted in Governance, Innovation | Tagged , , , , | 3 Comments

Quantum states of Society

Posted on November 4, 2017 by Eylan

I had a nightmare about a breakdown in society last night, and I woke knowing that that this fear has been there all along.  

I am not scared of what might happen, but of what is happening- and what happens when perspectives of the past are shifted, and we see what has happened, in new light.

Our brains seek narratives – with an well understood focus on the background stories and happy endings (for us). Yet, the lesson from quantum theories in science is that we sit on a more delicate balance between possible futures and presents.

It has always been thus. Perhaps it’s just middle-age, but for the first time in my cushioned life; much of which I have protected by the post-war consensus and techno-capitalism of Western privilege, I am afraid.

In our time, we see diplomacy distorted by demagogues, in America and Korea; idols and leaders unmasked as sexual predators; economic wellbeing rocked by plebiscites, and radicalism and religion prosper.

Racism, misogyny, and hate of all shades seeps through the open doors of our liberal society.   

Yet, the really shocking thing is that we are shocked by these realities. We knew. We knew and know that these horrors are there. We have always been aware of the parallel truths. It is the voluntary blindness of adulthood.  And, while hope is forgivable, not protecting each other is not.

To pick on the current issue of the day; Spacey, Cosby, MPs and other easy to turn on public figures are being forced into the light for Weinsteining. Yet, we still cannot face the abuse of grooming of more ‘likable’ figures, such as John Peel and Bill Wyman.

It’s hard not to note that this movement is currently mostly focussing on those bad people who are also not attractive, straight, or normatively needed.  I hope I am wrong, but my guess is that there will be a cull of those who were easy to pick out for being bad, powerful and gay, Jewish, black, or in some way disruptive. I know it will be hard if/when(!) my heroes get re-positioned by some ‘discovery’ – but, perhaps we need to wonder where this is going and where this will lead.

I am nervous of the unpicking of these threads, not because it isn’t right to call out sexual predators and abusers, but because it shows how immediate the risk is that we could jump to an alternate timeline – one with more danger for my children. One where difference is not safe in a liberal world – but where it is exposed in a sea of big data, amoral AI  and surveillance.

My Grandparents watched their worlds descend into moral and actual wastelands. As a Jewish kid growing up in middle class privilege, I heard the stories of our family histories in detached confusion. How could the world have been so twisted?

My Dad was taken from India during the fracture of Partition; as my Grandfather, a servant to the Raj and from the Jewish Bene Israel community, realised that India was no longer the civil multi-faith society it had been for them. My Mum’s family are from the European diaspora of Jews fleeing direct and historical persecution, in the cultured continent of Goethe and Spinoza. These immigrant families met in the East End of London, in a mixing of cultures that seemed to offer healing to the horrors of their past. I am a product of this hope.

This hope is baked into me. I believe, and have wanted to believe, in the good in human nature. I have made choices based on faith in the transformative nature of education and liberal values, aligning myself to movements – signing petitions and joining hashtag trends.  I don’t regret these choices – but I do wonder at my own naivete in thinking that I could negate the existence of the opposing forces.

Maybe the stench of hate is still too fresh from my nightmare, but today I needed to write about the lessons from our pasts. Not from history, because there is no one historical truth – but to learn from the quantum states of society that we can see on the edges of our vision.

The lessons that my grandparent’s generation taught me might  relevant:

  1. Always be ready leave – keep passports up to date and small but valuable items ready. No home is worth saving without those you love in it, in a community you can trust.
  2. Love your neighbour – but love your values more. Don’t adapt for approval.
  3. Keep a light on the dark corners – Call out the shadows – they are always there. 
  4. Revolutions and Wars are always waiting – they are closer than you think.

Last night, I had a nightmare.  Today, my eyes are wide open. I hope they will rest easy tonight.

Posted in Personal | 2 Comments

Pedagogy is Political

Posted on August 30, 2017 by Eylan

Warning – Polemic – Warning

Today, the news is full of shock and anger, mostly from the Left, at the news that St Olave’s Grammar School kicked out kids that were not maintaining the ‘high standards’ and exceptional results it prides itself on. However, this outrage is hypocritical and highlights the deep prejudices in our schools. Pedagogy (the theory and methodology of education) is political, and belongs in the national debate.

Parents know how central “Education, education, education”  is to the national political debate – especially around issues of social mobility and economic growth. However, if you are on the left and if you really want to make our economy more robust and our communities fairer – you need to challenge, not just who runs your school or what is studied – but how your children are learning, and why those choices have been made.  

Full disclosure: I am a progressive – which means (to me) that I think we have only just begun working out how to ‘do’ mass education – and that I believe there are more improvements we can find by trying new approaches.

Mass education has been a live experiment that’s only been running since 1945 (in the UK) and was built on the models available and familiar to those running the country – that of the classical education offered in the private school system and the pinnacle of which is the Oxbridge experience.

Deep within the system and in our society, at large, are some assumptions about education that rarely get an airing. I believe that one of those is that the elites deserve power, and the rest of us should be happy with a benign and elected dictatorship.

Why haven’t other models of schooling and education had time to evolve into our national system. Reggio Emilia, Project Based Learning,  Sudbury Schools , etc – work at least as well as the current system and produce successful and happier kids, and communities. See the incredible success of Expeditionary Learning and Big Picture schools in the US. Stuck out at the fringes, very few schools are brave enough to do right by their kids and communities.  

Even the Education Endowment Foundation review of PBL had to note that:

“In summary, although PBL is unlikely to improve children’s literacy outcomes or engagement, it may enhance the quality of children’s learning, particularly improving some of the skills required for future learning and employment.”

Surely, you’d expect that this summary would encourage parents and teachers to expect/demand these pedagogies in their schools. Right? But,… nope 🙁

But, instead, this unwillingness to move beyond traditional approaches comes from the long held conservatism in our communities and society –  because even the most left leaning parent are still in awe of the elites they claim to fight against.

One question will put this into sharp relief (especially for the parents reading):

If money was no object, you got no negative feedback from friends not able to do the same, and that your local state schools wouldn’t suffer – would you send your child to one of the better*  independent (private) schools?

Most of you would. You might never admit it to your friends – but you would. Let me tell you why.

Because you are part of the class system – and you’d want to give your kids the best possible start in life – and the rest of our society projects the belief that the independent school education is most likely to give them that. Looking at the white, male, privately educated leaders of our political parties and  those who fill our TV studios – it’s hard to argue.

Because you know that, under our current system, independent schools seek to give children an education perfectly suited to the examinations we use, and employment practices and prejudices in our workplaces. They get the results, right? Who wouldn’t want that advantage and access for their kids?

Because, the “best” state schools seek to emulate the independent sector, teaching through an academic curriculum, offering Latin, etc,  – a pattern that has spread since the coalition government – but begun under New Labour. Seeking to copy the better funded independent sector has it’s costs; notably in class sizes getting bigger; and the Arts and Sports often getting cut.

The irony of this is that it is the personalised and extra-curricular aspects of a private education are those that many paying parents believe adds the most value.

Worst of all – by copying the independent sector – but doing so without the resources and selectivity, the state sector is voluntarily setting itself up to continually fail and to maintain the pedestal that the private schools place themselves on.

Finally, you’d do it because there is no other option but to play the game; run by, and in favour of, the elites. Unless you happen to be in one of the very few areas to have a brave school to ‘chose’ from (like School21, XPSchool or Plymouth School for Creative Arts) where the pedagogy is explicit and progressive – then you are stuck with the inertia within a stunted system.

This post is not an argument for getting rid of independent schools (although I do believe they are the single most corrosive element in our education system) or to diss the hard work of thousands of teachers and school leaders. I want to see the state sector be more inclusive and democratic. That starts by being honest about the political nature of what we do in schools.

Holding up exam results as ‘proof’ that a model of education is superior to another is to take part in an act of propaganda in favour of an archaic and discriminatory system – that favours and perpetuates the elite.  We hear the debates about “Standards” and freedoms, academisation and assessment, or about workload and budgets. This makes the tension between the government and the profession, and distracts from where the real struggle is.

Those who lean on a ‘Research-led’ school improvement model are, in fact, allowing an ideology to define the educational outcomes and experiences of children- most of whom will not benefit. Almost all the research lean on performance in a very narrow set of measures in English and Maths. Shaping a school around what ‘What works’ can be as political as promoting one view of British History over another.

 

So, what’s to be done?

Firstly, the debate about what assumptions lie underneath how we educate and assess our kids needs to be opened and explored further – to expose the conservatism of our education system.

Not to knock what Oxbridge or independent schools do, but until we genuinely start to value learning experiences that are not slaves to those models – then a more democratic and equitable society will not be possible. Means of evidencing learning and ‘achievement’ need to encompass new behaviours – perhaps through Open Badges, but starting with the pedagogy of classroom practice.

Most of all, more teachers and parents need to talk about what mode of education they believe in – and they should make that work. We all know our current system is imperfect- so why not try another that better matches the beliefs about people and society we believe in?

Of course there will be objections. Of course the elite will pooh-pooh and demean those seeking to make change. But, if you believe, as I do, that we can make a fairer society than the one we live in now – and that is a target worth aiming for- then you have to bring your pedagogy in line with your politics.

My thanks to Dai Barnes, for his thoughtful and kind challenge, rigour and intelligence, and humanity and respect in discussing these ideas.

* Yes – I know, there are also independent schools whose results are poor. Which makes you wonder, what are parents paying for there – if not results?

Posted in Opinion | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

There Will be Blood – GDPR and EdTech

Posted on August 22, 2017 by Eylan

New EU regulations look set to bring some light into the often shady ‘Oil Rush’ in EdTech, drilling for data from our schools.  Individuals will have new and powerful rights to their personal data, and organisation will have to show what use that information has been put to. In this post, I’ll look at what is actually going on with data now; what does the EU regulation mean; and what might change.

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will come into force on 25th May 2018, and (put simply) strengthens the rights of citizens over the data  that their lives create. This useful Guardian article summarises the broader implications of the GDPR – and, NO, Brexit will not except UK citizens and organisations!

The new rights (in summary) are:

  • Article 12: The right to have questions about use of personal data answered, and to seek redress if these questions are not answered in a clear, concise, timely manner.
  • Articles 13 & 14: The right to know how personal data is being used at the time of collection, as well as the length of time for which it will be stored and contact information for the collecting party.
  • Article 15: The right to access the personal data that is being processed.
  • Article 16: The right to have incorrect personal data rectified.
  • Article 17: The right to have personal data erased when they are no longer necessary for the purposes for which they were collected and there is no legal ground for their maintenance.
  • Article 18: The right to restrict data processing where the data is inaccurate, its collection unlawful, or its processing no longer required.
  • Article 19: The data collecting party must inform all additional data processors with whom it shares personal data to cease processing data that has been rectified or erased.
  • Article 20: The right to receive their personal data in a structured, commonly-used, machine-readable format which they can freely share with other data processors.
  • Article 21: The right to object to personal data being used to profile or market to them.
  • Article 22: The right to not be subject to legal outcomes that rely solely on automated data processing.

For more detailed analysis – see here.

Like all the data protection regulations this new one replaces, GDPR will impact many aspects of school life. From fingerprints used to buy school lunches, to records of search terms used; school systems (MIS, assessment, attendance, LMS/VLEs) have been/are creating huge deposits of rich information about what goes on in classrooms and staffrooms.

The companies that run these systems are monetizing their access to this information – and, currently, have no need to check with  the schools/children/parents – and neither do the third party organisations using that data. Though consent will not be a requirement of GDPR – there are implications that those offering edtech solutions need to consider. (Thanks to Tony Sheppard for his advice on getting my facts right here!)

If Data is the new ‘Oil’ – then the GDPR is an attempt to bring regulation on the wild oil rush that has been going on across many sectors, before those industries take too much control over the geology of our privacy.

Use of oil from 1957

In the 1900s there were only really four uses of  crude oil. By the 1960s, as the image from 1957 below shows, that had grown to a complex tree. Now there is so much in our world that is a byproduct of  fossil fuels, we seem unable / unwilling to undo our dependence, even though (most of us) know that it must happen.

So as we look ahead to see how our data might be used, we must protect children, because they are in our care (natch) – but also the learning spaces and professionals that are responsible for education. It is teachers, parents and children that should be at the core of how learning is created – not the algorithms and interests of data-mining vested interests.

Data driven learning has already created troubling developments, notably use of machine learning. As Audrey Watters, the self-styled Cassandra of Edtech, points out, there is also a worrying trend of appropriating progressive terms to deliver traditional models – where data is used to create personalised instruction – rather than personalised learning.

Though Early Years settings, Schools, FE and HE institutions should be/are preparing for this shift in regulation – they cannot predict how parents, children and students will make use of these new rights.

I would expect a series of landmark cases quite early on as professionals, parents and guardians apply for full disclosure on data collected about their children. I’ll certainly be doing that!

The revelations of where the data has gone, and the uses to which it has been put will uncover a complex picture which should start to explode and reshape the way that commercial interests use data extracted from learning spaces.

The sheer amount of ‘paperwork’ (ironic how that term applies even in this most digital of discussions) created by this new regulation will force new behaviours in businesses – but also in schools, and in the classroom.

If a teacher starts to collect information about how kids are learning, or looks at new models of assessment – they will have to map out the possible uses it might be put to – and the school will have to mark out provisions and mechanisms for parents to give consent. Will an unintended consequence of GDPR in schools be that teachers stop collecting data?

What will happen when children become adults, still in education, and seek to track back their data through to early years – and want to interact with the datasets and how that shaped the options and decision that impacted their educational opportunities?

Given the huge interest in developing AI for education, the ethical considerations raised by GDPR alone, threaten the pace of development and investment for these exciting – but troubling – technologies. What if an AI teaching support system develops a bias towards a set of interventions for a set of children? Could the algorithms that underpin that technology be construed as racist or sexist?

I’d be depressed if these questions and challenges to the use of technology formed a barrier to the evolution of how we educate our children. Instead, I hope that it will refocus the debate on the WHY rather than on the HOW. We know technology, and the data it creates, can help education improve, but, as citizens, we should do this in the open.

Instead of worrying about how GDPR will strangle innovation or development, I’d like to engage in discussions about how we create a more Open education system – where the data forms part of the learning interactions with students. This would mean a huge shift in our educational culture – and the systems that run our schools.

We need open systems for managing digital learning – especially assessment/credentialling.   The Blockchain -through open Blockcerts – might offer a way to manage this new ecosytem – but it is only the start. As Doug Belshaw says, we also need to think about the ‘Weird and Wonderful’ aspects of education, that which data driven algorithms will struggle to interpret more effectively than human brains – and how we capture these in digital and meaningful ways.

If you are looking for specific, practical guidance, more detailed advice for schools is available – and is likely to become more readily available as we get closer to May 2018.

Until then, the debate is open – and the solutions should be too.

Posted in Innovation | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Four reasons to cry (if you are a museum educator)

Posted on July 12, 2017 by Eylan

via GIPHY

It’s not often I bring an audience down. As an upbeat and excitable person – passionate about education and vocal about how digital can be an vehicle for innovation, I often find I have been scheduled to speak after lunch, to refocus postprandial brains and leave them smiling and open to new ideas.

However, this June at an event for museum educators, I think I might have made some people cry. Here’s why

(Note: this post is full of tasty links. While the main meal should be nutritious, please explore the deeper flavours available by following the hyperlinks to other healthy brain snacks.)

Digital Learning in Museums, hosted by the Oxford University Museums Partnership, drew a national audience of leaders and practitioners from across the country. There were awesome speakers, and conversations with attendees during the breaks proved to be as valuable as some of the talks! 

I’d prepared a talk to bring some home truths to this nice audience and I didn’t hold back. To compensate, I smiled a lot, and talked fast – while struggling with an AV/IT issue which meant that I was running different versions of my deck on two devices.  

You can see my talk here, thanks the OUMP team, and my deck is shared below this post.

Despite my attempts to make it palatable,  some things needed to be said.

1 – Most edtech from the museum sector is failing to be found and/or valued by schools and learners.

This means that public funding is going to beautifully produced resources that very few people use. I’ve shared the research I worked on elsewhere, and some stats and recommendations made it into this talk for OUMP, (see slides below) and they are pretty shocking.

2 – Most digital learning products made by museums are not made for teachers and pupils, but for evidencing ‘public engagement’ with collections.

Of course public engagement is important – but unless a digital resource is made for the purposes of supporting learning, then it will not be useful for that prized activity.

Most education teams are still coming from a ‘We have a thing, let us show you’ approach – and few projects start with a design thinking, or agile development model. Given the costs of making a digital resource, and the platform and training requirements for users in being involved with a technology project – this is all but unforgivable.

3 – The GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Arts and Museums) and Heritage sector doesn’t have a robust or clear way to evaluate the impact of the work they do in education.

The vast majority of the museum education sector delivers ‘digital’ to schools via PDFs. While a PDF can be a powerful way to inspire learning, much of what museums offer is static and merely repackaging curatorial information with a ‘For Schools’ label.

Worse, as learning teams are dependent on PDFs as their digital offering for schools, they use the measure of ‘downloads’ of these files as evidence of engagement. Of course, these download stats mean nothing, as teachers have to download the pdfs to view them, but this is no guarantee of use in class or engagement with the institution.

4 – There is too little sharing – of what works and what didn’t!

At both this OUMP event, and others I have spoken at, I have found far too few practitioners sharing their stories or using open educational practices (which means more than just using OER). I was hugely impressed with both Andy McLellan, and Michelle Harrell, who both broke this pattern and told helpful stories of projects that didn’t go according to plan, and what  they did to learn from that.


Events like the Teachmeet I helped run, after a Culture24 event earlier in the year, could surely help with changing this culture – as a safer space for greater ‘Openness’ to grow. If teachers can admit failings in the context of the accountability pressures they are under – then, surely, museum educators could certainly be braver.

Of course, it’s not all bad news. Lots of places are opening up to new ways of working and thinking.  Coming from the commercial sector into the world of museums, galleries, heritage and culture – clients have come to me, keen to learn from how other parts of the education sector have made the shift from ‘product delivery’ towards ‘community engagement and service management’.

If you’d like to talk about how to develop educational resources that are found, used and valued by teachers and students, and make more impactful use of digital technology for learning, then please get in touch and let’s have a conversation!

Posted in edtech | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Innovation is not what you think it is…

Posted on April 27, 2017 by Eylan

via GIPHY (Yes, this is a gif of me)

Innovation means so many things to so many people that it means nothing in most contexts. This week, I heard my least favourite use of the word, in relation to EdTech. I thought I’d explain why, and offer a more useful definition of Innovation.

I enjoy the EdTech Podcast, created by Sophie Bailey – as it is a useful insight into the breadth of the sector. As it is the 1st Birthday of the podcast, I thought I’d catch up on those that I have missed.

As part of episode 64, Steve Connolly, Group Digital Director at Hodder,  used the term Innovation a lot. At one point, he said:

‘We are traditional publishers in that we publish traditional books, but…we’ve been innovating for ten 15 years.’

While Steve said a lot that made sense and is clearly doing a great job for Hodder, he used innovation to mean the way that publishers have adapted to digital technology and found new opportunities in the market.

IMHO – This is NOT innovation. You cannot innovate for 15 years!  What Steve means is evolution. He means gradual change. It is what all good businesses and organisations should be doing all the time – constantly improving and serving the audiences they work with where they need it.

Innovation is substantial positive change.  I’ve come to this definition having been challenged to explain what I mean by innovation again and again, in a range of contexts. This one works to distinguish innovation from all the other behaviours and characteristics of an organisation (or person).

Traditional publishers can  be innovative, but it is (by definition) not the way they work and (having worked in and for quite a few of them) the publishing process mitigates against innovation at almost every step.

I agree with Andrea Carr, Founder of Rising Stars, who (in the same podcast), who argued that we need to see more traditional/established publishers working with (not just assimilating) start-ups and other innovative sources – to improve the fertility of the edtech sector.

 

My thanks to Sophie Bailey for the ever stimulating EdTech Podcast – and congratulations on the anniversary!

 

Posted in edtech | Tagged , | Leave a comment