People who teach are
Constantly Learning By Christine Shannon, Director of Professional Learning and Research People who teach are constantly learning. We have no choice – we are at the forefront of preparing young people to enter society and contribute to its progress. In partnership with parents, we are engaged in guiding students through experiences which enable them to build skills and capacities and navigate their way through the world.
What is the research question?
At The Geelong College, adult learning is guided by the same principles as student learning. Interest, choice, collaboration and accountability are key elements of our professional learning program.
b) How does the iPad change our pedagogy when scaffolding children’s knowledge in writing?
This year Junior School staff have had the privilege of learning with three research mentors from Deakin University’s School of Education. Associate Professor Louise Paatsch, Professor Andrea Nolan and Dr Anna Kilderry generously shared their expertise, building on and extending our understanding of teacher research, and helping us scaffold a framework for our Learning Projects.
Because it is real and 21st century learners need to see ICT (information and communications technology) as a second or third limb. We need to equip children for jobs that have not yet been created. They need to develop skills that equip them to create, analyse, think critically and problem-find.
What can iPads offer as a tool for making children’s learning visible? Sub-questions: a) How does the iPad change our pedagogy when advancing children’s knowledge in shape?
Why is this research project important?
What data is to be collected and how? Work samples showing children’s knowledge – extended by app smashing with “Explain Everything” and “Book Creator”. From whom will the data be collected? Prep and Year 1 students in our homerooms. What will need to be considered in the data collection?
Louise Paatsch, Andrea Nolan and Anna Kilderry from Deakin University’s School of Education have been mentoring the College’s Junior School staff with their research.
The annual sharing and celebration of this learning is an affirming and energising experience. This is just one example of the learning that was shared this year: Learning Project 2016: Using iPads to enhance learning within an Early Years Reggio Emilia-inspired classroom. Charmaine Saraci, Emma Watters What is the research project about? We plan to explore the iPad as a tool and experiment with evidence-based strategies that improve literacy and numeracy learning. We seek to discover how technology can make a teacher’s work smarter, not harder, and discuss the possibility that moving away from paper-only planning can enhance and enrich student learning.
14 Ad Astra Issue No 131
We discussed that our research is trying to show that the iPad can be a valuable tool for making learning visible. But how do we assess this? How do we collect data that will answer these questions? Maybe keeping a selection of children’s work to analyse the different ways they are showing their learning and the types of learning they are exhibiting? But are work samples speaking to what the children are putting out, not what we are putting in? How do we answer the “pedagogy” side of the question? Do we need to refine the question more? Are providing open-ended learning tasks and thinking about apps that make the SAMR (Substitution, Augmentation, Modification and Redefinition) model possible enough of an answer to the pedagogy part of this question?