#OnlyLearning

When we discuss #Sustainability, we often talk about #FoodMiles and #Renewables. When I taught my Social Studies classes, I would often ask them to think about the #SupplyChain of the lunchbox items (Farming, Transporting, Selling, Shipping, Processing, Packaging etc). But whilst we are well-versed in discussing the hidden carbon footprint of our foods, we rarely give much consideration for our tech.  For a long time, we have championed digital solutions and cloud storage as "a great way to save paper", and saving trees (especially with deforestation continuing at pace around the world) is a worthy criteria. In a meeting just last year, a Microsoft employee rejoiced telling me how M365 had saved a school so much paper, that, if stacked it would be the equivalent height as London's Shard building. Little was said of the need for energy hungry servers to store all that data - the cloud is a clever label, because we rarely think of 'clouds' as sinister. ( Although I...

At a meeting yesterday, the Vice Principal shared this photo showing a large granite manse on the College Lawn.   Today, the college lawn is treated with the same reverence as the sections of the college which date back to  1525, it's funny to think the lawn has only been as it is since around WW1 (shortly before the Elphinstone Hall was built to replace the Common hall in the 1930s). As a result,  I've been enjoying a bit of digging into the History of King's (given it's now my place of work).  After a trawl through old maps on the National Library of Scotland website, I found this 1847 map ( https://maps.nls.uk/view/ 115109637 ) showing  Principal Jack's  manse in  approximately the  same location (it also names a few other academic manses from that time),  and it lines up beautifully with   https://www.electricscotland. com/history/statistical/kings. htm .    Given the timeframe, and the second document, we can safely assume...

I've enjoyed giving some thought lately to potential applications of AI in teacher education. Today, I experimented with ChatGPT in generating exemplar lesson plans and the results were mixed, but no lesser than one might expect from student teachers in their first foray into lesson planning. My initial thoughts were that this might be a useful tool for creating new examples of lessons to help model lesson structures and, moreover, offer students an opportunity to evaluate various plans, identifying the merits and shortfalls therein. There is also scope to use AI to help students/teachers get to grips with how they might embed technologies in their lesson plans: The Bing AI bot was perhaps more helpful in supporting teacher development by focusing on useful resources and a range of suggested activity ideas: I'm keen to keep the conversation around this going, so please let me know your thoughts.

Below is a blog post written by ChatGPT on Digital Citizenshi p on 10/03/2023.  Digital Citizenship Education: What it is and Why it Matters In today’s digital age, children and young people are growing up in a world that is more connected and online than ever before. They have access to an enormous amount of information, tools, and platforms that can help them learn, create, and communicate with others. However, this also means that they are exposed to a range of digital risks and challenges that can have serious consequences for their well-being, privacy, and reputation. This is where digital citizenship education comes in. Digital citizenship education is a term used to describe the process of teaching and learning about the responsible use of technology, the Internet, and social media. It aims to equip children and young people with the knowledge, skills, and attitudes they need to navigate the digital world safely, responsibly, and ethically. Why is digital citizenship educat...

Have you ever taken a moment to consider what you share online?  What about all those photographs of your children? Have you even asked your child if they are happy with you sending their digital likeness into the ether, at a time when an ever-greater number of tools are being launched, and used, with minimal thought for their longer term impact. The United Nations Convention of the Rights of the Child was written a long time before we had any reason to worry about online presence - after all the the UNCRC came into action in 1992, a year before  CERN  placed its World Wide Web technology in the public domain and gave birth to the phenomenon of online communication. Yet the UNCRC has incredible relevance for our children, especially given omnipresent online access and these new AI   tools : Article 3  - The best interests of the child must be a top priority in all decisions and actions that affect children. Article 8  - Every child has the right to an id...

 Why can't my pupils follow simple instructions By  Adam Boxer lead practitioner at The Totteridge Academy, London, on why pupils find it hard to follow simple instructions. [The following is a lightly edited lift from Adam's original blog  post] As soon as you are a few words in the noise starts to build as students pack away, put on coats, push their chairs in and talk to each other. Why? It’s not a difficult class and you’ve had good command of the group…so why does this always seem to happen? One of the most powerful techniques I use is Means of Participation (MOP) [read more in  Lee Donaghy’s blog ]. MOP is about how you communicate to students how they are supposed to participate in your lesson. Phrases like:           " …by putting your hand up…”           “…just think about the answer for me” establish the means by which your students will participate. It’s a powerful technique but it isn’t enough. ...

Challenging the Extrovert Ideal in the Classroom Without proffering cliches and stereotypes, the introverts in your class will likely prefer to reflect and think deeply. In the classroom setting, this can mean having a preference to work independently.  Introverts may prefer planning, enjoy brainstorming and considering all sides of something in their mind before taking the next step. They often prefer discussing things with one other person rather than in a large group.  Constantly being told to “speak up” and work with others during can cause stress or anxiety.  When you are designing tasks for your learners, remember that it may be focused, independent learning tasks in which some will shine brightest. There are links to resources and some great prompts in this article to help you plan for the introverts in your lessons. Here's Jamie Thom , author of    A Quiet Education: Challenging the extrovert ideal in our schools  discussing both why an...