Week 9
Initial visit to School
My Reflections
The initial visit to the primary school
today has been incredibly informative and inspiring. I had the opportunity to
interact with applications that could be used throughout the curriculum to maximize
the learning process, this included; ICanAnimate, Veescope, Telligami, Airplay
and Bookcreator. Bazelgatte exclaims that teachers fail to take advantage
of children’s previous knowledge regarding digital literacy. However an
increasing number of teachers are gaining confidence in discovering the use of
animation and moving image texts; as well as the equipment needed to create
them. Halsey (2007) states
that ‘As a teacher we can no longer ignore technology’, subsequently we must
embrace technology and envision new ways of using emerging technologies within
our classrooms (pp99). I feel that the session today had enabled my
confidence to grow, as well as stimulating possible lesson ideas for the
future.
The school itself is incredibly advanced in terms
of how it is used and infiltrated throughout the school. This extends to a
sensory room, a school radio station and even a WII station play area. Although
impressive, I couldn’t help but question whether these additions, the WII area in
particular, were essential for learning. In addition to this It has been noted
that the possible falling standards of literacy where due to the distractions
caused by the invasions of technology, for instance ‘showing films in the
classroom was mostly regarded as a form of babysitting, or sometimes as a
reward at the end of a unit of work.’ (Bazelgatte, ed: 55).This argument also
extends to the use of technology outside the classroom as ‘the watching of
television- and more recently the playing of computer games- have been
regularly depicted as a shocking waste of children valuable time.’ (Bazelgatte,
ed:55)(Palmer, 2006).
On the other hand digital literacy
can be used as a way of communicating and representing knowledge in different
contexts and to different audience (multimodal). It involves finding and
selecting relevant information, critically evaluating and re-contextualising
knowledge as well as having an understanding of the social contexts (Hague et
al, 2010). We had the opportunities to watch some clips created by the children
using the technologies available to them. A video clip using the green screen
based on a history topic caught my attention. Evidently the process of
collecting relevant information, prioritising the information with the audience
in mind and structuring the presentation is a very complex process. Furthermore
using the ipads required pupils to notice and understand the composition of shots,
the deployment of light, colour and movement, the arrangement of order and
duration in aural and visual material. Even presenting this topic requires
children to be the aware of reliability and authenticity of their chosen research
topic, particularly if information is taking from non-print mediums
(Bazelgatte, ed). Ultimately children should be taught how to approach
different digital literacy with a ‘degree of discrimination and critical
awareness that should attend reading, writing and communication of any kind’
(Alexander, 2009:270). All of which are skills that involve a higher level of thinking.
This only reiterates the importance of using these mediums to enable children to
develop layers of understanding throughout the curriculum.
After watching a video created by the children on the topic of history,
we could not stop discussing how excellent it was to watch the subject come to
life through the use of green screen (Veescope). Consequently it is easy to
image the discourse that would arise from the children after watching it. Marsh
and Bearne (2008) highlight the positive outcomes from the use of digital
literacy within the classroom, including the
fact that children need little encouragement to begin discuss the moving image
text encountered. This also extends to the language as children tend to employ ‘a
richer use of language and more sophisticated vocabulary’ (Marsh and Bearne,
2008: 22-8). Next
session we will be using the ipad applications and collating them together via Bookcreator
in the hope of ‘bringing
about more complex modes of communication and therefore more complex
appreciation of texts’ (Unsworth et al, 2005, p. 44).
Alexander, R. (2009)
Children, their World, their Education: Final Report and Recommendations of the
Cambridge Primary Review. Abingdon: Routledge.
Bazelgette,
C. (2010) (Ed) Teaching Media in Primary
Schools London: Sage
Dean
(2010)
Rethinking Literacy in: Bazalgette, C. (ed). ‘Teaching Media in Primary
Schools’ London: Sage
publications Ltd
Hague,
C., & Payton, S. (2010)
Digital Literacy across the curriculum. A
Futurelab handbook [Online] www.futurelab.org.uk (Accessed
05.02.14)
Halsey,
S. (2007) Embracing
emergent technologies and envisioning new ways of using them for literacy
learning in the primary classroom. Vol 6, No 2 (September, 2007). New Zealand.
PP99-107
Marsh, J. and Bearne, E. (2008) Moving
Literacy on. Leicester: UKLA
Palmer, S. (2006) Toxic Childhood: How the Modern World is Damaging Our
Children and What We Can
Do About it. London: Orien (Ch9)
Unsworth,
L., Thomas, A., Simpson, A., & Asha, J. (2005). Children's literature and
computer-based
teaching. Maidenhead: Open University Press
I agree- the visit to the school really brought all of the theory we have been looking at to life by demonstrating inspiring ways of incorporating ICT into literacy. I particularly liked the 'Art Attack' video we were shown.
ReplyDeleteI also agree that we as teacher's should not ignore technology, however I do believe that it should be used appropriately and in moderation. For example you mentioned the WII station and questioned whether it was essential to learning, I also question this and hope that it really is only used as a reward and not just as a time filler, as that may in turn encourage children to use technology at home opposed to doing schoolwork,
I worry that with all the technology being used at home, too much being used at school may mean children might begin to merge the concepts of being at home and being at school. Therefore as you mentioned in your entry, I question whether from this they may be distracted and not interpret the intended learning meant through the use of technology at school, therefore reducing the effectiveness of these new multimedia technologies in terms of education?
You make an interesting point about the possible merge between what children do at home and what they do at school. However I feel there is a clear difference, particularly by the fact that the school has blocked inappropriate sites such as facebook or msn.
ReplyDeleteDuring the last school visit I had asked the Year 1 teacher the specific reasons why they have a WII area and he explained that he is a huge incentive for good behaviour, it also develops the social skills of introvert children who may be use to interacting through computer games.
Despite this, I am still unsure how comfortable I am with the idea of a computer console in an educational establishment. However the arguments do reiterate the fact that advances in technology can be used to develop a variety of skills, and some beyond the curriculum.