Provide the infrastructure

Almost all schools visited in both the United States and Canada had a dedicated technician who would look after the nuts and bolts aspects of the technology. This freed up teachers to really focus on pedagogy and not have to worry if the technology was working or not.


Schools in Maine also had a resident technology integration specialist. This person’s job was to assist all classroom teachers in integrating technology in pedagogically sound ways, helping students reach those higher order thinking levels.

Leveraging the buying power

States and even regions are in a unique position, due to the size of their student and teacher populations, to leverage the cost of getting technology into the hands of students. Together with vision and clear direction, school administration can greatly assist in bridging the digital divide and give all students access to the technology they require. The hardware simply becomes standard issue to schools and students.


One such initiative is the Maine Learning Technology Initiative (MLTI). This initiative gives an Apple iBook to all middle school students attending public schools in Maine and their teachers. It was one of the first such initiatives anywhere in the world to equip all students with a laptop. MLTI came about due to a former Maine Governor, Angus King and a state budget surplus. This initiative included upgrading networking to schools and making each school a wireless hotspot. Furthermore it also provided intensive training to teachers before the laptops arrived in the schools.

Provide vision and research

For a creative curriculum to be delivered and thus prepare students for the 21st century, there needs to be a group of innovators or thinkers in the background researching methodologies and best practice. This group is separate from the administration at the organizational, regional and school level. Instead this group of thinkers works with teachers looking at ways to implement a creative curriculum and conducts research to determine effectiveness.


Todd Wright, Curriculum Coordinator, Information Technology, York Region District School Board, Canada leads a group of consultants. The consultants work out in schools with teachers helping them to develop pedagogically sound curriculum for the 21st century. They in turn help teachers work through the theory of creative curriculum, and the logistics of how to get things working in classrooms. This group of consultants is also responsible for looking into the future and trialing and assessing new technologies. At the time of my visit the consultants were experimenting with the possibility of using Second Life in classrooms. They were assessing whether or not this technology suitably supported learning in the classroom and also what the logistical challenges would be for making this technology happen in the classroom.


The work of the Lifelong Kindergarten at MIT, detailed previously, is continually working with schools in action research style projects to determine the effectiveness of new technologies on teaching and learning.


The John W. Gardner Centre for Youth and their Communities (JGC) at Stanford University partners with communities to research, develop and disseminate effective practices and models for developing well-rounded young people. JGC works with communities with high migrant populations living in disadvantage. JGC’s goal is to involve students, parents and the rest of the community in the school. The school becomes the centre of the community. JGC provides research to the community. JGC also actively engages in the development of youth programs. The research directly links to the programs and initiatives in the field of community youth development. In this way JGC provides support to the community, to schools and to teachers, working directly with them to support student learning.


The Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning (SCIL) at Stanford University conducts research to advance the science, technology and practice of learning and teaching. The SCIL works with teachers, scholars and students to research ways to improve both formal and informal learning. Recent research conducted by the SCIL includes:


The Creative Physical Classroom


“This world is but a canvas for our imaginations.” Henry David Thoreau


The physical space of a classroom is a canvas for our imaginations. There are ways to change classroom design in order to maximise higher ordering thinking and creativity.

Beware the computer lab!

Consider the following two pictures. The first one is indicative of a typical classroom early last century, the second a typical computer lab today. In both instances students are sitting in rows looking in the same direction. The difference is that in the second picture students have expensive electronic equipment in front of them. Depending on the curriculum implementation neither scenario is extremely conducive to conversation or collaboration and subsequently to creativity.


Furthermore in the computer lab scenario the technology ceases to be “ubiquitous and invisible”. Instead students most likely have a time which they access the lab and go and do ‘computers’, the technology becomes the object of learning and not the tool to support learning.


A better scenario would be to take computers out of the labs and distribute them to classrooms. This may mean there will not be as many computers in the classrooms as there would have been in a single lab, but with a creative curriculum the technology becomes the tool to support learning. The technology is there when it is required, just in time. For example, in an early years classroom at Jersey Public School there are only two computers in the classroom. The students are able to access the computers as they need them, when appropriate to their learning, to look up information about the weather or animal life cycles or to record digital stories.

Laptop initiatives

There are many positive things to be said about getting laptops into the hands of students. Among other things, laptops are personal and portable. They are small enough to seamlessly fit into a student backpack and yet still provide the creative power that is so necessary for success in the 21st century. Laptops reduce the logistical challenge of space in classrooms. Laptops aid collaboration. For example, it is so much easier to get into groups and work on a document collaboratively using Google Docs with each child using their laptops as opposed to working around a desktop computer where one student is typing.


The Maine Learning Technology Initiative (MLTI) was by far the largest initiative in the United States, arming its middle school student and teacher population with laptops. Students take their laptops with them to every class. The laptops are there to be used when appropriate to support learning.

The use of the laptops in classrooms is sometimes initiated by the teacher and sometimes by the student. For example, at Auburn Middle School, Auburn, Maine students were observed using their laptops in two different science classes. In one class the teacher initiated the use of the laptops and students were working on science investigation simulations. In the second class, students initiated the use of the laptops. In this class the students were discussing global weather patterns. All students had their laptops open but all were doing different things whilst also engaging in the class discussion. One student was creating a mind map of the discussion, another student was taking notes in Word, yet another student was looking up a meteorological website and yet another was looking up the definition of a term that came up in the discussion. The laptops in this second scenario were allowing the students to be in control of their own learning. This technology tool allowed them to access the curriculum in ways that best suited their learning.


Classrooms of the future

Wallenburg Hall at Stanford University provides a state-of-the-art testing ground for technology application in the classroom. Students and faculties have used the innovative spaces at Wallenburg Hall to experiment with new types of learning experiences. This breaks from the traditional lecture style delivery of content that is so common in universities. Lecturers, bringing their classes into Wallenburg Hall, see the value of transforming their mainly textual based lectures into more effective visual and collaborative lessons, in this way better preparing students for the 21st century.

Each of the classrooms at Wallenburg Hall is set up with two rear projection screen/interactive whiteboards, wirelessly networked laptops, video conferencing equipment, flexible furniture and moveable whiteboards that facilitate group work. The rooms are also equipped with discrete video cameras and microphones designed to capture group discussions and lessons. The aim in these spaces is to encourage flexibility, the user being able to easily design a physical learning environment that best suits their goals.


Students use large screen digital whiteboards to create, compare and analyse work that spans from ancient Hebrew text to computer interface designs. In the learning spaces, students are able to move quickly and easily from lecture mode to small group discussion, due to the flexible furniture and wirelessly networked laptops. Students are able to digitally capture audio, video and even written work from the formal classroom setting, in a digital format which they can then access and use in more informal learning settings.



Schools or Community Learning Centres

Alameda Community Learning Centre, a Year 6-12 school in Alameda, San Francisco is a school that wishes to empower students to take ownership of their own learning. The school does this through creative curriculum and timetabling and a creative learning space.


Students at Alameda spend some time in regular classrooms; however most of their time though is spent in the open classroom space where they communicate, collaborate and create, working on multidisciplinary projects together. The space appears informal and unstructured, but there is a buzz of learning in the large room as students work together. Teachers then become expert facilitators in this space as they work together with students.

What museums have to teach us

Whilst on the study tour numerous museums and science research centres across the United States and Canada were visited. These include:


These museums and research centres have a lot to teach us about classroom design. The audience for exhibits in all cases ranged from preschool children all the way up to the elderly. As I personally engaged in the exhibits and also spent time watching others do so, I began to think about what is it about exhibits in museums that makes them so engaging to such a diverse audience.


The exhibits firstly differentiated content for visitors. The more visual and ‘hands-on’ exhibits appealed to students. In most ‘hands-on’ centres, instructions were presented in both visual and text modes. There were always museum volunteers or assistants on hand to answer questions or to gently guide students in the learning they were doing. The exhibits explained quite technical scientific information by going from the real world to the abstract. Explanations started from where the visitor was. Above all there was no pressure. Students were learning because it was simply interesting and not because they needed to past a test.

Conclusions

The world has changed. The key to success in the future is creativity. Students who are able to work collaboratively to come up with novel solutions to world challenges will be those that succeed in the 21st century.


Evolution needs to come in four forms:

  1. Creative curriculum

  2. Creative teachers

  3. Creative administration and

  4. Creative classrooms.


We will be doing our students a disservice if we remain in the past whilst the world around us evolves. As educationalists, as professionals and as lifelong learners we need to evolve: in practice, in thought and within ourselves.


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