— Steve Weatherell (@steveweatherell) June 27, 2016
So was it worth the wait? After 9 years, ISTE has given the Standards a big shake-up. Firstly, the bar has been set higher, and no longer do we merely "use technology to learn". No, we are promoting "Transformative learning with technology".
And it's true! The new Standards are very far-reaching, including whole new skills and abilities which we expect good teaching to bring to our students. For example, there is a new category: Computational Thinking. Of course, it could all just be wishful thinking. Just saying something is transformative, does not make it so. But as I plot my path through CoETaIL Course 1, I feel that the new Standards (a taxonomy, if you will) are very timely.
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Bloom's Taxonomy updated 1990[/caption]This week I became re-acquainted, once again, with the work of Dr Benjamin Bloom who pops up whenever I am studying education.
The most interesting aspect of the 1990 revision of Bloom's taxonomy is how Synthesis is promoted and re-branded. It becomes Creating. Whereas 'synthesis' suggests a use of raw materials to make a new product, 'creation' implies an extra ingredient - something which wasn't there before. Perhaps the difference is only semantic, but the decision to put Creating at the top of the ladder is significant.
Few people in 1990 could have foreseen how, within a couple of decades, it would be commonplace to be able to create artifacts: films; sound recordings; multimedia objects using one and the same portable machine. But Bloom's revised taxonomy anticipated the changes in education which ubiquitous digital technology makes possible.
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3 steps to heaven[/caption]I read about another hierarchical taxonomy in Living and Learning with New Media. According to this analysis, kids, on their own and without the help of adults, hang out with technology, then mess around and finally geek out. It's a hopeful vision, but the reality about the geek stage which is "intense, autonomous, and interest-driven" (p. 28), is that:
"these kinds of youths are a small minority among those we encountered" (p. 28)
That is not a startling revelation to many of us who work with 21st century youth. Although some of my students are much more skillful and dexterous than me in their daily use of their devices, in other ways they are limited in what they do. They have acquired certain habits such as efficiently consuming and generating social media, but they do not necessarily learn new skills unless they offer immediate rewards (why would they?). This innate conservatism is invisible to many of my colleagues who regard their students as masters of the new devices, but it is important for the teachers to realise that it is so.
For otherwise, what would we need teachers for? Thankfully, search engines have taken over some of the bottom-rung Bloom skills. And there are web-services which allow anyone to cobble together a basic explanatory video. This leaves us with our hands a little freer to give the students new challenges.
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Image credit: ladder[/caption]Sure, student, you can bash out a quick presentation, but:
- Do you know how to find and evaluate the most reliable sources?
- Can you use visual information to engage your audience rather than riddle them with bullets?
- Will you present it in a way that your audience understands the ethical or social implications?
Google won't do that for you, but your teacher can.
Last week, in my Theory of Knowledge class, I had a clear idea of what I wanted the students to understand at the end of the lesson and I designed an activity to achieve it. I don't think I did a good job. In attempting to dictate the students' learning, I did not trust in their ability to construct it. We used the devices but as consumers when we could have been creating.
So next time we will climb the ladder.
