Never mind the technology, where’s the learning?

On Tuesday last I had the very pleasant experience of going to Scargill Junior School in order to do a short piece for Teachers’ TV News. If you’ve read my previous post, you will know this was prompted by the front page of the previous Tuesday’s Guardian that stated the Rose Review would recommend the teaching of Twitter in place on compulsory topics such as World War II and The Victorians. Unlike Joe Dale, who was invited to do a live head-to-head with Phil Beadle that afternoon for Radio 4’s PM programme I had a little more time to prepare both my thoughts and undertake some research. You can catch my views on the broadcast here, and it’s well worth reading Joe’s post event reflections on what he did not have time to say during the broadcast and how he might manage Twitter and blogging tools in the classroom.

The purpose of the Teachers’ TV News piece was rather different and the Twitter story was merely a way in to introduce to the audience, mostly educators of course, the sort of pedagogical use of ICT the Rose review might be talking about. The interim report has specifically asked Becta and the QCA to:

1. Review whether aspects of the Key Stage 3 curriculum for ICT would be more appropriately taught in Key Stage 2.
2. Make sure that by the end of Key Stage 2, children are able to select and apply ICT to advance their learning across the curriculum.

So I was particularly keen to ask the Headteacher at Scargill Junior her views on this. Unfortunately, as perhaps is often the way, this part of the interview got left out of the final two minute piece. I can see how shots of the pupils hunting for minibeasts and using smartphones to identify creatures using a branching database might have been more photogenic beyond my initial question. Suffice to say, Mrs Ireland was enthusiastic about both points and felt that the school was challenging their pupils beyond the requirements of Key Stage 2. Equally, I was extremely impressed with how the year 5 and year 6 pupils I spoke to were able to clearly articulate how ICT benefited their learning.

In addition, as part of my preparation, I was keen to enlist the help of fellow professionals, and therefore set up a wiki page within Naace Communities to elicit their thoughts on what a revised Primary curriculum should look like. Miles produced a useful list of broad skills that ICT is good at supporting:

• Creating
• Finding things out
• Communicating
• Collaborating
• Presenting
• Analysing
• Exploring
• Problem solving

Neil made the point that we should not lose higher order skills among a range of albeit valid, lower-level communication uses. By the end of Key Stage 2 pupils need to be able to judge the validity of their use so that, as new tools come out, they are able to adapt.

Leon made an excellent point that the concept of community building and digital literacies are the most important aspect when considering social media and ICT, “How to construct and apply genuine narratives that contribute to meaningful working within a primary community both on and offline are the most important thing to accomplish …” and drew my attention to this excellent video on the skillsets needed:

All of which inevitably got left out, but I’m eternally grateful for their ideas and contributions.

The Teachers’ TV news is here which, I’m told, will be available for approximately 2 weeks. The piece is 9 minutes and 24 seconds in.

Update: 6th April

You’ll be glad to known that Ed Balls has confirmed that Twitter replacing The Victorians in the Primary Curriculum is “”just complete nonsense”. Well that’s a relief! Remember you heard it here first. I doubt this will be reported on the front page of a national newspaper tomorrow.

Tags: Rosereview, Twitter, Primary curriculum, Scargill Junior School