BSF Leadership Programme

Gerald Haigh's Five Things To Think About – 30

Our regular column hits 30. So, new readers, don't forget to browse the archive after these latest tips on creating learning spaces, flying without pilots and getting to grips with Web 2.0.

The final frontier - into learning space on an iPod

Talking about learning while inhabiting a learning space isn’t a new idea. Len Marsh, then principal, introduced his "primary bases" at Bishop Grosseteste College, in the 1970s. It was teacher education happening in a classroom environment designed to promote discussion about layout, interaction and group work.

The concept is obviously a good one, and here it is again, in the regional Strategic Forums being run jointly by ASCL (Association of School and College Leaders) and RM, in Bristol, London, Warwickshire and Leeds. They provide, says the website, “A chance to develop and shape your own vision by working as a group in a real learning space environment which has been designed to encourage and facilitate active learning and hands-on opportunity.”

The events carry a fee (£75) but delegates are treated to a specially commissioned film of Sir Ken Robinson, inspirational keynote speaker Richard Gerver and creative activities to construct learning spaces using iPod Touches (which they get to keep).
Strategic Forums: a vision of future learning

Do you really need a pilot to start flying? Ewan McIntosh says No

Sometimes a single phrase brings you up short because it challenges a piece of wisdom that you’ve accepted as gospel. In this case it’s “Avoid the Pilot Project” from social media expert and educator Ewan Macintosh (left). It's a subhead in “An Adoption Strategy for Digital Media in Schools Turning Great Individual Practice into the Norm”, on the GETideas.org website created for school transformation by Cisco as part of its social responsibility remit.

Pilot projects never fail, says Macintosh, because they’re resourced for success. And if they do succeed, it doesn’t mean those who aren’t involved have bought into the innovation. It's much better if the whole organisation is ready to deal with failure: “When the culture already accepts that failure is healthy, pilot projects lose their point once again. That acceptance of failure stems from system leaders such as you.”

The title of the article says what it’s about, which is embedding the use of digital media across an institution. But the messages in it apply to the process of getting new ideas of any sort accepted and into action. It’s well worth reading by anyone involved in the transformation of learning. And school leaders can sign up for any of the series of free, live online leadership seminars being run by Ewan McIntosh on the GETideas.org website.

Your free online antidote to complacency – InspirED

Look at the latest edition, just out, of InspirED from Futurelab. InspirED is a magazine of stories and news about innovation in education, updated three times a year. It’s a free online resource, but you can sign up to be reminded about it. This latest edition has a lot about assistive technologies – still so often either forgotten or added later when it comes to new building projects.

Particularly fascinating is news of progress with eye-tracking technology, where users with no other kind of movement can control computers completely by shifting their gaze around the screen. I first saw this in its early stages at the Royal National College for the Blind. It seemed like science fiction then, and it’s heartening and inspiring to see the determination that’s going into something that will change the lives of one group of people.
inspired.futurelab.org.uk
More eye-tracking detail, with video, at AbilityNet GATE

Copy that. Forensics to the fore in Web 2.0 amazing investigations

Are you sure you know what’s really meant by Web 2.0? By the time you get well into Terry Freedman’s new (and free) e-book The Amazing Web 2.0 Projects Book you will, I guarantee, regardless of your previous level of understanding, be much clearer about what it can mean for schools and learning.

What Terry’s done here is put together a large collection of projects from teachers. Many of them are works in progress. All make fascinating reading. They’re deeply educative and – as when we’re presented with the painstaking work of serious-minded early years learners – often quite moving.

Favourites? As a CSI addict I enjoyed “CSI Twitter” in which a class of children in the States enrol a wide range of tweeters and bloggers in identifying an animal skeleton found on their campus. Within a few hours they had top scientists on the case. Imagine what that does for motivation and self-esteem.
www.ictineducation.org

How creating the buildings can be the learning too

Involving children in new building projects has stepped up several gears recently. The 3D web-based “Our School Building Matters” resource has attracted much attention, and there’s “Thinking Space”, a free workshop resource – two resources in fact, one for staff, one for learners – developed by CABE (Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment), Futurelab and Portsmouth City Council.

CABE has also worked with Bure Valley primary school in Norwich to involve children more deeply in the processes of planning and consultation. Activities that were trialled there are now included in another toolkit – “Our School Building Matters” – jointly from CABE and SSAT (Specialist Schools and Academies Trust) What’s different about this one is that it’s a cross-curricular resource that uses the building project to support learning. Sections include “A Crash Course in Architecture” and there are subject links and learning objectives for all ages throughout.

Gerald Haigh’s ‘Five Things To Think About’ column for the National College for School Leadership builds on his highly popular newspaper work and highlights important issues for school leaders engaged in Building Schools for the Future and the Primary Capital Programme.

Gerald Haigh welcomes feedback and suggestions - gerald.haigh@googlemail.com

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