What is Digital Learning in the Classroom?

Digital learning is a shorthand term for the revolution in digital media that can be used in the classroom to enhance learning. It does not mean an end to handwriting or traditional work methods and subjects; however it does mean the introduction of easily accessible electronic resources for learning and a better development of pupils’ enquiry skills.  

These devices can be tablets, iPads, Kindles, e-readers, laptops or netbooks which are brought into the classroom beside the books and the pens and paper to offer an extra media for creative teaching and the development of understanding. In the past schools have been quick to adapt to the technologies on offer, such as interactive whiteboards, projectors and visualizers, and children have become accustomed to watching the teachers present and operate these to show video clips, interactive programs and 3D interactive books and materials. These have been a fantastic addition to the teachers’ armoury of tools, but are only able to deliver to all at the same time, reducing the potential for the children to engage independently in enquiry, for groups to work on different questions within the room to present back, or for faster and slower workers to manage the pace of their own engagement. Similarly, once the lesson ended there was no real opportunity beyond written homework for the pupils to continue to engage with the subject; to watch again, to check understanding or to follow up areas of interest by finding out a bit more using the same resources. These devices are not simply glorified browsers: the range of 3D material, interactive information, apps to watch or to write is seemingly endless. Teachers too are collaborating on finding the best quality resources and school librarians are fast becoming champions of a proper education in research and information management.

Digital learning therefore allows children to have a level of independence, to work and collaborate as teams and to carry on individually later. The transferrable skills that are developed can be used for life as the route to enquiry never really changes and is becoming more and more important for senior study, for university and for the world of twenty-first century work.

The resources available are easy to manage beside the paper and pen, and can be activated or perhaps more importantly deactivated, very quickly so that they become a resource to be used rather than the focus of the lesson. This change has happened quickly. When schools first embraced computers and set up computer rooms, as we did at Notre Dame Preparatory School in the late 1990s, the computers were a greater focus than the skills. Ten years on the skills and abilities of the pupils have outgrown even the notion of ICT (computer skills) lessons so that using a computer is embedded in subject lessons. This makes a nonsense of confining computer use to short sessions in bookable computer rooms as pupils will need to utilise the resources at different times, for different amounts of time and in a variety of ways.

In my own science teaching with Year 6 recently I have made use of DVD, search facilities and an app that is able to demonstrate the working of lungs under different conditions. These three small tools, just a tiny part of my lessons, have enabled me to communicate more fully with my pupils, and affords them an experience rich not only in my words (!) but also enhanced by visually attractive and clear interactive diagrams, easy to access from the classroom (and at home later if they wish) and engages them in a ‘what happens if?’ activity afforded by changing the variables on the easy to manage app. However the children also used paper and pen, group discussion, presentation with questioning and skills in communicating their hypotheses. For me, the digital revolution is a very exciting way of harnessing the children’s natural curiosity and their intuitive digital skills to create a buzz of excitement in the classroom that leads to real happy, exciting, memorable, meaningful learning. That, after all, is what classrooms are meant to be about!

Wildfire Learning

Recent bushfires in Australia illustrate how quickly and uncontrollably fire can spread from the tiniest spark. This is both awesome and terrifying. However, if the same is applied to learning, and a surge of knowledge, questioning or understanding spreads through a classroom, generating ideas, interest, enthusiasm and greater or new understanding, then it is exciting for both pupils and teachers, and makes the job of learning a far more meaningful and manageable activity.

Children learn in many ways: they learn best from hands-on experience, and at school this translates into activities and progressive tasks that enable them to gain, master, rehearse and hopefully have ready at their disposal, the skills and knowledge that we want them to have.

Children also learn from some of what we tell them, although this relies on their interest and memory capacity, and is generally less effective than active learning. At home this translates into your reminding them and helping them, even with simple tasks such as remembering to put a particular piece of muddy kit into a laundry basket, or repacking their homework into the school bag. If these activities need reminders, then think how difficult it must be for a teacher faced with a room full of pupils who are not predisposed to listening to or remembering simple instructions, especially those who are accustomed to being followed around and reminded at every turn at home. 

Wildfire learning however is when the class is given a tiny idea or question, and let loose to think, explore and report back. Through looking over each other’s shoulders, or listening to each other they are then are able to share the connections and ideas that are sparked. This quickly spreads as children copy each other’s ideas and add those of their own. Group tasks that make use of this style of learning work best if the children have easy access to knowledge beyond their own, such as that available in books, or on apps and websites, and are encouraged to develop questions and answers that connect to the knowledge in hand. Although this can make classrooms very buzzy (for which read active and noisy) the generated learning quickly spreads, like wildfire, from group to group, and comments called across the room such as: “Has anyone else found out that…?” or “Where did you find that site?” or “Hang on…. If this is right, then…..!” are all music to a teacher’s ears! This style of learning, when pulled back to a class focus at the end of a session will deliver far more punch in the learning, helps to develop independence, creates knowledge that follows interest and is therefore far easier to remember and perhaps most importantly captivates children to do and to want to know more. Classroom learning that is exciting, self-motivated, challenging, and carried out with friends and peers is a fantastic way to generate not only knowledge, but also a confidence and love of learning for the whole of life. What better can education offer?

Girls' Education

It is a commonly understood notion that girls perform better in single sex environments. This makes sense for several reasons, firstly girls tend towards a more communicative, articulate and less physical style of learning in the classroom, and secondly they are likely to be made self-conscious or shy by the more physical and assertive learning styles used by boys. Developmentally girls mature both physically and neurologically more rapidly than boys, with better fine motor control, and ability to concentrate on small tasks for longer periods of time, and a useful ability to listen actively whilst absorbing information. Single-sex schools for boys and girls make the most of these diverse attributes, and although children do not arrive with stereotyped personalities and skills, the differences are worth noting so that the styles of teaching can be tailored to suit. The gender stereotyping that can occur in mixed schools can be avoided, instead building on the genuine interests of the child and finding her true strengths rather than perceived ones. Girls mature emotionally faster than boys and although this often means there is a need to address the resultant issues head on, and to understand the anxieties, it does help to know that there is at least a level of emotional intelligence and some common ground among the peers that enable girls to develop emotional tools for the future.

Girls’ schools have a responsibility to develop the whole person, emotionally and physically as well as academically, and to create aspirations to head for the most highly sought after professions and places in society, so confidence is high on the agenda, with added sport, drama, dance and public speaking to allow girls to develop a sense of themselves and to become assertive in the right way when it matters.

The curriculum also needs careful management, so that subjects which in the past were considered ‘best for boys’ such as science, mathematics, design technology and digital technologies are elevated and introduced early and encouraged through the girls’ emotional, communicative and creative attributes – all of which come more naturally to girls as a group. At Notre Dame Preparatory School the girls are encouraged to undertake a combined humanities and arts approach to learning, using the tools of digital technology, including iPads, data-logging, and interactive whiteboards, as well as an education rich in the sciences which are taught practically, but with a curve towards the needs of society, for example, in Year 6 all our girls undertake the St John Ambulance Young First Aider Certificate, learn how to create and deliver presentations on technical scientific knowledge and learn to set up and manage a debate on ethical issues, as well as following the broader National Curriculum. This initiative is called TASK, with the T standing for thinking – certainly the most important thing for any girl to learn.

In the sporting arena the school offers a rotating ‘sport for all’ session, as many girls love participating in team or accuracy sports, but begin by being far less confident than their brothers about experiencing unfamiliar activities or trying out for a team. The idea here is that the more competitive children,  as well as those quietly competent, have the freedom to participate and to be themselves, which can spur the remaining few into enjoyment and success. The school is then able to offer both competitive and non-competitive sports for the girls to enjoy, and to develop life-long fitness and wellbeing, away from the enthusiastic proactivity of physically confident boys. Sports ranging from racket sports such as badminton and tennis, to team sports such as hockey, football, lacrosse and netball to activities such as golf or cross country are offered to bring out the best in each girl. Success breeds success and the girls need to be taught this in order to broach their reticence and develop their skills to reach out to try new things. The football clubs are particularly popular in girls’ schools, because there is no stereotype to confuse those who want to join in and have a great time.

Music and drama have a very immediate pull for girls and drama groups, choirs, orchestras, ensembles and class activities are able to pick up on themes in other lessons as well as teaching beyond the basic skills and giving them poise. The relative emotional maturity allows for thoughtful improvising and a nurturing of the different aspects of personality. Girls enjoy humour in the classroom but are less able to cope with sarcasm or jokes that put them into the limelight. Creative lessons allow them to explore this as well as leading to fantastic performances and success in the future. The idea is to capitalise on the feminine side and to develop the skills needed to become an all-round amazing person.

A fear often expressed to me is that girls in single sex schools will not have the opportunity to get to know boys – but I ask them to consider what that might mean for some girls: less chance to play stereotypical boys sports, a leaning away from sciences and certain technical subjects, a reluctance to be noticed in a classroom and often being uncomfortable in a physically active (and as many girls see it, aggressive) environment. Boys are a fact of life, and there will be plenty of opportunities throughout life to play and work alongside them, and schools are aware of this, taking care to present role models of successful male teachers alongside the women, but for some girls, the sanctuary of an all-female class offers the most positive and effective start to the educational journey.

Independence is about learning self-regulation

This week, in preparation for heading back to what we used to call ‘the chalk face’, I read a series of blogs on education. One that struck me particularly, by Shelley Wright focussed on Self-Regulated Learning. There is a growing amount of educational research that shows that pupils who can control and regulate their own learning do best of all in the classroom. This requires reflection, but reflection in a young child needs careful direction so that it becomes purposeful. Typically thinking about their work falls into the attainment model:  how good or bad was the result, how much higher or lower than a previous mark, or how the grades compare with another child. However these are not improving strategies, and to make progress, at hopefully an accelerating rate, children need to understand what can make the learning experience more effective or more positive next time.

So teachers need to try to focus marking on constructive supportive points for the future, and to find aspects that can be praised.  They should also ask children to consider what went well in the work and what might have needed more attention. Pupils typically start by being able to point to simple ideas such as ‘I didn’t learn it enough’ or ‘I didn’t read the question carefully’ allowing them to realise what will lead to success another time, but for the older pupils allows them to pinpoint in a more sophisticated way how to manage exam technique, when to ask for help and how to manage longer term projects in terms of time and resource management. All of these, with thoughtful facilitation by a teacher, will lead to real improvement in the learning process over time, and can be implemented even with the very young. Correcting every spelling or slashing red pen across written assignments is not a very effective way to make a child enthusiastic about her own performance, so over-marking is no longer encouraged, and draft work, note taking, considering the audience for the task and other skills that can be employed to make future assignments better are taught rather than the constant practice of ‘best writing’ that we all endured in the past. As a messy and reluctant young writer my books were covered in stern corrections (and ink blots), but my spelling has never improved – all I learned was a fear of wielding a pen in public (fervent thanks for computers and spell-checker!).

To help with developing self-regulated learning we can all ask very simple questions of our children to help them to become reflective, such as: ‘What did you find easiest about that task? How did you choose to record the information? What would have helped you to manage better? Would you do this activity the same way next time? How would you change this piece to make it better? Could you think of another way of presenting this? What do you think your audience will understand? What did you find difficult? Was there a better question?

Focus on the learning process rather than the results and allow the child to reflect for herself what works and what doesn’t, and what she needs to focus on, and her work can only get better..!

Learning in the holidays

As we approach this Christmas Season this is a good opportunity to look at some recommendations for what you might do to keep your children's brains ticking over during the holiday.

Over the last few weeks my blog has referred to maths activities, listening games and reading skills. If there is any extra spare time why not turn your thoughts to history and geography?  There are many great places for family visits, such as Hampton Court Palace, museums in London (free admission to those), and art galleries. Websites will inform you of special exhibitions and of discount events, and travelling on the train gives you two for one offers on prices.

To make the experience particularly educational involve your children in the planning. Train schedules, car parks, ticket prices, choice of visit, maps of venues and making a timetable for the day can all be worked out together. Children love to be trusted to organise events and will be proud to show you their skills. Learning works best in the shape of an enjoyable experience… counting cash and sorting change on a shopping trip is the point of learning mathematics – it is what number work is for! Use those mobile phones for learning; sign up to a dictionary app for a new word every day or a puzzle, or even a simple daily crossword.

Allowing children to choose and make decisions is also very useful. Buying books for them is not quite the experience that being allowed to browse and choose them is. Don’t forget the public library either, a great, cheap and enjoyable outing. Direct your children to the non-fiction sections of the library, children love history and will be fascinated by how others lived. Maps are a great source of discussion… plan a walk using a local area map, or see if you have a local heritage trail… and keep talking as you go because discussion helps children to understand more than they will take in for themselves. Even a walk in the park (walking allows for far more conversation and observation than a car journey) or around the neighbourhood can be filled with discussions about what can be seen. Can you and your children name and recognise 5 types of trees or breeds of dog? Which Christmas decorations do they like as they pass them?

If you have lots of children and the possibility of childcare, try making an individual plan for a special and different day out for each child – children like few things more than a day of their parent’s undivided attention. My own mother took me to see the Tutankhamen exhibition on my own when I was about eight and I have never forgotten the pleasure of the exhibition or the delight of a day out with her by myself.  

Enjoy the precious days of the Christmas break.

Practical Maths

There is an idea among school communities that maths is a difficult abstract set of activities that need to be learned in order to be good at the subject. This is an interesting idea that denies much of the import and creativity that make maths an exciting and practical skill for real life.

This week I thought I would share a few ideas for bringing maths to life in the very simplest way, and show that it is the most basic skills that lead to the ability to think in the imaginative ways that lead to mathematical success in later years.

Understanding quantity is the key to dealing with numbers inside our heads. If you can’t work out the value of numbers and the general size you are considering, then estimating, checking and understanding are going to be difficult. Children find number ordering relatively easy by rote – many nursery children can count to fifty easily, but few have a sense of quantity and constructing this is an important task. An activity you can try for your selves is looking at a crowd of people (in a stadium or on the news) and asking ‘how many people can I see?’  For children estimating simple numbers is difficult: twenty, thirty  or forty - do they recognise the relative sizes? Most children assume that large numbers are homogenous and similar to each other instead of vastly different. People who are good at mental arithmetic generally have an accurate picture of the size of numbers to use alongside a quick understanding of the operation required. For those of you who find it hard to add up and divide the bill without a calculator at the end of the restaurant meal, you may not be bad at maths at all, but your mental picture of the numbers and quantity bonds is not well established, and you dont quite trust it!

So helping children to develop a notion of quantity is very useful. Guessing the number of things in a jar is a good idea, guessing first and then checking, and then playing again with other amounts to consolidate. Counting money is a truly valuable activity – estimating by recognising the different denominations, and not by the size of the coin heap! I have always used cards with children that find number concepts difficult. Simple games of gathering cards in turn round the group to make up an exact number… this game is fantastic for children on many levels firstly because children love turn taking games with their parents, secondly because it is number conservation and quantity practice, but thirdly and most usefully because the card configurations of numbers (diamonds, spades, hearts and clubs) always use the same shape for their numbers, and this allows children to develop a mental image of the quantity named by the number.

Once exhausted by number games how about the quantity of liquids or capacity - can you identify 100ml? Cookery with children is great introduction to measurement; ask them to measure and check, all the while reminding them of the sizes they are looking at. How tall are your children? Make a guess before you get out the tape measure – and ask them to guess too.

Maths is a game the whole family can play!

Why Do Good Manners Matter?

Why do good manners matter at all in this competitive day and age? What are good manners anyway?

For some this may appear to be about old fashioned courtesy, saying please and thank you, holding doors, helping old ladies across the street. Perhaps by doing a few formulaic things we can offer apparent kindness and make our little worlds run more smoothly. Is this little bit of altruism actually about making things work for ourselves or for other people?

The Christian Humanist view is that we should look after other people as we would like to be looked after ourselves. Christ himself asks us to do this, and to regard the lowliest among us as people of value by treating them with dignity and kindness. For me this is also about how we want to engage with the world; finding a place to belong with the people who live on this planet with me.

Ask yourself the question “Who is the nicest person I know? Someone I value and who values me. A person who I could go to with anything that troubled me, someone I trust, who will gently help me to the truth, who will ‘be there’ for me dispensing joy, wisdom and kindness”. Of course we may hope it is ourselves who are viewed as such, or that is how we may see our loved ones, or our special or old friend, or you at least know who that person might be; someone who knows and cares for you just as you are. Whoever they are I suspect they are someone with good manners. I expect they listen, make time for you, appear interested, are happy to pass the time of day, and are solicitous, kind and warm. I hope that I might be so regarded, although I know I am guilty of not making time (and always checking my phone or having somewhere else to be), but most of all I hope the children that I now teach might grow up to be that person.

How do we go about making our children into the wonderful adults they could be? I believe it starts with simple good manners. Children are naturally egocentric and they see the world through self-centred eyes. Children at play will naturally push past each other, avoid sharing and try to gain the main advantage in give and take. With little encouragement they are naturally competitive, like to be better (faster, brighter, stronger) than their peers, and enjoy demonstrating their talents and gifts, even to the detriment of their friends. So to help them to become the amazing popular friends to others that we hope they will be they need to have reflective thought processes introduced to them, the perspectives that others might have of them and the way others might feel.

Empathy starts with good manners, understanding that an engagement with someone else has a meaning and a purpose beyond the business of functional communication. So we want them to learn to say please and thank you because it offers dignity and value to the person they are speaking to. Stepping back or holding a door open to allow someone else to pass reminds us that we all have a role to play in making life pleasant for each other, and shows respect. Saying good morning, and looking at the person they are speaking to creates a bond of communication. We all know that a smile shared can lift a grey day!

So this week a focus on manners might make busy life a bit more pleasant for all. Children need lots of encouragement to understand that they are not the very centre of the universe, but telling them is unlikely to help, and can be unhelpful to a developing self-esteem. However, training them (by copying us) to take simple actions that validate others, that enable them to understand how to respect people by small acts of kindness and courtesy, these are the starting place. To grow up with a warm understanding of others and an ability to be a good friend brings its own happiness, perhaps one that is unfashionable when thinking about success, but being rich and fulfilled is about more than money.

What I hear referred to as ‘bullying’ is more often than not simply a rough and tumble lack of simple kind good manners. Children that push others or manage themselves to the front to assert themselves or their will over others are often unaware of the impact they are having on their peers. Rather than a consistent calculated attitude to nastiness they trip into it by overenthusiastic or thoughtless approaches to other people that speak of lack of understanding of the other and what they might want or be feeling. Sadly these are the very children that end up mystified when they have few close friends, and cannot see why they are considered unkind or rough. So I tell them that if they want to have a friend, they must be a friend – and it starts by showing good manners: sharing, caring, listening, standing back and saying please and thank you.

I wonder whether we confuse our children. We know they have rights and we fight for them. We want them to get ahead and we tell them so. We let them hear us compete with each other, or even bend the truth to manage our own lives. They learn from any self-motivated actions we take that deny the importance of someone else. If we do everything for our children it is no wonder they take little responsibility for their actions. If we let them believe they are the most important person in the solar system they won’t understand the cooperative compassion and respect that makes the world go round, and contributes to their own happiness. Unfortunately the last step in this process is to leave the learning of good manners until too late, to let schools teach it, to save it for a day when we are less busy (good manners can’t be used in a hurry) or to say one thing and then do another.

This week I would love to see the pupils in my care taking a little extra time to remember their manners and to take that step towards being the most wonderful person they can be.

Good day to you all.