Children and the Internet

I have now got more reading to do! Dr Tanya Bryon has published the national review entitled "Safer Children in a Digital World". I am hoping to get some time to plough through it this weekend. Then I might have something useful to say about it. Ewan McIntosh clearly has more time than I have as he has already managed to read and blog it!

Remember the BBC Micro?

An article on the BBC technology RSS feed today caught my eye. The creators of the BBC micro are reuniting at the science centre to discuss the legacy left by the machine. This was not my first computer but it was the one I used for the longest and learned most about. They appeared in our labs when I was at university. I learned to program in 6502 on it and I did my first real ICT teaching using them. That was an experience! We had four BBC model B micros, a single tape drive and a group a fifth year pupils on a Friday afternoon. The program was loaded one machine at a time and the kids warned that if they touched the key then they may not see the weekend. Ah, happy days :-) The video on the BBC news story shows a BBC with a tape drive very much like we first used. It was such an advance when we got a disc drive and then heaven when we had a room full of computers and a file server which had a twin floppy drive. This was a long time before the Econet hard drive which we eventually got. We taught the kids all sorts of interesting things - not just programming! This included word processing, Teletext graphics, Logo and of course we played adventure games.

Things have changed a bit in the past 25 years.

Derek Hits a World Wide Audience

Many other edubloggers in Scotland(Ewan for example) have written posts in the past couple of weeks about the brain training project that Derek Robertson is involved in and the coverage it received on breakfast TV, etc. The audience for the subject seems to have gone far wider than just the UK, in fact world wide. The BBC Woirld service programme Digital Planet included the piece on it's show on 17th March 2008. The response on the programme was a bit sceptical (as elsewhere) but at least the issue was being raised. Good on you Derek!

Quote?

3rd Lanark engraving
Originally uploaded by Gordon McKinlay

We were out geocaching yesterday (the geekiest way of going for a walk you can imagine!) and ended up in Cathkin park on the southside of Glasgow for a short while. There are nicer places in the universe. What interested me, however, was the fact that this is where Third Lanark football club played until they vanished from existence in 1967. I am not a football fan. I hated playing the game as a boy and don't particularly enjoy watching the game now. I do find local history fairly fascinating, however. A lot of the terracing is still there. I can't imagine how over 40,000 people crammed on to these on a Saturday afternoon, but that's another issue. What caught my attention was the engraving on a slab of stone behind the centre terrace. The photograph is not very great so you may struggle to read it.

It says:

Life is short
Art long
Opportunity fleeting
Experience treacherous
Judgement difficult

I have worked out that it is a quote from Hippocrates. What I can't understand or find out is why on earth the engraving is there at all. Have any historians out there got the vaguest idea? I would love to hear what you think. Someone must know why it is there.

No brief Candle

Tim Brighouse in Renfrewshire
Originally uploaded by Gordon McKinlay

In another part of his presentation, professor Tim Brighouse made this reference:

"This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.

I am of the opinion that my life belongs to the whole community, and as long as I live it is my privilege to do for it whatever I can.

I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no "brief candle" for me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations."

George Bernard Shaw

My thoughts on lights and torches would tend towards the scriptural and the words of Jesus which are not the same as Bernard Shaw. What is common, however, is that life is for living and giving and sharing with others, not for keeping to ourselves.

Being Average

Tim Brighouse in Renfrewshire
Originally uploaded by Gordon McKinlay

As part of his presentation to head teachers in Renfrewshire, professor Tim Brighouse used this poem:

The Average Child
by Mike Buscemi

I don’t cause teachers trouble;
My grades have been okay.
I listen in my classes.
I’m in school every day.

My teachers think I’m average;
My parents think so too.
I wish I didn’t know that, though;
There’s lots I’d like to do.

I’d like to build a rocket;
I read a book on how.
Or start a stamp collection…
But no use trying now.

’Cause, since I found I’m average,
I’m smart enough you see
To know there’s nothing special
I should expect of me.

I’m part of that majority,
That hump part of the bell,
Who spends his life unnoticed
In an average kind of hell.

I hope it's OK to reproduce the poem here. It appears to be all over the Internet! As we think about the quality of learning and teaching this is clearly something very important that we need to think about.

Butterflies and Hyacinths

Day 071/366 - Tim Brighouse in Renfrewshire
Originally uploaded by Gordon McKinlay

Yesterday was a very long day. We had two events with professor Tim Brighouse. In the afternoon he spoke to our head teachers about leadership. In the evening the focus was far more on learning and teaching, particularly in the context of using GLOW to enhance the learning experience.

He said a lot and his easy engaging presentation style struck a real chord with our head teachers. In is talk as well as in some of his writing he refers to the two things in the title of this post.

Butterflies refers to the idea that the flutter of a butterfly wing can have a huge impact elsewhere. Leaders need to look for the little things that have the biggest impact.

The hyacinths refer to something written by Alex Clegg. He was an education officer in the East Riding and had an aunt in Gantham where one Margaret Roberts grew up. In his aunt's house was a sampler which talked about the idea that if you have two loaves of bread then you should sell one and buy "hyacinths for the soul".

Here is the poem:

"If thou of fortune be bereft

and of thine earthly store have left

two loaves, sell one, and with the dole

buy hyacinths to feed the soul."

In other words we must not have too utilitarian a view. We need to focus on and highlight things that lift beyond the day to day.

I need to do some more thinking about this. Very thought provoking. I really enjoyed the day and particularly enjoyed debating learning and teaching with Tim over dinner. I need to spend more time looking for butterflies and hyacinths.

Glowing Brighter

We have a busy week ahead this week with GLOW. Tomorrow is the end of a lot of planning as Professor Tim Brighouse comes to Renfrewshire for the day. Professor Brighouse is a non executive director of RM, the company who is building GLOW. In the afternoon he will be sharing with our head teachers on leadership. In the evening he will give a presentation as part of our series of seminars on GLOW followed by input from Dawn Adam from LTS on using GLOW in learning and teaching. On Wednesday we have an important briefing on child protection. Our recently reviewed guidelines are being being put in a GLOW group to provide a space for sharing practice. On Thursday we have the next of our Curriculum for Excellence engagement seminars. We have started using GLOW as a place for teachers involved in trialling the outcomes. The GLOW group allows teachers to share what they are doing and starting to fil out thinking on individual outcomes. On Friday, I will be in Stirling for a meeting of the early adopter authorities. This gives us the opportunity to think through the issues that are arising as we implement GLOW across Renfrewshire. A busy week ahead.

GLOW in the papers

I did a telephone interview a couple of weeks ago with a lady from the Independent on GLOW. The final piece appeared on the 28th of February although I only saw it for the first time during the week. They got a lot of it right and at least they worked out Renfrewshire (they didn't do so well with Dunbartonshire or LTS!). John Connell has made an interesting point about GLOW not being about resources. This is absolutely the point we have been making at every opportunity. GLOW has to be about learning and teaching. The tools within GLOW provide a space for teachers and children to collaborate in their learning. If it does not enhance the learning experience then it is a complete and utter waste of time. Curriculum for excellence is providing us all in Scottish education with a focus on the quality of learning and teaching. When HMIE visit schools one of the main indicators focusses on the learning experience. Teachers are teachers because they want to improve the learning experience. Hopefully you can see where I am going with this.

Yes, GLOW may provide a bank of resources but there are tonnes of resources out there and you probably wouldn't want to touch most of them. Yes, GLOW provides a safe and secure environment to work in and you would get access to these tools without this safety aspect. The point has to be about making things better for weans.

That's how I am driving it anyway.

Far too Early

Why is it that early Saturday morning is currently the only time when I can get the chance to keep things anything like up to date? I tend to waken fairly early even at the weekends so it is not unusual for me to be up and about before 7am. Today is no exception. It is just after 8 now and I have already had two mugs of coffee, done the dishes, updated Flickr and ripped another record to MP3 (I got one of those USB record players for Christmas and am slowly working my way through my records from the seventies. Today it was Sky - do you remember them?). I have been finding it harder and harder to keep this blog up to date. Since I took over my current job nearly a year ago life has been a whirlwind of activity. Managing our educational development service has involved a fair amount of ramping up of workload. I never thought I would hear myself say that I had it easy as a QIO. I am sure that's not the case, it's just that I had grown used to the old job and am still learning this one. The upshot of it is that I have not been doing a great job of blogging. There has been a lot going on that I should be writing about from curriculum for excellence to GLOW to all sorts of other educational issues. Perhaps later. I think another cup of coffee is required.