Effective Use Of It For English Learning Sec

Effective Use of IT for English Learning and Teaching in Secondary Schools Paul McMahon International Teacher.

Why are we considering ICT for learning?

If our kids are doing well on test scores…

And our economy is strong…

And parents and kids seem to want us to focus on the bookwork…

Why should we change?

Friedman’s Flatteners

The Fall of the Wall and the Waging of the Windows

The Dawn of Connectivity: When Webs were No Longer for Spiders

Work Flow Software: Don’t Mind the Difference and the Distance

Uploading: Redefining the Multi-Colored Post-Its

Etc.

One Laptop Per Child?

Do you market your school as being conservative, traditional and the place for old-fashioned learning??

Natives and Immigrants *Ian Jukes and Anita Dosaj, The InfoSavvy Group, February 2003 Prefer to teach to the curriculum guide and standardized tests. Prefer learning that is relevant, instantly useful and fun. Prefer deferred gratification and deferred rewards. Prefer instant gratification and instant rewards. Prefer to teach “just-in-case” (it’s on the exam). Prefer to learn “just-in-time.” Prefer students to work independently rather than network and interact. Prefer to interact/network simultaneously with many others. Prefer to provide information linearly, logically and sequentially. Prefer random access to hyperlinked multimedia information. Prefer to provide text before pictures, sounds and video. Prefer processing pictures, sounds and video before text. Prefer singular processing and single or limited tasking. Prefer parallel processing and multitasking. Prefer slow and controlled release of information from limited sources. Prefer receiving information quickly from multiple multimedia sources. Digital Immigrant Teachers Digital Native Learners

What’s wrong with just turning out a group of kids with the same solid learning that their parent’s generation had?

It requires more than a “bolt on”

Computer Based Activities

Mind mappers like Gliffy http:// www.gliffy.com / for planning writing

Use of the commenting tools in Word

An advance on the above is to use picture collages to illustrate writing

Fliction as a stimulus to writing http:// www.flickr.com/search/?q = fliction&w =all

Recording voice http:// audacity.sourceforge.net / and video (Movie Maker) is also stimulating.

Are these useful in class/out of class?

Front of Class Interaction

There is research being produced, especially from the UK that suggests Interactive Whiteboards engage more learners by getting them to the front of the class doing things that all can see.

The Ability to Edit Not Just Use