Found on the web: 02/17/2011 (a.m.)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

DIY: ICT Case Studies: No place for corporate-speak

You can describe what your school does with educational technology ad nauseum, but in my opinion nothing will bring it alive as much as a well-written case study.

The reason that case studies can be so effective is that they take just one aspect of what the school is doing, rather than trying to present the whole lot.

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Managing the Leading

Julia Skinner disagrees with Terry's analysis of people who manage but don't lead.

As consumers ( in the real world) when things go wrong we call for the Manager. That role holds power. Power to sort out difficulties. Power to have answers to customers questions and queries. In retail particularly it is the aim of those career minded youths to work their way up to management and the exulted places they are considered to be.

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Three downsides of the idea of the guide on the side

So much is written these days about the role of the teacher being to “facilitate”, to be the “guide on the side”. This is justified on many grounds, not least that of the children knowing more than their teachers about educational technology. They are, after all, “digital natives”, or so we are told. It seems to me that we have thrown the baby out with the bath water.
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Also on the web: 02/12/2011 (a.m.)

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

The UK’s digital skills gap

Is it my imagination, or is it the case that 15 years ago employers were complaining that kids were coming out of school not knowing how to use Word and Excel, and many schools responded by trying to make sure that their pupils were taught useful skills. Now we discover that those skills aren’t useful after all.
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The importance of research for ICT teachers revisited

What’s the difference between action research, academic research and other types of research? Is it the case that in order to be seen to justify a research grant you have to couch your findings in terms which make them incomprehensible to the very people who might benefit from them? How does academic research “percolate” down into the classroom? And is there a case for saying that research findings should be reported in a “popular” style sometimes?
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The 25 Ways series: Retro Response #1

This is the first in what I hope to be a regular spot here on ICT in Education. Terry has kindly invited me to respond some of the articles in his series ’25 things to Make Yourself Unpopular’. The posts will be like an extended comment & I hope you will feel able to comment on them & visit me over at The Head’s Office.
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The importance of research for ICT teachers

How important is research for teachers in general, and ICT teachers in particular? One might be tempted to say that people learn in the same way now as they did thousands of years ago, so research, apart from keeping abreast of the latest developments in technology, is pretty redundant. I think there are problems with that attitude.
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Switched-On ICT Revisited

As I said in a previous article about it, Switched-On ICT is the name of the primary (elementary) scheme of work I've been involved with, as Series Editor. That role has entailed advising on assessing pupils' ICT capability, and helping to make sure that the instructions and assessment opportunities and statements are both consistent and accurate.

The text is engaging, with topics such as We Are Explorers, and makes full use of Web 2.0 and other free applications as well as schools' Learning Platforms. Here is a list of what I see as its strengths:

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Safer Internet Day

Just a quick reminder: this annual event us nearly upon us – tomorrow, 8th February 2011. See the Safer Internet Day website, and the Safer Internet Day Fair. What will your school be doing for the event? Check out the Think u Know website too. You might also find this post interesting: Digital Safety for Children and Youth. It has some interesting links.

First published in Computers in Classrooms, the free e-newsletter for edcational ICT professionals.