Today our region got a glimpse of the Ultranet. Being an Ultranet Coach last year, I was very keen to see what it had to offer. From what I have seen it looks like there has been a good push towards student learning and collaboration, which is great. There are many aspects to the Ultranet that were described today. Key features that have stood out for me are -
- Home page – a “landing’ space that can be personalised by each student and teacher, a bit like iGoogle.
- The Learning Portfolio – a place for the students to reflect on their learning journey, with examples of their achievements and work samples. Teachers can also use a portfolio to reflect on their practice and professional learning.
- Collaborative spaces – where teachers can set up spaces for projects to happen with other students in the school or with other classes across the state system – a chance to learn with others beyond the four walls of the classroom.
- Learner profiles – student will be able to see their own progress and learning plans and tasks. Teachers will be able to view their students’ profiles and parents will be able to access their own child’s profile over the course of their schooling in the state system. All this will be fully secured.
- Web 2.0 – blogs, wikis, video conferencing, forums and instant messaging look to be part of the Ultranet too.
What I am not sure about yet -
- Access to the www and possible Internet restrictions through the Ultranet.
- Its ability to keep up to date with the rapid changes in technology in order to sustain interest and relevance for our students and teachers.
- How global partnerships will be supported in this environment?
Ultimately, I see the goal for our schools will be to create richer learning environments for the students that allows them to be at ‘the centre’ of a connected network. I think there are exciting times ahead.
November 6th, 2009
Can we make a difference to student learning through the use of ICT? As a classroom teacher who has loved using ICT in her class for many years, I have to say YES! However, it has always been difficult to articulate why I have felt this.
Is it because students are more motivated? Or engaged? Or is more than that?
Is it because they are interacting more with each other, analysing their own and peer’s work, collaborating and creating products as a response to other learning? Reviewing, revisiting, rewriting? Reflecting and questioning?
Tonight I am reading an article by Carole Kimble, Ed. D called The Impact of Technology on Learning Making Sense of the Research 1999 (pdf download). It reminds me of some of my previous posts here on my blog about the way ICT is integrated or embedded into learning. Kimble explores the notion of doing more than just teaching the skills of technology. She highlights higher order thinking skills and problem-solving as way to maximise learning with ICT.
I recently had a comment on my blog by Jo McLeay about the way I think of ways that students can use new Web 2.0 tools to help them learn. I think as teachers we do this. However, not all teachers are on the same page with the use of ICT or with teaching and learning practices. And I guess the assumption that we all know how to effectively teach with ICT just because it has landed in our classroom, is one of the problems facing us now with so many advances in technology in such a short time.
Kimble writes, “Care must be taken to focus future research on understanding how learning and instruction should change to best use technology…”
As teachers or leaders I think we can make a difference to the learning of our students and each other. The ideas and the research explored in Kimble’s paper are certainly worth considering when I embark on delivering Peer Coaching training in my region this semester, and generally the work I do in schools.
July 14th, 2008
