School 2.0 in SA

In my ongoing persuit of getting teachers to embrace 21st Century social media tools in their classrooms in South Africa, I have mostly had to deal with severe resistance and antagonism. The best case scenarios have been amused interest, avoidance and lurking participation. The use of social media tools within school walls has mostly been banned, severely controlled or renegated for use by specialist teachers (CAT and IT). Huge amounts of money are still being spend on outdated “drill and practice” (and believe me I have also been there once) software.  School managements are “controlling” their learners’ social media habits by banning cell phones and social media networks like Facebook, under the pretence of caring for their learners’ safety.

So what am I saying?

I know about the risks. I know about privacy issues. I know about cyberbullying. I know about information overload (indeed). I know about time limatations, especially for our teachers. But this is the new world reality that we are supposed to prepare our learners for! The scary thing is that they are out there, without our guidance, embracing IT and incorporating IT into their very being in high definition colour and without constraint and thought. And yes, they are using IT at school under the tables and in their pockets. And yes, you can ignore IT, ban IT, firewall IT, suspend IT/them, but you are not going to stop them using IT!

So what is the answer?

There are no answers, only the persuit of knowledge for life. And our learners’ future will depend on how wisely and effectively they will be using the tools afforded to us in the 12st century and beyond. So yes, we can return to our blackboards/whiteboards/”interactive” whiteboards and teach the way we have been teaching for centuries, turning our backs on where they are now and where they will be in the future, but we will be failing our learners yet again. And this time we cannot even blame OBE, the digital divide, the government or for that matter, alien invasions. The problem lies squarely with us, as keepers of our learners’ future.

Solutions are never easy, they are brave, so….

• Accept that learners are on top of the technology- ask them to guide you (teach you) in the use of the tools, while you add your wisdom and experience as an educator in facilitating subject skills, knowlege and values.
• Instead of banning 21st century tools, use them actively in your classroom- get the kids to create and share their knowledge using their favourite tools.
• As far as the inherent dangers of using these tools are concerned: Equip yourself with the know-how of using the tools- it is the only way that you will be able to protect and guide them
• Go online, Mxit up, because what happens in real life, happens online, just faster and easier. So be there- you have to be!

So what can you do practically? Just a few ideas…

• Learn one tool a month (Mxit, delicious/diigo, twitter, blogging, Facebook, slideshare) and go and lurk in their spaces.
• Talk to the CAT teacher about how you can incorporate a new media tool into a lesson plan- once a month!
• Think about how you can incorporate cellphones into your lessons
• Read Steve’s blog on “Beyond the computer lab: Rethinking ICT for education”
• ………..

I think all teachers can relate to this dramatic presentation! I have decided to use it as a ice-breaker for my next teachers’ training workshop. There are quite a few “teaching styles” that can be explored as “how to-not to do it”….

What I enjoy most about this presentation is the passion- which is the most important thing that maketh a teacher!

I am still at the conference in PE and had one of those WOW moments this morning at one of the presentations. It was also one of those really humbling experiences.

Yesterday one of the teachers from rural KZN came to my collegue, and told her that she was doing a presentation on “How I teach”. Her words were “How do I get this into the computer“. She also wanted to have a PowerPoint presentation to accompany her paper, but has never ever even touched a computer.

So last night my colleague sat up till midnight making a PowerPoint for her. I was quite dubious that it would work as we did not have time to teach her how to use the equipment and the programme, even if we could get it “into the computer“. I was tasked to assist her with the presentation. Quite frankly I hoped that she would look at it and decide not to use the slides as I had only 10 minutes to explain it and go through it with her. But she was adament. She had to have her things “Up there“. I asked her if she wanted me to stay with her in the front and help her and she assured me that she was okay. I hovered around the front row ready to “save the day”.

The room was packed with about 100 delegates. She started off by reading her presentation from her paper and completely forgot about the laptop presentation. Then she remembered and frantically pressed too many buttons, which happened to catch the presentation up to where she was. Then  she relaxed and swapped over to the PowerPoint’s pace. It was poetry in motion. It calmed her down and she followed and talked to the slides. Like the professional she was!

Then came question time. One of the delegates asked her to go back to one of her slides as he wanted to ask her something about it. My heart froze. I almost jumped accross the desk to help her, but I froze in my seat as she calmly hit the back button till she got to the correct slide.

Not only did she gave a great presentation, she used the technology like a pro. Considering that it was the very first time that she has ever touched a computer, I suddenly was filled with hope for the future. I watched as new bounderies were crossed and I now know that I am not wrong when I say that the digital devide can be crossed- we just have to allow people to be brave!