Week 2 - Digital Pedagogy

This week we spent some time looking into digital environments and how a learning manager’s personal pedagogy can make or break e-Learning in the classroom. This week I really tried to focus on how I would use digital pedagogy in an early childhood context. There were two main points that stood out to me as goals learning managers must have if they want to achieve a successful digital environment. They are:

-          Connecting students to a variety of multi-modal resources like multimedia and video

-          It is only beneficial when appropriate learning approaches are taken

Digital pedagogy was also a major focus this week. Digital pedagogy can be defined as ‘the use of electronic elements to enhance or to change the experience of education’. There are many benefits to using digital pedagogy and ICT in an early childhood classroom…here are a few I came up with:

         Sourced from: Google images

-          There are many great IWB programs that allow for whole class interaction with ICT 

-          Youtube is a great tool for breaking up lessons so students remain engaged

-          It allows for ‘experts’ on a topic to share their ideas with students                                                                                                                                                

-          Students gain new skills in the area of technology that will assist     them in higher grades

-          They are ‘digital natives’ meaning that technology has been a part of their life from day one, they crave the interaction with different ICT’s

-          It can be a great tool for maths or literacy rotations

-          It allows students to express their ideas in more than one format

Check out the link to this poster that shows the different elements that Education Queensland believes make  a student a contemporary effective learner: https://classroomconnections.eq.edu.au/topics/Documents/2012/september/engaging-and-challenging-students.pdf

We also looked at productive pedagogies this week. Put simply, productive pedagogy is the art of teaching that is productive in the realisation of student learning outcomes. Check out the picture below that shows the breakdown of productive pedagogies.

  

 Picture sourced from: Google images

TPACK Framework – Unpacked!

The term TPACK stands for Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge. Essentially it is a framework that focuses on the culmination of a learning managers content knowledge, ability to use technology effectively and also their understanding of different pedagogical strategies. According to this week’s notes learning managers must have the following to be able to say they are working within the TPACK framework:

-          They must have technical skills

-          They must know their content

-          They must know how to deliver the content so that their students learn effectively         

                                                                                 Picture sourced from: http://mkoehler.educ.msu.edu/tpack/ using-the-tpack-image/

Check out this youtube clip that explains TPACK in a bit more detail:

Blooms Taxonomy

 

Another framework we looked into this week is Bloom’s Taxonomy. Bloom’s is based on the idea that the cognitive domain involves knowledge and the development of intellectual skills. There are six categories that made up the initial framework, they are: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. It was originally thought that you must master the first category before you were able to 

understand the next.

                                                                                                                      Sourced from: Google images

 The revised version of Bloom’s Taxonomy by Lorin Anderson reflects a more active form of thinking. Anderson’s changes involved the names of the categories and also their arrangement. The revised categories are: remembering, understanding, applying, analysing, evaluating and creating.

Sourced from: Google images

While at first glance Bloom’s taxonomy appears to be a linear process it is important to note that it is not. The diagram below shows a better reflection of the intention of Bloom’s taxonomy.

                                                  Sourced from: Google images

The Mobile Phone Wiki

The learning that occurred through the use of the Wiki this week seemed to me to use a little bit of the connectivism theory and also a little of the cognitivism. While using the Wiki I had to think back at times to my own personal experiences therefore using the cognitivism theory of long term memory. I also found I was looking at the different learning opportunities if students had the use of mobile phones in the classroom. This reflects the connectivism theory where ‘it identifies the networked nature of learning with computers and the internet.

The benefits of participating in a Wiki like activity is that it gives each person the opportunity to have their say as well as look at how other people view the situation. Issues that may arise when using Wiki’s could be: lack of participation by all members, negative responses to someone’s opinion and inappropriate use of the Wiki. While there aren't many drawbacks that I can think of one might be the access people have to the internet. These days most people have access to the internet but it is naive to think they everyone does or that they understand how to use it.

 Picture sourced from: Google images

The use of a Wiki in the classroom could contribute to student learning in many ways. It could be used as means for a debate, where students that aren’t confident standing in front of the class to demonstrate their point of view have the option to type it instead. It could be used as a peer teaching and feedback tool also.

The scaffolding of the Wiki activity helped to support the range of perspectives by allowing each person to choose which group they wanted to contribute to, by letting each person read all other comments and by allowing the integration of pictures, video and colour to be added to each person’s reflection of their learning.

While e-Learning is a great way of engaging students in the classroom it isn’t without its complexities. Working legally, safely and ethically online is a major fear factor for many teachers. Here are a few ways you can minimise the fear of e-Learning:

-          Know your copyright laws

-          Know child safety laws, beware personal images being uploaded online

-          Ensure students understand stranger danger

-          Insist on a zero tolerance for cyber bullying

-          Ensure students understand the importance of and impacts of your online reputation whether it be as a student, teacher or the school.                                                                                                  Picture sourced from: Google images

This week we have looked at Digital Pedagogy. While it appears simple on the surface, it can be quite a complex topic. Hopefully my breakdown of the course materials has helped you gain a better understanding of the topic….I know it has for me J

Tarina Scoleri

References

A Digital Pedagogy Unconference (2013). Digital Pedagogy, Retrieved from: 

           http://www.briancroxall.net/digitalpedagogy/what-is-digital-pedagogy/

Big Dog & Little Dog (2013). Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning Domains. Retrieved from:  

          http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html#cognitive

Managing E-Learning (2013). Week 2: e-Learning design principles. Retrieved from 

         CQUniversity courses, FAHE11001 Managing E-Learning, 

         http://www.e-courses.cqu.edu.au

Technological Pedagogical Content Knowledge (2011). Using the TPACK Image.

         Retrieved from: http://mkoehler.educ.msu.edu/tpack/using-the-tpack-image/