Views Ask Charlotte! T
his month, our regular ed tech columnist and teacher Charlotte Beckhurst issues a call to practitioners to get to
grips with technology in the classroom. In March I talked about moving from using technology as a ‘bolt on’
in lessons to integrating it in the curriculum and said I wanted to talk about this further. Over the past year, I have been working with Toshiba to put together a series of lesson plans, 20 in total, which integrate technology across the curriculum. The lesson plans in literacy, maths, and all foundation subjects, currently for the primary age range, cover all year groups from Early Years Foundation Stage to Year 6. We will be writing secondary school ones shortly as we want to share ideas across a wider age range. Although I can’t give too much away, I can say that these lesson plans
contain complete lessons, from beginning to end. While they have been written to be adapted they can also be followed as is if needed. I wrote these lessons for teachers who are starting out with technology integration and for those teachers who are looking for more ideas. Whether you are a music teacher, an art teacher, or a classroom teacher who teaches a range of subjects, these lesson plans provide a framework and ideas for how to use technology in the classroom. Each lesson includes preparation notes, a learning intention and success criteria, a starter, main activities, a plenary, hints and tips and extensions. By technology I am talking apps. Take Fresh Paint for example. I have
written a Year 4 lesson where children are learning to plan a piece of sculpture based on an artist. With links to the National Curriculum, the plan outlines how children are able to create sketch books to record observations and review and edit ideas. It enables children to improve their art skills as well as learn about great artists in history. In this lesson, children review the work of a range of sculptures and investigate proportions of the human body by planning their own sculpture piece. The children will apply their own knowledge of the proportions of the human body to plan their sculpture. Working in groups they will design poses and take digital photographs to capture their ideas. They will then use Fresh Paint to sketch and plan the sculpture. This is how technology should be incorporated into teaching and learning. As teachers, it is time to step up and grab hold of the here and now.
We so often talk about the future of technology but what about the use of technology to support and enhance our children’s learning right now? Think about the children in your class and what they are likely to be doing at home after school. How many do you know play computer games? Talk online to friends? Work on a tablet, while watching TV and have a mobile phone next to them to keep updated with Instagram? Furthermore, who has children in their class who can code? More importantly, who has children in their class who need to develop communication skills, problem solving skills or collaboration skills? The answer is, everyone. Technology is an answer to bringing these learning needs and the developments in society together. I talk a lot about 21st century learning skills. In a nutshell I want the
children of today to have skills for the jobs of the future. Where there is technology, there are jobs. When Martha Lane Fox talks about a family whose two year old had managed to book at holiday on a well-known website, she talks about how their child is a genius. She is right. And as teachers it is our responsibility to develop these children and to make their learning relevant to the world they live in today, whilst developing the skills for working relationships. Again technology is the answer.
Charlotte Beckhurst is a Microsoft Educator Expert. She is an Assistant Head at a primary school in Tottenham and runs training courses on using technology in the classroom. She blogs and shares resources at @CharBeckhurst and
www.chicmeek.blogspot.com
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www.education-today.co.uk
Effective revision strategies T
his month, teacher and Education Today’s regular STEM contributor Kirsty
Bertenshaw takes a timely look at key revision strategies. It is that time of year again when revision
becomes the focus in and out of the classroom. This can be difficult for both students and teachers. As a teacher, I am often concerned that I don’t teach “revision” as well as I could and students often say they don’t know how to revise. Actually, they usually mean they don’t know what revision is, and are usually revising in lessons with us already. After many years of teaching in exam season and much reading around
Kirsty Bertenshaw
the best techniques, I have come to the conclusion that the best way to teach revision is in fact just to guide students through activities in my own lessons, then tell them afterwards that these are good revision strategies –it delays the panic about revising, they can’t procrastinate by claiming they can’t revise, and they already have the skill set before they are told to start revising. It is vital that revision begins early – as a last minute person myself, I
know I should begin tasks earlier than I inevitably do, but I still don’t begin them when I know I should. This is common! Nag students to revise early, check on them, set it as homework and ask for proof they have actually done it – resources produced, screens shots of online revision etc. Early, spaced out revision produces the best results in terms of memory. Another common problem is only surface learning, or committing
information to short term memory. Any one that has ever taught 6th form knows that this leads to conversations such as “but you covered photosynthesis in your GCSE work” met with “I can’t remember learning that”. Learning can be deepened by revisiting it regularly. Activities should be short but often- attention spans last for no longer than 20 minutes (just think back to your last whole staff meeting and try to recall how long you lasted before day dreaming....) Instead of practising whole exam papers, student s should tackle them a question at a time, go for a walk, tidy their room, move around the classroom etc before starting another task. Breaks don’t have to be long, otherwise revision isn’t completed, but changing focus for a few minutes rests the eyes and the brain ready for more revision. Stress is factor to consider for every student, whether they are
predicted A* or G’s. Exam conditions surrounded by everyone with strangers (invigilators) watching can make anyone nervous. Techniques for remaining calm can help students focus and perhaps even calmly answers questions rather than scribbling, avoiding the problem of examiners deciphering poor handwriting. Simple ideas are 5 breaths in and 5 breaths out, taking short breaths in then out. Students concentrate on the breathing rather than the situation. Deep breathing also controls heart rate and calms students down, but give them a purpose to concentrate on such as inflating an imaginary balloon in their chest. Give the balloon a shape and colour and visualise it inflate and deflate with breathing. Preparing the correct technique for each subject is also important. If it is
an essay style question, practice essays not summaries. If it is a six mark question, which cause so much dread, then these need to be practiced too. Model answers can be helpful, but essentially answering, marking, correcting and rewriting answers is more effective. Things to definitely avoid doing are rereading or summaries; both are as
useful as each other but only have a low result in terms of memory. Mind maps also don’t lead to high results, however they can be useful, as long they are combined with questions e.g. 5 minutes to produce a mind map on bonding types using textbooks, class notes and peers, then only allowed to answer exam questions using that mind map. Using these techniques regularly in the classroom is all we can do in terms of revision- the rest is up to the student!
For more information:
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May 2015
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