TheFlippedScientist

Two recent developments in New Zealand in the digital world may not on the surface appear to be connected, but connections can sometimes not be what they seem. Last week, our Minister of Education, Hekia Parata announced that digtial technology would be added to the education curriculum.  Ms Parata stating: "The information technology sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in New Zealand, with a demand for skilled graduates. This step will support young people to develop skills, confidence and interest in digital technologies," However, these changes will lead to digital technology being taught as a non-academic vocational subject alongside woodwork.     Rather than integrating digital technologies into all aspects of the curriculum, students      will continue to be educationally disadvantaged and under-skilled for changes in society they will encounter. We should be incorporating...

Again twitter has got me thinking again, I know a dangerous proposition. It began again with a tweet from Justine Hughes. Then the following week the #edchatnz  chat was based around assessment and the common mantra of you can not make a pig fatter by measuring it more. The chat was full of interesting discussions which had me up at night as use of data is one of the major 21st century trends and is becoming mainstream. This idea of big data becoming an integral part of the modern world including in education was further reinforced by a Microsoft innovation expert meetup which introduced Power BI , Microsoft's attempt to enter the big data analytics market and apply this to education. Having listened to all these voices about assessment and big data, my mind wandered to a Mark Twain quote. As we grapple with the assessment and student data we are now obtaining as 'evidence' I think we as educators need to consider the questions we want to ask of the ...