Keep COOL till after school
I have watched with great interests the proposed changes to the New Zealand Education Act, in particular, the development of COOL (Communities of Online Learning). Being a child of the 80s, I was an avid watcher of After School with the catchphrase of "keep cool till after school". It appears now that one keep cool and now not even go to school. How things are changing. The general proposal appears to be that any registered and approved school, tertiary education provider or a body corporate that has been approved by the accreditation regime, will be able to be a COOL.
The argument being that these changes will increase the education options for learners. This will allow learners able to choose from a greater number of education providers and have increased access to more subjects and teaching expertise. The most controversial feature of the change appears to be that students enrolled in COOLs may not be required to physically attend school.
I will be honest and say my initial reaction was one of disbelief, a massive change to the landscape of New Zealand Education. However, like all things I look at the evidence for this massive change and considered the pitfalls and the opportunities this development may bring.
Digital teaching and learning have long been part of modern education. John Hattie's research clearly shows that quality teachers are the biggest in-school influence on children’s learning and New Zealand teachers are amongst the best in the world.
We as teachers make judgements about what each student needs to learn and do and adapt the learning to meet those needs. We use our knowledge to develop the best way for that learning to happen. We observe the impact of our teaching on each learner's progress and adapt as we go with the learning reflecting the community of our learners.
Recent evidence suggests that this is the teaching required to equip our learners. The Nature of Learning provides seven principles which are critical to learning, they are:
The question not being asked is what kind of future do we desire for our students? There seems to be a fait accompli in correspondence with the New Zealand Minister of Education Hekia Parata. The argument of the Minister is that teaching online is innovative in that it will offer a digital option to engage students, improve their digital fluency and connect them "even more to 21st Century opportunities".
Education, of course, is much more than that. It is the developing of social skills and inquiring minds. Education includes learning to interact with others and experiencing growing independence and a range of activities outside the home that challenge your preconceptions about the world.
The Correspondence School (Te Aho Kura) is given as an example of how the model could work in practice. The Correspondence School trustees, suggest COOLs will give learners and their whanau the right to choose the education that best suits their needs, not least in terms of the range of subjects available to them.
Te Aho Kura currently has a roll of around 23,000, about half of those students reportedly benefiting from access to subjects or curriculum adaptation that their own schools do not provide. Te Kura's support of the change is to be expected. It understands the art of teaching learners from a distance and appears to do the job well. Adding the opportunities offered to those students by online learning would seem to be a natural progression. For students who can and should be at school it is not.
Dame Karen Sewell, who chairs the board of trustees, says many of Te Kura's students have become disengaged from education and have exhausted all other options. That hints at another potential issue, international evidence reportedly showing that access to online learning increases student movement between providers.
Students who move from school to school, do not develop those key relationships with peers and teacher and struggle and there is no reason to believe that the outcome will be any less negative when lessons are delivered by through an online platform.
Developing relationships between learner and teacher is one of the critical features of successful learning and it is unclear if COOLs will achieve this. Although I can see some advantages of the COOL model to teach certain subjects learners may not have access at school, I do not see how the present model we have does not cater for this through blended learning.
I go back to asking are we locked into a future driven by the technology or are we able to decide what future we want for our students and let technology be a tool to help get to that future. Do we really want our students to work and live in an online environment where human interaction is from a screen away from the nuances of face to face communication? Relationships are the currency of our profession. So we must consider what the purpose of education is.
I think the introduction of COOLs misses a critical point. As research shows, rather than focusing on how learning is delivered, the investment should be on the best app there is, our teachers. Their pedagogy and ongoing development should be paramount. That, in my view, will yield the greatest return.
I will be honest and say my initial reaction was one of disbelief, a massive change to the landscape of New Zealand Education. However, like all things I look at the evidence for this massive change and considered the pitfalls and the opportunities this development may bring.
Digital teaching and learning have long been part of modern education. John Hattie's research clearly shows that quality teachers are the biggest in-school influence on children’s learning and New Zealand teachers are amongst the best in the world.
We as teachers make judgements about what each student needs to learn and do and adapt the learning to meet those needs. We use our knowledge to develop the best way for that learning to happen. We observe the impact of our teaching on each learner's progress and adapt as we go with the learning reflecting the community of our learners.
Recent evidence suggests that this is the teaching required to equip our learners. The Nature of Learning provides seven principles which are critical to learning, they are:
- Encouraging active engagement, and developing life long learners.
- Actively encouraging co-operative learning.
- Knowing your learner's interests and motivations.
- Knowing the individual differences among your learners, including their prior knowledge.
- Planning programmes that are challenging for all, but not excessive.
- Having clarity of expectation using assessment strategies consistent with these expectations with a strong emphasis on formative feedback to support learning.
- Promoting cross-curricular connections as well as links to the community and the wider world.
The question not being asked is what kind of future do we desire for our students? There seems to be a fait accompli in correspondence with the New Zealand Minister of Education Hekia Parata. The argument of the Minister is that teaching online is innovative in that it will offer a digital option to engage students, improve their digital fluency and connect them "even more to 21st Century opportunities".
Education, of course, is much more than that. It is the developing of social skills and inquiring minds. Education includes learning to interact with others and experiencing growing independence and a range of activities outside the home that challenge your preconceptions about the world.
The Correspondence School (Te Aho Kura) is given as an example of how the model could work in practice. The Correspondence School trustees, suggest COOLs will give learners and their whanau the right to choose the education that best suits their needs, not least in terms of the range of subjects available to them.
Te Aho Kura currently has a roll of around 23,000, about half of those students reportedly benefiting from access to subjects or curriculum adaptation that their own schools do not provide. Te Kura's support of the change is to be expected. It understands the art of teaching learners from a distance and appears to do the job well. Adding the opportunities offered to those students by online learning would seem to be a natural progression. For students who can and should be at school it is not.
Dame Karen Sewell, who chairs the board of trustees, says many of Te Kura's students have become disengaged from education and have exhausted all other options. That hints at another potential issue, international evidence reportedly showing that access to online learning increases student movement between providers.
Students who move from school to school, do not develop those key relationships with peers and teacher and struggle and there is no reason to believe that the outcome will be any less negative when lessons are delivered by through an online platform.
Developing relationships between learner and teacher is one of the critical features of successful learning and it is unclear if COOLs will achieve this. Although I can see some advantages of the COOL model to teach certain subjects learners may not have access at school, I do not see how the present model we have does not cater for this through blended learning.
I go back to asking are we locked into a future driven by the technology or are we able to decide what future we want for our students and let technology be a tool to help get to that future. Do we really want our students to work and live in an online environment where human interaction is from a screen away from the nuances of face to face communication? Relationships are the currency of our profession. So we must consider what the purpose of education is.
I think the introduction of COOLs misses a critical point. As research shows, rather than focusing on how learning is delivered, the investment should be on the best app there is, our teachers. Their pedagogy and ongoing development should be paramount. That, in my view, will yield the greatest return.
He aha te mea nui o te ao What is the most important thing in the world?He tangata, he tangata, he tangata It is the people, it is the people, it is the peopleMaori proverb
Comments
Speaking to my 22-year-old son today, he was appalled at the prospect of learning online. An avid user of tech himself he explained how important it was to form relationships with peers at school, to try different experiences, to have people keep him on track. Far from being a model student in HS, the support he got from teachers and the relationships he formed helped him move into tertiary education.
Te Kura offers a very valuable option to many, but there is no guarantee that they will be the ones running this new enterprise.