Tech Disruptions

The Brits Lead the Way - Yet Again

Elliot: Dave Whyley deserves a second "Mobile Learning Impact Award."
Cathie: What did our favorite Brit do this time?
Elliot: He persuaded O2, a British wireless cellphone operator, to put in a nationwide, blacklisted URL filtering service so that children could safely navigate the Internet from their cellphone computers.
Cathie: That's way cool! In the U.S., it is a law that schools must provide filtering software. Having the telco provide the filtering service relieves the school of that burden and potentially the telco can provide  for a more standard and thorough filtering experience.
Elliot: It took Dave the better part of a year to convince O2 to create this service. His increased hair loss is a testament to his efforts. 
Cathie: In the U.S., in schools that are using cellphone computers such as Keller ISD, the cellphone is pointed to the school district's filtering proxy. It sure would be nice to have that filtering done on a nationwide level, though. Somebody needs to do here what Dave did across the pond.
Elliot: Ah oh. "Somebody?"  Let's see: there is you and there is me. Oh, I get it, you mean some one of our blog readers should make this his or her crusade. Right?
Cathie: <silence>
Elliot: Sigh, that's what I was afraid of.  Hey, maybe I will lose weight instead of hair.
Cathie: <still silent>
Cathie: Dave has set a high bar; thank you Dave!

The Fourth "R"

Cathie: Betcha can’t guess what the fourth “R” is?
Elliot: RRRR?
Cathie: If a blogger writes a sound effect, will the readers hear it?
Elliot: You are too clever by half.
Cathie: You are avoiding the question, because you don’t know the answer; what’s the fourth “R”?
Elliot: Reading, wRiting, aRithmetic and… you'Re Right.
Cathie: Research!
Elliot: Aha! Definitely a 21st century skill!
Cathie: Problem solving has always been a core skill, but 21st century tools put a dramatic twist to that skill. For the first time students have a huge range of information resources literally in the palm of their hand.
Elliot: With keyword search being just one of the research activities.
Cathie: Framing a question, planning how to investigate the question, synthesizing a response to the question – those are all aspects of that fourth R skill.
Elliot: If a student has frequency data, for example, dump those data into www.wordle.net  and whrrrr out pops a visually interesting histogram --- immediately.
Cathie: Another non-sound sound effect? 
Elliot: You are distracting me….
Cathie: …Not very hard to do
Elliot: I choose to ignore that comment… But I do agree, your fourth “R” is as fundamental as the first three R’s.
Cathie: And we need to teach that fourth R from the earliest grades; we can’t wait for high school.
Elliot: I sense another blog post coming
Cathie: You sense right… for a change.
Elliot: Ohhhhhhhhh… bloggers, what do you think, is Cathie’s fourth R as fundamental as the original three?

Supporting School Transformation: An Example from Singapore

Elliot: Transitioning a school from didactic instruction to project-based instruction is no mean feat!
Cathie: And that is exactly why Nan Chiau Primary in Singapore has created an interesting organization to help it in that effort. The principal, Mr. Chun Ming Tan started CERA – The Center for Educational Research and Action – where researchers from the National Institute of Education and outside professionals can come together to work, side-by-side, with Nan Chiau teachers and administrators as the school makes that transition.
Elliot: “Outside professionals” sounds like “outside agitators” to me. And since you and I are the first two “outside professionals” in CERA maybe the latter term is appropriate.
Cathie: Speak for yourself; I am not an agitator.
Elliot: Now, now relax; nothing to get your dander up.
Cathie: “Dander up”? This isn’t the fifties, slick.
Elliot: <Aside to the assembled masses: I think I have irritated her. Ooops. I didn’t mean to; I was just trying to say something clever for the post.>
Cathie: And if you think you were being clever, slick, think again.
Elliot: <Further aside: I am in Big T Trouble now; watch how adroitly I handle this potentially explosive situation.> You’re right; we are not outside agitators.
Cathie: On second thought, I think that one of our roles in CERA is to stand back and critique, so in that sense we are outside agitators. Good point, Dr. E.
Elliot: I don’t know of any district, let alone school, that has its own center for research and action.
Cathie: But the transition from didactic instruction to project-based instruction is an enormous undertaking, one that a school should not – can not – do all alone.
Elliot: With CERA, Nan Chiau isn’t all alone; CERA will bring a broad range of resources into Nan Chiau.
Cathie: And, because the researchers will describe their experiences in publications, CERA will benefit more than just Nan Chiau.
Elliot: I simply can’t see Ann Arbor’s schools, my home town for 20 years, creating a CERA. Heavens, they barely let me in the door to my kids’ school, let alone have me help them professionally.
Cathie: Oh, I am not going to touch that one; much too easy.
Elliot: I don’t mean to make it easy!
Cathie: And, I won’t touch that one, either. 

Visionary Principal in Singapore

Context: Singapore is known worldwide as having an excellent educational system. However, Singapore has realized that its educational system must change in order to prepare its children for the demands of a global, 21st century marketplace. To that end, Singapore has embarked upon a series of MasterPlans.  We (Cathie and Elliot), together with researchers at the National Institute of Education, are working with a specific school, Nan Chiau Primary, as it transforms itself according to the guidelines in MasterPlan 3.

Cathie: It’s very exciting to work with a school principal who really has a vision for his school.
Elliot: Yes, Chun Ming TAN, principal of Nan Chiau Primary in Singapore is a leader and he knows the best restaurants in Singapore, too.
Cathie: You did seem to enjoy eating the chili crab at the Longbeach Restaurant.
Elliot: How could you tell?
Cathie: The splashes and spots all over your shirt spoke volumes.
Elliot: OxyClean – I carry the travel size with me, always.
Cathie: At my suggestion.
Elliot: You said in the last blog post I would have the “last word.”
Cathie: And you will; patience. In between the splashing and the spotting, did you hear Chun Ming say: “It is unimaginable that a student could graduate from Nan Chiau and not be comfortable with emailing, blogging, Googling, podcasting.”
Elliot: “Unimaginable” is a pretty strong sentiment, especially when that is the expectation for an elementary school student. How many elementary school principals in the U.S. would feel comfortable making a similar statement, I wonder.
Cathie: And, he is backing up his words with actions. He is moving his school – his primary school – from using didactic instruction to project-based instruction, and he is working to put a personal computing device in the hands of each and every child.
Elliot: And that device is… ta da… a cellphone computer!
Cathie: Chun Ming gets the idea of mobility for the Mobile Generation. His primary school students expect to use computing 24/7. For them, computing is already essential outside of school; he and his teachers are working to make it essential inside of school too.
Elliot: Nan Chiau is a poster child for SETDA’s #1 directive: use computing “continuously and seamlessly.”
Cathie: See, I let you have the last sentence.
Elliot: Your generosity is overwhelming; thank you. (Thought but spoken: “One of these days, Alice, one of these days.”)

The Kindle is a Platform

Elliot: The Kindle DX isn’t just an ebook Reader… it’s a Media Buzz Generator!
Cathie: Buzz warranted - I think it has a good chance of succeeding at the university level. It will save the students money, it is more convenient than dragging around heavy textbooks, and it is a pretty cool gadget.
Elliot: But what do you really think?
Cathie: No reason to be enigmatic like somebody I know.
Elliot: Let me just once zing you without you coming back with a better rejoinder.
Cathie: Ok. Next time.
Elliot: I don’t believe it but thank you. So, what do you think of the DX displaying only in black and white.  Color won’t come for at least a couple of years.
Cathie: e-Ink may well be sharp and easy on the eyes, but B&W is so 50’s! FIFTIES! However, I think college kids will put up with that limitation, given all the other plus factors.
Elliot: Did you catch the bit about the Kindle DX coming with a browser. I saw that rumor only in the Wall Street Journal article about the DX.
Cathie: Yes, that was a most tantalizing tidbit, actually. If the Kindle DX has a real browser, then, using the Sprint cellular network, the Kindle, with its QWERTY keyboard, could be a netbook and use apps stored in the “cloud.”
Elliot: If only! The scuttlebutt I hear is that the browser is pretty rudimentary.
Cathie: That may be true today, but tomorrow, that browser could be much better.
Elliot: You are absolutely right. Amazon is a smart and bold company; the Kindle is a platform, not just an ebook reader. Dell makes smartphones; Oracle makes servers; now Amazon makes netbooks. What an industry! 

E-Rate Needs to Expand

Elliot: I met a real-live congressional lobbyist at the Intel Visionary Conference. I didn’t see any pork barrels though.
Cathie: Your small town roots are showing.
Elliot: That’s a polite way of calling me a hick from nowhere.
Cathie: Your words, not mine.
Elliot: In any case… I asked him about lobbying the E-Rate commission to get them to loosen up and pay for mobile devices – cellphone computers -- and data plans.
Cathie: E-Rate will pay for a mobile, networked device and a data plan, but only if the device stays on the school campus.
Elliot: But the point is for kids to carry their mobile computers home and access the Internet, cellularly, from home – actually, from anywhere.
Cathie: Cellphone computers are the one technology that can close the digital divide and level the playing field by providing all children with access to the World Wide Web – outside of school as well as inside of school.
Elliot: But the lobbyist said that there is a mandated cap on the amount of E-Rate funding – $2.5 billion - and until that cap is raised, the E-Rate commission isn’t going to loosen up its rules.
Cathie: That’s an easy one: raise the cap.
Elliot: I tried that on the lobbyist but he felt that in the current climate, it was fortunate that the cap hadn’t been cut; an increase in the cap is just not in the cards.
Cathie: I think the E-Rate issue is a major one that the educational community needs to address. Hey, you’ll be on the ISTE Board starting in June– congratulations on your election, by the way. You need to get ISTE moving on this.
Elliot: Thank you. But I am more than a little nervous; I have never been on a board before. I figured I would keep a low profile and just kinda observe what’s going on at my first meeting.
Cathie: Elliot not saying much at a meeting? Ahh, that’s not possible; you’ve never done such a thing before, and I can’t believe you can start being a wallflower now.
Elliot: But I don’t understand how ISTE works.
Cathie: Not having an understanding has never stopped you from talking before. Are you feeling ill?
Elliot: Ha ha ho ho. I am giving up pontificating for Lent; seems appropriate. 
Cathie: But you’re not Catholic.
Elliot: …Picky, Picky, Picky…
Cathie: … And it is in your very nature to pontificate! Folks, we have to interrupt this blog post right now. I must check on Elliot’s health. Stay tuned!