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Learning in the New MillenniumPhase Three: Findings |
“Hope the
wireless stuff isn't too complicated - sounds a bit daunting but i
daresay the pupils will teach me.”
LiNM project teacher
“... the iBook is a attractive piece of equipment, it is light weight and easy to use.”
LiNM project student
“The fact that
the computers (iBooks) are well adapted to the way most people live
is a good sign that these big software companys are actually
listening to what the needs of the young and old acctually are and
not just what they think we are going to like and use.” LiNM
project student
“The people at macintosh certainly did a jolly good job. I thank ultralab and nortel for the opertunity they gave me. I must say that I think that this is one of the greatest computers I have ever used. All of the componants are so well crafted and integrated together”
LiNM project student
Although this document is confidential between Nortel and ULTRALAB, and these are only preliminary findings, we are confident that the change in learning implicit in these early findings is crucial and will shape the future of education in the UK.
On February 22nd twelve most senior members of the directorate of the DfEE, led by David Normington, visited ULTRALAB and we were able to feed some of the information outlined below into the debate These senior civil servants were able to use mobile technology (both iBooks with Base Stations and Nokia 7110 phones) and were astounded by the consequences they foresaw - “it’s a real eyeopener”- in terms of pupils learning by mobile technology (so much so that a member of the schools directorate used his mobile phone to cancel an order for a project until he had time to consider).
In addition ULTRALAB is currently working on two Architectural projects concerning the design of school buildings, where the initial findings have been fed into the debate and radically altered the discussion and ultimately, will effect the design.
As these early findings become more concrete ULTRALAB will continue to feed the information to Nortel, into government committees and to other projects.
The iBooks were first delivered to the primary teachers on 2nd February 2000. The staff were ‘overwhelmed’ because everything worked at instantly. The Base Station was plugged in and immediately the iBooks formed a network and access to the internet was established. This is possible because the Base Stations (previously set up at ULTRALAB) keep their settings when moved between locations. This makes direct networking and connection using an ISP very straightforward.
After the initial installation the teachers were given a demonstration. It was a pleasure to watch their reactions. Holding the iBooks, connected to the web they walked in the playground, along to the entrance lobby, into classrooms and sat at some desks. Their delight was exciting to observe as the possibilities slowly dawned. The teachers talked about being freed from the “shackles of computer suites” and it was like a revelation as they planned the breadth of the creative things they could do. Of interest to this project will be to monitor those early enthusiasms and establish if plans are carried forward into actions.
The primary pupils provided a series of observations after two weeks use of the iBooks in round table discussion. These were then collated and summarised by the teacher as follows:
• "They are
good because you can move about with them"
• "We find it quite amazing that you can go wireless and access
the internet"
• "We liked it that we could talk to friends across the
classroom"
• " We children are looking forward to showing parents what we
doing when we take them home"
• "Can have a teacher being able to 'mark' or edit work in
progress"
• "teacher was OK about them being in class"
• "even exchanging files was quite an easy task"
• "We also loved the colours !!!"
The computers were then introduced into the secondary classrooms on 16th February. The secondary school teachers, unlike the primary teachers, already had fixed plans for the use of the iBooks. The science teacher was “interested in using the iBooks as student's virtual notebooks for school etc”. He planned to give them to some students in year 11 to do web investigations for a science topic. This would involve the pupils eventual report back to the class, thus improving both their IT skills and presentation skills.
In a different secondary school the iBook was also placed in a science class. The initial feedback from these lessons is very positive and indicates that using the iBooks in science lesson has proved very successful.
‘Head of Science phoned me to say they had had the most fantastic Science lesson. Lesson progressed as usual but as teacher spoke, those on iBooks checked out websites and then fed back to class. Real buzz in the classroom New ways of working...’
LiNM project teacher
The interesting question for our research is: could this lesson have been completed without mobile IP (in a traditional computer suite). The answer from the teacher is a definite no, simply because the lesson plan required the use and demonstration of specific science experiments using bunsen burners and chemicals.
Secondary school students have used the iBooks to,
‘.....finish some personal web pages at home. I done some of my homework, but I found out I had to come into school before emailing it and connecting it to the black mac to save my web page work.’
LiNM project student
They have used the web and have done
“...simple
searches and complicated searches”.
as well as “...conferencing
and sending mails (emails)”
Networking with others proved to be very popular,
“It was a great learning tool as it allowed me to network my research with my friends research. and not only that it looks like a fine piece of design skill. By using the the iBook I was able to do the research for the website that has hopefully now been set up”
LiNM project student
There is some early evidence of a change in work patterns amongst students/staff as well as value added to conventional lessons (see comment above from teacher on secondary science lessons)
One of the most obvious changes is the flexibility offered by a laptop computer (this, ‘Anytime. Anywhere’ aspect is well documented in other projects). The additional flexibility that LiNM students have is the ability to access data wherever they are. One student used the iBook to prepare work for a classmate to take to a demonstration at European SchoolNet in Brussels: the ability to upload to the server instantly and add the relevant hot links ‘added value’ to the experience.
“I had a lot of work to do and I even got a chance to create a new web page about our presenation at ultralab, which I uploaded to the server for xxx to take to brussles with her.”
LiNM project student
The iBook travelled to Brussels and back and was used on a network, to record information from the conference and to pass the information ‘back’ to those at the school.
For some students the technology is expanding their horizons and adding many other possibilities
“Wireless Internet is very cool - being able to wander round whilst browsing the Internet is something I like. ....I worked out that I could browse the Internet from my village park!”
LiNM project student
Many staff and students were impressed at the distance and speed of the wireless networks, and the way in which the networking possibilities enabled research. Interesting here is the and changed patterns of behaviour on the part of students,
“ Even though the airport was in a different building it was possible to get a strong enough signal to get web access from the science computer room. The presence of web access attracted many students to the usually quiet science computer/ work room at lunchtimes...”
LiNM project teacher
One can observe with online computer suites how the pattern of lunchtime activities have changed as students browse the web for personal research or project work. Mobile IP extends this possibility, freeing staff from covering computer rooms and enabling the engagement of non-academic staff (see above). Encouraging was the frequency with which students/staff mentioned using the iBooks and the web as a ‘research tool’
“Although we did not have enough time with the machines to fully explore their classroom use, we did use them as a web researching tool during lessons; popular and useful but also distracting to the other students.”
LiNM project teacher
“The students used the I books to carry out homework and coursework tasks ... and were quite reluctant to return their new tool (toy?!)”
LiNM project teacher
If the technology is to permeate the classroom it has to accepted without artificial barriers impeding its use. In line with other phases of LiNM project staff had use of the iBooks over a period of time (between two and fifteen days) to give them the opportunity to investigate the possible uses of the technology before they entered the schools. We firmly hold to the principle that confident staff allow their students to be creative with technology and a freer reign to investigate the strength and weaknesses of the technology. The project teachers, appreciating this early use, then passed the computers on to other staff in the school, This resulted in a positive attitude towards the technology,
“They (other
teachers) all loved them and are now sufficiently confident of the
internet and searching to start using with children, so thanks for
that.”
LiNM project teacher
In the primary sector the attitude was very open. Pupils were allowed to move around the school, to collect the equipment, use the equipment in a self directed way and return equipment to a central point. Use of kit in this way fits the pattern of learning in the primary classroom. For primary pupils entry on an individual basis to ‘computer areas’ is accepted and often encouraged. One would expect therefore that mobile wireless technology would have less impact in this sector. This did not prove to be the case. Younger children are restless and investigative. The ability to use the iBooks outside the confines of the school was seen by the teachers as one of its greatest assets. The ability to include extracurricular staff,“even the dinner ladies were roped in...” proved invaluable in involving the whole school in learning. The caretaker also became involved in helping the pupils to achieve their ‘collecting data around the school’ objectives.
A group of primary students were encouraged to use the iBooks in literacy lessons. The ICT teacher’s concern was that the staff would find the computers a 'disturbance'. Students were encouraged, as consistent with the LiNM project,objectives, to discuss the use of the computer and share the results of their research with the rest of the class. The staff response to these uses proved encouraging
“Even though this was at short notice the teacher was not worried about any disturbance, so success there I think also. We let the children express their ideas about them in their own time, but overwhelmingly they were a great success"
LiNM project teacher
Secondary school lessons tend to be fixed, located in a central subject area. We would anticipate that for these classes mobile IP would be more valuable as many lessons are constrained to separate teaching areas and pupils/classes do not have the flexibility which allows them to move to central computer suites when they are needed. In addition these facilities are scare in the secondary sector and usually heavily pre booked. Most of the secondary teacher’s responses were positive,
“Most of the teacher said that they were jealous of me and all wanted to know what we did on them (iBooks) I showed them and they were very impreased with my typing skills and the other things I was able to do which they only dream about doing.”
LiNM project student
“I asked the teachers if I was allowed to do my writen work on the computer and they all agreed to let me, in spanish I even did a word-search on the iBook which the teacher really liked because it was different and very colourful.”
LiNM project student
“I enjoyed using it in class especially in science. All my teachers allowed me to use the ibooks in all my classes which was great.“
LiNM project student
To encourage the use of co-operation and networking the computers had a series of ‘network games’ installed. Care was taken in the choice of these games, tending to be those which encouraged co-operative rather than competitive skills, for example a multiplayer cribbage to aid numeracy. Students viewed this games as those intended to “....to occupy your brain”. However network games can be complex to set-up (requiring the IP address of participating computer/s) and the iBooks other novelty factors proved more seductive, for example sharing files with friends. In retrospect we need not have worried about providing these opportunities and students in both sectors did much ‘sharing’ across the network (see previous comments)
There is apparent an increasing nervousness amongst staff concerning appropriate uses of the web, although all our research (cache examinations for example) indicate a personal usage (football sites, fashion sites) as opposed to an illicit usage (pornography sites). Often nervousness occurs because appropriate guidelines are not clear to students and staff, in the case below between personal research and subject research,
“... however giving students free access to the web without close supervision generally led to random surfing; many a site disappeared as I entered the room ?! “
LiNM project teacher
Once pupils and staff are aware that all sites visited are logged the experience of both groups will change.
However continual press coverage of misuse of the web may affect some teachers and this may eventually impact on staff’s attitudes towards a student’s free research on the web and inhibit the use mobile IP in some schools. We do not believe that this will become apparent within LiNM because of the mature and flexible attitude that this long term project has encouraged amongst the staff and schools involved. We are aware however that this may curtail or inhibit usage in other schools where staff have not had the benefit of experience and expertise.
Teachers are planning on additional uses for the computers as they return to their schools
“I have 2
students entering for the think quest awards so it would be
interesting to see how they were used to tackle the problem of
teamwork and web development.”
LiNM project teacher
“I could also see their value for sharing class experimental results or collecting data although we did not fully try this out.”
LiNM project teacher
Some problems were encountered at home which could be overcome with some computer knowledge or keeping the iBooks for a longer period of time. These problems were connected with using the modem at home and airport at school when browsing the web. Settings had to be changed
“... it has been a pain reconfiguring for work and again for home. You should not have to do this!!! ... We cant plug into our (school) phone connections at all because we have a digital switchboard with digital sockets which do not work with analogue modems.”
LiNM project teacher
“Another bad thing is the fact that you have to keep swapping and changing from airport to othe things in order to log on to the internet.”
LiNM project student
However this was not always the case and many students coped very well
“The students
found connecting the computers together fairly intuitive and shared
information with this facility.”
LiNM project teacher
iT is an area where investigation should continue to examine strategies which staff/students develop to cope with the complexities mobile IP involves
Children organise themselves:
Enlightening, but unsurprising, has been how the pupils have organised the distribution of the equipment. Initially, we at ULTRALAB wondered if, because there weren’t enough iBooks for personal ownership some students could be disappointed. However the children manage to ‘organise the distribution’, so there were not disappointments.
“I had real good
fun on the Laptops and people who dont go on the internet, they had a
go with some of us and they thought the games were good like Snood
and many others
Basicly it was good because we could talk to our school mates
anywhere in the school and we can't do that with just one computer in
the school and we can take them anywhere...”
LiNM project student
“hi i really like the ibooks coz u can carry them about without wires! my friend says that she likes every thing! and she really like the mouses coz u move ur fingers like a mouse!”
LiNM project student
Despite some technological hitches even primary students manage to work out how to connect to the Internet where the staff were often baffled. The credit here goes to staff who allow pupils to experiment without fear of damaging the kit
“I was just about
to say that they weren't working and have just been contacted from
upstairs! The children got them to work obviously ! Perhaps you and I
are redundant?”
LiNM project teacher
The initial feedback is positive. The actual use of the computer in the school should not be confused with design and style issues (although the iBooks were used in one secondary school in ‘Design and Technology’ classes to feed into a discussion concerning product design). The iBooks are lightweight, colourful and attractive; all features which are likely to find approval with students and important for the age profile we are working with.
Many issues that arose concerned home/ school use. These arose because laptops are intended for personal use. To effectively use laptops as shared machines, available for home loan, specific applications, similar to ‘Location Manager’ on the Macintosh, need to designed and installed. Where we installed these applications conflicts were non-existent.
LiNM research interest concerns the initial uses mobile IP and quantifying the added value (if any) that this gives to lessons. Although there is considerable ‘novelty value’ in the use of iBooks initial monitoring indicates some interesting usage. This research is ongoing.