Education and Business

We were proud to be the recipients of the first Richmond Education Business Partnership Award.  The success of the growing relationship between Teddington and Cordless Consultants was recognised by the Local Authority at their annual awards ceremony in mid June.  The award represents according to Linda McPhee, 14-19 Advisor for Richmond, a new dawn in school business links and has grown to represent best practice on a national scale. The project has the scope to be developed as the terms progress, and new focuses for learning are developed.  Kevin Watling, Project Director and Richard Leyland who has worked on some of the high profile collaborative curriculum projects with the school received the award from Her Worship the Mayor, Cllr Celia Hodges.

Digital Britons

We have been working with the expertise of the “Magic Lantern” film production company who have been commissioned to make a short film of students’ views of their digital futures. The intended audience for the finished film are NESTA – a body of policy makers, senior broadcasters and educators. Our young innovators worked on ideas about  what is needed from public service media –from TV and radio to on line, newspapers and government services and as well as larger commercial institutions.  Facilitated by the production company, the students made a short film supporting their chosen ideas where they aimed to demonstrate their thoughts on reimagining public service media for the broadband age.  It was a tremendous collaborative effort over two days, and will go some way to informing debate on the Digital Age white paper coming before parliament in the near future.

The Big Move

The opportunities afforded to staff to reflect on teaching styles and the opportunities a new building offers was the main thrust of an article written about the project in the Guardian last week,  As learning environments change, there is increased opportunity for teachers to up their technology skills and transform their teaching.  This room flexibility stretches staff. meaning that teachers have to be prepared to offer different stimuli to people in the room; they have to be far more adaptable and they have to have a wider knowledge of presentation formats.

The article went on to highlight our ICT staff development group which includes one staff member from each major faculty, which meets to work on skills identified as necessary by our annual staff skills audit.  The focus on training in particular skill areas such as podcasts or managed learning environments was highlighted in the article and it emphasises th erole of faculty champions in cascading skills and techniques back to the rest of the department.  Thanks go to Stephanie Sparrow who spent a good deal of time working with me in presenting this case study which was used as part of a supplement to complement a major BsF launch at their annual keynote conference which is sponsored by the Guardian newspaper.

The whole article can be viewed from the following link:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/thebigmove/flexible-classrooms

Partnerships for Schools

The Pilot Room played host to Partnerships for Schools last Friday when Nicky Old, their Senior Communications Manager interviewed staff and students for a podcast to be hosted on the case study section of their website:  http://www.partnershipsforschools.org.uk/library/ICT_CS.jsp

Students spoke enthusiastically about the challenges and opportunities afforded by working in a new environment, and the way that they had the chance to explore new technologies.  The ability to present work in a variety of formats, use technology to solve business problems and work and co-operate in a commercial style environment were all areas identified by the Year 10 students.  The Podcast is due to be uploaded to the site in the near future.

21st Century Education

“The school was asked last term to contribute to the Mobile Learning Institute’s Film Series “A 21st Century Education”. They profile individuals who embrace and defend fresh approaches to learning and who confront the urgent social challenges that are part of a 21st century experience.  Our collaboration featured Stephen Heppell visiting our pilot zone, describing his vision for schools,  talking to myself and Peter Cowley from the Local Authority, and exploring ideas for classroom design.

Thin end of the wedge

Whilst in Oslo this week I had an opportunity to look around an award winning secondary school – Kastellet Skole, in the southern suburbs.  Although a ICT rich school, they too have a finite budget to furnish a new development and I was interested to see an extensive use of thin client hardware to support some central areas.  This allowed Torill Røeggen, an inspiring Assistant Headteacher to invest more in infrastructure and future-proofing the school for the demands of ICT in years to come.  The school makes exemplary use of its managed learning environment, and I was impressed with the emphasis given to making the staff feel comfortable with technology.  Three ICT trainers have dual responsibility for teaching and supporting colleagues in ICT delivery – an enormous investment in manpower which is paying off in an ICT confident and technologically rich school.

The blood of the soul…

Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow, wrote Oliver Wendell Holmes, an Americal poet.  I was very keen in the early stages of setting up the pilot room to have both French and German lessons taking advantage of the facilities on offer.  Afetr some initial planning, teachers and language assistants have come together to devise a series of lessons aimed at both upper and lower school classes, and which revolve primarily around recording of audio and video material.  The activities are supported by Peter Cowley from the local authority who has had experience in the delivery of similar material when leading the Ingenium project at nearby Grey Court School.  Lessons with students presenting pieces to camera, backed by chromakey images to represent different locations were a hit with the students.

Pilot Zone opens

Thursday 27th November 2008 saw the official launch of our learning space.  Attended by many of our sponsors, local authority representatives and friends from the local community, the Mayor of Richmond upon Thames formally cut the blue ribbon to set the seal on a successful day. It was an opportunity to emphasise the true organic nature of  our project as a number of partners pleged further equipment or expertise to the project.

“Objects we ardently pursue”

“…bring little happiness when gained; most of our pleasures come from unexpected sources” wrote Herbert Spencer, the English essayist and philosopher. During the life of our pilot teaching space, we are recording how the room and its furniture respond to our varied demands we place on it as teachers and technology users. The feedback to manufacturers and furniture suppliers is just one aspect of the way our room is being used.

 

The star attraction at our opening ceremony last Thursday exemplifies Herbert Spenser’s quote in the title.  Whilst preparing an old data projector to throw an image onto a white wall at right angles to our first projector, a locking nut slipped, causing the ceiling mounted projector to rest at a 45 degree angle and shine onto a moveable plectrum shaped table.  A quick keystone adjustment later produced a quality table top image  which could be further enhance by wireless mouse and keyboard as shown below – it was the most commented on piece of technology during the afternoon, people conjuring up a stream of ideas for its use. Needless to say the projector remains tilted, and my plans to project quality map and ariel photograph images to enhance geography lessons are well underway.

 

The Sound of Silence

Our team of testbed students were invited to visit Nokia HQ in Farnborough last week. We had a fascinating tour of how the organization is changing and adapting their office layout.  We dropped into their still developing training room which looked pretty much like our pilot teaching space – it was interesting to see a large organization plan and think its learning strategy in the same way as ourselves. Students felt comfortable in the space and saw many parallels with what we are trying to achieve in our own school area.

We took the opportunity to go into their anechoic chamber (above) which is ideal for testing the response of loudspeakers or microphones on their mobile devices. Every surface was covered in absorbing materials – the inside of the chamber is lined with foam wedges to absorb sound; this includes the floor. The floor you walk on is a wire trampoline stretched between the walls with an acoustically transparent catch net below.  The experience of utter silence in the room is very strange – there was no ambient noise at all, the smallest sounds—a whisper, the sound of breathing, or even a  heartbeat were magnified. Weird!