Vince’s Learning Log

Back in 1996 the International Commission on Education for the Twenty-first century wrote the report, Learning: The Treasure Within to UNESCO in which it argued that in a changing, complex and interdependent world there was a need to move beyond traditional responses for education which sought to supply each child with a store of knowledge from which to draw. Accordingly the Commission proposed ‘four fundamental types of learning which, throughout a person’s life, would in a way be pillars of knowledge

• Learning to know - acquiring intellectual curiosity, understanding and a capacity to being able to continue learning throughout life.
• Learning to do - being able to put what one has learnt into practice even in uncertain times, being able to process information and communicate with others.
• Learning to live together - developing respect for others, their cultures, their values, their viewpoints; appreciating interdependence.
• Learning to be - developing the ‘all round persons’ who can understand themself and their world and solve their own problems.

There is a lot of wisdom in such a framework and there would be not too many people who would argue with the elements it outlines for successful learning. Learning dispositions like Art Costa’s 16 Habits of Mind are easily accommodated within this framework as are thinking tools such as de Bono’s Thinking Hats and it is difficult to contemplate any future-oriented learning framework in which learning technologies are not firmly embedded. Learning technologies themselves provide a wealth of opportunities for our school communities to work towards the realisation of the above learning goals for students but presently these opportunities are often only slowly taken up by teachers who find the challenges of the ever-rolling technology juggernaut, combined with increasing accountabilities and responsibilities and pressures of working in today’s schools challenging to say the least. The reality, as I see it, is that unless we harness the undoubted opportunities offered by learning technologies we run the risk of widening the digital divide between teachers and those they seek to serve, the students for whom school will become increasingly irrelevant and indeed a barrier to their learning. Recently there have been a number of videos posted on the new Teacher Tube site that advocate in compelling terms the power of technology to engage today’s learners and encourage teachers to rise to the challenge. Such a one is the ‘Pay Attention’ video which is a powerful in its advocacy for teachers to use use mobile technologies such as ipods and mobiles. This video which is becoming quite ‘viral’ in the blogosphere in terms of its number of views is conceptually similar to the Did You Know video. Both videos present a series of facts presented starkly on a black background to the accompaniment of a haunting musical background. The net effect is to stir in the viewer the fact that our world is ‘flattening’ in many ways, both in the way our children learn in the case of Pay Attention and the new world order in the case of the Did you Know video which, from a US perspective, emphasises the rise of the educated class in China. Interestingly, from an Australian perspective, this weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald features some comments from erstwhile Prime-Minister Paul Keating, currently basking in the limelight of the musical comedy, Keating, dedicated to him and presently playing to packed houses in Melbourne. Keating has this to say of the educational policies of current Australian PM, John Howard, whom he unflatteringly caricatures as a ‘dessicated coconut.’ “……..The Chinese are pushing kids through universities devoted to mathematics and the sciences. Mr Howard’s policy is to get the kids into retail, keep ‘em dumb and cut their wages.” Challenging times for us all indeed and remininiscent of the Confucian curse, “May You Live in Interesting Times.”