My last post presented a little snippet from a Cellphone policy from Montgomery School District. Essentially it said no phone/mobile device should enter or be used here. The policy was written perhaps four years ago and could have been seen as a safe move given what the perceived possible contribution to learning compared to possible issues unacceptable use might raise. The balance is tipping at lightning speed (and forever) with devices such as the ipod touch, iphone, android devices, netbooks etc. Their possible contribution is real contribution. 
I have said and have to repeat that management issues aside we are forgoing an opportunity to learn to be better; to move into a new paradigm rather than just admire it from afar as the kids get on with it. The steps we need are bolder and quicker. Schools are slowly coming round to the idea of 1to1 provision and here it is in an ipod touch for $300 New Zealand Dollars. The video below looks at the experience of a school in the U.K.
A Safe Step may be to allow these touch devices which though not a phone are all but and use our schools wireless networks for connectivity. The next generation will undoubtedly have cameras and mics making them a reasonably solid platform for learning especially once a few apps come down from the appstore. What I think we need to realise fast is that we if we converge some of the functionality we have been get elsewhere into one of these devices they are not as expensive as they first seem.
This to me is one device format that we will see in almost everyone’s future and generally it will contain a phone as well.
These devices will undoubtedly enable learning, save lives and change lives.
Are we big enough to let them change our schools?
When will we let this take place?
Here are some of the things an iPhone can do today. This is a small selection There are 100,000 apps in the store many costing $0.99 making opportunities nearly endless.
| Camera |  | $100 |
| Torch |  | $20 |
| Notebook |  | $5 |
| GPS |  | $200 |
| stopwatch |  | $20 |
| media player |  | $60 |
| Games console |  | $400 |
| Mapbook |  | $10 |
| Spirit level |  | $20 |
| TV |  | $100 |
Others may not agree but a mobile device that has iPhone capability is a point that will soon be achievable for more of the population than having their own pc ever was. To me the important thing is that it will be personal and so will the learning.
Mark Prensky is debating should we give a four year old an iPhone?
Some other links
Elsewhere we can find out about 5 (Free) iPhone Apps Every Parent Should Have.
Exams phone a friend
Montgomery County Public Schools, Montgomery County, Md. "Possession of portable pager on public school property. In this section the following words have the meanings indicated: 'Portable pager' means any device carried, worn, or transported by an individual to receive or communicate messages. 'Public school property' means the grounds of any public school. "Except as provided ..., an individual may not possess a portable pager on public school property. This section does not apply to: handicapped students using portable pagers for medical reasons; law enforcement officers; visitors on public school property for an authorized program, meeting, or function; faculty or staff members employed by a county board; members of any volunteer fire department, ambulance company, or rescue squad, who are designated to possess a portable pager on public school property by the chief of the volunteer fire department, ambulance company, or rescue squad, and the school principal; and students whose portable pagers are contained in vehicles that are on public school property and are not found to be connected with criminal activity.
Shades of grey ??? The policy as outlined by the students ???
Google have many of us waiting to find out what wave is and what it might mean for us. Having had a bit of a read around the place and not having an invite myself I became interested. Rather than add yet another review the connections I looked at showed something new and powerful The you tube example is a realtime dialogue with translation. Below this in the iframe is Daniel Tenners take on what Google wave is and isn't for the full page is found here. Personally I think this is going to be big for collaboration and that connectivity is going to be the big delivery point for personal learning in online connected real time environment like google docs etherpad and google wave.
I was at the Ulearn conference recently where several learners were talking about having a voice, being heard and saying what you think. In these times of change; debate and honesty are needed because the present reality is not the preferred future (the outcome of these debates will determine our direction into the unknown.)
In one workshop, on edupunk a discussion was raised suggesting that because of the danger of pornography and misuse students should not be allowed to have mobile devices in the learning environment. I found myself getting agitated while listening to someone outlining the issue who seemed incredibly reticent to allow mobile devices within the school system due to this risk. Mobile devices are ubiquitous and they are becoming “T H E M A J O R P E R S O N A L” connectivity mechanism.
There is much talk about schooling becoming irrelevant and while I think this is far from the case I would like to argue here that these risks may gain traction in an education system that doesn’t accept its role has changed and that an approach to internet safety must embrace change from within; utilising an ecological approach.
On a weekday 6 hours is the average time spent in school 18 are spent in the outside world. Sure there is the little matter of sleep and eating but the figure above speaks for itself. When we consider that access to learning technologies is probably greater outside of the school we have a curriculum of self direction. The options for good and bad, sustainable and unsustainable, moral and immoral, positive and negative, creative and consumerist are boundless outside of school. Students are learning more than ever outside of our gates. Our separation of the technological means used in the two environments is an untenable position in the long term and I propose - in the here and now. In waiting to be prepared we may lose our opportunity be part of the ecological development.
The Youth/Teens ie our Students have A participatory culture.
This participatory culture is “a culture with relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, strong support
for creating and sharing one’s creations, and some type of informal mentorship whereby what
is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices.A participatory culture is also
one in which members believe their contributions matter, and feel some degree of social connection
with one another (at the least they care what other people think about what they have
created). Forms of participatory culture include:
Affiliations — memberships, formal and informal, in online communities centered
around various forms of media, such as Friendster, Facebook, message boards,
metagaming, game clans, or MySpace).
Expressions — producing new creative forms, such as digital sampling, skinning and
modding, fan videomaking, fan fiction writing, zines, mash-ups).
Collaborative Problem-solving — working together in teams, formal and informal,
to complete tasks and develop new knowledge (such as through Wikipedia, alternative
reality gaming, spoiling).
Circulations — Shaping the flow of media (such as podcasting, blogging).” taken from the confronting the challenges
report from the Mc Aurthur Foundation
| Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century |  |
The same report suggests the following and reading it helps me think what our preferred future might be:
“Rather than dealing with each technology in isolation, we would do better to take an ecological
approach, thinking about the interrelationship among all of these different communication
technologies, the cultural communities that grow up around them, and the activities they support.”
My Beliefs are that given the cultural communities that exist for young people are so connected they have the potential to bypass and ignore a formal education system.
Our steps towards a preferable future
What this does not mean
This does not mean that learners can have whatever content they like on their phones etc but rather that we understand we will maximise both learning and shared values through adopting acceptable use based on http://www.utechtips.com/aup-driven-by-vision-not-protection/
Kids are sophisticated media producers....
We had a look at digital stories and how to make them with students at Southwell School. No matter what, it is important to hand over the learning to the students. Well ... here are some results. No success criteria in this first attempt was laid out but we talked about copyright, tone, static images etc. The students were self motivated by the chance to work in the digital environment and to apply learning to this media genre and format.
