networked education for a networked society drives commerce

August 17th, 2009

We don’t prize thinking in this country. We are suspicious of the intellectual; it’s almost as if we believe too much thinking is not a good thing.

Writes, Peter Hyman a deputy head teacher at a London comprehensive.

He goes onto articulate a theory that is shared by a number leading thinkers; Howard Rheingold, Henry Jenkins, Michael Wesch and Stephen Heppell as four examples.

Howard talks about a new literacy for the 21st Century, his key points being:

Attention
Participation
Cooperation
Critical Consumption
Network Awareness

Henry Jenkins the De Florez professor of the Comparative Studies Media Program at MIT produced a report on media
literacy for the MacArthur Foundation in 2006, Howard Rheingold described Jenkins thinking as an entire approach to culture. A culture that Jenkins describes as a Participatory Culture. Jenkins himself writes, ‘we have also identified a set of core social skills and cultural competencies that young people should acquire if they are to be full, active, creative, and ethical participants in this emerging participatory culture.’ Our new networked and read-write participatory society offers a multiverse of ways to interact, however, we need new literacies premised upon the principal of Engagement:

Performance – the ability to adopt alternative identities for the purpose of improvisation and discovery

Simulation – the ability to interpret and construct dynamic models of real world processes

Appropriation – the ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content

Multitasking – the ability to scan one’s environment and shift focus as needed to salient details.

Distributed cognition – the ability to interact meaningfully with tools that expand mental capacities

Collective intelligence – the ability to pool knowledge and compare notes with others toward a common goal

Judgment - the ability to evaluate the reliability and credibility of different information sources

Transmedia navigation – the ability to follow the flow of stories and information across multiple modalities

Networking -the ability to search for, synthesize, and disseminate information

Negotiation – the ability to travel across diverse communities, discerning and respecting multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative norms.

Henry quotes Jonathan Fanton

The real gap between tomorrow’s digital haves and have-nots will be a lag in competence and confidence in the fast-paced variegated digital universe building and breeding outside schoolhouse walls…. Today’s digital youth are in the process of creating a new kind of literacy; this evolving skill extends beyond the traditions of reading and writing into a community of expression and problem- solving that not only is changing their world but ours, too… In this new media age, the ability to negotiate and evaluate information online, to recognize manipulation and propaganda and to assimilate ethical values is becoming as basic to education as reading and writing.

And he himself goes onto say

A growing body of scholarship suggests potential benefits of these emergent forms of participatory culture, including opportunities for peer-to-peer learning, a changed attitude towards intellectual property, the diversification of cultural expression, the development of skills valued in the modern workplace, and a more empowered conception of citizenship. Access to this participatory culture functions as a new form of the hidden curriculum, shaping which kids will succeed and which will be left behind as they enter schools and workplaces.

Not all of these skills are dramatically new — they are extensions on or elaborations of aspects of traditional research methods, text-based literacies, and critical analysis that have long been valued within formal education. In some cases, these skills have taken on new importance as young people move into emerging media institutions and practices. In some cases, these new technologies have enabled shifts in how we as a society produced, dissect, and circulate information. Those interested in reviewing the full framework should download the report.

Michael Wesch in his films demonstrates how his teaching has evolved to accommodate these insights.

Whilst Steve Heppel describes the educational 4C’s:

{1}
Creating

{2}
Critiquing

{3}
Collaborating

{4}
Communicating

Stephen Heppell considers the 21st century to herald the ‘learning age’. In the 20th century, he argues, we built big things (railways, universities) but the focus for the 21st century is ‘helping people to help each other’. In his view, “The old stuff won’t do any more”.

Peter Hyman elaborates

Yet too many lessons do not get beyond information-giving and that’s often because exams test knowledge and some understanding but not a lot else. That means much of a child’s education is spent on low-level thinking. The result is, sadly, that the imagination and potential of too many children are dulled.

The traditionalists would say that the main problem is ignorance of basic information. The conclusion of these critics is that schools don’t teach this stuff any more. They do, of course, with bells on. A thousand years of British history has been compulsory since 1988. The question is why aren’t students retaining the information? The answer: probably that there is too much focus on imparting knowledge and not techniques for understanding, explaining and then using that knowledge.

And he goes onto say

The truth is that the annual debate about whether exams are too easy or too hard misses the point – which is whether the exams test the right sorts of things. In my view, they don’t. GCSE exam results are not a true reflection of the talent of my students or anyone else’s. GCSEs are based on the assumption that students leave school at 16, which most don’t. Yet politicians of all parties are too scared to get rid of them. It’s time to scrap them and have a series of pathways from 14 to 19, with students able to take relevant exams and do extended projects at the times that suit them. The best schools are starting to offer this already.

A rebellion of sorts is on the way,

What has been missing is a fundamental debate about the sort of students we want leaving school at 18. What skills do we want them to have? What toolkit should they have to thrive in the world they will enter? If we want Britain to succeed, we need students leaving school with the qualities – teamwork, creativity, perseverance – that will prepare them for their working lives. When employers are asked what skills they want from students, they regularly put good oral communication at the top of the list. Yet too few students leave school having the confidence to perform in front of an audience or present an articulate case without notes.

Many schools are now rebelling against the old way of doing things and devising lessons that explicitly teach students the best ways of improving their learning.

In my presentation at Reboot Britain, I explored some the thinking, and ideas that shape the networked society and how that has multiple ramifications. I found Peter Hymans, article enlightening and informative, constructive and useful.

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