ICT and Computing in Education
Originally uploaded by Lower Columbia College
Has anyone seen the new Computing programme of study*?
I’m betting lots of you have heard about it, and a few of you have read it.
If you haven’t, you really should – it’s only short. In fact, for KS3 it amounts to 9 bullet points. Nine.
Most ICT teachers will probably look at it with dismay, or at least some trepidation. First, the DfE have ditched “ICT” and replaced it with “Computing”**. And the bullets cover topics such as computational abstractions, sorting algorithms, boolean logic and the fetch execute cycle to name but 4.
There are a few… addendums? Caveats? A couple of points to make, at least.
First, ICT has not been ditched. ICT, as a subject title, is seen as being devalued in the eyes of the DfE. I’m not getting into my own point of view on that, at all – it is what it is and while I appreciate that some feel angry, undermined and under-appreciated, that’s not what I want to talk about right now. The DfE has rebranded the subject as Computing – which isn’t the same thing as ditching it entirely.
Take a look at bullet points 8 and 9:
“undertake creative projects that involve selecting, using, and combining multiple
applications, preferably across a range of devices, to achieve challenging goals,
including collecting and analysing data and meeting the needs of known users”
&
“create, reuse, revise and repurpose digital information and content with attention
to design, intellectual property and audience.”
That sounds a lot like ICT to me. Looking at presentation software, designing documents for hardcopy (i.e. posters and leaflets), spreadsheet modelling, data handling with a database, web design, image editing, video editing, audio editing, digital creativity – it’s all in there.
It’s written up in a pretty vague way – but then it’s meant to be. The PoS is supposed to be slim, and vague. It provides the pegs on which we get to hang our curriculum. Again, I have my own opinion on the sweeping changes being brought in by the DfE in the last few years – but we are where we are. The government wants schools to have more independence. Here is an outline of the kind of stuff we want you to do – you fill in the blanks.
And most ICT teachers, and most ICT departments, should feel comfortable with their own curricula to meet those two criteria. The fact that it represents 2/9 bullet points (22%), doesn’t mean that it should equate to the same proportion of curriculum time.
So what about the other 7 bullet points?
“understand at least two key algorithms for each of sorting and searching; use
logical reasoning to evaluate the performance trade-offs of using alternative
algorithms to solve the same problem”
Well, that’s potentially a half-term’s work. To do it properly I’d probably want to build up to it over the three years – looking at algorithms in general and sorting algorithms in particular as part of a wider context (or I could try and sell the pupils on a unit of work all about sorting data – but I’m not sure they’d find the prospect as exciting as I probably would***). I doubt highly that anyone is suggesting we spend as much time on the bubble and shuttle sorts as we do on the whole “ICT” curriculum as it was.
Think back, those of you who’ve been in this game more than 5 years or so, and you may recall the KS3 National Strategy. A lesson-by-lesson programme of study for the whole of KS3. Many schools took it as a prescribed scheme of work that must be followed at all costs – when in fact it was designed as a starting point for schools lacking enough specialist ICT teachers. Here was a set of resources you COULD use as a starting point, and build upon until to meet your students’ needs and your staff expertise.
I see this new document in the same way. There are 7 new things that you might not be familiar with if you’re not a computer science specialist – so we’ve put a good bit of detail and a good bit of emphasis into them to make it clear and to give you a starting point. There are also two bullet points at the end to cover the stuff you already know – and we’re not going to patronise you on those ones because we trust you to know what you’re doing.
I’m sure some will accuse me of being naive (a criticism I’ve faced more than once), but until someone tells me that I’m wrong, that’s the way I’m planning to read that document.
My school’s KS3 ICT/computing curriculum is made up of 3 strands – digital productivity (e.g. MS Office type stuff****), digital creativity and computer science. Creating a computer game? You need to design it (creativity), build it (computer science) and advertise it (productivity). Find the user manual for any computer game and have a look at the credits – see what the different people have contributed to the game. I bet a lot of them have done some ‘coding’ at some level – but I bet a hell of a lot have done all sorts of other work – all of it done on, or with, a computer. That’s the model I’m taking at KS3…
* http://media.education.gov.uk/assets/files/pdf/n/national%20curriculum%20consultation%20-%20framework%20document.pdf, pp. 152-155
** I know that, technically, only English and other languages should be capitalised as proper nouns, but I think it helps differentiate between general stuff relating to anything computer based and the specific subject area we’re talking about.
*** I’ve met Tony Hoare, who invented the Quicksort algorithm – I doubt the kids would be as humbled as I over that experience!
**** Doug Belshaw quite rightly picked me up on this point within about 30s of hitting the “post” button. I don’t want to amend the post too heavily as this isn’t the point I was trying to make, but his criticism is fair. Nomenclature is a big deal – just ask teachers whether we should call our subject ICT, Digital Literacy, Computing, Computer Studies, Computer Science, IT or something entirely different – then step back and watch the argument ensue.
I accept that being productive is not about using PPT and Word. I was trying to rapidly differentiate between a set of topics – a set of topics that are never truly distinct anyway. Does making a poster fit into productivity, or creativity? Ultimately both, but for the sake of trying to categorise things I’m going to lump it in productivity – with a tacit understanding that layout and design are key principles involved.
Communication and collaboration would fit into productivity, as would turning a machine on, managing files & folders, eSafety, etc. Call it digital literacy if you prefer. Call it Hungarian Basket Weaving if you prefer! And I apologise for making the reference to MSO (although I’m leaving it there – I don’t believe it editing all of my mistakes out).
Coast Guard – Search and Rescue Demonstration
Originally uploaded by U.S. Coast Guard
At last week’s ICT2012 conference I was really looking forward to hearing from the DfE and Ofsted, both of whom were sending representatives. Sadly both had to pull out, however all was not lost and the organisers of the conference managed to find a number of colleagues who had undergone recent ICT thematic inspections.
The thoughts below are an amalgam of what was actually said, what I remember being said, the hastily scribbled notes I made and a few bits of input from elsewhere. I don’t claim that they are accurate or gospel, but assume that any mistakes, errors or ommissions are mine.
Create an Open Curriculum at KS3
Rather than specifying exactly what is going to be learned and exactly how it is going be be learned, allow students to explore problems, identify strategies and form their own solutions. This is brave, and risky, and challenging. But without that challenge there is little actual learning, and what there is is superficial.
BYOD
One school was praised for having an open Wifi network at a policy towards BYOD. I’m not 100% on this one personally, but I can see that allowing students to use their own mobile devices as a platform to engage and extend learning could well be a positive thing. I think that security, data protection and the risks of loss and damage are significant – not to mention the digital divide. And for me it is moot as the whole school policy of no mobiles is very unlikely to change in the immediate future.
Comparing Tools
Rather than teaching students how to create bullet points in PowerPoint, encourage them to thnk about alternative ways of presenting information to a given audience. Compare Prezi, PowerPoint and ComicLife and you’ll have students who are in a much better position when it comes to tackling real problems productively in the future.
Digital Leaders
The idea of getting students to take on some responsibility – either through completing donkey work on the VLE, sharing techniques with students, running staff INSET or even running sessions for parents – has been one I’ve been keen on since I first heard about the idea. It currently resides on my ToDo list somewhere below “plan tomorrow’s lessons” and somewhere above “solve world hunger”.
Documentation
Yawn… I know, but a solid SEF and Quality Assurance document mean that you are reflecting on your department’s practices and you know where you have flaws and what you have to do to fix them. There is an element of hoop jumping (OK, a lot of hoop jumping), but both documents ultimately lead to an improvment in provision for the students. So suck it up and get it done!
Curriculum Mapping
In many schools ICT is an option at KS4, but the PoS was (and the subject as a set of knowledge and understanding) still is mandatory. One school was praised for clearly mapping the old PoS to non-ICT subjects at KS4. Another was awarded outstanding with no mention of this despite having no mapping in place. We don’t have it and while it is on my ToDo list it, probably lies only just above solving world hunger and just below dusting the ceiling…
eSafety
This is a key topic right now. It’s one thing to have curriculum based eSafety lessons, to have digital leaders running INSET for parents and having clear policies in the department handbook – but that still isn’t enough to get you outstanding (apparently). Criticism of the department that did all of the above included the lack of a CEOP button on the front of the VLE. All schools should (I’m not sure if it’s mandatory, but I think it will help a lot) have someone who has attended the free CEOP half day workshop. The issue is not just one of “have you taught it”, but more of “is it embedded and understood at every level within the school”. Do the teachers know how to deal with students accessing inappropriate material? Do the students know the likely consequences? Are staff and students alike aware of their digital footprint? Potentially, it never stops, but the odd lesson on not sharing your password and not giving your phone number out simply won’t cut it, is the message.
And that’s about it for now. Very little mention in there about teaching and learning, but I think that’s because that applies to everyone. It’s not that it doesn’t need saying, but here we’re looking at the ICT thematic elements. Outstanding teaching, learning, pace, progress, measurement, awareness, subject knowledge, behaviour and all of that other stuff is still essential. This just has to sit on top.
But remember, as gruelling as all this sounds, if it were easy we’d all be going home at 3, collecting our gold plated pensions and live our lives oblivious to what stress really is 
Originally uploaded by Kushal Das
Over the past year lots and lots of people have asked me about a programming summer school – an opportunity for non-coding ICT teachers to pick up some programming skills in advance of next year.
I always feel a pang of altruism when I hear things like that always want to try and offer something to fill in the gaps – but the result of that is that I spend lots and lots of time sorting out CAS hub meetings, attending teachmeets, sharing resources and lots of other stuff that I massively enjoy and get a lot from, but it doesn’t half eat into my free (ha ha!) time.
And so I decided last week I *would* run a summer school, but that (unusually for me), I would charge for it.
Having done a bit of research, the likes of Lighthouse and exam boards themselves usually offer CPD courses for £225 – 300 + VAT per day. After a bit of calculating, I reckon that charging £250 for two days (so half the price of the others), I can still sleep at night, most schools can afford to spend the cost of a day’s supply for 2 days of training without needing any cover and I can earn a few quid to help me try and reach my financial aspiration of one day getting to the lofty heights of flat broke.
So, I present to you the first ever Teesside Python Summer School. Your £250 gets you a place on a small course (max. 14 delegates, so you can get the individual attention and support that you need), two lunches, any and all resources I can come up with and a big does of good karma for helping to offset all the other stuff I have (and will continue to) given away.
I’ve provisionally shifted half the tickets already, which is great, but do get in touch if you have any queries.
Originally uploaded by Mark Brannan
Programme of Study
Medium Term Plan
With the official dis-application of the ICT Programme of Study (or PoS – and make what you will of that acronym…) schools have the freedom to teach what they want, how they want.
Some have seen that as a sign that ICT isn’t important and can be, at best farmed out to all of the other subjects, and and at worst just simply dropped without trace. This is, of course, incredibly short-sighted and probably likely to backfire. It’s true that Ofsted are focusing much more on numeracy and literacy, but if you listen to what the DfE are saying, their move to disapply the PoS is nothing to do with ICT not being important – quite the opposite.
People like CAS, BCS, the Royal Society, Microsoft and Google are all telling us, and telling those in power, that ICT isn’t doing everything it should (which is not the same as saying that ICT is no good). And so those in power are giving us an opportunity to do what we want. Not in the way that Mrs. C says “do want you want” when she’s in a strop, but in that positive, empowering way of saying “OK, you show me what you want to do and we’ll see where we go from there”.
In two years there will be a new, officially sanctioned PoS. One that will go beyond *just* using Microsoft Office and Flowol (I know that many people have been doing much more than that for years, but not because of the PoS, and it’s scary how many tales I’ve heard of schools that haven’t gone beyond that). What we do now will influence that PoS, so we need to try things out and push the boundaries a bit. Some stuff will work, some won’t, but that’s a part of education. Right?
Writing a PoS for my department was easy. Really easy It took me about an hour. Why? Well, largely because we’ve always treated the PoS with disdain. We’ve made sure we’ve ticked the right boxes, but we’ve treated it as a pretty low floor and pretty ugh done what we’ve wanted to anyway. Gove says we could have 11 year olds making simple 2D animations in a free program called Scratch? Our Y7s were writing Pong and Breakout clones years ago!
Along with that I’ve written what I have called a medium term plan. Now, don’t tell anyone, but I don’t really know the difference between a SoW and a MTP, but it’s a list of units we might do and how they will fit together to meet my draft PoS.
I think the two documents nicely lead through a 3-stranded curriculum, with digital literacy (using a computer on a day-to-day level) at the core and stretching out through creative skills and computing topics alike. There are a couple of notable omissions, specifically in the form of image and video editing. We do intend to teach those, but as the logistics can be tricky and the outcomes very risky we’ve not included them in the PoS – so there is no stick to beat us with if we fail.
This task is being emulated in lots of other places – check out ictcurric and digitalstudies for just two examples of collaborative SoW, but perhaps this might be a useful pair of documents for others.
I’m writing this post on the train home from the amazing CAS Conference 2012 (#casconf2012).
I tried ot tweet as much as possible during the two days, but between a limited battery life and (more importantly) getting actively involved in many of the sessions there is much I haven’t talked about.
As always, my blogging is almost entirely selfish and my main priority is to start to reflect on what I’ve learned over the last two days. It’s all very ‘gut reaction’ stuff before I forget the details.
Thursday – Bring & Brag
The evening before the main conference is traditionally a ‘bring & brag’ unconference style event. Meet up, eat nibbles, drink wine, then a series of short presentations .This year the whole thing felt tight and slick, with quick turnarounds, short presentations and little reliance on slideshows. Being partly involved in the running of the B&B session I didn’t really get chance to make many notes, but Alan O’Donohue (@teknoteacher) was as energetic as ever, Ben Gristwood (@Mr_G_ICT) talked about some really interesting work with Digital Leaders and someone (I forget who!) talked about a 6th form student who built a gaming PC for their A2 extended project – something I want my Y7s to get involved in this term!
Thankfully Leon Cych (@eyebeams) was there capturing everything – video, audio and stills – and I should have the audio from each mini-talk to post on the CAS Rounup Podcast over the next few weeks.
Friday – Plenaries – CAS LAndscape & Future and Centres of Excellence
Partly housekeeping and partly letting everyone know where everything is going, Simon Peyton-Jones (chair of CAS) and Bill Mitchell (Director of BCS Academoy of Computing) talked about the many, many events that have occured over the last 12 months, including the Royal Society Report, the official withdrawal of the ICT PoS and, vitally, the fact this isn’t the government saying ‘we don’t value ICT’ but TPTB offering us the opportunity to decide what WE think is important. Bill also talked about the CAS/BCS Network of Excellence. The hope was to get 200 schools and a couple of universities involved int he first year, with maybe 30 universities and lots of schools by 2020. So far there have been over 500 school applications and over 20 universities have expressed an interest, so the motiviation is there and next year should be a very exciting one.
Keynote – Replacing City Traders With Robots – Dave Cliff
Keynotes are funny things. Sometimes they’re fascinating and engorssing, sometimes they’re practical and involving, sometimes they’re dull and seem t go on for ever. This one was definitely the first. Giving a bit of context (horses and pigeons being the early information and communication technology used by the very first stock market traders) we looked at how automated systems have developed to the point where they are involved in 95% of all stock market transactions – many with no human involvements at all. Then we looked at how humans have managed to screw up complex technology on a grand scale. The scariest topic was ‘normalisation of deviance’ – the idea that something outside of acceptable parameters doesn’t immediately end in failure, so we accept it as ‘normal’. This is ultimately what led to the Challenger disaster and demonstrates nicely why relying on technology can be a risky business. Bring the two topics together and you have an almost entirely automated multi-national economic system written by software engineers that has repeatedly shown in recent years that it is working outside the bounds of safety (an IPO going from $15 per share to $0.00002 per share in less than 1.5 seconds, quicker than the CEO can hit the off switch, with no rational explanation from any financial authority is just one of many scary examples given). This might not sound like the most fascinating of topics, and it might not be the most obvious way to start a conference about teaching computer science in schools, but Dave did a fantastic job of demonstrating not how, but WHY computer science is so important.
Workshop 1 – Arduino: If seeing is beliving, what is touching? – Chris Martin
I’ve been hearing people talk about Arduinos for a while now. I even tried to buy a kit a few years ago but the company, for some reason, decided not to process my order and I never did get round to chasing it up. With a simple programming interface (there are only two buttons you need and a space for some syntax), a USB lead and any manner of ‘bits’ you can program a physical device. Starting with making an LED flash on and off we were quickly controlling the speed of the flashing using potentiometers, using light sensors to turn motors and using acoustic proximity sensors to set off explosions (because, and I quote, “it’s not just chemists that get to blow s**t up”). The kits are around £40 with everything you need to get started, and with paired or small group programming you could get away with 4 or 5 for a class. As a workshop should, this was hands on from the start and while some students naturally engage with on-screen programming, the idea that you can do something with a physical output in seconds is undoubtedly engaging for many. I think half a dozen Arduino kits half just become my top priority with any spare budget, even more so than the Kinect I was after.
Workshop 2 – Algorithmic Problem Solving – Joao Ferrerrira
I’ve mentioned more than once that while my GCSE Computing students have really engaged with computer programming and have enjoyed getting to grips with the discrete elements (assignment, selection, iteration, file handling, etc.) my big bugbear is that most are not good at problem solving, decomposition and abstraction. That is to say, ask them to write a for loop to display the first 20 square numbers and you’re sorted, but give them a problem (like how many trips it will take to get a load of vampires and maidens to a hotel bar) and they just don’t know how to start breaking th eproblem down into manageable chunks. Joao presented some really interesting approaches to generating algorithms without a computer. Some of it was quite heavy (Hoare triples and state change diagrams, for those who know about such things) but I really do think there’s scope here to investigate better ways of helping students to start thinking computationally, which is an essential part of computing as a discipline.
As an added bonus, it turns out Joao lives less than 3 miles from my school and is running his undergraduate course on algorithmic problem solving in September at my nearest university. Suffice to say I’ve made sure he’ll be presenting at a hub meeting before veyr much longer!
Lunch
Now I’m not normally one to go into *so* much detail, and this isn;t about the food (delicious though it was). The point here is I actually 5 minutes (maybe as much as 10) to catch my breath. Those 3 sessions were all genuinely inspiring and packed with brilliant ideas and stuff that I wanted to think about. The cogs were whirring and had that been the end of the day then I would have happily set out for home with a spring in my step and feeling that I’d got a heck of a lot of value. As it was, there was still much more to come!
Workshop 3 – The productive teacher – James Franklin
James wanted to talk about a pedagogical approach called Minimally Invasive Education, pioneered by Sugata Mitra. His argument is that in the absence of a teacher, learners will teach themselves. If you provide them with the resources and the encouragement then they can learn at least as effectively without direct intervention as they would with it. To this extent James showed his Y7 class a series of manipulated images and gave them 6 lessons to teach themselves and each other the skills required to replicate them. He actively refused to do any teaching or answer questions and removed any rules in order that they shouldn’t be barriers to learning. Want to text your Dad to help solve that problem? Fine. Want to use your phone to wathc a video tutorial on YouTube? Fine. Want to tie your tie around your head like Rambo? Well… only if you can justify it pedagogically.
A very similar technique apparently worked well for spreadsheet modelling too and feedback form the students was overwhelmingly positive. James’ GCSE cohort didn’t do quite as well, however. While they learned a heck of a lot about databases and could explain why forms were useful in terms of your ability to add macros, action buttons and user-friendly interface elements, they scored very poorly on practice papers because they weren’t hitting the rote answer expected by the exam board.
Maybe this says something about the way in which we assess students, and maybe this approach is better suited to skills-based topics rather than knowledge-based. James admitted himself that he would be very wary of using this technique to teach programming from scratch as it is too easy for students to waste a lot of time exploring the wrong avenue when a simple array would save them all the hassle.
Overall it’s a brave approach, and one that would almost certianly fail an inspection on the grounds that not eveyr student can demonstrate progress over one lesson (in fact, the fact that they can sometimes make no progress in a lesson is actually the point!). That said, if we want independent learners who can solve problems, communicate, work collaboratively and don’t sit around waiting to be spoon fed then this might be just what the doctor ordered.
Workshop 4 – Sensing the world (with Scratch)
My final workshop of the day was spent playing with picoboards, a £40 sensor board that plugs in via USB and talks directly to Scratch. With nothing more than a simple driver install I was playing the trombone by blowing into the microphone and moving a slider bar, and then managed to quickly write a working game with a variety of controls including light sensing, buttons and more. Much simpler than an Arduino and much more focused on physical input that a Raspberry Pi, I can see why these engage students so well and they’re going second on my shopping list after the Arduino kits mentioned earlier.
Plenaries – How Google can help you & Raspberry Pi
I have to admit, I was totally exhausted by this point and somewhat overwhelmed. Andrew Eland and Alan Mycroft both spoke eloquently and engagingly about their respective topics and Google is very keen to support computing as a discipline. Particularly as their UK recruitment of software engineers is doubling every 18 months (a trend that shows no sign of letting up in the near future). I *still* have yet to get my hands on a Pi, and even when I do, I think I might just be too busy playing with Arduino kits and sense boards to get much done.
Summary
In summary? Best. Day. Ever. Last year was great, the year before was fantastic. This was simply awe inspiring. All the things I haven’t mentioned – chatting with Susan Robson, catching up with frineds from the CAS Working Group, shared conversations in the atrium over sandwiches (or a pint, last night). They were a huge part of it all and I’m heading back and JUST the right time of year, all set to plan the most kick-ass curriculum you’ve ever seen.
Originally uploaded by alternatePhotography
A little over 2 years ago I managed to get my department onto the OCR GCSE Computing Pilot. Now, our first cohort is coming out the other side and with all the ‘kerfuffle’, a flood of exam boards (well, 2) have suddenly gone from saying “there’s no demand, it’s not worth it” to rushing out GCSE Computing specifications for first teaching from 2012.
My default position is to stick to what I know. I’ve spent 2 years creating resources and learning about how OCR wants me to tackle the specification, and how it wants the students to tackle it. But on the other hand, I don’t want to sit here out of habit and miss a better opportunity.
This morning I’ve had a good read through what AQA and Edexcel have to offer. And I think I’ll stick where I am. Not least because for an exam board to go from ‘no spec’ to a spec ready for submission to the DfE or Ofqual or whoever is doing the QCA’s job these days within a couple of months is a little bit rushed for my liking.
The AQA spec looks broadly similar, although the theory topics skip a lot of the software and binary representation stuff in favour of prototyping and testing and there are two programming controlled assessments which is a little more… up front than the OCR approach (in which the practical investigation has really turned into a programming task – although they were bullied into that by the (then) QCDA and I like that at least it’s something a bit different.
A key point for me is that in the summary marking criteria for the programming unit, the programming techniques used section gets 36 of the 63 marks – the next largest component being just 9 marks. Sounds ideal!
Until you read the detailed mark scheme, where you get those 36 marks for “discussion of most of the programming techniques” – death by writeup…
You actually get 9 marks for producing the code itself.
What can you say about Edexcel? In fairness, I moaned that AQA had probably rushed their specification out. Edexcel haven’t – because there isn’t even a draft to look at yet. There are some outline details – a 40% written exam, 35% practical exam and a 25% controlled assessment.
I must admit, I’m a fan of practical exams. They’re logistically more difficult, but they provide a more accurate reflection of a student’s ability than coursework and the focus switches to teaching and learning rather than doing and redoing.
That said, with options evening tomorrow, I don’t feel compelled to jump to a spec I haven’t read and I’ve not been a huge fan of Edexcel’s output in recent years (although I know many that have).
So at the moment I don’t feel that spoilt for choice. Competition is a good thing, and for centres coming at GCSE Computing for the first time either in 2012 or 2013 then perhaps the route is a little less cut and dried. For me, though. It’ll be another year at least with OCR.
Originally uploaded by Cassey
http://www.youtube.com/user/mwclarkson
<– Useful AS Computing resources
I have 3 (count them, three) AS Computing students. Due to timetabling constraints I teach them for 1 hour a week during school hours and 2 hours a week after school.
Due to other commitments, one student misses every other 1 hour session and a different student misses virtually all of the 2 hour sessions (so he’s essentially doing a full AS on one hour a week).
In order to provide some more assistance I’ve started creating some simple videos. Production value is nil (a cheap camcorder, a tripod and a mini whiteboard), editing is limited to adding a few titles at either end and the script is made up as I go along.
Hopefully they might be of some use to others too, and if you do spot any glaring errors, then do let me know…
Originally uploaded by norrix
Well, by now you really ought to be aware that the secretary of state for education, Michael Gove, has had quite a lot to say this morning on the topic of ICT and Computing provision in schools.
I’m not actually going to say too much about the speech specifically, but more about the consequences.
What I will say is that the rhetoric and soundbites in the media outlets* had me pretty disheartened first thing – but reading the detail in many of those reports and the speech itself I think everything’s going to be fine (and if you disagree, just go to make-everything-ok.com).
I’ve seen forum threads, tweets and comments all day from teachers in turns ecstatic, perturbed and distraught at the future prospects for careers, subject areas and the academic future of our students.
ICT provision at KS1, 2, 3 and 4 is still compulsory. And so it should be. Students need to know how to use computers to complete tasks – modelling, presenting information, research. This may be delivered in a cross-curricular format, at least at KS2 and 4. It may be taught as a discrete subject.
Maybe this will give SLTs and HoDs the push they need to look at which elements really should be taught in a cross-curricular format. Maybe Science and Maths will be given some formal responsibility for delivering some of the above. All schools now formally have the freedom to choose the most appropriate method. I would more than happily let my Maths colleagues deliver spreadsheet skills and modelling techniques. I’m not suggesting that cross-curricular is the only way to go, but I spend so much of my time making up scenarios to give the skills a context that it does seem there’s an opportunity there.
And what of the Computing side of the curriculum? I’ve been teaching Computing topics at KS3 for years. Initially just when ‘no-one was looking’ (especially the kids), but increasingly explicitly as the years have gone on. And I’m hardly alone. Gove has been quoted suggesting that in the near future our 11 year olds could be creating 2D animations. I started delivering Scratch lessons to my Y7s in 2006 I think…
At KS4, those studying a GCSE or other Level 2 course in ICT can continue to do so and I’m equally certain that ICT qualifications will be around for a long time. With the expansion of Computing topics lower down, there should be more opportunities for Computing to be popular as a formal qualification, and this is a good thing. It’s about choice and exposure.
Some are clearly concerned that Computing is for a niche, or at best a minority. I wouldn’t go that far, but History, Geography, Music, Drama, Art… they’re none of them for everyone at KS4. And again, nor should they be. But now, hopefully, all schools will have Computing at KS3 so that students can make an informed choice, and all schools should be able to offer Computing as a qualification so that students have an opportunity.
What changed today? For me, actually, very little. I had a great discussion with my Y9s about their options (as planned), practiced search techniques with my Y8s (as planned), created radio adverts with one Year 11 group (as planned), had a go at coding a theatre booking system with my Y11 Computing group (as planned) and looked at the TCP/IP stack and common protocols with my Y12s (as planned). Tomorrow will be similar. Y7s creating a database, Y13 creating an interactive Flash product, Y10 video editing, Y12 practising working with arrays – a broad and balanced curriculum made up of essential application skills, creative use of computers and the study of how to make computers work for us.
The future is not what a politician tells us it will be, the future is what we do with what we’ve got.
* BBC News – “The current information and communications technology (ICT) curriculum in England’s schools is a “mess” and must be radically revamped”
Telegraph – “‘Dull’ technology school lessons to be replaced”
ZDNet – “‘Boring’ IT classes face being axed”
I could go on…
With 6th Form recruitment and Year 9 options seasons looming large on the horizon, the time seemed right to step up my advertising campaign. With that in mind I’ve spent part of the day putting 10 posters together. Simple, plain and hopefully intriguing, each one uses a quote from ilearnedtoprogram.com along with an appropriate image from StockXchng.
Opinions and suggestions would be most welcome – and you can see all 10 here.
The posters at the minute have the school logo on, but if people think they’re any good, and once I fix any little errors or issues (I’m not happy with the BlueJ logo text) I’ll happily remove the badge and release under a CC license.
Picture courtesy of the flickrpoet site
Nick Jackson wrote a blog post yesterday entitled ‘Put the brakes on’, specifically relating to the current push for Computing. The main thrust of his argument (as I understand it) is that we need to consider what the results of this push might be, and that the many good bits of ICT risk being pushed out in order to make room for the ‘new’ content, and he posed a number of questions.
Although I want to reply directly in the comments, I also didn’t want to submit a 3000 word essay* there, so I’m doing that here instead and will provide a brief summary over there. So, expect some strong, and very personal opinions. Any comments and any inference are entirely my own.
* As of now WordPress is telling me there are 2753 words, so not far off!
Why was ICT introduced in the first place?
To an extent, this is a distraction. Rather than concentrating on the historical aspects of how we got here, I’m interested in where we go next. Alternatively, you could read into that ‘why should we teach ICT in the first place’, which is a more useful question. Now I have no statistics to hand, but how are you reading this? How many computers, computer programs and computer users were involved in your toothbrush? Designing it, designing the equipment to make it, tracking the finances within the company that made it, organising the shipping to the retailer, examining the ideal price point, marketing, designing the packaging, researching the most efficient design of the head, analysing the way that bacteria and plaque attack teeth and gums, and so on, and so on and so on. There is a real need for everyone to learn enough about IT to make use of the technology we have available, at whatever level of ability and requirement. I don’t think that anyone is arguing against the need for IT to be taught in schools here. I find the biggest arguments are those that try to define what IT actually is.
Why did Computer [studies] largely disappear into the shadows?
Short answer, I don’t know. I wasn’t around at the time. I’m led to believe that universities didn’t want students who had studied Computer Science in the same way that my primary school didn’t want me to have learned to read and write before I got there (“We like to teach them our way”). How much of that is true, I don’t know. When I was at school in the early 90s, my IT lessons involved using a spreadsheet to plan a Teddy Bear’s Picnic and creating a newsletter with textflow in a DTP. And that was about it – certainly no Computer Science there. and no wonder I didn’t take the subject at KS4 or KS5.
Why is it that universities, in particular those offering Computer Science and other related courses, don’t seem to be that interested in all this debate or in getting involved in designing a clear curriculum pathway up to degree entry?
For the first point, they are. Having just spent two days at the semi-annual Computing At School Working Group Meeting in Cambridge, the Computer Science agenda is very much at the top of people’s priorities. Whether it be university academics, genuinely (i.e. personally) interested representatives of exam boards, school teachers, IT industrialists, researchers, parents or some bloke who happened to be wandering past, there is a large group of very interested people who have a lot to say on the matter. I’d love to give you a list of names, but I’m not sure how appropriate it would be as I don’t think the attendance list is publicly available elsewhere. Suffice to say I’m happy, excited and encouraged. But if this wasn’t happening, how else did Eric Schmidt happen to fly in from the US and suddenly decide to add his opinions on the teaching of IT in schools if people aren’t talking about it? I’m sure it’s not something he decided to find out on his own.
I suppose the last argument is slightly off topic considering the original question which specified universities, but several of them were well represented. For the second part; again, there are many people interested in how we get a good intake for Computer Science degrees. CS is unique in having such a broad baseline at the start of the degree, from those who don’t really understand what CS actually is, right up to those who are already doing paid programming work in their spare time. This discrepancy makes differentiation incredibly difficult, even for the very top universities (did I mention that the meeting was hel din Cambridge?) that take the best and the brightest and it’s something that those responsible for running these courses desperately want to improve upon. Perhaps the message isn’t getting through clearly elsewhere, but within CAS it is pretty clear. Universities want a better calibre of student in terms of their experience and exposure to Computer Science and they want to help schools identify appropriate routes.
Add to that, that Computer Science at schools is about more than getting people into computer Science at university. My brother is a materials scientist, and writes his own code all the time. My dad used to a chemical engineer, ditto. Research scientists and engineers all over the place are writing their own code. Thousands of people try to maintain small websites using online template tools or Publisher. How much easier would their jobs be if more people knew a bit about scripting and coding – be it Java, Javascript, HTML or CSS? Mathematicians using Matlab, office managers knowing the difference between RJ45 and RS232 – all these things are distinct from a Computer Science degree, but some CS education further up in their education could do wonders.
Are there not other areas of ICT that are equally as ‘valuable’ as Computing?
Absolutely. I would split IT up into 3 distinct categories: Digital Literacy, or IT for users; Digital Creativity, with image editing, video editing, audio and animation; Computer Science, the technical bits including programming but also looking at system architecture, interface design, networking and protocols.
Maths does something similar – Numeracy and then Pure, Mechanics, Statistics and Decision.
English does something similar – Literacy, English Language and English Literature.
I wouldn’t necessarily argue at this point that any one of those is more important that the other, although there may be some room for positioning at some point in the future. When I first got into teaching, 7 years ago, the IT for Users agenda was the entire curriculum. Over those years the creativity has come in more and more. The big gap there is the technical stuff. We effectively have a generation of students who know how to punch the buttons into a calculator, but don’t understand how multiplication actually works – and that’s why I’m pushing. I don’t say that we shouldn’t teach students how to use the calculator, but we need to make sure we also cover the fundamentals that make it work.
What will happen if ICT ‘soft skills’ are not taught at all in schools?
If by ‘soft skills’ you mean how to create a decent slideshow, make a poster, interrogate a spreadsheet, et al. then it would, of course, be pretty bad. A lot of the ‘soft skills’ are not covered well anyway, and if I didn’t teach students how to create a 3 table relational database in Access just for the sake of it then I’m not sure that they would be significantly worse off. Equally, I can spend 4 hours trying to explain why consistency and brevity are the key elements of a good slideshow, only to see the same student arrive for a History lesson and use a different background for every slide, cut and paste whole passages from the Web and use every animation they can get their hands on. I’m wandering off topic a little, and regardless of the issues surrounding these skills, they are important and it is vital that students get experience in how to do these things well. Whether the cross curricular model is working or whether we keep it in departments is besides the point, the answer to the question is ‘of course we need them’.
If ICT is to be taught cross-curricular, is that really going to work in your school?
At the minute, it would be a struggle. We do try to make contextual links with other departments where we can. Our graphics work ties in with Art. Our Sketchup work ties in with DT. Our presentation work ties in with Geography. What I would love is for the Maths and Science departments to take the spreadsheets and models off our hands. They’re both pretty busy right now and I can see much resistance to what I think would be a better model for delivery and so the answer is ‘no’. And even if it was ‘yes’ then there would still be room for this stuff in ICT as a specific subject. If you are a teacher IN English, then you’re a teacher OF English. The same is true of IT, but English still has a valuable place in the timetable, and so does IT. Again, I refer to my earlier point – IT is made up of 3 elements and I’m not campaigning for the death or dropping of any one. One of them is woefully under taught, however, and it’s that imbalance I am seeking to redress.
Are the Computing qualifications on offer really that good?
Tail wagging the dog. That doesn’t make the question invalid, but we need to teach the right things, and then assess those. What we shouldn’t do is find out what we can assess, and then teach that.
At GCSE there are two real options. OCR GCSE ICT with the optional programming module instead of the multimedia module, or OCR GCSE Computing. The former we haven’t gone for, largely because of OCR’s reputation over the GCSE examinations and coursework moderation from the previous incarnation of the ICT GCSE. The GCSE Computing we have gone for, and we’re currently in the second year. We’ve not sat the exam yet, but the theory content looks good to me. There’s significant crossover with the ICT GCSE and the ‘new’ bits are in line with my understanding of Computer Science. The coursework controlled assessment tasks are pitched pretty high, and while the paper looks fairly accessible the practical work is coming out as pretty bi-modal. Either you’re looking at A/B or D/E, with very little in the middle. Research shows this is true at KS5 and degree level too, so it’s not necessarily a failing on behalf of the OCR specification.
What is less forgivable is the continuing reliance on describing the situation, planning, testing and evaluating. While I understand that these are fairly universal across ICT specifications, students at this age level should be looking at the principles and practicalities. Until you can write code, you’ll always struggle to design it. I experiment with writing words as I go; deleting the bits that don’t work, rewording phrases and so on. This is also how a lot of code gets written. Yes, it’s important to put some thought into it, but the weighting is all wrong.
I suspect that, again, OCR’s hands were tied on this issue, and I’m hoping that the death of the QCDA will help at least a little.
At KS5 there are several A Levels in computing, plus a number of vocational qualifications. There is some complaint that the specifications are just squashed down versions of a degree course, and certainly some of the content is similar to my own Computer Science degree, but I’m not really in a position to comment with any authority. I do know that I enjoy teaching the AQA specification and that the students seem to gain knowledge, skills, enjoyment and enthusiasm from the course. I’d call that a win.
What about the average student who just wants to use a computer to complete tasks they need to do, what should they be taught? Programming? Will that engage them?
Whatever is needed, what we are offering now simply does not work. Students are bored by ICT. Teachers are bored by ICT. Employers and universities are fed up with the lack of skills, knowledge and understanding that students have when they get there. Studies have shown that drilling spelling tests doesn’t actually help people with spelling when they’re writing sentences. Likewise, getting students to create a good PowerPoint when someone stands over them doesn’t seem to help them when it comes to doing the same under a different context. For that they need some understanding of design principles. Getting students to use a spreadsheet to work out whether they can afford an extra £1 on the cost of a prom ticket might tick a box in ICT lessons, but understanding how the spreadsheet is working and learning about how you can use VBA (or similar) to extend the core functionality would actually be pretty handy.
Does teaching Shakespeare engage all students? What about trigonometry? Or coastal erosion? Or cadences? Or the periodic table? There were plenty of Y6 and Y7 students at last night’s open evening asking about programming opportunities and I’ve yet to meet more than a handful of students who didn’t enjoy making games in Scratch and Alice. So, yes, I think we can justify an opinion that all students should be exposed to these skills and that most students would benefit.
Some responses to other bits that weren’t in that list of questions:
“We’re very very good at making games – but we need the skills. We need computer scientists, animators, artists and there aren’t enough of them,”
Now, am I being a little pedantic here or are there three different strands to ICT cited in that quote?
YES! none of them refer to the use of MS Office though…
“a mix of personnel with STEM skills and creative talent ranging from animation to design and fine arts.”
Yet again, am I seeing something more than Computing mentioned here? And even where there is no mention of arts or animation skills, design or other non-specific Computing skills, there is reference to some ICT skills that I doubt most Computing courses cover.
And again, no-one is saying (ar at least I’m not) that Computing should be taught over and above all. Simply that there isn virtually no Computing, there has been absolutely no Computing and there needs to be more of it to complement some of the design, artistic and animation skills that are already being taught – although they’re still fairly new and they’re not necessarily being taught well or ubiquitously yet.
And finally in direct response, Nick linked to Tristram Shephard’s blog post where I saw that, speaking of the OCR GCSE Computing:
Hmm – there’s nothing that could be called forward-looking or creative here – in fact it reads much like GCSE specs from the 1990s with a bit of programming thrown in for good measure.
Now while ICT should and does change at a rate of knots, Computing (for the most part) shouldn’t! Logic gates, von Neumann architecture and the basic programming principles of assignment, selection and iteration haven’t changed. Arguably OOP is a better paradigm than procedural code and network topologies have changed, but the difference between teaching people how to use applications and how basic, fundamental principles work is that the former is constantly changing and the latter not so much. I bet that Maths teacher in the next room is still teaching that Pythagoras stuff. And the scientist on the other side still keeps banging on about stuff that Newton thought up ages ago!
In summary:
On an entirely selfish note, I am really pleased that the Computing movement is gathering momentum, and once the Raspberry Pi becomes available (see yesterday’s post) I have every intention of getting my hands of dozens of them. There has been a real lack of Computing in schools for a long time, and this needs to be addressed. Partly because I altruistically think that all students really should have access to this stuff and partly because I selfishly love teaching this stuff. I also selfishly love teaching Creative iMedia, so please don’t think that I want Computing to oust everything else. It takes a lot of momentum to shift the status quo, however, so I’m pushing like mad and make no apologies for doing so.
