Phones, smart glasses and bionics in schools?

One of the challenges in education, as it relates to technology, is that we often spend so much time focussing on the tech at the time, or on the tech issues at the time.   Take for example the Smartphone.  The last few years have seen such significant and ongoing discussions of banning phone in schools.    Smart phone technology, if you disregard the Blackberry (showing my age there!), could be considered to have been introduced with the original iPhone 18 years ago.   Now it took time to get to the point that smart phones were in the hands of most children, and it took time for the potential issues and risks to become apparent, however it didn’t take 18 years;  This isn’t an emerging or sudden issue yet we are still looking at it rather than towards the future and the new technologies which are already upon us.

And this is where some of the discussion with my amazing colleagues in The Digital Futures Group kicks in.  They have recently been discussing the issues of wearables such as smart watches and smart glasses, demonstrating the technology and some of the resulting issues, but more importantly looking to the future.   What are we to do if a student arrives at an exam sporting smart glasses with Wi-Fi capability?   How would we even identify they were even smart glasses?   And even if we do identify them as smart glasses, can we take prescription glasses off a student with a sight impairment?

Looking a bit further into the future, Ian Yorston, at the ISC Digital Conference, referred to bionic enhancements humans may receive, asking questions in response to discussion as to privacy.   He was pointing to privacy as a construct which simply doesn’t stand up to scrutinization and even more so in the future.   If a person with sight loss gets a bionic eye to allow them to see, which in turn records their interactions, or maybe a person with memory issues has the same functionality, can we have privacy?   And why is this different to me looking round the room and noting things down?    But circling back to schools, and exams in particular, are we going to get students to remove their bionic implants and put them in a jar beside the envelope with their phone and smart watch in?

The issue here is the integration of technology.   As Mark Weiser said, “The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it.”    In the past it was easy to spot technology and ask students to put their phone in an envelope as they enter the exam hall.   But as the technology becomes integrated with what they are wearing, in their rings, their watches, their glasses and their jewellery, it becomes more difficult to identify and also more difficult to remove;  Remove a students smart glasses and they may not be able to see the exam paper.   And as we look further into the future the technology will become even more integrated, becoming integrated with our physical being, providing those that can’t hear, the ability to hear, and those that can’t see, the ability to see, plus providing augmented abilities.   Will it be right or even possible to have students remove such tech?

So for me there is no point looking at phone bans and even how we manage phones as soon enough we will need to consider smart glasses, then smart something else, then eventually technologies so integrated they cannot be removed.   So how will we manage exams, or classroom interactions where bionic enhancements allow for recording, transcription and the like?   Or allow for instant searching of the internet with recommendations then made to the user?    For me this brings us back to school values, and those foundational statements as to what we believe matters.   Be brilliant, be curious, be authentic, be disruptors and be kind are the values in my school. 

In reflecting maybe we need to have less detailed policies, guidance and advice;  Every year we just seem to be adding to these documents and as technology marches on this is unlikely to change.   Maybe we need to spend more time connecting with our values.   After all, cheating in an exam using a paper cheat sheet, smart glasses or a bionic eye, is that being authentic?    Recording someone without their permission, is that being kind?   Also, if I am using the tech I have to reach the best outcomes, is this ok, curious, authentic and brilliant, versus using the tech to get to a solution or piece of coursework with the least effort?

Maybe the answer, in our values, has been in front of us the whole time.

New Academic Year: Here we go again…

It’s the start of another academic year and for us in the tech side of EdTech, it is the busiest time of year.   We have new staff and new students to get signed up and able to access school systems to enable teaching, learning and administrative processes to proceed.   We have the usual uptake in cybercrime, partly due to cyber criminals targeting education at this busy time of year but party due to staff returning and looking at their email inboxes after a period away from them.   Then we have the usual issues associated with people being away from their school tech, or at least not using it as frequently, including forgotten passwords, “can’t connect to the Wi-Fi” or to the classroom Smartboard and the like.   Printers where toner cartridges may have dried up too, among many other issues that all suddenly appear at the end of August and beginning of September as teaching staff and students return.  And it is also worth noting that although teachers and students may have been away, for school IT staff the summer holiday period wasn’t a holiday period.  It was their chance to do all the maintenance, upgrade and general preparation work required ahead of the start of a new academic year.  

So the start of a new academic year is definitely a challenge.   My approach to the above, and to the challenges of a new academic year,  for the last several years has been two key words:

Reasonableness.    IT staff in schools are (mostly) human and it is a busy period of time so there is almost immediate need to prioritise.   We cannot do everything, for everyone, all at once.   Now laughingly my office does include a crystal ball and a wand as often it does appear that we are predicting the future and performing magic, however largely this is part luck and part good planning.   The reality is we will do everything we can to support but it will be what we “reasonably” can and therefore involves triaging and prioritisation of tasks.  It is important to get this “reasonableness” across to all engaging with school IT teams, plus to the teams themselves.

Entropy. This simply for me is the acceptance that the world around us is always seeking chaos, no matter what we put in place.   It is therefore required that we are agile and responsive when things go wrong, or when things aren’t planned as well as they maybe could have been.   Schools are dynamic places, and we need to plan and prepare as best as we can, however no amount of planning and preparation can cope with the variables presented by thousands of students and hundreds of staff especially at the start of a new academic year after over a month away from school.  This means we, and those engaging with IT teams, need to be accepting of where things go wrong or not quite as we would have liked.

As the new academic year begins my wishes go out to IT staff in schools across the UK and beyond.   Our job is to make the tech aspect of school life go smoothly and if all goes well, be almost transparent to the end users whether they be students or staff.   Where things do go as planned, we are supporting schools by putting appropriate technology tools in the hands of school leaders, teachers and students.   These tools enable, enhance and empower.  This transparency, however, means when it all goes well there is little praise or thanks, as the work and effort was all but invisible.  If it goes less well the concerns and complaints will be quick to arise.  

As such if you see your IT team around your school do say hello, ask them about the work they have done over the summer in preparing for the new academic year and thank them for this, and in advance for the work they will do in this busy introductory period and beyond.   I know from experience, teaching isn’t easy, but also from experience, the educational IT world also comes with its challenges, especially at the start of a new academic year.   If we want to achieve all we can in schools, for our students, for staff and for our wider community, it takes everyone’s involvement and effort.

Smart Tech: Do we need to ban it?

Some schools operate in a bit of a tech paradox.   Use tech to help students with special needs or disability, EAL students, or simply to support collaboration, critical thinking, communication and creativity, while at the same time banning technology due to the risks related to online content, or the evils of screentime.   For example, many schools are banning mobile phones or at least smart phones.   But in a world of evolving technology and slow evolving school policy, are we always going to be behind the curve?

Banning Phones, but what next?

Am not going to discuss banning phones here as I have written enough on it in the past.    Needless to say my view is that we should seek to manage rather than banning phones, and in schools with limited technology available, why wouldn’t you seek to use such a valuable and flexible bit of kit which the kids just happen to have brought with them?

The issue here though, is that we can ban phones all we want but the technology has already moved on, with more and more students bringing wearables such as smart watches into school.   Less conspicuous than a smart phone but increasingly becoming almost as powerful.   So are we going to start banning smart watches?

And even if we do, we are already seeing signs of what the next issue might be in AI powered wearables that record and monitor what a person is doing to provide insights, summaries and advice.   Quick lets make sure they are mentioned in our school policies as yet another thing which is banned, and which staff should be on the lookout for.   And what of smart pens or earpieces? We don’t seem too far away from having to provide students with a technological pat down to make sure they aren’t packing any dangerous smart devices. Or maybe we need tech detecting metal detectors in the entrances to schools?

Integrated tech

More recently we have seen the issue of integrated tech where technology is integrated with other items, such as integrating camera, microphone and smart tech into a pair of glasses.   “Ban them” I hear you cry.   I can see it now, the student squinting at the board at the front of the class as their smart glasses have been confiscated.   Hold on, how would I even be able to tell they were smart glasses?   I also wonder what other items might have smart tech integrated with it.   Maybe smart earrings?   We already have smart rings…..hold on does that mean we have to ban rings too?

Thinking to the future

It all gets a bit worse if we look even further forward and start to consider cybernetics.   What if a students failing or failed eyesight in their left eye is addressed through a smart implant.   Do they need to take their eye out for exams?     Or a student with motor control has some sort of haptic device to help them, do they need to take it off for exams?   What if the student has some sort of brain implant to augment their capabilities; where would we stand with that?

Conclusion

Our thinking to date has, in my opinion, tended towards being focussed on the short term, as well as reactive.   We don’t know how to manage phones or smart watches, so lets ban them.  But this doesn’t deal with the problem, and in fact misses some of the potential benefits which might exist.   It also just kicks the can down the road a little until we need to ban the next thing, and the next thing, adding more and more to our policies and guidelines, and to the checking people need to do to ensure students are complying with the increasingly complex rules.  

Instead, couldn’t we look forward, and consider the increasingly likelihood of wearables, or integrated tech and even of cybernetics.    Maybe there is another way other than banning, which would allow for the kit to be safely and responsibly used. With this as the context it seems inappropriate and even a bit silly to be looking to ban tech.  Instead maybe we need to step back and consider education and learning, and how it might need to evolve in a world of evolving technology.

A-Level/BTec results day

Tomorrow is results day for students all over the world getting their A-Level or BTec Level 3 results.  So firstly, good luck to everyone awaiting results and I hope you get all you hoped for.

But…..

Exams results aren’t everything!   Our current system definitely has them as important as they impact on the next stage in life and on career or university opportunities but if we take a wider angle lens they aren’t as important, and it is for this reason that I ask parents and their children to seek to take that wider angle lens.   Taking the wide angle lens isn’t easy though, I will admit, as it focusses on considering and accepting an unknown future where we have a bias for what we know, an availability bias.  But it is important.

Exams results are an important step in our life journey, there is no doubt in this, although I would definitely like to see some change in our current education systems and in the industrial error approach to student learning.   But that’s for another blog, and also something I don’t see changing any time soon so for now we are stuck with this system.  So exams are important but not as important as I feel they are made out to be.    For some students, they will get the results they sought to get, either through natural aptitude, hard work or an element of luck.   And I note most will likely get there through a mixture of ability, hard work and luck, something which I see as a recurring theme in life.   Others may be a little disappointed but nonetheless proceed to the next stage of their lives or education.   While others still will be very disappointed and see their initial plans go up in smoke, possibly seeing their grades failing to meet the entry requirements for their chosen course and then having to look to clearing for alternatives.  This might be the result of failing to put in the needed effort, however it may also be the result of external circumstances, such as family matters, or health issues, or it could even be the result of bad luck and the questions which arose on that particular exam paper on that particular day.

In my school days I saw the later, seeing my plans go up in smoke and requiring an additional year of school study rather than my planned jump to university study.  I feel now that this likely happened as I didn’t fully focus having previously found the previous standard grade exams easy, so I attributed the issue mainly down to myself.   At the time I was gutted and got quite depressed and down about the whole thing.   I went to a pretty dark place at times, and suspect these days may have sought or been made to seek medical help, where back then this wasn’t as normal or common.  But taking a wider angle lens and looking back now I suspect this “failure” made me work a bit harder than I had done and shaped the career which was yet to come.  A year later I joined the university, having also taken a summer course as a backup plan, proceeding four years later to a 2.1 hons, albeit even then I was disappointed in not getting a first class.  But again, this possibly a good thing as again it lit a fire in me that saw me focus and quickly progress from a lecturer to a course leader and eventual Head of School in an FE college in only a few years.

My message to students is therefore to avoid focussing too much on your results, be they good, bad or indifferent.  This isn’t the end, but is but a point in a long life journey which has many twists and turns.  With that in mind either take the opportunity to celebrate, or to reflect and learn, but that’s all it is, a point and in a day or so this point in time will have passed and it will be time to move on and focus on next steps.   You are not defined by the results you achieve, but by what you do next, and the thing you do after that, and after that.

Good luck, well done no matter what the results, and may the future hold many exciting opportunities and experiences ahead, even if your plans now have to change.

Anyone for chaos?

I have recently read Chaos by J. Gleik and it has got me thinking about how chaos theory might be applicable to education.  Now this does remind me of a professional development session some years back delivered by Roy Leighton where he referred to chaos and the butterfly effect, although I cant quite remember the context in which Roy  raised the topic.

Now before I go any further let me just point out I am no expert of chaos theory, the maths behind it or how it might apply to living world, physics, etc so what I present here are my thoughts based on the limited amount I have read and how I have came to understand it.

Chaos theory and entropy

One of key words I use with my technology services team is that of entropy, or the 2nd law of thermodynamics.   For me this is the need for us to constantly expend energy and effort in order to create a stable state and maintain order, where the world around us seeks chaos and disorder.   I make this point to highlight that things can go wrong and inevitably will go wrong, plus that things will change, often at short notice.    We therefore need to be constantly exerting energy, changing our approach and adjusting to try and maintain the stable state we wish.   This stable state might be a great service provided to teachers, a reliable IT infrastructure or excellent teaching and learning.   Either way we are going to have to be constantly putting in effort to achieve the state we wish to achieve and keep things there.

For me this links a little to chaos, and maybe is extended by the concept of chaos, in that even a stable system can show some unpredictability and variation leading to a constant need to exert effort to address these variations and try and keep the system, education, teaching and learning and technology services, stable.    It also highlights for me that no matter how stable the system is, for example this years autumn term when compared to last years autumn term, there will also be a degree of variability and chaos having an impact.

Education and data

It is the use of data in education which is where I think chaos is particularly appropriate.   We seek to us very simplistic models to allow us to compare students, to compare schools and even to compare whole national education systems.    Is their pass rate higher than ours, and is this years pass rate higher than last years rate?     Is the value added calculation for this years set of students greater or lesser than last years, or greater or lesser than other local or competing schools?     The issue with this is that it implies that education is so very simple that it can be so easily measured and compared.    It doesn’t take much thinking to realise the almost infinite number of variables which might have an impact on results, including results for a given school.    Socio-economic factors, local events, school leadership focus, the culture of the school and of the surrounding community, and much, much more all go to impact on results.   Now if we ignore chaos theory we might simply say that the impact of these things might be minor when factored across a whole cohort of students, however the reality is that these factors can grossly change the outcomes.   Chaos theory, or my interpretation of it, shows that small variations can have overall impact rather than being negligible and able to be disregarded.    It may even be that a single event can nudge results significantly positive or negative, with the event itself barely remembered when the results come out.    Basically, our approach to data and to measuring educational outcomes is simple, which is great in terms of people understanding the facts and figures, but is wholly lacking in any real appreciation of the complexity of education, and therefore quite significantly flawed.

What matters is what we measure?

And then to make things worse, we have the issue that we often focus on what is easy to measure, so on these simplistic measures, with that then becoming central to our efforts.    So is student exam grades provide a simplistic but easily measurable indicator of learning, we focus on achieving better exam grades when maybe we should be focussing on better ways to measure learning.     Technology for me is having a key impact here as surely we need to ask why it is so important to memorise facts, as students are required to do for exams, when in the real world you can simple Google the information.   As for coursework, the recent growth in generative AI must surely force us to question our approach to coursework.    So, do we need to reconsider what we measure and also how we measure it?

For me this may be a large part of the issue in that education has changed little in over a century, being still largely built on classroom of students sat in front of a teacher, tests, coursework and homework, while the world has changed significantly over the same period and even over shorter periods.   Just consider technology and the impact social media has had over 20 years, or the impact of generative AI which has happened in the last 3 years, post ChatGPTs public release.   The world is moving fast, the world is inherently chaotic, and if we look specifically at education, it involves groups of human beings in the students and teachers, which add yet many more variables to the mix.

Concluison

As humans we like simple narratives such as “GCSE grades have fallen again”.    But this fails to capture the complexities and variables which feed into education, into teaching and learning, and eventually into the simple measure, exam results, which are often used to measure the success, or failure, or education systems, schools and even individual students.   The world however isn’t simple and is subject to entropy and a bit of chaos.   I remember reading something on statistics which suggested as we add further variables our ability to measure and predict goes exponentially downwards.    So, if we consider education and the variables as they relate to individual students, teachers, school contexts, parents, and much more, our ability to accurately measure must be very small indeed. 

So, the question is, how do we better deal with chaos and the pace of change within the world when looking at education?      I suspect the answer lies in decentralising to allow for local needs to be addressed, on trust and on transparency to reduce the importance of centralised measures, and on a move to a more individualised rather than industrialised education system.   Easy said, although am not so sure its as easy to implement and achieve.

Reflections on 10 years

The summer period, although not a “holiday” per say for IT staff in schools, is a little bit quieter without all the staff, student and other users around requiring support.   I certainly have less meetings in the calendar and no conferences to rush off to.  Yes, there are all the upgrade and maintenance works, but I still feel it is a quieter period, and in this there is an opportunity to stop and reflect.  And so, I find myself stopping and reflecting on the fact that the end of this academic year sees me completing 10 years in my current role and at my current school.    This is the longest I have been with any organisation, and by far the longest period I have held a single job title.   

As I stop and reflect, I look back on a past blog post where I reflected on my move back to the UK in 20215, having been out in the UAE for several years.  You can see that post here.

The last ten years have presented many work-related challenges with some resulting in significant stress and others resulting in a healthy and needed level of challenge and stress.   On the more “stressy” projects or issues, I can look back and say they were resolved and life continued although at the time I was often struggling to see the way around or through the issue at hand.  Some work relationships became strained, and that’s putting it lightly.    And lets not even mention the pandemic and what was a very difficult challenging period for schools and for IT staff in schools. If there is one thing I have learned, it is that the world goes on and that things are often not as bad as they seem in the moment.  Lately I have found myself using the phrase “one foot in front of the other” or “little steps” which I feel sums up the mindset that is sometimes key in dealing with difficult issues.  I also try to consider the people side of people, processes and technology to a greater extent.  I a world of AI, maybe being human and how we interact with people is what really matters.

I need to also acknowledge my personal life hasn’t been without challenges over the last ten years, related to my children and also to the breakup of my marriage of almost 18 years.   On reflecting, and thinking about some of the issues and events, some of it is still is a bit raw and makes me feel a little emotional.   There were definitely moments where I felt lost and had no sense of how I could move forward, or even survive, however I do feel I am in a better place now and I have high hopes for what the future may hold.  My thanks go to a couple of people who leant their support and friendship including making time for a coffee (yes, I do occasionally drink coffee rather than an Irn-Bru!) and a chat, allowing me to share my struggles;  I hope you know who you are. 

When I reflected on my time in the UAE, and my move back to the UK, I commented towards a feeling of atrophy and habit being an issue, in that my work in the UAE had become routine, and that was all based on just 8 years and a number of job titles.   Thinking from where I am now, 10 years further on, and only 1 job title and school, I wonder as to whether I have been impacted by the same atrophy.   My sense is that the answer is that I haven’t and this in part lies with my work being more than just my core job, seeing me get involved with various conferences, become an ANME ambassador, a member of the Digital Futures Group and the vice chair of the ISC Digital Advisory Group, writing for EdExec Magazine and contributing to National Education Group professional development courses, as well as my involvement in the development of the ISBA digital survey for 2024, with the 2026 version already well into the preparation phase.   There are also the many conferences and events I have had the pleasure of contributing to or attending.   The various groups, and more importantly the various people I have interacted, and who share a passion for technology and its potential in education, as well as the need for education to change, have given me the variety which I feel is needed in life, challenging and encouraging me in equal measures, and also providing me the support and friendship when I have needed it most.

And then there are the amazing memories of the last ten years.    There is the formation of the Digital Futures Group (DFG) with Emma and Gemma over lunch in Amsterdam.  There is being invited to join the ISC Digital Advisory Group.    There is also the chance reconnection with Rick Cowell, who had been a previous work colleague, and the chance to contribute to the ANME as an ambassador.    A trip to speak in Venice followed by my attempted murder on the grand canal at the hands of my DFG colleagues, not to mention my first session presenting at the BETT conference. I also had the opportunity to create and manage a podcast with Ian Stockbridge, producing the In Our Humble Opinion podcast and discussing cyber security in schools. It wasn’t particularly well produced with some meandering discussion and variable length episodes but it was a lot of fun.And then there was accepting the Outstanding IT Professional award at the EduFuturists Uprising event a few weeks ago. I was so proud to be nominated alongside so many other great IT professionals, let alone to go on and win.

Personally, there was the joy of a first family holiday abroad after a period of about 10 years where we hadn’t had such a family holiday, despite actually living abroad for the majority of that time period.    There was seeing my son complete school and move on to study at college, where he has just finished and appears to have achieved some great results.   There was even the opportunity to accompany him to BETT which he was attending in relation to Esports. In more recent times I have also found myself visiting new places, or places only visited briefly for work, so spending time personally and with my new partner in Amsterdam and then in Egypt, making new memories.

This all gets me thinking about how, as humans, we have a definite tendency to overweight the bad things, remembering pain, loss, etc, while underweighting the good, often forgetting the chance encounters, the moments of laughter, etc.   Looking at this post, for example, I note how I started with the challenges rather than the positive memories.   I feel increasingly we are all generally getting that bit more negative, finding things more difficult, or at least feeling as if they are more difficult.   I think we need to be conscious of this and try to make sure we remember the good bits, maybe even making active efforts to ensure we record such events.   This makes me think of the growth and fixed mindsets;  Maybe if we have a more growth mindset and can identify our agency and ability to change things, accepting that nothing is fixed or permanent, we will be that bit more positive and happier.

Looking forward to the future I think the key thing for me, is simply to be more me.  I think the world of technology and external forces, social media, news of conflict, fake news, AI, etc, all make it more and more important for us to be true to ourselves, and to do so requires us not to look outward, but increasingly to look inward.   But also, we need to embrace the fact the human animal is still an animal and benefits from its herd, so it is also about cultivating networks of friends and colleagues such that collectively we are all better for it.   Its about those human connections.

Am not sure what I’ll be doing or writing 5 years from now, but as I look out on my garden on a sunny July 2025 day, the future looks bright.  

I hope everyone enjoys the summer period whether taking a break or whether working on the IT tasks in schools or colleges.  Make sure you find some time just to be you!

Perception through a screen

Reality is experienced through our perceptions, our senses, our feelings, belief, etc.   So, this means that real truth is difficult to discern, if it even exists, as we all have slightly different senses, feelings and beliefs.     This creates a rich world especially in relation to our interactions with other human beings where body language, intonation, pace and more all add to what we say, as we seek to communicate and to collaborate.

But then we enter the digital world.   Recently I saw a young girl engaged in an online game with friends, where at the same time she had her mobile phone perched against her monitor in a WhatsApp group chat with some of her friends.    Some were involved in the game but others were not.   Her reality was being experienced through two screens, one being the monitor of her PC as she played and the other being her mobile which connected her to her friends.   This got me thinking about how our increasing use of digital technologies and tools might be shaping our reality.

One of the first things we lose in the example above is the non-verbal communication and the additional information which helps us when communicating with others.   A video call, with its head or upper torso view, fails to communicate the full range of non-verbal communication which is apparent when stood talking with someone.   Additionally, I suspect the digitisation of audio removes some subtle tells plus we need to remember that video calls aren’t properly duplex allowing for multiple people to communicate at the same time, unlike in real life meetings.   I think the challenge around multiple people speaking at the same time on a video call relates to the lack of spatial data in that all the voices come from speakers in your laptop or desktop or from headphones, where in real life your ears can pick up the position of the audio source, the person speaking, and can use this to help filter out the voices of multiple participants speaking at once, based on their differing positions.

I also wonder that this faux group play activity may give an impression of a social experience however without the physical interactions of a “real-life” activity, and that this lack of physical interaction results in a different physiological response from participants when compared to a an in-person activity.   I wonder, for example, if our heart rate changes in the same way during a video call when compared with an in-person interaction; I suspect not.  This in turn makes me wonder what the impact is where the psychological impact of an activity no longer aligns with the normal physiological impact as would have been experienced by previous generations of humans spanning back thousands of years.  Does this potential gap make a difference?  And if the “virtual” group play holds the same, or nearly the same value, to the individual as real life interactions might that lead us to allocate more value to online interactions which leaves us open to online trolling, cyber bullying and hurtful online comments, which in turn impact on our mental health and wellbeing?  Many of the comments I have read online are things people would be less likely to say if the person they were directing the comments towards was stood in front of them.

There are lots of advantages to the online and digital world including the ease of communication across vast distances, the ability to communicate without the time-bounds of people being available at the same time, the ability to collaborate and share complex ideas, etc.   But in all this there are disadvantages or risks.   Has the digital world been re-wiring how we think and how we learn?  Is the abundance of stuff, as supported by technology a good thing, including for fast food, OnDemand TV, next day delivery, instant content generation through the use of generative AI, etc.   Maybe this abundance is making us more needy or less resilient?   Has our reliance on technology and our habitual use of technology led to a perception of lesser agency over our own lives?  Is the digital world with its instant news and social media, shaping our reality and leading to the sense of struggle, division and unfairness which seems to be the standard state of affairs when I watch the breakfast news each morning?

I suppose my main question here is, has the world changed for the worse, or is it a case that we are now viewing our worlds increasing through the prism of our screens and our devices, the technologies they use and the companies that control these technologies?

AI: Can we automate being human?

A recent meeting with the University of Glasgow, along with my involvement in the ISC Digital Conference as well as in the Edufuturists Uprising event got me thinking about education in general.  I have repeatedly commented on the need for us to refocus on what is most important, rather than continuing our approach of adding additional tasks, guidelines and frameworks for teachers to use.  Yes, each task, framework of guideline might be well intentioned but it also adds complexity and generally adds to teachers workloads, at a time where workload is already a noted issue, and to their cognitive load in and out of the classroom. 

Efficiency and AI

I have previously written my concerns regarding the efficiency narrative which seems to surround AI use by teachers.   My concern has largely been around the fact that any time gains which AI may bring, will simply allow some new task or requirement to be introduced thereby filling this newly available time and bringing us right back to where we are today when it comes to workload.   I also note there is plenty of research to show our workload tends to expand to fill the available time we have.Prof Miles Berry, however, at the ISC Conference presented another concern in his question as to whether we want teachers to be “more efficient” or whether we would prefer them to be “better” teachers.    It seems clear that doing more of the same, doing things quicker isn’t what we want, and that clearly our preference should be on doing things better.

Make things better / more complex

This got me thinking about all the various things which I have seen introduced in education reflecting on lesson planning in particular.   When I trained in the mid 90s, qualifying in the late 90s, a lesson plan was pretty simple.    But as time advanced we added more steps, adding the need for differentiation, consideration of EAL and SEND, WALF and WILF and much more.   I look at teaching today and there is so much to consider and think about that surely it must detract from the art of teaching, and I do consider teaching to be an artform.   

This may be the issue, and was something Prof Berry referred to; whether teaching was a profession or craft.   When I trained the discussion focussed on teaching as a profession in that it conferred an element of professional judgement and autonomy, rather than a trade where you just completed your given tasks.  My view on this has changed;  I don’t think teaching now carries the prestige and respect of a profession however I still see the importance and value in the autonomy and in the ability to be creative, so maybe rather than a professional or trade, teaching is more like a craft as Prof Berry suggested.

But aside from that, over time we have been seeking to better understand what good teaching looks like, breaking it down into its component parts and then mandating that teachers should do each of these parts, as a requirement of every lesson or at least most lessons.   Considering machine automation, being able to break a task down into its component parts makes it more automatable.   It becomes almost mechanical in nature.   But teaching is much more than this, involving the interactions of teachers and students, the interplay of discussion, group work, the exploring of knowledge and skills, but all within a social context.   Great teaching is more than the sum of its parts. Maybe our efforts to break teaching down into automatable, mechanical chunks is causing us to lose something from great teaching.   Maybe we lose some of the magic, some of the dynamic, unexpected and unpredictable elements of a classroom.    Maybe we lose some of the failures and mistakes, which we as humans learn so much from.

Safety and reliability or risk and memorable?

I wonder if we have been exchanging the creativity and dynamism of past educational experience, for more scalable and predictable experiences;  When I consider my memory and what I remember most, my fondest memories, they tend to be the things which have been unexpected or new, rather than those which are safe, repeated and predictable.

The challenge in all of this is that if we move back towards teaching as an art, as a craft and we trust in teachers and allow the autonomy they once had, there is a risk that some teaching may be poor, albeit I suspect some teaching will be amazing.   Are we willing to take the risk?  Is an amazing life long memory of a lesson for 1 student equal in value to a poor experience by another student?I find this in itself interesting in that we want  resilient students, students that can pick themselves up, learn and grow from where things go wrong.   I wonder if the education system as a whole, in the UK, needs to consider this?   Maybe in seeking to avoid things going wrong we have also lost something important?   And surely there are ways to put some guardrails in place such that autonomy can be restored but with insurance in place to address where teaching isn’t quite up to scratch?

As schools and the world wrestle with AI and automation, have we been slowly trying to boil teaching down to its component parts and to mandate people do the same things, which will help with efficiency and reliable safe outcomes? And in doing so are we making it easier for us to use of AI and have AI replace us in some tasks such as lesson content generation, marking, etc?   But maybe, in a world of AI, the best learning needs to be much more messy and much more human. Being messy isn’t easily automated and I am not sure it should be. There is a balance to be reached in all of this, but I suspect the key is needing to step back and look at education broadly. I suspect this is easier said than done.

The power of the pack

The last three weeks have been very hectic indeed and have meant that I haven’t been able to post here for a while.   I have presented at EdExec Live, attended the Google IT Summit with the ANME, led the planning and delivery of the ISC Digital Conference plus presented a session on cyber at the same conference, attended a meeting with the University of Glasgow looking at Digital Citizenship Education and attended the edufuturist awards event.   And this has meant travelling all over, which as per usual, seen train cancellations, mis-direction by google maps, which I swear is trying its best to kill me, traffic and expensive uber travel due to “increased demand”.    To say things have been busy is an understatement.

In all of this, the main take away from me continues to be my favourite quote from David Weinberger; “the smartest person in the room is the room”.   I have been so privileged and lucky to find myself in rooms filled with some amazing educators and tech people, and I have benefited so much from this.    I simply cant list off all the people who I have had the opportunity to discuss technology and education or to share thoughts with as I will invariably miss someone off.   But they include my friends and colleagues in the Digital Futures Group including Emma Darcy, Gemma Gwilliam, James Garnett and Abid Patel.   The ANME gang also, including Tim Mace, Ben Whitaker (the other one!), Luke Vere, and Dave Leonard as well as the A.B.I.D again!    Then there has been Kirsty Rogers, who I am lucky to work with at Millfield, Poppy LeMar, the amazing Al Kingsley and Ollie Barnes, SJ White, Laura Knight, Tara Jones, Hayley White, Cat Scutt, Victoria Hedlund, Julie Caron, Miles Berry, Joe Cozens, Tom Dore, Georgina Dean, David Horton, Neelam Parmar, Simon Balderson, Andy Kemp, Martyn Colliver and Mark Steed.   In terms of the EduFuturists event I cant not mention Ben Whitaker and Steven Hope, who put on such an amazing event and who relentlessly challenge in relation to the need to reimagine education.   Am so proud to consider myself part of their Wolf Pack seeking to push for educational change.   As they say, the power of the wolf is the pack, and the power of the pack is the wolf. Also Ian Phillips, Martyn Collins, Patrick McGrath, Andrew Caffrey, Rick Cowell, Mark Anderson and Christine Mayers.   The list goes on, and this represents only some of those I have had the chance to network with, and my apologies to those I have met but not listed;  My excuse is its been so busy and such a whirlwind three weeks (not to mention the fact I suspect my memory is getting worse with age) however additionally this post would be very long if I listed everyone.

This all brings me to Thursday 27th and the Edufuturists event and the proud moment I got to accept the Outstanding IT professional award.   I had no expectation as to winning given the very strong list of people shortlisted however the night saw me collect the award from the twice award winning and amazing Dave Leonard.   For me this award is due to the many people I have worked with and met and networked with who have shaped and at times challenged my views.   The award is also the product of the amazing team which work with me at Millfield including Barry, Helen, James N and James F, Martin and Belinda.   Without their tireless efforts, and the efforts of the rest of the team, I would never have been able to engage in this networking, and especially in the efforts of the last three weeks, and be able to support and be involved with such great groups as the Digital Futures Group, the ANME and the ISC Digital Advisory Group, the Edufuturists, among others.

This and a long conversation with the couple across from me on the train heading home from the Edufuturists event, speaking to people in person rather than via a screen, a conversation which was accidental and unplanned, got me thinking. It got me considering the challenges of education in a digital world, of digital citizenship, the challenges of AI, the “lets be more efficient” narrative (blog post to follow on this one!) and more.   Maybe we need to look less at the technology, the products and services, and spend more time looking at the human side, and the people sitting to our left and right, but also inwards.  Maybe we need to spend more time interacting with other human beings, networking and sharing and maybe some of this has to be messy and without scripts, frameworks, KPIs and other measures. Maybe the answer to our technology challenges doesn’t lie in technology, but lies with people and considering what it means to be human and to flourish! And in this maybe we also need to ask what the purpose of education is and review how the current system compares. Are we equipping our students for the future, or are we educating them based on past needs?

Are you sitting comfortably?

I had cause to undertake a task the other day which brought me well outside my comfort zone.    Am not going to go into any great detail as to the nature of the task but it is enough to say it was significant and it didn’t go well.

Oh, to be comfortable!

If I was to ask you whether you would prefer to be comfortable or uncomfortable the answer is pretty clear.  I suspect it’s going to be, to be comfortable.  We want to be comfortable in our emotional lives, in our physical lives and in our spiritual lives, etc.   But with comfort, comes habit and with habit comes acceptance and then things become taken for granted.   No one celebrates doing what they have always been doing. 

We achieve most when we take risks, do something new or challenge ourselves.   That’s when the great things happen.   We celebrate the good exam result, the award or the completion of a difficult task.   To have overcome difficulty, to overcome challenge is to have succeeded and is worthy of celebration.   These are the things we remember! But it also means that when things go wrong, they go wrong and leave you feeling down and having failed.   That’s how I felt the other day, down, depleted and dejected.  But does that mean, in seeking to avoid that negative feeling I stop trying or challenging myself?

Balance

The key here is that of balance.  A challenge brings with it the possibility of the highs of success but equally brings with it the lows of failing to succeed.   I think it is therefore about trying to reframe the narrative.    If we don’t challenge ourselves we would be devoid of the highs and the lows.  It would be safe, maybe even comfortable, but life would also be a bit bland.   To seek the highs we must accept the potential for the lows, and that’s the rub. 

Education, schools and AI

All of this makes me think of student use of AI in schools;   Sadly some students will seek comfort and ease, using AI to produce coursework with minimal effort.   They will therefore benefit little from the process of creating that coursework.    Other students however will engage with the AI, using it to help develop ideas and their thinking and to produce the best piece of coursework possible.   Some of this will be difficult with the use of different AI tools for different purposes, repeated refining of prompts, and providing of their own personal content as part of the coursework.   Students will need to constantly review and evaluate the work as they co-create it with the help of AI.  These students will produce excellent pieces of work, possibly beyond what they would achieve without AI tools, but most importantly they will benefit from their efforts and difficulties, learning as part of the process and isn’t assessment all about learning.

But back to me.

Desirable difficulty is a term I use often however when things don’t go well it isn’t as an easy a concept to digest.   But I suspect I learned from this experience, even although it didn’t go well.   I now need to get it in my head that it all wasn’t a waste of time.   Making an effort matters whether we succeed or not, and that every experience is a learning experience.   So comfort, although useful at times, isn’t the ideal state for us as human beings.

Oh well, suppose its time to dust myself off and move on; onwards and upwards as they say.