Reflecting on 2023/24

And so another academic year draws to a close so I thought I would share some initial reflections:

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

AI continued to be a big topic of discussion throughout 2023/24 and saw me speaking to school leaders, teachers but also to school support staff on its potential as well as the risks and challenges.    I think like a lot of Tech AI has those which are heavily engaged and supportive of its use, then a larger body with are unsure or reluctant, followed by those that are anti and against its use.    As such at the moment the impact of AI when viewed generally, may appear less than its potential or what those positive about AI are proclaiming.   For me it is about getting more staff experimenting and finding out how AI can benefit them in schools, often in little and simply ways rather than the flash examples we often see.   Personally, I am slowly introducing greater use of AI into my various workflows and in doing so seeing benefits in time saved but also, and possibly more importantly, on the quality of outputs.    By using generative AI to assist me, AI and I (??) are coming up with more ideas, using a wider vocabulary range, creating better graphics and reducing errors among other things.    Two heads, even if one is a headless AI, are better than one!

Digital Divides

I have already mentioned AI and generative AI but it represents yet another aspect to the issue of digital divides.    Technology, and generative AI has such potential to enable greater creativity, address imbalances such as those related to SEND or to language proficiency, support collaborative and communication and much more.   But you need to have access to the technology, the software, the hardware, the internet bandwidth and more, with this access often the product of a digital strategy or plan, and the relevant budget and finance.   You also need access to support and help, to a culture which embraces the potential of technology and generative AI, at school but also add home and in your local community, friends and colleagues.    The number possible divides between those that have and those that have not is only increasing, and the magnitude of each divide is only widening with each passing day as those that have, experiment, adapt and innovate, while those that have not are held back, continuing to work in ways that are long established, as the world around them changes.

Digital Future Group (DFG), collaboration and sharing

Generative AI advancement is just one indicator of the increasing pace of technology change, with resulting impact on society more broadly.   But how can we keep up with these dizzying advancements and changes?    Can one person keep up with all the apps, the tools, the different approaches?  For me the key here is in approaching the problem collectively and collaboratively rather than individually.   For example, this year has seen the creation and my involvement in the Digital Futures Group, which is all about sharing and networking.   I am so blessed to be part of a group of professionals who operate across different contexts, in different roles and with different skills and experience, across the UK, and I am better for my involvement.   I have also had the pleasure of being involved with the Association of Network Managers in Education (ANME) and also the Independent Schools Council (ISC) Digital Advisory Group.    Each of these organisations has allowed me to network with some amazing people, gaining from their experiences, their values and views, the knowledge and maybe even their humanity, and in a world of increasing use of AI, maybe our humanity, and sharing our humanity is all the more important.

Wellbeing

I think another reflection on the academic year relates to wellbeing, and it may be that this jumps to mind due to a recent presentation at the ANME South West event in relation to wellbeing and IT support staff.    This academic year has for me been a very difficult one personally with a major personal upheaval hitting me in the first term, something that I am not sure I have fully recovered from as we complete the final term.   Actually, thinking about it I don’t think it is about recovery but more about adapting to the changed circumstances I now find myself in.   This has forced me to stop and reflect and in doing so identify a lot of personal practices and habits I have developed which have led to an unbalanced life.   It took a significant life event to make me stop and reflect such that I am now trying to rebalance and establish new habits.   This has also got me thinking about the “be more efficient” narrative and what it means to be a good employee.   I get the concept of being more efficient and therefore doing things quicker or using less energy, etc, but if all this leads to as being asked to do yet more things, surely this isn’t a sustainable model.    Laura Knight talked about resilience and how this isn’t something we should aim for as its ok to being resilient to short term issues, but having to constantly exist in a state of resilience isn’t really living and in all honesty isn’t something we can do for any significant period of time.    For me “efficiency” may suffer similar problems.    And if being efficient is driven by an organisational need for efficiency, so does this mean that to be a good employee I need to be efficient and get more done than others, and if this is the case does it not possibly drive unsustainable hours, stress and workload issues.   So maybe schools and other organisations need to consider what it is to be a good employee, with leaders modelling this and with the expectations clearly espoused.  Maybe we also need to stop and identify what really matters, rather than constantly adding more tasks, more requirements and more considerations to our everyday roles.

Conclusion

This for me has been a year of difficulties but also of a greater sense of community and collaboration.   AI, Digital Divides, Networking and Wellbeing are definitely the four themes which currently stick out for me from what has been a busy academic year, but then again when are academic years in schools or colleges not busy?    Am hoping that 2024/25 will be another positive year and soon enough it will be upon us.   I am going to post in the coming weeks a month by month review of some of my highlights for the year including some photos but for now let me just wish everyone a good holiday period acknowledging that myself and my team, plus many others, particularly IT teams, will actually be working much of the holiday period on IT upgrades and many other things, ahead of the new academic year.    All the best to all.

AI and collaborative planning

The other day I was lucky enough to share my thoughts with a number of schools in relation to the use of Generative Artificial Intelligence within teaching and learning.   My session included a brief introduction into Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Generative Artificial Intelligence, before talking about the benefits and, risks and challenges.    I also talked about a few Generative AI tools.

In delivering the session I spotted that some of the later sessions on the event agenda including time for colleagues from across different schools to get together in their subject area to work collaboratively, to share ideas, resources, etc.    And it was at this point that I saw a clear potential use for generative AI.

We are in that final part of the academic year where many teachers are already considering the 2024/25 academic year and putting their planning into place.   It has always been beneficial to do this collaboratively with other teachers, either in your school, across schools in a Multi-Academy Trust or school group, or even beyond.    The bigger and more diverse the group of teachers sharing the better.    It all fits with my favourite quote, that “the smartest person in the room, is the room”.   So, the more people we are working with collaboratively and sharing ideas with, the smarter we are collectively.   But why does it need to be just about people.   

In the event I spoke at I suggested that staff might want to invite ChatGPT or Gemini into their collaborative planning sessions, getting some input and ideas from Generative AI or they might use Generative AI to help in further developing ideas they themselves have come up.    A Generative AI tool would bring additional ideas from the very broad training data it will have ingested and therefore may propose things a group of teachers might not consider. Ok, so it isn’t another person in the room, but it is another intelligence or it is an intelligent assistant to the people in the room.   Maybe the intelligent assistant, such as ChatGPT, makes each individual “smarter” and then the collaboration of the room again makes people collectively smarter still.

Collaborative planning among teachers is now a largely established habit in schools so maybe we can augment the practice by getting into the habit of bring generative AI into these meetings, these discussions and these collaborative events.     If a room of people is smarter than the individuals, then a room of people, supported by intelligent assistants, supported by generative AI tools, is clearer smarter still.

So, if you are doing any collaborative planning in the weeks ahead, or at the start of the new academic year, are you going to involve Generative AI tools in the process?

AI Virtual Friends

Ever since ChatGPT made an appearance various companies and individuals have sought to make use of generative AI to create the next big app, the next TikTok or Angry Birds Space, or other viral app.   One area which I looked into, was the growth in virtual friend apps.    Initially, my thinking was that virtual friend apps might be a useful tool, particularly for shy students or those who need some guidance or support in relation to social interaction.   A virtual friend might provide this.    As I looked into the various apps available however I quickly became a little worried about some of the apps now available, including to children.    Now my concerns seem to align with a news story I read in relation to a rise in school sexism being attributed to phones plus I have had my own concerns in relation to the various algorithms built into social media platforms and how they seek to keep us glued to their platforms, through fielding the content which they think we want to see.   And remember it works out what we want to see by past history, where sexism and other bias was rife, and based on what people access and, as the saying goes, “sex sells”.   

Below I will just share some of my initial thoughts and I have included some screenshots which some may consider distasteful however I include them to demonstrate some of the issues with the various apps I stumbled upon.

Gender Bias

One thing that was particularly obvious was the gender bias in the branding and advertising of the apps.   From what I saw there was a bias towards apps designed to appeal to males using female imagery although this may be due to apps identifying my gender from tracking info.    Additionally, the imagery used, in both males and females, was very stereotypical from an appearance and from a race point of view.    In terms of being representative, the images were far from a representation of the population, pointing towards an unrealistic body image where which could have a potentially significant impact on impressionable children.   They also tended towards using imagery which appeared to show individuals in their late teens and early twenties which in turn might encourage children to experiment with these apps, even although they may not be the target audience, or at least the apps may not admit this is their targeted audience.

Encouraging potentially unacceptable behaviours

Another concern I had was with apps suggesting that the AI virtual friend would pander to the users every desire and whim.    From the point of view of young children seeking to explore boundaries the provision of an AI friend that might encourage or support this beyond the point of acceptable reason, as based on their age, is a concern.    The world will always come with rules and boundaries and it is important that students are aware, so virtual friends that model the breaking or non-existence of boundaries could encourage risky behaviours in the real world.

NSFW

The term, NSFW, or Not Safe For Work appeared within the adverts for a few of the virtual friend apps and with one app there was even the mention of “Barely Legal”.   Where these apps have few if any safeguards in relation to use by children, this is of significant concern.   It is also noted that the NSFW isn’t meant as a warning but as an enticement and therefore this might encourage young children to try these apps, where the content or even behaviour of the AI chatbot is not age appropriate.

Blurring the boundaries between AI and reality

One of my concerns in looking at the virtual friends apps was the potential for children to become confused and for the boundary between the fake virtual friend and real friends to blur such that the child may act inappropriately in the real world based on activities which a virtual friend was willing to accept in the virtual world.   It was therefore a little worrying to actually find one app using this in their advertising and questioning “what is real anyway?”   

Conclusion

Now I think it is very important to note here that I suspect there are some possible positives which could result from virtual friends such as solutions which direct individuals to support services or provide support and advice themselves.   Or apps that provide friendship or moral support, but within reason.   That said there are equally apps which clearly are focused on baser human tendencies and which seek to make money by playing to this.   These apps, although not necessarily aimed at children, could easily fall into the hands of children with a resultant potential for harm. I didn’t see any evidence of age verification in the apps I looked at.

Now, I didn’t spend a significant time playing with any of the apps, rather just looked to see what apps were available and how they were advertised via social media, so I cannot say much about their potential to hold the attention of users including children however based on my brief investigation the discussion was rather bland;  That said a lot of the text messages I routinely share may be considered bland and it may be that this changes as you provide more data and interact over a longer period, plus as the AI models themselves continue to develop and improve.   I also note that there were so many of these apps, often with apps with different names but from the same provider, and generally these apps were not the product of the big tech companies.   I would suspect some of them may even be the product of cyber criminals seeking to harvest data.

If I was to propose my main concern, it is the two-way nature of the communication.   Up until this point inappropriate content, such as porn, is very much a one-way communication, being the consumption of content.   With AI there is now the potential for this to become two way making it more akin to the normal interactions we may have in our day to day lives.    For children I suspect this could make these apps all the more dangerous as this may impact their norms and views as to what is acceptable.

Running fast but standing still?

The last 12 months have seen things in my life change significantly and I find myself still trying to establish new norms.   It has also got me thinking about life and its meaning, something which I have enjoyed exploring through reading psychology and sociology books.    So, I would just like to share some reflections both for myself, hoping to find some logic in the act of writing down my thoughts, but also maybe in the hope that it might help others or lead to others sharing their thoughts which might further add to the discussion.

The pace of life is only increasing

I have long considered that the pace of life is increasing but generally I have put this down to age.  I have put it down to the fact that as we get older there are less “new” experiences in our lives, where these experiences are markers of time in our memories.  As such when we reflect on being younger we find lots of markers as everything was new at some point, but as we age the markers get further apart as less things are “new”, creating an illusion of time moving quicker.    

But what if this is only part of the story?   The world has and is becoming increasingly digital and technological, driven on by increased convenience, such as on-demand TV and next day online delivery.    Technology has also provided us with short video social media content allowing us to quickly while away our time, or fill any gaps in our day, but without engaging in more significant content such as a movie or TV series.    We also have email, SMS and chat software allowing for immediate contact and sharing, and now are staring down the face of generative AI and its potential to allow us to be more efficient and get more done, quicker.    Its all about doing more, so maybe this drive for convenience, do more and do it quicker, is all resulting in lives where the pace of life is only quickening, with no sign of this abating.

Handling a fast paced life

As the pace of life increases, whether due to tech or due to age, we develop strategies to help us manage the situation.    In particular we look to automate ourselves, building human habits to reduce the cognitive load and ensure we get more done, quicker.    For example, going out for a run in the morning; by making sure that your trainers and your running gear is at the side of your bed, you seek to automate your behaviour minimising friction such that you are out of bed, dressed and out the door without the need to think.    This is but one of the many routines and habits we build to help us navigate life, with these habits becoming all the more important as the pace of things quickens.   Could it be though, that for all these habits are a good thing, they also have a drawback?   Yes they aid efficiency and allow us to get more done but at what cost?

A habit of habits

I suspect I have fallen into a habit of habits, where I have developed habits for running, for getting regular tasks done, using online tools to help with this, for getting housework and chores done, and for much beyond this.    Building habits have become a habit, and I would go so far as to say, a successful one if the measure is how much I get done.  If life was a quantitative game I would be winning.   It is only that a sudden change in my life has disrupted this leading to me evaluating my situation and at times leading to me feeling a little bit lost and at times, depressed.    My routines have been disrupted such that I have suddenly had some downtime, some alone and reflection time, and in this time, the difference between this and the busy, habit laden norms I have developed, there is a gulf.   Looking back on the pace of life, when things were slower and less fast paced, the difference between a busy period and quiet reflection time was notable but not huge.   As the pace of life has increased the difference between these two points has only increased with a corresponding increase in the mental impact when we find ourselves stopped. 

Human Flourishing

I think part of the problem is that if we average out our lives they are getting more fast paced and busier, and we are being driven by the need to do more, do be better, to be more efficient.  Eat right, exercise, work harder, socialise, look after your family, have time for yourself, read, study and much more;  Its all about doing more but there are still only 24 hours to each day, and we spend at least some of those sleeping.    This has left me feeling lost and unfulfilled.   We are squeezing the time to stop, to reflect and to make sense of things out of our lives and this isn’t a good thing.    Yes we are getting the quantity of things done but maybe at a cost of quality of life.   We need this downtime or slow time, and it has taken a significant life change to make me aware of this, and I am finding it far from comfortable.   When I stop and have time to reflect I feel I should be doing something more productive.    I find it difficult to slow down and to live in the moment, to take things in and truly appreciate them as I feel I should be doing if I am flourishing as a human being.    In a world of efficiency, hard work, productivity and continual improvement, fast paced lives and fast technology change is it any wonder?   Am I just existing and doing, or am I truly living?    Is life measured by what we do, what we achieve, or is it how we feel about it?

Conclusions

I don’t have answers for this and this post was more about sharing and dumping some ideas rather than presenting solutions.   I feel our current trajectory is one we cannot continue on and discussions of workload concerns seem to agree.   AI can help but if all it does is allow us to do even more, then it may actually play into the problem rather than solving it.    For me I think we need to slow down, we need to seek to do less, focussing on what is most important, we need to find a better balance.    As I said, I am not comfortable with things at the moment, but maybe I need to be uncomfortable for a while, maybe its desirable difficulty.    The thing is it took a major life upset to get to this realisation, so I suspect many will be that busy being efficient that they might never have the time to make this leap.    As a society do we need to take another look at what is truly important, whether it be in life, in education or in any other sphere which we as humans operate?

Balance and pluralism

I have written a few times on balance however a recent post by my Digital Futures Colleague (DFG) Darren White talking about risk (“Lets talk about risk”) got me thinking it was about time for another balance post.    Now it is easier to explore balance by looking at a specific situation so I would like to look briefly at 1:1 devices.   As with a lot of things there are those who evangelise about 1:1 devices and about the many ways they benefit students, meanwhile there are the doomsayers who plead that we must avoid the evil of 1:1 devices due to all the damage they will do to our youths.     It’s the old binary arguments.    But the world is not that clean and simple with clear demarcation of the good and the evil, the positive and the negative.    We need to get better at adapting to pluralism and the fact that 1:1 devices, and other things, can be both good and bad.   If we can adapt to this we can start doing what we really need to do which is to take a risk based view and reach a reasoned professional judgment, understanding both the pros and the cons.

So lets just dip into the positives of 1:1 devices then;   Lets start with the fact that the world is increasingly digital.  As such getting students to work in a digital world, to establish their skills and experience, and even establish their identity online, can be good in preparing them for life beyond compulsory education.    We also have the benefits of the various accessibility tools which exist within devices which might assist SEND students with accessing learning content or with contributing to lessons, or producing coursework, homework and other materials.   The same can be said in terms of language and how technology can help EAL students better access learning through being able to easily translate content into their principal language, or from their principal language into English.  And I note tools which will help SEND and EAL students often have a positive impact on all students, rather than just SEND and EAL students.    Next we have access to communications, collaboration and creativity tools, to research materials, to a wealth of content way beyond what any school can offer on its own, all  through devices in the hands of the students.    

But there are drawbacks;   1:1 devices are great but when the student goes home do they have access to high speed internet, parents that understand and embrace technology, etc.   1:1 devices can open a digital divide where the same divide isn’t as apparent when it comes to pen and paper, and school text books.     We also have the issue of students possibly spending too much time staring at screens particularly late at night, or if using devices simply to mindlessly scroll through social media content.     And linked to this students may start to suffer reduced attention spans and become more easily distracted as they become used to the constant notifications and alerts, the quick surfing from site to site, which is the staple of the internet.   We also have safeguarding risks, as although devices might be included in school filtering and monitoring, no filtering and monitoring solution is perfect meaning there is a risk students may be able to access upsetting or even dangerous content. 

The issue with all of this is that we cannot have the advantages without the disadvantages.  Its like having your cake and wanting to eat it.    And the same can be said for mobile phones in schools, generative AI and many other things.   Its not a binary, it’s a pluralism, that the good and the bad are linked and you cant have one without the other.   Faced with this it then becomes about risk or value based assessment.    Does the value of a tool, solution or process, outweigh the risk?   It also becomes about communication and transparency, being open within the school community including with parents about why something is being done, what the benefits are, what the risks are and how reasonable efforts are being made to reduce the risks,

Additionally, this gets me thinking of some discussion in Nassim Talebs “The Black Swan”.    It breaks down to, the more we learn, the less we know, which I think is attributed to Einstein.   So, as we learn more about the risks and about the complexity of the world we live in, plus the more we come to need to adapt to rapid change, the more we need to accept we know less than we think we do.   Given this, binary arguments as to how we should or shouldn’t use technology need to become a thing of the past.   The world is not that simple and clean.   We need to adapt a risk based decision making process, accepting pluralism.

An esports journey

During last week I had the pleasure of entertaining my colleague from the Digital Futures Group (DFG) Gemma Gwilliam along with Nick Morley and Emma Watson to Millfield to talk about esports in schools.    I am very positive about the potential for esports in schools so I enjoyed yet another opportunity to share the Millfield journey and to encourage other schools to consider how they might implement esports.

Now as a teacher, back in the early 2000’s I started up a computer gaming club using Xbox devices, before moving to getting games installed on the computers in one IT Lab, then in my next school I had a PlayStation 2 in my desk drawer attached to the classroom projector, before again progressing to installing games on the PCs.   This was all before esports was really a thing.   At that point I saw how gaming engaged students and the advantages in relation to behaviour and attitude to school.    Looking at esports now however I see that there were also many other advantages which I hadn’t seen back then such as how students developed communication skills especially in collaborative games, the development of leadership skills, problem solving and strategy, resilience and many other soft skills.   Looking at esports, yes becoming an esports professional can be lucrative however very few students will ever achieve this, but the skills they can develop along the way have applications across different careers and across life.    Its very much the same as students playing rugby or football;  few will ever achieve international level playing, however for all involved, including those that don’t, the act of involvement will develop many beneficial and useful life skills.    It is also worth noting that many students are already really engaged in computer games, and therefore through esports we can hopefully harness their excitement and engagement while delivering positive learning experiences which can help the students to develop;  Its about teaching them where they are.

During the visit I shared Millfield’s journey, acknowledging that things have progressed slower than I would have liked, however it is important to note that progress has definitely been made and we have some exciting plans for the year ahead.  The Millfield journey began back in 2018/19 when we first looked at esports and looked at upgrading two of our IT labs, at a time when the labs needed upgrading anyway.    Feedback from students was very positive about our idea of introducing esports, with 88% of students replying to a survey indicating they were positive about the school introducing esports.   As such when the end of the academic year arrived we replaced the PCs in the IT labs as planned, however increased the specification slightly to support esports, but also to support other applications which would benefit from the additional RAM and a more powerful graphic card.  At the time we choose to have the uprated hardware housed in normal PC chassis such that they looked no different to PCs across the school or in the IT labs we didn’t upgrade.   This was to avoid any issues with students preferring to be taught in the two upgraded classrooms rather than those which hadn’t, as the rooms all looked no different to each other;   You don’t need to buy gaming machines with neon lights and see through cases if you don’t want to or if it doesn’t suit your schools needs.    2019/20 saw our first involvement in the British Esports Federation, or Association as it was then, school Champs tournament with our senior school students before we piloted an independent schools competition the following year.    After this we added esports to our activities programme, we then introduced a girls only group to try and encourage more of our girls to get involved, then introducing esports as an activity at our prep school.   During the course of this year we have added F1 Sim racing to the roster of games, which previously had largely focussing on Rocket League given its age rating and ease of play, and Overwatch for the senior school students.  So steadily over the years we have been refining and developing our offering.

I also shared some advice with our visitors while they were at Millfield, based on our experiences.   I stressed the importance of differentiating between gaming and competitive esports;  this is important for students, staff and parents to understand that esports is competitive, it is about teamwork based games, communication, etc, rather than the solitary gaming which parents in particular might be concerned about.    I also included the need to factor the costs of headsets and controllers in as these are largely consumable items, plus the need to be aware of game updates as these can get quite large and once multiplied across a number of machines can have an impact on the schools bandwidth, or may take some time to get installed, which is the last thing you want when you have a group of students waiting to get playing.    I also acknowledged the importance of using students own experience in any esports provision as the students are often more aware of the controls, settings, etc, of games than staff and therefore we should seek to harness this knowledge and experience.     My final points related to the fact that you can start small, and don’t need labs full of neon gaming computers and fancy gaming keyboard, mice and chairs;   A few average i5 PCs with 8Gb of Ram would be sufficient to run Rocket League just to get you started and from there you can progress.    Also, its about having some fun, both staff and students.

Looking to the future and Millfield, I am definitely eager to continue building on our esports provision and also supporting and encouraging other schools to get involved.    So, within the school we will hopefully look towards becoming more competitive in the Champs tournament, plus possibly trying to arrange a smaller inter schools competition with other school.   Having missed the qualifiers for the Williams F1 sim racing competition this year, hopefully next year we will be able to put some players forward and get involved.     It would also be nice to harness some of the opportunities around esports such as getting students shout casting on matches, developing marketing materials, organising events, etc, where this might link well with teaching departments such as English, media, business, etc.    We would also like to look to deliver an esports camp possibly during the summer using the BTec qualifications as a blueprint, albeit any camp would only be a taster given the short duration of any such camp.

In a world where technology is moving at great pace, it will be the human capabilities, which AI for example cannot deliver, which we will need to focus on.   Leadership, communication, collaboration, resilience, self motivation, continual improvement, emotional intelligence and more.   All of these can be developed and encouraged through esports, plus its something many students are already interested and engaged in so.   To me that seems like a win, win!

EdExec Live – London

I recently spoke at the EdExec live event, talking about school IT strategy.   I thought I would share some of my somewhat rambling thoughts from the event.  I note one of my opening slides related to Star Trek and what appears to be an ipad-esqe device in captain Piccard’s hands, back in a 1992 episode of The Next Generation.   Now Star Trek TNG is set in the 24th century, yet the iPad made its appearance in 2010, in the 21st century.  This shows how poor we are at predicting the future, however also hints to the pace of technological change.

Tech is here and here to stay

We just need to look at our lives today and we can see that technology is a key part of it.  On my way to London for the EdExec event I used digital train tickets, I listened to music via spotify, worked on some blogs using my MS Surface while also engaging in social media discussion.   I also used Google Maps to help me navigate my way to the event venue.   Technology is now an essential part of our everyday lives.   And looking at schools it is no different.  When I qualified as a teacher, back in the late 90s (and that does make me feel old!) you put your lesson content on a roller blackboard or acetates for display via an OHP.   You recorded student attendance manually in a register.   Now, all of these things involve technology, recording attendance on your schools Management Information System (MIS), putting digital content on your digital panel, smartboard or projector.  You also use digital tools for safeguarding, for communication and for much more.    All of our schools are digital, to some extent, already.

Strategy

And if schools are digital there should be some sort of plan to manage the training needs of staff, sustainability into the future, renewal and updates, etc.     Although the technology is already here, we need to ensure we have a plan to make this situation sustainable into the future.    Beyond the basics, if you are looking to significant innovation, such as rolling out a learning platform or 1:1 devices for the first time, we need a detailed strategy and plan to ensure we get all the basics in place, such as infrastructure, training and support.   After this, once technology is largely embedded and mature, such as at Millfield where 1:1 devices have been in place 2012, office 365 has been phased in since 2019, and Teams/OneNote from 2022, there isnt the same need for a distinct technology plan and technology now takes its lead from the broader school vision and strategy.  So the need for a distinct technology strategy varies with the technology maturity in the school.   I also note as you go down the iPad route, over chromebooks or windows laptops, or Office 365 rather than Google Workspace for Education, etc, and as these become embedded, it becomes increasingly difficult to change path.

A key issue in all the technology decision making is that it is not about the technology, the shiny new Chromebooks or Google Classroom, but about the Why and what you hope to achieve.   Is it about improving access for students with SEND, or about students with EAL?   Is it about supporting the development of soft skills such as creativity, communication, collaboration and problem solving?  Why are you seeking to use technology and what do you how to achieve?    Once you have this you can then look at which technology or technologies are the best fit for your requirements.

Balance

I also highlighted the importance of balance during my session.   Everything we do, which we do for good reasons, will have a negative implication.   We ban phones and students will still use them, plus we lose an opportunity to teach students about appropriate use of their devices.       We buy 1:1 devices and we increase the safeguarding risks as students now have their own personal devices, while also possibly having a wellbeing impact due to increasing screentime.   There is a constant balance and very few, if any, binary situations where something is purely good or bad;   The reality is that technology tends to be good and bad.   The key therefore is the need to consider the options and the good vs. bad continuum and then to work out what works for your school and where on the continuum you will sit, your risk appetite.

Some of the future

I also spent a little time looking towards the future, but acknowledging that we are poor at predicting the future, so I had opted for some future advancements, which are almost here, or here but not fully implemented at this time.     Now this clearly had to include mention of Generative AI (GenAI) and how education and schools need to look to adapt to this new technology, which both students and staff are already using.    If GenAI gives all students the ability to create coursework, homework and other content, but with a broader vocabulary, independent of their primary language, independent of any special educational needs or disabilities and of their creative thinking, isn’t this a good thing?   But if this is the case, how do we continue to grade student work and award them their GCSEs and A-Levels, or maybe we no longer need to rank and order students in the same way we used to?    There is the potential for such a broad shift in education resulting from GenAI, but I also am concerned that there is also potential to expand the digital divides which already exist.

Linked to the above is hopefully that shift towards digital exams rather than sitting students in an exam hall once year with paper and pen.   And I am not talking about the “paper under glass” exams which are planned for the coming years, where the paper exam is just made into an identical digital exam.   I am thinking more about adaptive testing, allowing students to take exams as and when they are ready, allowing schools to manage 100’s of students through a Maths exam for example, but where they don’t have that number of devices and therefore have to put students through in batches.   It may even be that students don’t even sit these exams in the school but can actually engage in them anywhere and anytime.

And in the way of balance, with GenAI, and with a shift towards digital exams, and with more digital time generally, we need to consider the risks related to addictive social media content, data protection of increasing volumes of data being shared, particularly where the data relates to young people, the risks associated with fake news, and with influence and manipulation of people via social media and other platforms.   

A solution?

I finished my session with my favourite quote, which I have been using for years, the quote from David Weinberger, “the smartest person in the room, is the room”.    In a world where technology is moving so fast, and where education has a tendency to move much slower, our best change to maximise the positive impact of technology, while minimising and controlling the negatives, is to focus on the power of the collective.   Working collectively, sharing ideas, what works, but also what doesn’t, will allow us all to be better than any of us can be individually.    Our biggest strength is in networks, in collaborating and in sharing.    The bigger the room, the smarter we all are.

FutureShots 2024, Part 2

This is the second of two blog posts reflecting on the FutureShots event which I attended and spoke at earlier this month.   You can read the first post here which focussed on the first part of the morning, including the keynote from Laura Knight and the panel session which I myself was involved in.   This post picks up from there midway through the morning and starts with another panel session where once again some of the early comments resonated with my thinking in relation to AI and education..

Should we consider if AI means we should stop that which we are currently doing?   This early comment in the session, to me goes to the fact that technology, including AI, is but a tool and you need to use the right tool at the right time, and therefore there is a lot which we do in schools and colleges currently that we should continue doing.   I love a good post-it note in a lesson, posting different thoughts and ideas around the room.  Some of what we do may change however equally some things may not change and this is fine.    The potential for technology and particularly AI to act as an enabler and a leveller was also mentioned, highlighting how, if used appropriately, technology has the potential to have a profound impact on Bobby, a student I will introduce shortly, and other individual students.   Equally during the panel the importance of putting humans at the centre of things, including of AI use, was stated alongside human characteristics such as emotional intelligence

Gemma Gwilliam, a fellow member of The Digital Futures group was up next as part of a panel session alongside Jordan King, Global Opportunity Scholar di Franklin University Switzerland and Jean Wu, Director of Green Office Sustainability Programs di Franklin University.   This was the first of Gemma’s two contributions to the event.   This session focussed on sustainability and I very much liked the comment on the multi-faceted nature of sustainability.   As a director of IT when I consider sustainability I am often thinking about financial sustainability in terms of ongoing replacement and refresh of devices and hardware, or about systemic sustainability in whether a process will be repeatable and scalable.   There is also the environment sustainability; does the solution allow us to thrive or merely to survive?   Gender equality was also raised as a sustainability issue which to me makes a lot of sense, but I had never previously heard it discussed in this way, in relation to sustainability.   It was also very refreshing to hear how AI shouldn’t be seen as a replacement for “flawed” humans, as AI is also flawed.  I think this is very interesting as it acknowledges our human flaws and therefore suggests we may need to re-evaluate quite how critical we are of AI when it comes to bias and inaccuracies, etc, where we as humans, on careful analysis, don’t do much better despite the fact we convince ourselves that we do.     On this panel, Jordan a young researcher raised the issue of how some see gen-Z as being lacking in resiliency and maybe even  being “soft” and in need of constant “trigger” warnings however she then proceeded to point to all the social media and the events in the press, to conflict such as those currently engulfing various parts of the world, which have bombarded her generation through technology more than any other generation in history;   Maybe we need to cut gen-Z a bit of slack here.

Now in the afternoon I didn’t take any real notes mainly due to my Surface battery giving up, and me having left by battery pack back at the room which was some distance away.    I do remember Gemma’s second contribution of the day, although this might be due to arriving just as she was due to start, sitting in the front row and beginning to eat from a little tub of ice cream;   Who needs supportive colleagues when you have me?    Now as it was great to hear Gemma hit a particular theme which I believe is so important, in the need to seek collective knowledge.   She mentioned a great set of books, including Darren Whites book, where Darren is also a Digital Futures Group member, plus a variety of others.  She also mentioned blogs, including mine, plus other online groups and individual sharing ideas, thoughts and resources.  For me in a world where technology is moving so fast the old methods of centralised reform and of waiting for CPD are no longer as appropriate as they are too slow.    The key and our best hope is to network and to collectively share ideas, thoughts and resources, and this type of networking is the key tenet of the Digital Futures Group.   “The smartest person in the room, is the room” as David Weinberger would say, so the bigger the room or more rooms you get involved in the better you, and collectively everyone, will be.    Gemma towards the end of the session eloquently brought things back to the students, as that is what education and schools are all about, however her use of “Bobby” and it all being about Bobby, and about us needing to consider Bobby and the effect on Bobby was so very impactful    This act of putting a name and making it about a specific, visualisable student rather than the generic and nebulous “students” makes all the difference and really helps nail the need to consider the individual learners in all we do.  

It was great to finish the day on top of what we dubbed “Teletubby hill”, being the grassed roof of the building in which the conference was held, looking off towards the setting sun.   It was a very busy but also very useful and interesting day.  And there was ice cream so what more can you ask for.  

How little did I know that attempted murder and Gondola related trauma awaited on day 2!

Wellbeing and muppets

I have blogged a couple of times on how we are constantly adding things, processes, tasks, etc, in order to result in better outcomes.  We are also forever looking to be more efficient, so we release some time to allow us to do yet more things.   One look at what teaching looked like back in the late 90’s when I qualified (god, am I that old??) compared with now very easily illustrates this.   Now a lot of the things we have added have came out of increasing amounts of research showing us what seems to generally work, or they have come out of a response to where something has gone wrong, but they have all involved doing more.

Now no-one wants to do worse, where taking something away, a process, a resource or anything else seems to logically result in a reduction in performance or quality of outcome.   We also have loss aversion, a heuristic, to deal with whereby we value what we have, and our current processes, more highly than alternatives, leading to us being reluctant to let go of that which we have.

And all of this means we are forever doing more, and one look at the teacher wellbeing index seems to point to increasing amounts of stress in education, increasing incidences of burnout, etc.   Recently I have also found myself looking at increasing email and message volumes with some research pointing to increased stress resulting from increased email traffic.   We cannot continue on this trajectory of adding and must at some point step back and reassess education and what really matters.   Not an easy ask sadly!

So what can we do?    I don’t have an answer to solve this problem as it is such a big problem impacting on wellbeing that it will take a fundamental rethink of what education is all about, and about what matters in schools and colleges.    I would suggest one thing we need to do is to reconsider the resiliency and efficiency narratives;  Being highly resilient, as Laura Knight recently raised, or highly efficient may be good in the short term but what does it mean in the long term?  How long can we be in resiliency mode for before it wears you down?    Can you flourish as a human being, enjoying life and contributing to society if your whole focus is on hyper efficiency?

Again I don’t have an answer but I do have a suggestion;  It is the need to lighten up and have a little fun.  To be social, to have a laugh and remember it isn’t all about resiliency and efficiency.   So to address that, a team member recently, with permission, used GPT 4o to convert our staff photos into the muppet versions of ourselves, before posting these to the staff list and onto our Office 365 profiles.    It didn’t solve the workload or wellbeing issue, but this random act gave people a laugh and raised a few smiles.    And maybe we need a little bit more of that!    

FutureShots 2024, Part 1

Early this month I had my second opportunity, post returning to the UK from the UAE, to contribute to an international conference event, this time the FutureShots event in Italy, not far outside Venice.   Now I have already posted on my Gondola experience during this particular trip however I would now like to share some thoughts from the conference proper, and in particular the first day of the conference which was focussed on AI in education.

The keynote session was delivered by my friend and colleague from the ISC Digital Advisory Group, Laura Knight who delivered her usual flawless presentation with so many take aways, so let me try to summarise the ones which particularly resonated with me.

Binaries: I have long been concerned by binary arguments which seem to dominate lots of education discussions.    In the case of AI things are no different with people either being doom and gloom, AI will end the world, or being evangelical about its ability to transform the world and education for the better.    The reality, as I have often stated, is that reality lies somewhere in between with positives balanced out against negatives, challenges or drawbacks.   AI isnt positive OR negative, but both positive and negative, and very dependent on the people using it, how they are using it and the task to which they are putting it, be it for good or for evil.

Trough of Disillusionment:  Laura suggested that we may be passing the hype part of AI and moving into the “trough of disillusionment”.   There has certainly been a lot of singing and dancing about AI in education and maybe this is wearing thin as generally the impact has been less than advertised, but I also note that the tech is improving and advancing quickly.   Only in the last few weeks we have seen GPT 4o and similar advancements coming out of Google, so could it be that as we approach the trough of disillusionment with one iteration of generative AI, that a new iteration and new functionality appears throwing us back into awe and wonderment.

Now Laura delivered many more points which I took away from her session. This includes considering ownership of ideas, agency in the use of the tools, the importance of trust, integrity and truth, and much more.   I will however save some of these for future blogs.  

The final, and possibly biggest point I took away from the session related to the term “resilience” which is often stated as a characteristic we wish to foster in students.    Laura raised concerns that although resilience is important it is not a state we can live in for any length of time.   This loosely aligns with my concerns regarding the “do more”, “be more efficient” narrative which we encounter all so often, both in education and beyond.   This “do more” with the same resources, pushes us increasingly into survival mode and “resilience” and this is something which is unsustainable over time.   Laura suggested an alternative in “equanimity” and being comfortable and calmly coping and managing change.   Now I am not 100% sure on this term yet, but I definitely agree with the sentiment that maybe we need to be a little more careful in over selling resilience as the solution to our challenges.

Next up was the panel session which I was involved in, chaired by Alessandro Bilotta, Content Director for EDUtech di Terrapinn along with Carlos Garriga Gamarra, CIO, IE University, Donatella Solda, Presidentessa, EdTech Italia, and Diego Pizzocaro, Head, H-FARM My School.   Now I must admit I didn’t take any notes during this one, having been a bit too busy being involved in it but the session did pose some interesting questions such as what it means to be human in a world of AI and generative AI?    If they key thing for us humans to do is the things AI cant do, what are those things?   Now I think the key thing is the social side of life, the human to human interaction including non-verbal queues, so not a Teams or Zoom call.   I used the term “human flourishing” as I think that sounds about right in principle although I will admit I havent quite bottomed out what human flourishing actually looks like;  I suspect that’s a work in progress.    Another question related to GDPR and AI, and whether GDPR was a road block.  For me it isnt;  We’ve been using satnav and google and social media for years without too many GDPR related questions.   Data protection is important but good practice in terms of data protection is independent of whether you are looking at an AI based solution or a non-AI based solution;  Its simply just good data protection practice.

EdTech startups were the next session of the conference with a number of startups each providing a short pitch of their product;  I must admit to being impressed with some of the pitches not just due to the ideas, but due to the presenters delivering in English where their native language was generally Italian.   Doing a short time bounded pitch is hard enough without having to give it in a second language.   Now the fact that H-Farm has these startups as part of their campus is such a great idea as it encourages the co-creation of solutions rather than tech vendors creating what they think education wants, and then spending lots of money convincing educationalists that their product is the one and best solution.

We were not even through the morning at this point and I already had quite a few thoughts and ideas to take away and consider.   My surface battery was depleting fast, an issue which was to impact me later on in the day but the day was going well.   Now I have plenty more to share from the event, however am going to split things here for now and continue in a subsequent blog.    If I was taking away a key thing from the morning it was the need to put the humans at the centre of AI use.   It is about assisting humans and allowing humans to therefore focus on the things which humans do well, and that support “human flourishing”.