Category: Learning Technologies

ISC Digital, Brighton: Some thoughts

The need for sharing and collaborating across schools was the key message I took away from the Brighton ISC EdTech Summit last week.   We need to share what works, the challenges, the successes, the approaches and the journeys taken.  It is only through this sharing we can be more consistent and effective in our use of EdTech.

Now before I go any further I need to get the journey off my chest.   A 3 train journey on the way to Brighton including a rush to the 2nd train following a delay on train number 1, followed by missing my planned homeward bound train, which would have been a 2 train journey, and therefore requiring a 4 train trip.  Am not the best traveller on trains especially when no seat is available and the above pushed me to the limit of my patience.    All this plus taxis, so total travel of 7 trains and 4 taxis.    But enough of that, now I have it off my chest, the key thing was the conference itself.

The event started with the launch speech by Ty Goddard and Ian Philips asking all attendees to engage and not just by liking or following on social media, but by contributing to the conversation.   This message was re-iterated by many of the speakers, that there was a need for increasing dialogue and discussion in relation to EdTech, to what works and also to the journeys taken and all of the wrong turns, diversions and U-turns which arise as part of implementing EdTech projects in schools.

Richard Teversham from Apple was next up highlighting the fact that we now live in a world where every job is a technology job.    I particularly liked his explanation of how we were in the third age, a people age, and that it was people first, before technology.   My own experience seems to agree with this.   Technology is great but it needs someone to understand how it might be used and how it might benefit teaching and learning, then it needs someone to actually use it.   It needs people and these people need to be motivated and interested in how the technology might enable learners, they also need to see the potential.  In relation to potential Richard explained that “with technology great things can happen” and I tend to agree.

As the event went on it was highlighted that there was a need to have a clear purpose in using EdTech solutions before any implementation.    I particularly enjoyed an open panel discussion where all attendees were invited to contribute to a discussion about how the impact of EdTech might be measured.   Ty Goddard summed this particular session up well with the suggestion of a need to refocus on establishing “Value” as opposed to “Impact”.    The term “Value” to me is softer and doesn’t conjure up the image of exam results as the sole impact measure, plus it is likely to be more inclusive of the various ways that EdTech might affect (I had to careful avoid using the word impact there!) learners, learning, teachers and teaching. This session also provided me the opportunity to finally meet Bukky Yusuf who I have been interacting with via Twitter for a number of years.   It is always nice to meet edutweeps in real life.   I should note I also met Abid Patel in person for the first time during the course of the conference.

The conference also provided me the opportunity to present and I had the pleasure of presenting with Louise Jones, a fellow Scot.    Her session was a bit of an eye opener particularly when she discussed “voice first” and raised the issue that traditional web searches return 1000’s of answers, but when you ask Alexa you will get only a single answer;  As such what are the implications for our learners where they are likely to increasingly make use of voice first services?   The existence of free web services was also raised and how we need to increasingly ask ourselves why a given service is free and how the service provider is themselves benefiting;  few companies create a service, at their own cost, just for the good of society.  I also liked her discussion of how version history and meta data, and the ability to replay the creation of documents by students might surface information in relation to the students thinking processes.

The whole event was finally wrapped up by Priya Lakhani from CenturyTech with an inspiring talk as to how AI can impact the classroom and also pointing towards what she described as “BS AI”.   The final video of the conference being from Taylor Mali in relation to What teachers make.    If you haven’t seen the video I suggest you watch it as it summed up the conference for me;  I will say no more in order to avoid spoiling it.

It was a very useful, informative and enjoyable day.   I also managed to get my Irn Bru into a few of the photos shared via twitter!   But on a more serious note, the key in the days events is not the day itself but what comes from it and if Ian and Ty’s comments are to be taken as their aim, it is their wish that what comes from the event is further discussion.    I expect that they will be successful in this and that discussion will follow the event.

So, with that in mind I hope to build a group of educators to discuss digital citizenship, an area I am particularly interested in, including curating ideas and resources.    You can register your interest via this Microsoft Form.

 

 

 

Microsoft Bootcamp

Last week I attended a 3-day Microsoft Bootcamp in the Microsoft London offices.   It was a pretty packed programme across the 3 days covering a diverse range of topics however as I sit on the train on the way home let me try and summarise the key points.

Accessibility

The session on accessibility led by Hector Minto (@hminto) is the one that sticks in my mind the most.   In fact from discussing with some others, it stuck in their minds too.    During the session a variety of accessibility tools were demonstrated with the most important factor being that these solutions are already available within Windows 10 and the Office 365 suite.     Some of the ideas where horribly simple;  Horrible in the fact that these simple approaches hadn’t been something I had realised could have a significant impact.    A larger pointer for when demonstrating on screen or a slightly different windows colour scheme were just two of the tips.    Adding Alt text to images in documents and on social media posts was another.    The ability to add subtitles to video via using Microsoft Stream or the use of PowerPoint and inline translation were also discussed.

It is clearly for all of us to do our bit, and generally this only requires making small changes to our normal practices.

The “MEC” or Microsoft Educator Community

I have been aware of the MEC and the variety of resources available within it for some time.   The three-day event however highlighted how the MEC could be used as a vehicle for CPD.   I, myself, have recently seen the power of training codes and badges on motivating people to undertake CPD in relation to educational technology and the event only served to strengthen this view.   One of the keys tasks I believe I now need to undertake is to curate the MEC content which I believe is most valid and will have the biggest impact with staff at my school.

Microsoft Teams

A fair amount of the event was focused on how Teams could be used in schools, colleges and universities.    It was notable that the actual platform used throughout all three days, to facilitate collaboration, discussion and sharing, was in fact Microsoft Teams.   People were posting questions, links and other content so that all attendees could benefit from the shared knowledge and experience of the group.   I can clearly see the benefits of using Teams to support educators from across department, across a school or even across institutions to get together and work collectively to bring about continual improvement and to tackle challenges.

A number of the events sessions included remote sessions delivered from the Seattle and also Glasgow, a reasonably diverse choice in locations.    These highlighted how Teams could facilitate opportunities for learning more akin to that experience by the increasing number of remote workers which now exist.   This also, again, highlighted where Stream could play its part in the recording of such meetings complete with the automatic creation of subtitles which were easily searchable by users.

Microsoft OneNote

A number of individuals shared how they were using OneNote in their institution.   I found a particular presentation by Esam Baboukhanto be very interesting.    Esam pre-prepared regular checklists and review questions in OneNote in order to get students to take greater responsibility for their learning.   He also mentioned the use of review questions which students were required to undertaken to get them to revisit learning in order to aid better memory retention.    The use of OneNote as a tool to aid such spaced retrieval practice was something which I hadn’t considered however I can easily see how this might work well.

Overall

It was a tiring three days with lots going on.   The event itself was specific to FE and HE, whereas my current context is that of an independent school.   I had decided to attend given the large number of students we have which study A-Levels which otherwise they would study in an FE institution.    In hindsight I made the right call as the event was very worthwhile.   I left with plenty of notes and an equally high number of points either for consideration or for action.    All attendees also left with Microsoft Trainer accreditation, thereby able to deliver training and issue training codes via the Microsoft training platform.   For those who are considering attending a Bootcamp I would definitely recommend it.

I am also looking forward to continuing online discussions via Teams with those who attended the event and with others who have attended previous events.   I suspect, despite what was an excellent event, I am still to experience the true benefits of the event.   I suspect such benefit lies in the network and community of individuals sharing their ideas, resources and thoughts on the Microsoft platform, and on other EdTech following attending a Bootcamp.

 

A VR Conference

Attended my first ever event in VR on Saturday evening, listening to Steve Bambury discuss his views on VR in education.

The Engage platform used for the session was reasonable intuitive to use with a limited set of controls to get used to.     You can easily wander around within the presentation environment or can make use of the ability to teleport as you can in lots of VR apps.    Engage also comes with a short tutorial, which I made use of, to help you get used to how things work.

Within the platform the event organiser has the ability to display slides which in the event I attended were displayed on a big screen towards the back of the environment.   The organiser can also mute or unmute attendees which is useful in avoiding audio issues and in particular audio feedback.

My Selfie in VR

Through their controllers attendees are easily able to make use of common hand gestures including raising a hand to ask a question, waving and pointing at objects or people as needed.   You can also bring up a virtual tablet device which allows you to capture photos from the session, or even a selfie or two, as well as take notes and access your settings.

For me one of the key takeaways from the session was the ability to collaborate across distance.  In this case Steve was in the UAE while I was in the UK.  Am not sure where some of the other attendees were from however I suspect some US attendees may have been present.   Clearly VR allows people to discuss or work collaboratively independent of distance although time zone would need to be considered.      Another advantage I can see was the openness of the environment which to me would facilitate students exploring locations, ideas and concepts with a degree to freedom which is not easily replicable in the real world.

It should also be noted that VR allows you to replay previous events, such as being able to step back into the presentation at a later date, viewing it from a different perspective or just revisiting or revising the content.    This might be useful in terms of reviewing a session, its successes and challenges, prior to identifying next steps or areas for improvement.   Additionally, just prior to the session, I explored some of the pre-prepared content which comes with Engage, such as a David Attenborough presentation focussing on Dinosaurs.    There appeared to be lots of content to view being a mix of proper VR experiences and 360 degree videos.   I expect with a bit more time I will explore some of this content.

Overall I enjoyed the experience and can see how it might be useful for CPD and for collaborative activities with students.   I think my next step will be to play with creating my own event and how this would work, with a particular focus on how students might interact and work together within a Engage environment.

 

 

 

 

 

A bit more VR

Once again decided to experiment with the VR this week, this time trying two new apps although both this time were paid apps.   The apps in question were Gravity Sketch and Masterpiece VR.    In both cases I didn’t have too long to experiment with them so the below are just my initial impressions.

Starting with gravity sketch, the first thing I found was that the app seems to be very powerful and with that comes a complex set of controls.  This is an app you would need to spend some time with to properly get to grips with it before being able to confidently use it.    I found myself quickly able to draw various shapes and models reasonably easily however I think trying to make a larger product from these shapes would take me a greater among of time.   I particularly like the tool that allowed me to extrude a shape.   I found myself quickly making the body for chess pieces, something which isn’t quite as easy to do when you are limited to primitive shapes as you are in some other apps I have tried.   I can see this app having great potential in Design Technology lessons in particular.

Masterpiece VR, I felt, wasn’t quite as powerful in terms of the tools available when compared with Gravity sketch however as a result it has an easier user interface to get to grips with.   I was quickly working with virtual clay and making a sculpture.  I could easily edit my sculpture cutting sections away or moulding areas to suit my needs much in the same way I would envisage you would work with real clay.  Note: I have little experience of working with clay sculptures so I may be totally wrong on that point.     Now I do not attest to being an artist in any shape or form, however I was easily able to create the start of a basic sculpture.  As such I believe this app could easily be used by students in art lessons to develop much more impressive creations than anything I might be able to achieve.   This is definitely an app where experimentation could be encouraged without the need for significant training in advance.

In both of the above apps the tools are provided to help students get to grips with the ability to create within a 3D virtual space.   As this kind of working becomes more common within the creative, the design and the entertainment industries I think it is useful to introduce students during their format education.

 

 

More thoughts on VR: Free VR apps

This morning I continued my experimentation with the HP WMR headset I am currently playing with, trying the below apps:

  • Home: A VR Spacewalk
  • Sharecare VR
  • Geogebra Mixed Reality
  • VR Museum of Fine Art
  • Google Earth VR

I picked the above due to being free and also being listed by Steve Bambury on his list of Educational VR Apps.

The first app I tried is one I had tried in an initial demo I received on using VR so is an app I was at least passingly familiar with.   Basically, you are put in the position of an astronaut on the International Space Station.   The app is reasonably intuitive once you get going, with instructions offered to you at each stage.    I must admit to feeling a little disoriented at times but on reflection this isn’t surprising as, being an astronaut, you would be working in zero gravity resulting in no clear sensation as to which way is down.   Overall a fun little app which may have a place in science or possible design technology lessons or even to help provide context for space-based stories written within English lessons.

My next app on the headset was Sharecare VR.   This app lets you pull apart the human body and look at its constituent parts including the skeletal and circulator system.   I didn’t find this app instantly intuitive however it is relatively simple meaning with a little effort I got to grasp with what you can do.   I can see clear uses in Biology lessons looking at how the human body is constructed and getting a better understanding of the various parts.   It may also be useful in Sports Science or Physical education courses.   My feeling is this app might be useful either as a starting point before teaching specific areas of the human body or might be useful to provide the context to ensure students see how individual components of the human body relate.

The possibility of using Geogebra in VR sounded interesting to me as I am familiar with the desktop based version so I was eager to use this app. Must admit to being a little disappointed by it however not being a Maths teacher, this may be simply because I don’t quite understand how the app might be used in lessons.   The app comes with a number of geometric shapes and patterns in 3D which you can scale and move around.  The controls are rather simple however I felt they were maybe a little too simple resulting in limiting what you can do.    Overall this isn’t an app I really think I can pass any judgement on; Will leave that to the Maths teachers.

The Museum of Fine Art as a VR experience sounded interesting, being able to explore a Museum but in VR.   My first issue was that the space I was experimenting in was a little small to get the best out of this app.   I suspect it would be so much better using the backpack mounted and therefore wire free Z-Series workstation however on this occasion I was wired to the PC in its desk-mounted setup.   A bigger space also may have made things better.   The app easily lets you explore the virtual version of the museum and walk, or teleport, around various exhibits.   Each exhibit comes with a description providing information on the exhibit.     I found this app quite interesting albeit I am not sure why, after using it and exploring once, you would want to then revisit.   It may however allow art students easy access to revisit masterpieces as and when they need without the difficulty and cost of travelling to a real rather than virtual museum.

My final app for the weekend was Google Earth VR and I must admit I really enjoyed this one.    I found myself visiting schools which I had worked with previously in the UAE, visiting my family home, doing a flyover of my current school and also visiting a couple of famous locations.   The provided tutorial easily prepares you to be able to get the best out of the simple control system so almost immediately you can begin flying around earth.    I found myself stepping back when jumping into a location on the edge of the Grand Canyon so you do have to be careful.    The limitation I did find is that some locations don’t have detailed street view maps available so you can only fly over rather than step into the location.   This was the case for some locations in Al Ain in the UAE which I was hoping to explore, having previously lived there, however exploring the UK seemed to work in most locations.   The free ability to fly around the UK and visit different locations is likely to have potential applications in a variety of lessons including providing context in English lessons, exploring different structures and architecture in Art or in Design Technology lessons or visiting different parts of the world for geography lessons.   I am sure the free form ability of the app will present applications way beyond the above suggestions.

It is clear that there are a number of very useful and interesting free apps available for a WMR headset like the HP unit I am using.   I suspect and hope this will increase over time.   The apps I looked at provide a useful starting platform once you have a headset and suitable PC or Laptop.    My next plan is to explore a couple of paid apps where I think I will focus on free form apps most likely mainly focussed on the STEM or STEAM subjects.    Am looking forward to seeing what additional applications to education might be possible.

 

 

 

VR – First Impressions

During the week I took possession of an HP Windows Virtual Reality (WMR) headset with which to experiment with, courtesy of ThinkBlue.    It has been a busy week, being the week before the school restarts, so I haven’t had quite as much time to experiment with the equipment as I would have liked however I thought I would share some initial thoughts.

One of the first Apps I tried was Tiltbrush and I must admit I loved the ability to paint and create in 3D space.   Being able to walk around a 3D creation, to zoom in and out, allows a level of freedom I haven’t quite experienced before when creating artwork on a computer.   I will admit I am far from an artist, as such I will be very interested in seeing how students and also teachers within the Art department make use of Tiltbrush and in the artwork they may end up creating.

The main potential for VR, for me, lies in platforms which allow creativity such as Tiltbrush as opposed to preproduced content which the user simply works through.   That said I had to try 1943 Belin Blitz a VR experience focussing around a Lancaster bomber crew taking part in the world war 2 bombing of Berlin.    I will admit to enjoying the experience and can see how it might add to student learning and engagement in a topic.   That said, it suffers from the usual issue of preproduced content in that you simply work through it.    Having reached the end that’s it finished as its unlikely you will revisit the content meaning it is difficult to justify the high cost of VR equipment simply to run through preproduced content.

Blocks by Google was my next app to try.   Like Tiltbrush it is creative platform which allows you to produce 3 dimensional designs using geometric shapes.    I found thee platform very intuitive and easy to use.   Having followed the basic tutorial which is provided I was quickly able to progress and start building my own designs, in my case choosing to create a military fort.    Sadly, I only had a limited amount of time to spare so only started to get to grips with what was possible.  Again, I cant wait to see what students and design technology students in particular are able to create.

Now my main focus is on how VR might be usable in schools however I couldn’t resist the temptation to engage in a little gaming.    Beat Saber was my choice of games and I will admit that it is an excellent and engaging little game.    Within no time I was slashing away at coloured blocks all to the rhythm of the music included within the game.    I didn’t quite expect the game to be quite as much fun as it is plus also never expected it to involve such physical effort.    I found myself sweating after on a short time of playing.    If looking for a tenuous link to education maybe I could link it to either Physical Education (PE) or maybe to Dance?

I have only had the VR headset now for a few days and within that have only managed a couple of hours of use.   I can already see some initial ideas as to how this technology might be used in schools.    A couple of ideas that have occurred to me already are how students might be able to create their own VR environments for others to explore or how VR could be used to create 3D components that then could either be incorporated into gaming experiences.    I look forward to exploring VR more over the coming months.

 

EdTech paradigms

I have been using a Surface Go as my main work device now for a number of months.    It is however only recently that I have finally found myself making use of Windows 10’s tablet mode.   An EdTech paradigm I had held had changed.

Initially my view on Tablet mode was one of disapproval.   It simply didn’t feel right to me.   I couldn’t find my apps where I wanted them, I couldn’t manage what I had open very well and I couldn’t access files and folders.   I simple didn’t like tablet mode.

On reflection the reason for this was that my Surface Go was replacing my desktop PC and laptop.   As such I was initially viewing it from the perspective of a laptop/desktop experience which tablet mode simply doesn’t give you.  But, tablet mode isn’t meant to give you this experience after all it is about setting the device up to perform as a tablet computer as opposed to a desktop/laptop.  It is about being able to work on the move, without a flat surface to sit the device on and also being able to work one handed, while holding the device in the other hand.    I was approaching a new devices functionality from the paradigm of an older way of working.

It was around a month or so ago I realised the advantages of tablet mode in particular when combined with One Note.   In a conference I could flip the keyboard cover behind my device, stick the device in tablet mode then maximise OneNote to full screen.   This gave me a full screen to sketch on or write notes on using the Microsoft Surface Pen.    In meetings I could make use of teams to access resources and documents which were required while easily switching to OneNote to take notes.   And when needed, when I found a free place to work, I could flick back to normal desktop mode and view my files, outlook and other applications in the way I normally would have done on a desktop or laptop.

For me this highlights the ongoing, and one of the biggest challenges of EdTech.   When looking at new tech we largely view it from the viewpoint of existing paradigms.   As such we may not see benefits which potentially exist.   Equally, in order to undergo a paradigm shift we need to commit to seeking these new views plus we need to experiment.   Only by trying will we be able to identify what we don’t know and see new potentials.  This, however, opens us up to the potential risk of failure, which is often an uncomfortable, albeit necessary, experience.

As I have often heard in IT industry circles “fail fast” is the key;   Try new things and experiment, but do it early and with limited groups or trials, where issues or problems will not have wider implications.   Learn from the mistakes and iterate to new solutions and share these solutions.   By doing so hopefully we can all collectively move EdTech use in schools forward.

“More” edTech anyone?

What are the barriers to “more use of edtech” in schools?   A recent British Educational Suppliers Association (BESA) survey, as recently reported in the TES, suggested that budgets and “teachers’ unwillingness” were two of the main barriers identified by the survey.   But was the right question being asked?

Firstly, looking at barriers to using “more” EdTech suggests that we don’t have enough and therefore should use more.    This is a rather simplistic viewpoint as it suggests that the volume of EdTech in use is the key factor we should be seeking to address.   In my view it isn’t.   We should be seeking to use technology effectively and where appropriate.    As Mike Sharples (@sharplm)  recently commented, “technology alone will not transform education.   Focus on pedagogy with new technology, not just the technology.”

The wide scale deployment of interactive whiteboards to schools can be considered as having increased the EdTech in education however I would challenge anyone to prove that it was effective.   It didn’t improve outcomes.   It didn’t support students in learning in new ways or improve their access to learning materials.  It didn’t empower teachers to re-imagine the learning experience.   In my view it simply allowed teachers to do what they always had been doing with a whiteboard/blackboard but using a digital surface instead, and at significant cost.

Taking the issue of budget into consideration, is it any wonder that school leaders would choose not to invest in EdTech where they can see limited added value from significant investment and where investment in other areas may show more reliable predictors of effectiveness or return on investment.    If budgets were less strained maybe the situation would be different.   As a result of this is it also therefore any small wonder that they would report that lack of budget as a reason for not investing, having themselves had to prioritise their spending.

Sticking with interactive whiteboards, the deployment of them was often to whole schools or departments.   This approach to “more” is better fails to take into account different subject, teacher, student, topic, lesson, etc needs.   It is a one shape fits all approach.     What motivation does a teacher have to learn how best to use this new classroom technology given it has been foisted upon them.     Teachers, due to not understanding the technology or having time to experiment, may also be unable to identify appropriate uses within their classroom and teaching for this new device.    Given the lack of intrinsic motivation and perceived appropriateness of the technology is it any wonder that “teachers’ unwillingness” to make use of more EdTech might be perceived and reported by schools. 

In looking at EdTech use in schools we need to adopt a more nuanced approach.  It isn’t about using more Edtech.   It should be about considering the different needs of teachers and students and allowing them to experiment and use solutions which fit these needs.    From this, best practice can be identified and shared, and approaches can be regularly reviewed and revised to maximise their impact.   I should note that an open, supportive culture and warm, friendly organisational climate is key to enabling this.

I also wonder about some teacher’s perception of what “good” use of EdTech looks like.   Social media gives us plenty of examples of exemplary teaching using EdTech however this often comes from teachers who have got to this point from long periods of trial, error and practice which isn’t evident from social media postings.    Also, the posts generally focus on the good, may be staged for marketing purposes for the school, or may be biased or divorced from the real world in other ways.   EdTech doesn’t necessarily have to be a complex all singing and dancing affair or something worthy of a photo shoot and full page spread in an educational magazine.   Good initial use of EdTech might be a simple and limited action relating to a specific part of a lesson.   It could be simply to make use of an application such as Microsoft Teams or Showbie.  From here it can built upon.      Additionally, good use of EdTech seldom comes about without significant time, effort and experimentation.   It is also worth noting that technology is always changing and new uses for existing technologies can always be found and therefore the seeking of improvement is never ending.    This is a bit like teaching in general where there is always room to build upon practice with each new lesson, topic, class or academic year.

I think back to a presentation I gave in Dubai some years ago in which I identified what I believed at the time to be the factors I thought were key to Technology use in schools.   Teacher motivation, confidence and training were some of the factors I listed and I continue to believe these are key although I think my view as to training is now broader than it was then.   Training in my eyes now includes using social media, such as twitter, peer discussion and planning, experimenting and traditional training sessions.    A key issue supporting these three factors is the culture and climate within a school.   Open and supportive school cultures promote sharing of ideas and allow for trial and error to occur.

It is with this in mind I wonder whether a better question would have been: What are the barriers to supporting teachers to use Edtech in my school?

 

Microsoft Forms and Live Spreadsheets

I used to use Google Forms and as such when Microsoft introduced Forms I was very excited about being able to use the Office 365 platform for my form based needs however I quickly found one big limitation.

In google I could create a form which for example gathered budget requests.  I could then make this available to all staff.    I could then create a spreadsheet into which the data went but into which I then started to add my own comments regarding each request indicating whether I felt they should be accepted, declined or needed further discussion.  This spreadsheet was then shared with other budget decision makers for their comments.    As such the budget decision makers were able to make notes on a live spreadsheet which instantly updated with new requests as and when they were submitted.    It sped the whole process up significantly.     The issue was the in Microsoft Forms when you accessed the data in a spreadsheet format this was via download facilities meaning the resulting data spreadsheet did not update as new requests came in, and therefore couldn’t be used to keep running notes.

Thankfully, thanks to twitter and my PLN, I have now found that Microsoft have built the exact functionality I need, it is simply that the process is a little different.

Now I need to create a spreadsheet which can be stored in either OneDrive, Teams or Sharepoint.    The spreadsheet just needs to be blank.     Once the spreadsheet has been created you then need to open it up in Excel Online, the web version of Excel rather than the desktop application.    Easiest method to do this is to visit Office.com in a web browser and open the file from the appropriate OneDrive, Teams or SharePoint app.

Once in Excel Online simply go to Insert > Form and select the New Form option.

You should now be presented with the familiar MS Forms interface where you can build the form you want, adding whatever questions you need.     Once you have your form completed try the Preview option, enter and submit some sample data.    Now revisit your online spreadsheet and the data you have entered should now be visible.   You have now created a live spreadsheet which updates as data is submitted via the form.   You can also easily add your own additional comments to the spreadsheet as needed.

For me Microsoft Forms has now become a much better resource and I am looking forward to sharing the above info with colleagues over the coming week so that they too may start making greater use of Forms.

 

Some thoughts on AI in education

A recent post in the TES got me thinking once again about AI in the schools.   The post focused on parents fears about artificial intelligence use in schools stating 77% of parents expressed a concern over a lack of transparency.

Firstly before I get into my views on AI let me first take some issues with the reporting and with the parental perception part of the research.   Looking at the research which you can find here, the question asked of parents focused on the “consequences of the use of AI”.   This feels a little negatively biased to start with.    Under this banner question a serious of sub-questions were asked with the participants asked to respond with either don’t know, fairly concerned/very concerned or not very concerned/not at all concerned.  Again the options hint towards negativity and therefore introduce bias.   And finally the sub question itself in relation to transparency for example focused on concerns relating to a “lack of transparency”, again a negative implication and further negative bias.     It is also worth noting that the survey only had 1225 parents contributing.    I think this falls very short of a sufficient sample to draw any meaningful and generalisable findings.   Despite all of the above the TES decided to pick up and report the findings of “parents’ fear about artificial intelligence in schools” including indicating an “overwhelming majority of parents are concerned”.   I find it somewhat funny that concern of potential bias in relation to AI was reported in an article itself so loaded with its own bias.

So to my views;  I myself have concerns regarding AI use in schools however also see much potential.   Funnily enough the Nesta report to which the TES referred concludes that AI in education “promises much to be excited about.”

Given the negative bias in the TES report lets therefore start with my positive views as to the potential for AI in education.   AI is very good at identifying patterns and divergence from patterns within large data sets.    This makes them ideal for analysing the wealth of school and wider educational data which exists to help educators, those responsible for educational policy and decision making, school leaders and even the teachers themselves.    Now thoughts may instantly jump to achievement data sets resulting from testing, final exams or teacher awarded grading however the opportunities far exceed this area.   Take for example data taken from school Wi-Fi, where students are allowed access, in relation to student movements around the school.   This data might help a school reorganise the school day or restructure the timetable in order to become more efficient and maximise the learning time available.   It might also be used to redesign learning spaces or develop spaces for students to rest, take a break and address their wellbeing.  This is but one example of how AI might be used along with school data.

AI can help direct students to appropriate learning materials using data to identify the areas where students need additional support along with the best support materials to meet these needs.    Some platforms already exist and are exploring this opportunity including Century, a platform which I heard very positive stories regarding when recently speaking to students at a school using it.   Platforms like this might prove highly valuable additional resources to complement classroom teaching or to provide a more effective homework platform.   This area and use of AI is likely to continue grow with the development of more and more online learning content being key to this.

AI can help with teacher administrative tasks such as registration conducted via facial recognition or marking of tests by natural language AIs that can apply a given marking criteria to student submitted work.    We also need to recognise some of the AIs that are already available including voice recognition and dictation, which is now a feature of the MS office products.    Googles search facilities, a now standard feature used in schools and classrooms, also quietly uses AI yet we don’t bat much of an eyelid to it.

The negatives implications which exist in relation to AI generally apply beyond the educational context, albeit the educational context in teaching our future generations makes things all the more worrying.

AIs need to be taught and to learn with this done using training data sets.   The worry is that bias in the training data set will result in bias in the AIs decision making.    As a result an AI which was developed in the UK, and therefore trained using UK based data, and used successfully in UK schools may not be appropriate for use in schools in Asia or the Middle East due to its decision making being biased towards a UK context.   That said, this same issue would impact on any product or service, or even individuals where they seek to operate outside their normal context.   We all have an inherent bias, we “humans”, create the AIs and train the AIs so is it realistic to expect an AI without bias?  I suspect part of the issue is a concern in relation to a particular bias being introduced purposefully however I think it is more likely bias in AIs will arise accidentally as it general does within humans.

There is a concern that AI decision making based on large data sets may become impossible for humans to explain or understand, as the decision making process could be based on huge amounts of data.     This brings with it the concern that we may lose some of our control.   If a teacher recommends a career track for a student they will be able to explain how they arrived at this however if an AI was used, the teacher may be able to present the AIs findings but may be unable to explain or understand how this was arrived at.   How many parents who be happy with a suggested career path for their child without any explanation available?

Linked to the above is a concern of “determinism” where AI might identify an end point and then through its actions lead to this occurring.  So those students identified as achieving a C grade in GCSE might be presented with content and learning materials which lead them to achieve exactly that.  This concern is again about a lack of control however it could be suggested we are deterministic in some of the practices already in use widely in schools.   Take for example the setting of students into ability bands, is this not potentially deterministic as the students in the top band get the most challenging content which may enable them to achieve top grades while the students in the lowest band gets easier materials which means the don’t learn the more complex materials, and as a result are unable to achieve the top grades.    Also is there a danger of determinism every time a teacher reports a predicted grade to parents or where a school uses ALIS or other benchmarking data?

Overall AI is going to find increasing uses in schools.   My gut feeling however is that for the foreseeable future this will be very much in a subtle way as data analysis systems start to suggest areas to investigate within school data, accessibility tools including dictation and translation support students in class and AI driven learning platforms provide personalised learning opportunities beyond the classroom.   These are but a few examples of things already happening now.  These uses of AI are likely to become more common.   Discussion of AI reminds of a quote in relation to effective technology integration being such that the teacher and learners don’t even stop to think about the fact they are using tech, the tech use is transparent.   I think AI use is going to be exactly this, and the AI in Googles search goes some way to provide this;  When was the last time when you were conducting an online search that you stopped to think about how google search works and how AI may be involved?