voyeurism

show and tell

have finished the presentation for the school briefings, as well the handouts for the pupils during the briefings :-)

details of time and space #2

i've just completed some necessary parts of the preparation for the intervention next year.

basically, i've planned the destinations for each day in the field for each of the four schools.

that has allowed me to decide upon the topics for the Structured Academic Controversies (eight topics in all, to ensure that pupils from each school will have exposure to topics on each of the three syllabus themes of 'development', 'environment' and 'tourism').

finally, i have designed, printed, and reproduced sufficient copies of the:

- worksheets for orienteering
- worksheets for land-use mapping
- worksheets for Structured Academic Controversy
- instructions for the chaperons
- recording instruments for the pre- and post-tests
- recording instruments for pupil performance during orienteering (individual and summative)
- recording instrument for pupil performance during the Structured Academic Controversy

on the shoulders of giants

over the past four days, i have had the privilege of attending a course facilitated by two giants in education - Marlene Scardamalia and Carl Bereiter. Both are faculty at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto.

In fact, Marlene holds the Presidents' Chair in Education and Knowledge Technologies at OISE. She is also Director of the Institute for Knowledge Innovation and Technology. Carl is co-director of the Education Commons at OISE.

i was also pleased to meet Elizabeth Morley, who is the principal of the Laboratory School at the Institute of Child Study, University of Toronto. Together with Richard Reeve and Richard Messina, she shared her vision of how knowledge building can be effectively translated in a whole-school context.

the course was MID 816 - Advanced Computer-based Systems for Education and Training. basically it was a showcase for an online collaborative learning environment developed by IKIT, known as Knowledge Forum . Knowledge Forum is designed specifically to support what are known as knowledge-building communities (knowledge-building is defined as the production and continual improvement of ideas of value to a community; thus, knowledge-building communities can be thought of as Communities of Practice which are specifically devoted to the creation of new knowledge). the metaphor presented was the contrast between the Ptolemaic view of the curriculum (centred around tasks and activities) and the Copernican view (idea-centric). an example of a knowledge-building community is the Children's Own Museum.

Knowledge Forum is similar in concept to bulletin boards and threaded discussions, with the enhancements that it allows the posts to be arranged spatially on screen. this allows related posts to be overlaid against background images (which, if well designed, can be used to further augment the spatial organising framework). the object-oriented approach to the traditional bulletin board also means that posts can be easily referenced and viewed in multiple contextually-specific ways. special effort has been made to allow for scaffolding of posts (for those who prefer it), as well as to facilitate what are known as 'rise aboves'. the latter are essentially points of summary and/or summative insights obtained retrospectively.

part of the course featured a video conference between participants from Canada, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and (i believe) Italy. it was certainly a first for me to experience such a novel mode of discussion :-)

Technorati Tags: constructivism, education, learning, technology

happy trails

over the past week i have been visiting the seven neighbourhoods which i had identified last week for the Structured Academic Controversies.

i've decided to have the orienteering routes to also be in these same neighbourhoods, so that at least pupils would have some initial familiarity with the neighbourhoods, as they would have explored them during the orienteering, before they embark upon the Structured Academic Controversies.

the routes are all between 1.5 km and 2.0 km long - the shortest being Pasir Panjang, and the longest Singapore Expo.

an update on the scheduling - Christ Church Secondary has elected to do the study from June - August '04.

i would also like to welcome two chaperons to the team - Koh Hock Leong (who will be helping out in the mornings in June, ie with Bowen Secondary), and Tan Kwang Sheng, (who will be helping from January till early March, with Yishun Town Secondary)