Future Schools 2018 Day 1

Future Schools 2018 in the amazing Melbourne - a fantastic opportunity to learn from the best presenters and other imaginative educators gathered for the conference. The only grumble has been the cost of accommodation as the F1 Grand Prix is on this week!

DAY 1

Sir Ken Robinson

Arguably the best and most influential speaker in the field of education kicked off the conference. A VERY hard act to follow! Sir Ken mixes witt, humour and a wonderfully natural story-telling style to illuminate clearly the path education needs to head down.

Some ideas and quotes from his talk:
Every country is trying to reform education - generally it has been a catastrophic failure
In each case the principles for change in the reform movement have been

Conformity
Compliance
Competition

Which is at direct odds with what we know about how children learn and thrive. Bells, periods, same age groups, subjects in silos are things we only do in school - why? He used the metaphor of agriculture - in nature plants grow together but we grow them apart, then have to deal with the problems… nature has the right way!

More testing is not the answer - this is a picture from Bihar India that shows the results of over-testing to compensate for weak teaching.

The picture shows parents giving students the answers during a test. Assessment literally driving parents up the wall!

Just like natural resources, human resources are highly diverse, sometimes hidden, need refining through practice, discipline and application. All of these resources can interrelate in a wonderful way.

Learning, education, school - there is a big difference between the three. Learning is driven by curiosity. Kids love to learn

Teachers have become service workers for the testing industries
Sustainable agriculture is not about the plant but the soil - same in education, we have focused on output and yield (exams, grades, league tables) which has eroded the culture of learning. If you have a vibrant culture - learning will take place
If we are teachers, we are in the business of miracles

A succinct definition:

In essence Sir Ken's message advocated for schools creating conditions that nurture and encourage diversity, creativity and collaboration.

Catherine Ball
Drones for teaching, learning and creativity

• Drones are a $127 Billion industry

• Drone tourism - fly a drone somewhere in the world from where you are - navigate around the Grand Canyon from Perth

• Incredible diverse uses for drones

• Ethics of new technology - just because we can, should we?

• Not enough woman involved www.sheflies.com.au

Peter Dawkins
Beyond the ATAR

Peter delivered an insightful keynote looking at the usefulness (or otherwise) of ATAR in our education system right now.

ATAR is a 20th Century construct which has had its time (spontaneous applause for this!)

Schools need to be more than ATAR factories, looking at these key 21C skills, Peter thought that ATAR restricts our ability to teach these in school:

This is an insightful graph showing that ATAR is not a great predictor of academic success at University:

Over 60% of students are getting into Uni with pathways other that ATAR - much higher than I thought!

The Mitchell institute has a report on the usefulness of ATAR http://www.mitchellinstitute.org.au/papers/crunching-the-number/

Peter spoke about the Victoria uni 1st year model-one unit at a time, small classes, engaged collaborative learning, a very different approach.

Kate HighfieldThe intentional use of technology as a learning enabler

Kate made a clear case for looking a technology use through the lens of research and what we know about how children learn. Does our current use of technology support the research?

5 points of learning theory

• We learn through play

• Sustained shared thinking

• Intentional teaching

• Building knowledge

• Feedback

Peter Goss @peter_goss
Using data to improve teaching

Peter made a strong data-based case about improving teaching

This was very interesting - data suggesting a "sweet spot" between inquiry and teacher-directed methods. Given that data comes from a PISA Science test which prejudices fact-recall and skills more suited to direct instruction, I am not sure there is any merit in this.

Looking at schools performing well above average in Naplan could help for us to investigate what works for them and what they are doing.

Dan Haesler
Engaging students

Dan had a clear message - it doesn't matter what stuff you buy and how many laptops you have to engage kids - it won't happen if they are not mentally healthy.

Student's need a feeling of connectedness with school.

Slides and more resources here http://cutthroughhq.com/nfs2018/

21st Century skills Roundtable

A discussion led by the head of Singapore American School, Dr Chip Kimball. The topic was assessing and reporting on 21C skills. He uses a rubric for assessing skills in a PBL environment. Communication to parents was the key.

These skills need to start early… we are obligated to teach these things and should not hide behind ATAR as an excuse to not do it…

To see a documentary on this work go to www.sasdocumentary.com