Twitter to be taught at Schools

The Daily Mail is alight today with a story that “Ed Balls will today defend plans to teach primary school children about Twitter and Wikipedia while slimming down content in key subjects.

The earlier children learn about the internet and new technology the better, the Schools Secretary will say, or they will remain in the ‘technological dark ages’.

History and geography will be named ‘historical, geographical and social understanding’ in a new primary school curriculum.

Leaked draft plans, drawn up by former Ofsted chief Sir Jim Rose, show that primary teachers will no longer be required to cover the Romans, Vikings or Tudors in history and could drop both the Victorians and the Second World War.

However, the draft syllabus for English stipulates that ‘media texts’ and ’social and collaborative forms of communication’ should be covered alongside traditional works of literature.

These should include ‘emails, messaging, wikis and twitters’.

Wikis, as in the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, are sites that can be altered by users.

Twitter is the social networking phenomenon that requires users to post ‘ microblogs’ just 140 characters long.

Mr Balls will tell the Association of Teachers and Lecturers’ conference in Liverpool it would be ‘ nonsense’ to suggest children would learn about Twitter instead of the Tudors and that good teachers can ensure children learn about history and new technology.

‘Of course children should also learn about new technology. In my experience, the earlier they do so, the better,’ he will say.

‘In the same way we have a duty to ensure our children learn about history, we also have a duty to make sure they are not left in the technological dark ages – I believe good teachers are more than capable of ensuring the two things run alongside each other.

‘The modern world and the way in which we learn and absorb knowledge has changed radically and I suspect it will continue to do so.

‘We need to prepare our children and young people not just with knowledge but also with the skills to find information.’

But critics warned against draining lessons of academic content and said most children were accustomed to using modern media at home and needed no encouragement at school.

In his speech to ATL’s annual conference in Liverpool, Mr Balls will say children will be taught ‘a broad chronology’ of historical events such as the War of the Roses and industrial revolution, as well as making in-depth studies.”

Although the tradaitionalists may jump on the bandwagon, this is about more than simply “teaching twitter”.  Social Media networks are the communication method of the futre.  Schools have always been there to teach children the skills that they need to cope with life in the world, in the past this meant learning facts and information, but for the 21st century we have to ask ourselves why we need to “learn” the facts and information when we have permant access to a whole plethora of information on any particular topic.  Not simply the text book facts, the history of WW1 condensed into a simple list of battles and generals, but instead personal accounts and stories, maps, photosgraphs, images, the stories from the other side too, not simply the world according to UK historians.

It has been said many times here and elsewhere, that the challenge for teaching in the 21st century will be teaching children how to sort, sift and rate information.  What is fact, what is opinion, what are ravings by a madman with a grudge?  What is authority and what is unreliable.

We cannot assume that children will “abosrb” this information simply by using PCs at home.  Anyone with teenagers will know that some of the television soaps  almost become a living part of teenagers lives.  We see that reality TV has blurred the lines totally between fact and entertainment.  A new tv/film genre has been created, the docufiction.

20 years ago there was a similar outrage, as maths teachers decided to teach children how to use calculators.  Stating that yes, in reality, as soon as children had left school they would never use a slide rule, or long division, but that those academic principles should still be taught.

Frankly, I personally don’t feel that the world is a poorer place because children now work out Pie using a calculator.

Teaching social media isn’t about switching on, logging in an typing.  Its about teaching the awareness, of communication styles and skills, about gathering  and assessing information.

After all, isn’t the Social Media simply the debating societies of old?  And where as the debating societies were restricted to the priviledge few at universities and private schools, and also with the confidence and skill to talk in them, social media is open to all.

And that, we feel, is no bad thing.

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Digital Information will need a revolution in the classrooms

Microsoft commonly quote that “By 2010 the amount of digital information in the world is set to double every 72 hours.”

Blogging has now become mainstream with virtually all business having a blog with their website, and social networking means that pretty much everybody has at least 2 or 3 profiles.

The skills that we will need to cope with the mass of digital information are very different from the skills that anyone older than current school age will have been taught.  Traditional education centres around teaching information, and the student learns that information, and carries it around in their head.  Over time, recall of the precise detail of the information weakens, but the student still “knows” enough about it to go and refresh their knowledge through google, the web, or even still books.

In the future, the skills required will be centred around retreiving & gathering information rather than learning it.  And most importantly, about filtering information.

A google search on a general subject matter such as “Gordon Brown” currently returns about 15 million matches.  If we follow the logic we will soon have 30m matches, and then 60m…..etc etc. 

So how do we know which ones are right and which ones are wrong, which are fact and which are fiction, which are opinion and which are source documents.

When you can carry around the whole internet in your pocket, accessing it all in a second off your phone, or ipod or ultra portable laptop you don’t need to be able to remember vast quantities of facts and dates. 

Our mainstream schools currently teach ICT as a module, a specific subject taught in a classroom, learning word processing, spreadsheets, a bit of access, a bit of basic code, and if you are very lucky, photo and video editing etc.  Fundamentally, ICT lessons are not that different to those taught 10 or even 15 years ago.

ICT needs to disappear from the curriculum, and just be taken into every lesson in the same way that “writing” is.  Be viewed as a tool rather than a subject matter.  We teach our children how to hold pencils, and how to form their letters, how to read from left to right.  We now need to extend that approach to digital skills.

Will future educators teach children how to touchtype (will they even need to be able to type), how to form searches, how to skim read vast quanties of data and extract the one relevant bit.  How will the examination process work, what use in the digital world is an qualification about recalling information?

One thing is certain, the debate on education in the digital future is just starting.

Teaching Kids that Money Matters

As we go into the recession, and every family is feeling the financial pinch, the government announces the launch of an £11.5m scheme to teach children how to manage their finances.

 

The Populus poll of 1,000 parents and children, aged seven to 15, at the end of August found

·         70% were discussing money more than at the same time last year. A third of families had opted not to take a holiday this year,

·         62% had stopped having takeaways and meals out.  

·         36% of parents had already switched to doing their weekly shopping at a value supermarket, with a further 19% planning to do so in the future.

·         Over half (56%) had stopped trips to the cinema and other entertainment-related trips.

 

These decisions are noticed by the children, and although 77% of parents said they would normally try to avoid exposing their children to money concerns, the present economic climate means that things that children have grown up taking for granted are becoming more of a luxury.

 

Almost a third of parents try to avoid the topic of money at home and a quarter of these said that was because childhood should be a carefree time.   However maybe involving children in these discussions helps them to understand the context of their parents decisions and choices, and that the “pester power” that marketing companies rely on for so many sales may be replaced an gradual awareness that money doesn’t grow on trees, and that choices must be made.

  

The My Money programme will be rolled out to primary and secondary school pupils, covering topics such as how money is used and debt. A survey commissioned to mark the launch suggests children are becoming more aware of the credit crunch as parents discuss finances more openly.   Chief executive of the Personal Finance Education Group (that Charity that will be implementing the My Money programme) Wendy van den Hende said: “The spending changes that many families are making can actually provide an opportunity to get conversations started at home and talk about practical ways of managing money. “

 

Older children should have some concept of money, and that financial decisions are not in fact carefree.  One of the discussions which has come out of the Credit Crunch is that the UK society is a spend now society, looking for that instant gratification from consumer goods and spending with little thought or regard as to whether or not that spending is affordable.  The current situation is a good one to grasp, and to show the children a good practise, and to put into place the sensibleness which we need to teach.

The Top Ten Things That Hardworking Families Pay For.

Today the Prime Minister said

“Let’s never forget we are talking about households that are paying higher fuel bills as a result of global oil prices,  we’re talking about small businesses that are lacking capital because of a global financial crisis, we’re talking about couples and families that cannot get mortgages because of a global crisis, we’re talking about families and communities hit by unemployment because of this global financial crisis.”

This is good news from our Prime Minister who has acknowledged that during this difficult time his priority must be to “do what I can on the side of hardworking families”.

Is this the recognition that tax payers have being looking for years, the “hardworking families” that Gordon Brown is talking about are the normal, everyday, real people that pay the mamouth bills that this country pays every year in providing vital services to everyone, taxpayer, or not.

The top ten- So where does tax payers money get spent?  Here’s a quick guide through 2007-8 estimated expediture.  Are you happy with how your money is being spent?

1.   We spend over £103 billion a year on the National Health Service, this works out at £1,490 per person per year.

We have one of the best health services in the world, with some of the worlds highest skilled doctors and nurses at our service.

Are we as tax payers getting the service that they pay for, or are we having to pay for private treatments because the health service is snowed under with non-contibuting patients from other countries getting free treatment, and others that use the NHS to service their addictions problems?

Do you think that you should only get out of the health service what you put in?  Should treatments be restricted to the people that have paid for it?  And who should come first in the queue tell us what you think?

2. We spend £100bn on Social Services and other forms of Social Protection. 

And this doesn’t include pensions.  £27bn of this is personal social services, another £35bn relates to sickness and disability, £28bn goes on families, and £22bn goes on unemployment and social exclusion.  These are all huge numbers which would explain why policies which look to cut back on incapacity payments, and get people on benefits back to into work are always top of the election manifestos.  Do you agree that this is an area where easy savings can be made?

3.  We spent £79bn on Pensions & Old Age

Again, the UK stands tall in the world in providing a standard pension that everyone is entitled to, regardless of their financial status.  Many groups argue that the pension is too low, and can’t properly support an elderly person who has this as their sole means of income.  The stock market crash has wiped billions off the values of stocks and shares, and with it billions off peoples personal pension funds.  And together with an aging population this figure is only set to rise.  Can we continue to afford to pay everyone a pension, regardless of their other sources of income?  Do you think that Fred Goodwin (Lately departed RBS head) will truely appreciate his £90.70 a week or do you think it would be better spent elsewhere?

4. We spent Just over £70 billion on Education and Training each year, that’s £1,160 per person per year.

Falling class sizes, choice of schools, record exam pass rates every year, more people attending university than ever before……  The Government has spent a lot of money over the last decade on improving education, infact 20% more than 5 years previous.  Do you think we are getting value for money out of the eduction spend?

5. We spend £34bn on defense spending.

This is three times more than the total annual spend on the environment.  Should be be protecting our environment through military defense? Do you this those priorities are correct?

6. We spend £32bn on public order and saftey

Included is this £2bn on managing immigration claims and £5bn on the prison services.  The law courts cost us another £9bn.  Are we paying the costs of being a lawless society?

7. We pay £30bn on interest on government debt.

This is equivalent to £500 per person in the UK.  But given the bank bailout this is likely to rise next year.  We may be lucky, Northern Rock has already repaid 57% of it’s government loan, but how long are we going to be paying interest on the debts used to finance the banks.  Tell us what you think.

8. We spend Just over £21 Billion a year on transport.

Just over £6 billion a year that is spent on our roads, upgraiding them to be safer to drive on. The government is also spending over 20 milliom on road safty. Of this, £15 million was used to support all of the activity on the THINK! campaign. this covers media spend, PR work, sponsorship, partnership work creative work, e-communications and evaluation. The budget is spread across a number of issues such as drink-driving, child road safety. £3 million per year is spent on paid advertising for the THINK! Drink Drive Campaign. About £850,000 per year is for the THINK! Christmas Drink Drive Campaign. And  the rest of the money is spent on public transport,  bus, railways etc. Tell use what you think.

9.  We spend £21bn a year on things we never see.

£5bn gets spent on International Aid, should charity begin at home? Is it time we started looking after number 1? and what could we use that money for that would benefit the tax payers – after all, that’s more than we spend on under 5’s education, or over half of the secondary school budget each year.   This could provide state funded childcare for all of the those hardworking families who see huge amounts of their weekly pay disappear in childcare costs.  An amazing £16bn gets spent on legal, executive and non departmental bodies and organisations.  What do they do with it?  Who knows?  We don’t even know who they are?  Our guess is that this must be the civil service pay!  Tell us what you think, maybe this is the number that everyone jumps on as “wastage”.

10. We spent £12bn on Housing

This must be a minefield for the government, large amounts of houses that are occupied by people who may have never worked, or may never intend working for some reason.  Should we accept this, or should we ask our councils to do something about it.   Should tenants be evicted, and not given other accomodation, if they fail to look after and maintain their properties propertly, and made to pay the bill for fixing the property up?  Do you think that priority should be given on the waiting lists to the hardworking families that Gordon Brown is talking about, instead of them ending up down the bottom of the queue behind those with no earned income.  Even newly arrived assylum seekers are assured of accomodation somewhere or other.  However many working families find themselves stuck on the list for years and years in damp and inadequate accomodation simply because they don’t have enough “points”.

This is the top 10 areas of exenditure as extracted from the Functional and Economic Category Analysis of Public Sector Expenditure, April 2008, table 5.2 Total Expenditure on Services by sub-function 2007-08 estimated outturn.