iBooks Author – Changing School Resource Creation

I am fairly notorious at my school for my fondness for my iPad – thinking of educational contexts in which to use it, as well as practically applying those ideas. There has been some hesitancy for schools to take up the iPad for its students, in that they aren’t as good to use for work creation as they are content consumption (especially the 1st model). There has been, however, a development from Apple much more important that a new hardware announcement – that they are going into the school textbook business – and, more important, have released an iBook Authoring program.

This is an excellent development for schools because they can now gain more ownership of the resources they make and share with students. Any material teachers have developed and used in the past can now be converted into an iBook format for students to use on the very portable iPads – hence drawing upon the specific skills of the teachers in a school, rather than relying on materials from publishing companies that can be a little limited and uneven in its application to specific educational contexts.  Schools will also like the development, especially as it will reduce the need for a resource spend on textbooks that are often collecting dust in storerooms, or reduce the burden on parents in schools where the students purchase the books.

There can be criticism of the concept of the authoring software – that it can only be used on an iMac or Macbook and that the idea of “textbooks” is antiquated and teacher-centric. There is, however, a need for schools to provide some kind of foundation material, in order to teach students about the context and background of material / texts / themes / concepts being covered – as well as a commonality of message and resources throughout a year group. That way, assessment tasks are easier to set and administer.  The textbook is a current reality in schools and will not disappear easily. Nor should they.

There is also an possibility that if a school is a Macbook school, an assessment task could be set where students use the iBook software to make their own textbooks on a particular subject – or, really, any kind of book.  Many students like to emulate already existing templates and structures present in their media world – in order to present their own ideas. Producing a professional looking document would encourage them to enjoy completing the assessment task – enjoyment of assessment tasks is often half the battle. The key role for the teacher setting such a task would be to teach them about making the material theirs, instead of just rebadging Wikipedia – the conversations about the contents of the book would be as important as the final product.  The finished products could also help to foster conversations between students about their strengths and weaknesses.

It is an excellent new development from Apple, to see that they are also committed to creation of material, not just the consumption of it. Teachers and school systems should be excited about this because it will make education more tailored to individual schools and their students.

Movies Getting Back to Narrative – Hugo and Tintin

Over the past week I have had the pleasure to see two new movies with my children, Tintin and Hugo. Not children’s movies, though. I call them movies that happen to appeal to children. They were both a pleasant change from the films parents have become used to for a number of years.

The reason I liked both films is because they had a solid narrative at their core. They weren’t making constant asides, endless popular culture references nor patronising to their audience with comic actions put in just for them. They demanded their audience pay attention to the evolving narrative. This is especially the case with Hugo.  Hugo is an outstanding film because it demanded that people, not just children, learn and think about the way film used to be made and how it can engage with the imagination. The film itself demanded the audience pay attention to nuance of character interaction.  Tintin asked its audience to go back to a time where action was king in movies, where characters were villainous or good.

I liked Shrek and Shrek 2 and their satire on society and storytelling – getting away from the fusty, dry fairytales that Disney were doing at the time. It loosened up the reverence towards old stories to an era that was questioning whether narrative was really relevant to them – made it possible to tell old stories in a new way. The other sequels, however, watered down that effect and the range of films it has spawned have taken audiences away from paying attention to story and wait for the next injoke, slapstick or fart joke. The low point of modern cinema for me have been the Chipmunk films for that reason.

That is why Tintin and Hugo were a welcome change from that. There was a bit of old time magic in both films, combined with subtle use of modern technology that served the storytelling, not an end in itself. Unfortunately, while we were waiting to see Hugo, we saw a preview for a film that shows us exactly what is wrong with most films around – Journey 2.  A silly, 3D effects driven movie that cares little for narrative and film magic and engaging with the imagination of its audience. Cynical and manipulative. The moment Michael Caine appears is the funniest part of the absurdity that is the trailer. He is, in modern films, a bit of a cartoon character.

I am not looking forward to whatever kids’ movies we will see through the year. They seem to be continuing the sloppy narrative structure format we have seen and Pixar’s latest effort, Brave doesn’t inspire confidence. However, it was a good double whammy this Christmas / January school holiday period.

 

1-1-1 – A Way of Making Short Videos in Less than a Week

I have taught for a while and have yearned for a time when students can represent their ideas on video that doesn’t suck up weeks of unproductive time when other parts of a learning program can be undertaken.  I spent a lot of time with cameras shared around large groups. That was before the advent of the Flip Camera.

The Flip Camera – though it is being phased out in its Cisco version – is a fantastic tool for English teachers simply because it’s easy to film with, easy to upload to a computer and is relatively cheap. Another vital part of the tool is that schools own the cameras and hence prevent issues with student owned phones. It is important, though, to make the point to students that any footage filmed cannot be uploaded to Facebook, Youtube, etc.  When you have done that, you are ready for 1-1-1, once you have a set of 7 flip cameras.  That allows for groups between 4 and 6 to be formed.

The First Lesson.  This is to be spent planning the video and playing with the cameras, working on the principle that facial expressions and body language / movement is more important that voice – mainly because the flip cameras don’t have great sound recording. It does also put the presentations into the realm of the non-verbal, which is a good outcome. It is important to restrict the planning to that 1 lesson, because they can make up ideas and think of ways of practically enabling their ideas to be filmed – with sketches and short phrases to repeat, rather than detailed plans that can’t be filmed.

The Second Lesson. This is the filming lesson. It is best to find a spot in a school that has a number of spaces for filming, so you can supervise, but also allowing them to find a good space. For Romeo and Juliet, near a balcony is a good idea. This is a busy lesson, working with groups on approaches to filming, encouraging them to do multiple takes and film from different angles, in order to give them enough material to edit from.  It is important, though, to not micromanage their filming process – this is a chance to find the best way to experiment.  Simple ideas like holding the flip above their heads can give students ideas about angles.

The Third Lesson. Editing. This is where students can have their discussions of the most important parts of the footage and how to place it. In addition, students could insert music into their movies, giving it a more cinematic touch. This is also intensive, but enabling the projects, not telling them what to insert. It is important to keep this at one lesson – because it is easy to let this process take too long. That is because Lesson 4 is time for viewing, evaluating and reflecting.

1-1-1 Start it in Year 7 so they can continue to build on their skills each time they do it, making it easier to embed the lessons into programs, without video becoming a time vampire.

Have fun.

 

Electroboard Workshop at the CEO Elearn Day

Adam Tulissio from Electroboard is presenting at the CEO Elearning Day at the Southern Region Office, canvassing questions from the gathered staff about how to best use Electroboard in their classrooms.
Question 1. We don’t use the Smartboards
Question 2. Recording lessons without making a huge file.
Question 3. Finding and templates and resources already present, making templates
Question 4. Recording video
Question 5. Games

These questions were answered through Adam showing what Version 10.8 of the software does.

Hence, we were shown these tools:
-Staff can embed all documents, such as Word documents into a Smart Notebook file – and can prepare work at home because you can install Smart Notebooks software into a home computer.
-The software allows for tables to be made, like MS Word, but with a finger.
-The Calligriphic Pen gives a better looking pen on the screen – part of the new software.
-Windows computers – very important to have the correct screen resolution setting for the Smartboard – 1024 x 768 is the best setting.
-The Magic Pen provides a chance for teachers to focus on particular objects, magnify them as well as having notes fade after 12 seconds.
-Show / Hide screen shade tool is very helpful in order to reveal board notes one group at a time.
-Words copied from a Word document can be excised from documents in order to make a cloze passage.
-It is quite possible to overuse the IWB.
-Secondary teachers have a more difficult relationship with Smartboards than primary because of the nature of the day to day routine. Suggestion was made for staff to install the software on home and/ or work computer so they can play with the possibilities.
-Better to give students a Smart Notebook version of the lessons than a pdf.
-Important to tell the computer tech people to install Smart Notebook updates to all computers.
-The embedding of video was shown – but it’s important to have a Transcoding Software Package installed in your computers in order for it to work.
-The attachments tab will allow you to insert things like Word documents, hyperlinks and videos.
Comment : This really requires some playing with the program at home and in preparation time – however, can work as a reusable resource, to be adapted over the year.
-Attachments in the Smart Notebook files means that you can have a hub, rather than having it on files scattered around the system.
-The Smart Notebook program can be used like a Powerpoint, except with the capabilities of Mindmaps and the other things that you could do with Smartboard tech.

Comment: Representation Assessment Tasks could be easily achieved through use of this software, without concerns about different versions of Microsoft Powerpoint.

The page recorder tool was shown – it only records one page at a time.  However, via Smartboard tools – the white circle in a blue box contains Smart Recorder – which saves your lessons as .wmv files (on Windows machines).  Suggestion was made to purchase a desktop microphone in order to record the lesson with better sound.

These are the links to the Smart Notebook 10.8 for Mac and Smart Notebook 10.8 for Windows software updates.

Also, if you want a link to the Google Doc to the notes, find it here.

KeyNotes – A Lame Show and a Thing of the Past?

Keynotes, for any of us who can remember the early 1990s and obscure Australian TV, was a music based quiz show hosted by Australia’s favourite Puzzling Star, Richard Wilkins. (Puzzling Star, as in – how the heck is he still on TV?) It was a show so mediocre that no-one has bothered to make a Youtube video of any part of it – just this one page of some startling early 90s fashion. Keynotes are also the most promoted and hyped part of any education conference. They usually feature an educelebrity – a person who can wow people with powerpoints, prezis, videos – whose job it is to dare people to dream. About something. Anything, really. Then, the rest of the day is filled with people going to workshops that may or may not involve butchers’ paper. Though, these days, the butchers’ paper has been replaced with Smartboards or somesuch. (Of course, then there is TED, which is a day of keynotes. Woo!)  Keynote speakers are a vexed issue for any body that organises conferences. The people who organise the these conferences spend many a day trying to find the best, most inspiring people.  This is reinforced by the belief that Keynote speakers get participants through the door with their hundreds or thousands of dollars.

I think this is all absurd. My attendance at a conference has never hung on the identity of the Keynote speakers. To me, keynote presentations are somewhere between a American Televangelist sermon and a book launch. Promoting your yee-hah idea and then being humble about that idea. Though, as TED fever hits the keynote scene, I can see the whizzbang starting to overwhelm the humble.  I usually find Keynote speeches interesting for about 10% of their length. There’s the key ideas and a couple of good anecdotes, a couple of usable ideas and that’s it. The other 90% has been filled with a wide array of edufiller, mostly where we see that the Keynote speaker is just one of us – the one of us with a microphone, but one of us all the same. The filler often comes from the following array – some self-deprecating story of Where I Did Something Wrong and I Learnt From It ; When I Heard Someone Else Say Something Really Profound ; You Know, Stuff in the Past Wasn’t That Bad ; It Really Isn’t Your Students, It’s How You Engage Them ; All Students Want to Be Creative, You Just Need the Key ; Sometimes Your Students Are the Best Teachers and so forth.  And then I remember vividly the American educelebrity Gary Stager (whose Twitter name throws in the Ph.D, just so you know), who harangued people at the ACEC 2010 conference for “allowing” the National Curriculum to be written and spending the rest of the time generally telling people we needed to get with the times. And 1:1 laptops in classrooms will save the educational world.  The organisers at ACEC then got more bang for their $10,000 when Stager proceeded to roll his eyes at the work being presented during at least one workshop.

ACEC 2010 was my first ever big, expensive education conference and all I remember thinking from the Keynotes was Stager’s Rant, Sylvia Martinez’ GenYes idea being excellent (but, even so, was the 10% I liked of her keynote) and the best Keynote speaker by far being the Australian Chris Betcher, who didn’t charge $10,000, I would imagine. Betcher, like Britain’s educelebrity Stephen Heppell in a presentation I saw a year or two before, presented practical ideas, didn’t harangue people, didn’t act to “inspire” people and then was approachable afterwards. But as good as Betcher and Heppell were, the workshops and seminars were the main attraction at ACEC, as was meeting fellow educators. The same has gone, for me, at ETA Conferences. This is why I feel vaguely resentful that all participants at conferences are herded in to see the keynote, as if that person really is the Most Important Person to hear. It’s also telling when some people look askance at people who dare to tweet and web surf during keynotes, as if that is rude. Almost as if you were tweeting during a sermon or homily. It is at such conferences that you won’t see Twitter backchannels being shown on screens in the presenting hall – because more than likely someone doesn’t agree with a. the keynote presenter or b. the fact that everyone has to listen to them for the hour.

I thought I was alone in being annoyed by Keynotery until I went to a TeachMeet in Castle Hill recently, and Summer Charlesworth (@EduSum) was less than enthusiastic about them.  The entire set-up of the TeachMeets gave me an insight into just why Keynote didacticism and even the old conference model might be a thing of the past. The speakers only spoke for a short time, presented practical ideas and no-one was looking daggers at those of us who were tweeting and web surfing during the presentations. And instead of the 10% good stuff, 90% filler ratio, it was all the good stuff. There was a teacher in Yorkshire, Nick Jackson (@largerama) who spoke of Digital Leaders, which is the same type of program spoken of by Sylvia Martinez at ACEC.  His talk, delivered via Skype, was just as inspiring and helpful as the 10% of Martinez’ talk – except he didn’t charge a cent, didn’t need to put up in a hotel and got to the point quickly.

Having seen this model work so smoothly, what is emerging for me is two alternative versions of the educational conference. The traditional form, keynotes and all, may well be under threat. I missed the ETA Conference in Sydney this year, largely because I didn’t hear about it.  Emails didn’t appear, faxes may have been sent – I don’t know. Twitter is largely quiet about such conferences. Twitter was silent even during the conference, when only three attendees out of the hundreds who go tweeted during the conference.  In addition, ETA Conference attendance is a vexed issue when schools have tight PD budgets and often don’t like the prospect of having to pay for casuals in addition to the entry fees. Staff often have to choose to have only one PD experience a year, and many might not want to spend it listening to a keynote speaker.  In addition, planning and approvals for attendance has be done months in advance. On the flip side, having been part of the organising of such conferences and being a presenter, I appreciate that there are a lot of costs involved – not the least being the conference location, the food and the keynote speakers.  I can also appreciate that people would be resentful about having information from the conference being made freely available to tweeters outside the conference, who haven’t paid a cent.

TeachMeet, however, is a different, more flexible arrangement. They occur frequently, in a number of locations throughout Sydney, in schools that are provided free. Food is often supplied via sponsorship or BYO. They are also tweeted about – with the backchannel shown for all to see – are free, was easy to attend, there is no paperwork to be filled out.  They also more casual and welcoming, in terms of the format as well as in who can present.  It is much less confronting to someone to present a 2 or 7 minute idea than a 50 minute presentation. And no keynote.

I’m not suggesting that the traditional conferences don’t have their place or even prestige – they do, and will continue to have pride of place for many teachers. I still get lovely feedback on the material I prepared for Run, Lola, Run for a 2008 ETA Conference, which was created partially because it was my first presentation and I was desperately nervous. However, they might have to change their stripes in order to survive. The first thing to go might be the Keynote address, simply because they present lovely, challenging ideas, but ones that we hear all the time in education. What people crave at conferences is support, inspiration, useful things for classrooms, a friendly atmosphere. The special location, gourmet food and imported keynote presenters provided at traditional conferences are unnecessary trimmings. Concepts like TeachMeet will become more and more attractive for time poor teachers who need small courses served often, rather than the wagyu steak (or, in some cases, overcooked roast beef) served once a year.

Year 9 Blogging – A New Adventure

My Year 9 students are currently dipping their toes into the world of blogging (some of the students currently watching me write this don’t particularly like the “dipping their toes” metaphor).  It is all part of a plan to encourage students to compose persuasive writing, without only composing essays.

One my of students is telling me that Tumblr is better for people her age – WordPress is more for grown-ups.  Tumblr has pictures and is not “boring” – and students feel like they can express themselves and people can’t judge them.  The idea of sending messages to each other is also attractive.  WordPress looks like their assessment work, Tumblr more their leisure time.  Addictive, as one student is telling me.

And yet Tumblr is blocked here, as it is in most schools.  So, WordPress it continues to be – without the engagement level that Tumblr can provide.

A Year on From ACEC – What has Happened?

It has been almost a year since I went to the ACEC Conference in Melbourne – an amazing three days where I went from being an ICT enthusiast to being part of a bigger movement – to be inspired to be one of the enablers of ICT change.

On one level, I can look back at the year and say not much has happened in my own personal context.  Perhaps it’s been a failure.  Teachers at my school are teaching 1:1 classrooms, but are experiencing problems with battery life, slowness of the Windows machines.  They are also applying old pedagogies to new technology – have students use the laptops as an exercise book, copying notes, answering comprehension questions.  And not a lot has changed about the way most staff approach technology and project based learning is far from being a reality.  For this, I have wondered whether the context of my attendance is partially responsible.  After all, I really went because I was able to get accommodation and I wanted an excuse to go to Melbourne for a week. It wasn’t a part of a greater plan to have all the schools of our region being empowered by my wisdom.

This would be an overly negative perspective to have, however.  To me, looking back, ACEC was a consciousness raising venture that I could apply to my own approach to ICT over my whole career, not just a year.  In the past year, I have completed in e-review for my English faculty, outlining how the faculty could use elearning strategies by marrying existing programs with the technology.  It was a review designed for the next 3 – 5 years, not the next few months.  It assiduously avoided applications that I believe are short term fads (Xtra Normal, stand up) and instead looked at applications that will still be relevant to the aims of the faculty in the years to come.

It also showed me exactly why portable technology is the answer to many teacher dilemmas and questions – flip cameras, the ipod touch (at the time) – easy to use, easy to apply technology is easier for teachers and students to use.  I recently thrust a flip camera into the hand of a teacher who had never used a camera in the classroom before – by the end of the day I had plenty of usable footage of her classroom for an open day video I was making.  There, on a big screen, were her shots of her class engaging with computers and reading their poems for people to see.  Next step for her may well be to have students include flip camera footage into projects and portfolios – she certainly felt empowered by her brush with the wonders of flip.

I’m also finding that when little steps are needed to make teachers’ tech lives easier and more varied, I have been able to not only help them to use the tools, but explain why it’s useful.  And those moments come at random times.  It’s all part of a long term, organic process, I’m discovering.  Our e-learning co-ordinator is now picking my brain on how to use Twitter for student and staff engagement, which will be the next step in the skills I gained from ACEC being useful for something.

In the end, it’s still my PLN that is the best thing I gained from ACEC, and seeing the power and usefulness of Twitter.  Before ACEC, I felt a bit isolated and alone.  Now I don’t – I have a group of people I can rely on for help and resource links.  And moral support.  And Twitter – well, I barely used it before ACEC.  Now, Twitter has taken me places and shown me things I could only dream about.  Mind you, the staff at my school don’t get Twitter yet.  They still ask “how do you have time”, not knowing that they could get a load of information by being on for as little as 10 minutes.  That understanding may happen.  Or not.  I’m now not as concerned as I once was – paradigm change like that really is a process, not an outcome that is easily ticked off.

How the iPad is changing my teaching Forever

This is not an advertisement for Apple Computers, nor is it a clarion call for people to buy ipads. It is simply about how the ipad is revolutionising how I conduct myself in a classroom with the ipad in hand. I never really got how it could do it  - after all, people criticise it for not being a phone, not being able to play DVDs or Flash, not running Windows applications, having a keyboard that annoys touch typists. However, it all starts for me when I get to school.

As I sit down and dole out my spoonful of coffee into the plunger, I have the day’s newspaper ready to read, to see if there are any articles would be useful to look for later. Otherwise, I am on my twitter account, seeing if there are any articles about education or the outside that have been sent by those I follow. Sometimes I find articles that I tweet to my audience on the account I set up for students, where they follow any relevant article I find.

I then can get onto my Planbook, which I am still working out how to use. I have only had it for a week. So far, though, I have been writing point form lesson plans for the day, ready to refer to them in class. I was never a huge one for taking lesson plan books with me – I had a habit of leaving books behind and it was also a pain sometimes to sit down at my desk and write out the lesson plan. With the ipad, I just tap away in next to no time, wherever I am.

When I am in class, I take the roll with the Attendance app, which is the easiest attendance taking tool I have used – I simply tap whether students are absent, late, excused or present. I can also enter notes relating to a student from that lesson.  The app provides a running tally of how many times students have been absent and/or late, so you can immediately tell the students that they are skating on thin ice by being late 3 times in a week. For someone who hated taking the roll each day, this app is quick and very useful. A drama teacher colleague whom I put onto the app told me that she loves the way the app can place students into randomised groups of three or more – excellent for assigning students into groups for group work. All of it is instant and I’m not bent over a markbook with a pen. This ease of access cannot be underestimated.

During class, I have also used the ipad in a variety of ways. I buy ebook versions of textbooks used by students and use my Kindle app. The Kindle app is excellent, in that I can now find the quote I want much more quickly through the search function. Otherwise, I scan worksheets into the school system, which I then email to the ipad. I can then download them and read them through the iBooks app. Alternatively, I use QuickOffice to read Word documents. In addition, if I want to show any quick videos or play music immediately – instead of waiting forever for the lumbering Windows machine to decide to start up – I fire up the Youtube or ipod functions, accompanied by a lovely hand-sized portable speaker bought from Officeworks for $20.  (Name escapes me right now). At the moment, I can only use my 3G connection for the Youtube, but I never get near my 1GB download limit. It is worth it.

As students do activities, they ask a variety of questions which can be answered by a number of approaches – such as my mind, or the wonders of the internet. That way, I can show how I search for items, modelling internet usage. The other day, I had students who were struggling with how to write about characters because, as they said to me, they don’t read much in the way of prose fiction. So, I had a search for some Matthew Reilly – it’s a style that is engaging to the make student who doesn’t like reading anything – and then handed them the pad. They read it, fascinated. I can see that being a useful tool in terms of helping individual students access certain styles, openings of texts, all sorts of creative material. I cannot say enough how great it is to be not waiting, not going to the computer box and clicking endlessly, or lumping a laptop about – I am with individual students, providing individual answers.

During break times, I will be talking to staff and questions arise about texts, school dates, whatever arises, in my role as Assistant English Co-ordinator. With the pad, I can answer questions through whichever notes I’ve taken, the internet, book references. In addition, I know exactly when school events and assessment tasks are about to occur through CalenGoo – a nice app that makes it easy to read the school’s Google calendar. It all has meant that I am organised in a way I never have been – a bit of a Holy Grail for teachers, especially those who have a lot to do. Then, when school has ended, sometimes we have those pesky meetings.  I have been using the pad to take notes from meetings – using Pages – emailing them to myself or other people who need them.

I haven’t even touched on prezi and the other apps that are being continually developed for the ipad. I dare say that will come as I experiment more – and continue to follow excellent ipad users on Twitter, who mention what they are up to. In my school, I am a curiosity – and cop comments about “toy”, “fun”, etc I also have teachers talking about a reluctance to adopt a new device, because they have all their stuff on a laptop and/or desktop. However, there needs to be a change in the way they think about this technology. The ipad is a device with which you start from scratch – you don’t use it with Windows style thinking. I use it in conjunction with other computer tools to organise what I do and deliver a fast lesson without technology lag. It is the best tech tool I have ever seen for teachers.

ETA Conference 2010 – A Sherman Tank Rolling Forth

I thoroughly enjoyed the first day of the ETA Conference of 2010 – I think the Technology Park as a venue has improved markedly since the last time we were there. it was also heartening to see some younger teachers there – the profession needs to have younger teachers to learn what makes the subject of English tick. In other words, help them see beyond their own school context and beyond Naplan, Myschool and HSC results.

It was also great to see a keynote address provided by a new text world provocateur in Sherman Young. It was pretty clear that he has a clear(ish) vision of what we as English teachers will face in the next few years and decades. For many in the room, I was wondering what they made of the ideas of the impact of technology on the act of reading and responding. There were probably many who were comforted with the notion that students may start reading novels again, now that they are available on the Kindle or iPad. That is not, however, the point of Sherman’s vision.

The main thing I liked about Sherman’s talk was that he has a liking and link to the past – in that he likes books – but he presented ideas on how the ‘book’ will be re-invented, fragmented and sustained. All at once. It was, though, a positive vision and came with glimpses into how teachers could get their head and teaching styles around the teaching of English in this world.

Telling also were the answers to questions posed by Eva Gold and Mark Howie. Sherman is spot on in relation to the National Curriculum in English being about going beyond the medium and going to the core values of what you are intending to do with the subject. This is what a number of people do not quite get with technology – it’s simply a tool for the delivery and creation of ideas and information. It’s a great way to deliver it and create it, for sure, but it shouldn’t be the focus. As I said to people, it shouldn’t be remarkable to see people with ipads at the conference – everyone should have them. They are a great organising tool, a way to reduce clutter of paper, books, bulky laptops and other stuff we carry everywhere. Mark Howie’s question about students placing themselves more into the story, making it more personalised, is also a crucial question for all of us as teachers. The Web 3.0 phenomenon of personalising people’s experiences provides possibilities of a barrier-free responder/composer interchange. That would get teachers excited. Some of us who experience students who want to receive, not create ideas, would love to see a change in this. I don’t know, though, that technology will make more teenagers from the western suburbs want to interact with Wuthering Heights on any level.

The workshops were interesting, in that technology still seems a bit of a mystery to most English teachers. This is due in part to the dizzying array of sites and apps around, but I also think it’s due to the distinctly un- user friendly nature of Windows machines and the way they connect to wireless networks. It could also be that most English teachers still love their books and paper. Looking around during the opening plenary proved that most English teachers still like the old technology. No matter the age.

The younger teachers, though, are a bit of a concern. I talked to one who thought that tweeting during the conference was the act of a ‘nerd’. She, along with a number of professionals, need to see Twitter as a way to build professional learning networks, as well as a way to share information and learning with others at a conference in other workshops or to people at home or at work who could not make the conference. It would be good to see more people in their 20s tweeting next year, so the number of active tweeters can go into double figures.

Mad Men Series 4 and English Teaching

On the train going to the ETA Conference, there are a number of options available to me with this iPad on my lap. There’s books to read, twitter to follow, the Herald has been downloaded. I’m not on a train very often, but if I did it daily, I’d be vaguely disappointed to arrive at my destination!

This time I’ve decided to add to my blog and I’m settling on Mad Men Series 4, the one just finished. And phones.

One of the reasons I adore Mad Men is the efficient use of dialogue, sets, costumes and props (indeed, my partner and I have moments where we cry ‘props porn’ each time we see a lovingly lingering shot on a particularly good bit of 1960s kit). Each scene seems to finely honed and crafted, which makes each episode an event, rather than an episode in a TV show. But fans of the show would already know all this and there’s a mini industry of Mad Men analyses out there, so I’ll move swiftly onto my point.

The key symbol of Season 4 seemed to be the telephone. It featured on the pre-season computer wallpaper, standing next to Don Draper in an empty office, implying a desperate connection to a marketplace that could cause the downfall of a young advertising agency. Indeed, a phone call to Roger Sterling placed from Lucky Strike threatened to do just that. However, the most significant phone moment was when Don was dreading phoning California to ask whether his first ‘wife’ had died as yet, showing that the program is as much about the eternal question of maintaining and developing relationships as it is about cultural production in the 1960s.

The telephone continues to be as significant as it ever was to teachers. It might be dreaded phone call from a parent unhappy with their child’s progress in class; a call from a hospital saying that your child is there after an accident at school. There is something a little bit tense about the ringing of a phone, the mystery of what comes next. It’s different to the arrival of an email, which allows time to contemplate a response, a building of fear or development of a way to celebrate. The email is a silent messenger, whether it be a good or bad message. The phone, especially in an open plan staffroom, isn’t.

I find it ironic that this iPad has a phone SIM in it so I can communicate to the outside world. It uses mobile telephone infrastructure to send out its arguments – usually mobile phone communication is short, sharp conversations or texts – both are not exactly ideal for an extended contemplation on anything.

So, there it is. There is so much more to be said about Mad Men – Peggy, for example, has become a focal point for the examination of femininity in the 1960s – but that will do for now. I have some tweets to read and write.