Activity 6: Contemporary trends in New Zealand
Activity 6: Contemporary trends in New Zealand
Step 1 (What):
The one trend that is most relevant is the impact of digital learning. Within the Mathematical field the amount of changes from the old style of pen and paper/route learning is something of the past. The Ministry of Education site has stated that a focus on the "influence of digital technologies across all aspects of education" should be a trend to focus on. The growing impact of desmos, geogebra, and NZgrapher are a few visual Mathematical digital learning tools that are being used in NCEA assessments at our school. Being able to stay up to date and build on this trend is of major importance in order to stay relevant within an evolving digital world. 
Another trend that I would like to come back and focus on would also be the development of personal skills that Daggett (2014) was speaking about.
Step 2 (So What):
Career readiness data from the ACT's national studies has stated that 19.9% of those entering a four year programs and 51% in two year programs need remediation. Schools need to improve communication with multiple parties, such as parents, staff, community members, etc. and need to address this specific critical reality. Graduating students from college are not being up-skilled enough to make it in the University academic world and should get involved with the growing trend of being aware and keeping up to date with the digital innovations that have evolved.
The key challenge will be trying to get all teachers on board with this trend. The teaching world is an aging world with many approaching retirement. Many of these individuals do not see it necessary to retrain since they will be retiring soon. This impacts the generation of students that may miss out on some key digital skills, especially since NCEA is moving toward more and more digital assessments.Daggett (2014) mentions that "on average, 33.8% of students are likely to fail in a classroom where lecturing is the dominant strategy in comparison to 21.8% of students where the learning is more active." He also mentions that we as teachers need to become more student-centered and an interactive learning environment.
Step 3 (Now What):
My local Math's community has been responsive to this trend even though we were not really aware of the necessity until now. Our department has recently had an introduction of new management (me being one of them), as well as some new first year teachers. It was important for us (the Mathematical Department) to update the assessment and teaching styles of the department. There are still half the staff that are not so digitally inclined, but we have created an environment of shared best practices to educate not just one-on-one but as a whole department. This focus for our department is, strangely enough, in line with the trend the influence of digital technologies. The Epak mentioned from my earlier blog has allowed the department to network with one another and to push the digital trend along with our school policies. This restructure for our department also fits in well with integrating the new digital applications within our internal assessments, making them more relevant for today's growing digital trend.
My local Math's community has been responsive to this trend even though we were not really aware of the necessity until now. Our department has recently had an introduction of new management (me being one of them), as well as some new first year teachers. It was important for us (the Mathematical Department) to update the assessment and teaching styles of the department. There are still half the staff that are not so digitally inclined, but we have created an environment of shared best practices to educate not just one-on-one but as a whole department. This focus for our department is, strangely enough, in line with the trend the influence of digital technologies. The Epak mentioned from my earlier blog has allowed the department to network with one another and to push the digital trend along with our school policies. This restructure for our department also fits in well with integrating the new digital applications within our internal assessments, making them more relevant for today's growing digital trend.
Referneces :
Daggett, B. (2014). Addressing Current and Future Challenges in Education.
Retrieved from http://www.leadered.com/pdf/2014 MSC_
AddressingCurrentandFutureChallenges.pdf
Retrieved from http://www.leadered.com/pdf/2014 MSC_
AddressingCurrentandFutureChallenges.pdf
Ministry of education: sources relevant to future-focused learning.
https://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Ministry/consultations/Future-focused
-learning-resources.pdf
-learning-resources.pdf
OECD. (2016) Trends Shaping Education 2016, OECD Publishing, Paris. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/trends_ edu-2016-en Daggett, B. (2014). Addressing Current and Future Challenges in Education. Retrieved from http://www.leadered.com/pdf/2014MSC_AddressingCurrentandFutu reChallenges.pdf
What strategies are you guys using to get the teachers that are not digitally inclined to start changing their practice.
ReplyDeleteWe use our Faculty meetings to present "best shared" practices. As well as stress the value of our Departments reflections page. This has put the "visual" lesson in the hands of the teachers were they normally never get a chance to go and observe this type of lesson during their non contact time. This has proven useful with Desmos and Tinkercad. Also I have had private course meetings and sat with staff to show the actual benefits of Turnitin and relating it to our literacy inquiries. Basically our strategies is getting out and showing the staff the value by coming to them instead of asking them to come to us.
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