You can find out more about Jason on his website >>
The ULearn12 channel has many more videos recorded at the conference.
To register for upcoming conferences, visit ICOT2013 and the Learning@School2013 Roadshow.
You can find out more about Jason on his website >>
The ULearn12 channel has many more videos recorded at the conference.
To register for upcoming conferences, visit ICOT2013 and the Learning@School2013 Roadshow.
Jason Ohler is a professor emeritus in educational technology. He was a keynote speaker at ULearn2012. Jason argues that we need to acknowledge that we now expect students to write media, and this means that art and design have become the 'fourth R', an essential literacy.
Hello my name's Jason Ohler. I am, amongst other things, Professor Emeritus of educational technology. I helped to set up a very early Masters in educational technology in direct response to desktop computing in the classroom. EdTech existed but it was effectively the study of how to create effective film strips and movies and laser disks and so on. And then the microcomputer came along and it actually empowered teachers to become producers rather than just consumers. and of course that trickled down to students and so on and here we are now 30 years later.
The revolutions that are at work now that we don't fully acknowledge, include, and perhaps the most important one is the fact that we now expect students to write media but we won't acknowledge that in any formal sense. We are still very stuck on the 3 Rs when in fact art and design have now become the fourth R. They are not sort of neat things to have kids do they are actual literacies that they need to be literate as producers.
And the idea is that literacy has always meant consuming and producing the media forms of the day, always. And if a student could only read but not write they would be considered half literate. Well we didn't really believe that we could produce our own TV and radio and those kinds of things, until about ten years ago, 20 if you're really geeky. And so being media literate has meant that you sort of gird yourself psychologically to understand how those who are in charge of the media are trying to sell you something. And that has changed, that has a whole new component now, and that is to be media literate also means to also be able to produce media because it is so possible to do so.
So what schools have not taken on is what does that mean to produce really literate, articulate, well researched media. In most places that you go in the world you will find literacy very much defined as a facility with words and numbers. And we have obviously moved beyond that.
In New Zealand, God bless you guys, you actually have a media literacy curriculum. I understand it is not mandatory but at least it is available, and it is such a step in the right direction. But you don't find that typically in many of the countries that I work in. That is considered an extra.
And the weird thing is we test for a facility with words and numbers and we just hope and pray that our kids are in command of what I call our media collage, and that's your average web page where we bring together movies, and still images, and music, and words, and art, and design, because I think we are smart enough to know that if you're not in command of the media collage then you can't walk through that portal that leads you into the digital economy. And we all want our kids to be successful.
But we test for a very old fashioned kind of literacy, that's still very important, as a guy who writes books and so on, words are still important, it is only one. And that is part of the media collage. And we are still not standing up and saying "You know what, literacy has expanded to include this." And if the whole point of being literate is to have access to employment, culture, power, personal fulfillment, if that's the point of it, then why aren't we very deliberately teaching how to create good effective, articulate, research based media collages?
Jason Ohler is a professor emeritus in educational technology. He was a keynote speaker at ULearn2012. Jason argues that we need to acknowledge that we now expect students to write media, and this means that art and design have become the 'fourth R', an essential literacy.
Hello my name's Jason Ohler. I am, amongst other things, Professor Emeritus of educational technology. I helped to set up a very early Masters in educational technology in direct response to desktop computing in the classroom. EdTech existed but it was effectively the study of how to create effective film strips and movies and laser disks and so on. And then the microcomputer came along and it actually empowered teachers to become producers rather than just consumers. and of course that trickled down to students and so on and here we are now 30 years later.
The revolutions that are at work now that we don't fully acknowledge, include, and perhaps the most important one is the fact that we now expect students to write media but we won't acknowledge that in any formal sense. We are still very stuck on the 3 Rs when in fact art and design have now become the fourth R. They are not sort of neat things to have kids do they are actual literacies that they need to be literate as producers.
And the idea is that literacy has always meant consuming and producing the media forms of the day, always. And if a student could only read but not write they would be considered half literate. Well we didn't really believe that we could produce our own TV and radio and those kinds of things, until about ten years ago, 20 if you're really geeky. And so being media literate has meant that you sort of gird yourself psychologically to understand how those who are in charge of the media are trying to sell you something. And that has changed, that has a whole new component now, and that is to be media literate also means to also be able to produce media because it is so possible to do so.
So what schools have not taken on is what does that mean to produce really literate, articulate, well researched media. In most places that you go in the world you will find literacy very much defined as a facility with words and numbers. And we have obviously moved beyond that.
In New Zealand, God bless you guys, you actually have a media literacy curriculum. I understand it is not mandatory but at least it is available, and it is such a step in the right direction. But you don't find that typically in many of the countries that I work in. That is considered an extra.
And the weird thing is we test for a facility with words and numbers and we just hope and pray that our kids are in command of what I call our media collage, and that's your average web page where we bring together movies, and still images, and music, and words, and art, and design, because I think we are smart enough to know that if you're not in command of the media collage then you can't walk through that portal that leads you into the digital economy. And we all want our kids to be successful.
But we test for a very old fashioned kind of literacy, that's still very important, as a guy who writes books and so on, words are still important, it is only one. And that is part of the media collage. And we are still not standing up and saying "You know what, literacy has expanded to include this." And if the whole point of being literate is to have access to employment, culture, power, personal fulfillment, if that's the point of it, then why aren't we very deliberately teaching how to create good effective, articulate, research based media collages?
Jason Ohler is a professor emeritus in educational technology. He was a keynote speaker at ULearn2012. Jason argues that we need to acknowledge that we now expect students to write media, and this means that art and design have become the 'fourth R', an essential literacy.
Hello my name's Jason Ohler. I am, amongst other things, Professor Emeritus of educational technology. I helped to set up a very early Masters in educational technology in direct response to desktop computing in the classroom. EdTech existed but it was effectively the study of how to create effective film strips and movies and laser disks and so on. And then the microcomputer came along and it actually empowered teachers to become producers rather than just consumers. and of course that trickled down to students and so on and here we are now 30 years later.
The revolutions that are at work now that we don't fully acknowledge, include, and perhaps the most important one is the fact that we now expect students to write media but we won't acknowledge that in any formal sense. We are still very stuck on the 3 Rs when in fact art and design have now become the fourth R. They are not sort of neat things to have kids do they are actual literacies that they need to be literate as producers.
And the idea is that literacy has always meant consuming and producing the media forms of the day, always. And if a student could only read but not write they would be considered half literate. Well we didn't really believe that we could produce our own TV and radio and those kinds of things, until about ten years ago, 20 if you're really geeky. And so being media literate has meant that you sort of gird yourself psychologically to understand how those who are in charge of the media are trying to sell you something. And that has changed, that has a whole new component now, and that is to be media literate also means to also be able to produce media because it is so possible to do so.
So what schools have not taken on is what does that mean to produce really literate, articulate, well researched media. In most places that you go in the world you will find literacy very much defined as a facility with words and numbers. And we have obviously moved beyond that.
In New Zealand, God bless you guys, you actually have a media literacy curriculum. I understand it is not mandatory but at least it is available, and it is such a step in the right direction. But you don't find that typically in many of the countries that I work in. That is considered an extra.
And the weird thing is we test for a facility with words and numbers and we just hope and pray that our kids are in command of what I call our media collage, and that's your average web page where we bring together movies, and still images, and music, and words, and art, and design, because I think we are smart enough to know that if you're not in command of the media collage then you can't walk through that portal that leads you into the digital economy. And we all want our kids to be successful.
But we test for a very old fashioned kind of literacy, that's still very important, as a guy who writes books and so on, words are still important, it is only one. And that is part of the media collage. And we are still not standing up and saying "You know what, literacy has expanded to include this." And if the whole point of being literate is to have access to employment, culture, power, personal fulfillment, if that's the point of it, then why aren't we very deliberately teaching how to create good effective, articulate, research based media collages?
You can find out more about Jason on his website >>
The ULearn12 channel has many more videos recorded at the conference.
To register for upcoming conferences, visit ICOT2013 and the Learning@School2013 Roadshow.
Education consultation and writer Tony Ryan talks at Ulearn11 about how technology in the classroom relies on good pedagogy in order to be a meaningful resource. Tony believes we should explore pedagogies and learning models such as connectivism and the use of mobile devices to enable new ways to create and co-create knowledge.
Craig Cummings is from the Department of Education in Victoria, Australia. Craig was given the mandate to investigate the elements of 21st century learning environments and then implement his findings. He discusses his findings In this EDtalk recorded at ULearn10 in Christchurch.
Annie Agnew was an invited presenter at ULearn12. In this talk Annie describes how she realised we need to listen to the children to identify how they deftly weave their learning experiences.
