Blogging Again - getting going for the new academic year

Out and about with our Roadshow this week reminded me how hectic it is in the FE colleges over the next couple of weeks with student induction underway. Wouldn't it be great if prior to starting new learners could login into the systems and prepare themselves for a new phase in their lifelong learning journey, hitting the ground running so that the excitement and motivation I could see in all the faces this week can be exploited.

I think most people would concede that, particularly young people (so called  Digital Natives), are well able to work their way around a system that has user friendly help. One of the attractions of coming into an FE institution is the perception that they will be treated like adults and technology, in particular some of the social software applications, I think can help in that respect. The ability to customise the interface, the opportunity to choose how other applications are integrated all add to the development of learner autonomy. Induction is a good place to start and I'd be interested to find out the views of my colleagues out in colleges.

Of course there is a need to follow through on this promise and ensure that the learning experiences meet the expectations set at induction time. I guess it all comes back round to taking a strategic approach to course development and delivery but in practice that's a tall order of course any strategy is dependent on a many variables. The team here at the RSC have been working out how to support colleagues in the learning providers we support to do this. Our Collaborative Course Design initiative aims to provide this, with the team working intensively with a whole course team over a couple of days and providing a mentoring role beyond that if appropriate. We'll be piloting this before Christmas and the focus will be on collaborative development of collaborative learning that exploits ICT to the full. Get in touch if you'd like to know more or feel free to comment here - ideas are always valuable and welcome.

Look Mum - I'm Blogging

Having had little experience of creative writing and having never kept a written journal in my life, I’ll admit to being a bit sceptical about this blogging malarkey. Indeed when I decided to produce a weekly Blog I was worried that I wouldn’t be able to meet the deadlines albeit they are self imposed. I have never regarded myself as being a particularly reflective person. I have a poor memory and often just barge on ahead without thinking things through properly and luckily my instincts often serve me well.

Having said that, I must admit now that I’m doing better than I expected and the requirement to think about next week’s “episode” seems to be improving my ability to reflect on my activities in general. I wonder if encouraging this type of activity would work with young learners moving into post 16 education. While I acknowledge that there are many mature learners both in HE and FE, statistics published last month from the SFC suggest that around 70% of learners in Scotland’s universities and colleges are aged between 16 and 20 and might be considered as so called “digital natives”.

It strikes me that introducing Blogs as an integral part of some courses would be a very appropriate method of encouraging young people to be confident individuals, responsible citizens, effective contributors and successful learners, the four capacities of the Curriculum for Excellence, an initiative underway in schools in Scotland now being introduced into FE colleges. Blogging and also other learning technologies such as ePortfolios, are aimed at enabling reflection, self assessment, peer assessment and use systems that can provide great functionality, accommodate a wide range of digital media, are user friendly and evidently a more attractive medium that pen and paper.

Our young people or digital natives might be very IT savvy but I’m not convinced that, in the main, they are particularly reflective or able to take responsibility for their own learning effectively. Perhaps incorporating Web2.0 / web publishing tools as legitimate learning technologies and even formalising their use within the curriculum, say within the core skills, might provide opportunities to improve information skills, digital literacy and motivate learners.