The future of school

The issue in the Sydney Morning Herald article “The future of school” shows how the influence of technology may not be benefit to the students if they are not a properly implemented.

Shapley, Sheenhan, Maloney and Caranikas-Walker (2011) states that it is inevitable that schools now are different from years ago due to the use of technology changing the “learning styles, strengths and preferences.” It is the use of new technologies that are influencing how students are able to access information, communicate, and to learn.

Professor Neil Selwyn predicts that classrooms will be empty of students and the schools will not exist anymore as virtual learning institution on the worldwide web might be implemented. As Selwyn says “everyone will have their own personal computer device in their palm and that will change many things in school in terms of communication, social networking and information-gathering and so on.” Also in the future, how exams will be online rather than hand written and “instead of having an open-book exam, it will be an open internet exam.”

In the United States, there has been 27 states announced that they will run virtual schools, however the implications of virtual school is the concern of budget constraints and falling enrolments. However there are benefits to virtual learning, such as students living in remote areas or unable to attend school due to medical problems, virtual school can be a great support to them.

However Professor Neil Selwyn believes “schools tend not be taken over by new technologies, rather teachers adapt them to suit their needs.” As students are able to download videos or MP3 files, however they need to be guided on how to use technology to aid their learning such as access information or collaborating to learn.

Selwyn states it is true new technologies are great inventions in helping people have greater resources and learn in a different ways. However technology will not fix the inequalities between students, some students will fall behind with technology while others will benefit. He believes parents, teachers and schools need to think about the issue of individualising learning. Technology should not be used to cut corners, rather to provide a second-rate education.

I agree with Professor Neil Selwyn, that technology should not change the way of education dramatically, it should be just use as an aid for learning. Teachers need to guide students on how to use technology for their learning rather than a short cut for their learning. However there are both benefits and implications of the use of technology, ultimately it comes down to the how well students are able to benefit from it and how well teachers use the technology in their teaching.

References:

•  Shapley, K., Sheenhan, D., Maloney, C. & Caranika-Walker, F. (2011) Effects of Technology Immersion on Middle School Students’ Learning Opportunities and Achievement, The Journal of Education Research
• Maslen, G. (2013) The future of school, retrieved October 7, 2013 from http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/the-future-of-school-20130822-2sdvz.html

School lessons worth learning

School lessons worth learning

This, my last blog entry, is about a media coverage that calls for a need to have a better education system which does justice for all Australian students. Just as I often get reminded of one of my lectures about social justice and market-based views of education, this article grabbed my attention avidly, with hoping for finding some useful suggestions towards achieving social justice side of education without too drastic sacrifice of market-competitive side of it, well… if there is something that sounds too good to be true, vast majority of the time it probably is…

But Michael Hewitson, a founding principal of Trinity College, came up with a set of some productive and constructive ideas in a book he penned due to be released soon,  which he have been learning lessons for through years of his experience and expertise as an educator , that any education industry-related personnel should arguably bear in mind with. They are as follows:-

- Parents are the best evaluators. Monopoly schooling can fail. Parents in poor areas need choice.

- Schools may not be the best place for some students to learn. Teenagers over the age of 14 should be able to take up full-time apprenticeships.

- Any community group can sponsor independent state schools.

- State education departments should fully fund independent state schools with enrolment open to all.

- Existing state and non-government schools should be able to apply to become independent state schools. New independent state schools could open in poorer areas if parental demand exists, and accept all students.

- Public student performance testing for all schools should be mandatory and results made public.

- New schools are needed that offer more than just core academic skills. Schools need to offer values for living.

- To ensure a diversity in publicly funded independent state schools, there should be a separation of church and state. Proselytising of any faith system (including atheism) should not be allowed in state schools.

- New schools that parents wish to choose for their children are needed in lower-economic areas. Values matter, and schools need to overtly state their value systems for parents to choose.

How Will Our Children Learn? Choosing Better Schools: Educational Excellence in Every Postcode, by Michael Hewitson, is published by The Publisher's Apprentice

These ideas are what portray the underlying problems as for why relative standards are declining regardless of how much money governments spend and also, these are underpinned by three fundamental principles which he identified.

"That more money thrown at a non-performing system of schools does not, and will not, increase student access to quality schooling.

"That school governance is the core problem which must be addressed.

"That all parents, both rich and poor, must have access to a choice of schools."

 One of the central point to look at, as the article presents, is about how the schools are to be managed and controlled. He sees the current way of operating schools- whether them be state or private schools- is problematic in terms of maintaining cost-efficiency therefore he argues that state schools should be allowed to choose between remaining as part of the state system/independent state school, run autonomously by a board with professional support from the department. And likewise, independent school should be able to choose to become independent state schools. His idea of independent state schools is something not to be overlooked in a sense that it is one of scarce ideas to be able to target underperforming schools yet sucking money like juice and those parents who are disadvantaged SES-wise so that parents from virtually any address can access to a school that is appropriately quality controlled. The economic factor is often argued as a vital factor to good quality education as Apple (1996) states “a good education is only one that is directly tied to economic needs” (p. 5).

Funding should be going to the right place, and school should be more dependent on people who know what they are looking for from education- parents and principles. These are the reminders to suggestions to the solution that we are all longing for.

Michael Apple (1996) Cultural Politics and Education, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York and London.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/policy/the-challenge-for-education/story-fn59nlz9-1226742745020#

South Australian Liberal opposition launches entrepreneurial education policy

South Australian Liberal opposition launches entrepreneurial education policy

I came across a news article about a state initiative in South Australia to equip students with the knowledge and skills necessary to be entrepreneurial-oriented which is about being able to plan, establish and grow one’s own business. It is said that the policy, which comes ahead of the state election due in March next year, aims to create an entrepreneurial curriculum that’ll be offered through three existing high schools. According to the policy document, the three special entry entrepreneur high schools will be supported by entrepreneurs, business leaders, mentors and organisations that’ll contribute to programs. Looking at the aim of this initiative in a rough sense, it leaves me the impression that it tries to overcome the unemployment rate and other economic constraints by emphasizing that students should be more focused on being business-oriented like it is depicted in opposition education spokesman David Pisoni’s statement, “The state Liberals are committed to nurturing our next generation of job creators and business and community leaders by fostering young entrepreneurial minds to drive wealth creation and innovation in South Australia into the future,” .

In my view, this particular piece of state-driven initiative comes in two different colours just as much as every coin has its flip side. Apparently it looks appropriate in a way that the education policy is trying to keep up with the reality-reality full of ambiguity of this ever-changing and complex globalised market-oriented world-by directing students to be ‘armed up’ with equipments to survive through this era of globalisation but meanwhile, it makes me think of, again, what the true meaning of education is, especially when students are in a transition period from childhood to adulthood.

Learning how to cope with the world is one thing, and at the same time it is arguably just as important to be given the opportunity to nurture their individual uniqueness, their personality which will form the foundation of whatever they will achieve when they grow up. During this set of processes, students get to learn to recognise that everyone’s different ability excels in different circumstances and this is where the concept of equity gets taught. It is about appreciating everyone’s different attributes and different abilities therefore cooperate one another by working in harmony to create a synergy effect to make the society a better place to leave for possible maximum number of people in our society, as its importance is also pointed out by Ladson-Billing where she states “Not only must teachers encourage academic success and cultural competence, they must help students to recognize, understand, and critique current social inequities(p. 476).

Getting back to the initiative, it appears to be more of a political propaganda rather than a kind of educational reform in its true sense, with possibly bearing in mind of next March’s election.

Just like South Australian Education Minister Jennifer Rankine says in an emailed response to StartupSmart that students can already study business and enterprise related topics through a range of existing subjects.

“There is a specific subject called Business and Enterprise in which students learn about the successful management of business and enterprise on a local, national, and global scale,” she says.

“They gain knowledge and understanding of business operations, develop financial and technological skills, participate in planning, developing, and controlling business activities, and evaluate decisions on business practices.

It looks like there is no need for any separate entrepreneurship program for schoolies when schools can possibly strengthen the entrepreneurship sections of even the current business related subjects.

http://www.startupsmart.com.au/government-and-regulation/south-australian-liberal-opposition-launches-entrepreneurial-education-policy.html

Toward a Theory of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy

DOI: 10.3102/00028312032003465

Am Educ Res J 1995 32: 465

Gloria Ladson-Billings

Australian education is built on sand.

Australian education is built on sand

An interesting, yet shocking article by Chris Nugent backed up with a set of data from National Primary English Curriculum 2013. It points out how ‘pathetic’ the current address of Australian education in teaching literacy skills, particularly in three key areas- English spelling skills, read-aloud skills, and the English alphabetic(phonic)skills. He found out some, in my opinion at least, blatantly unbelievable facts such as that half the adult population in Tasmania is functionally illiterate; reading test scores of yr 4 Australian pupils were the worst out of 27 countries in the English speaking world;

Up to 8 million Australian workers struggled with basic reading skill and also that our primary and secondary schools house an additional 1.5 million pupils who are also struggling with their basic reading and spelling. And subsequently he points out the enormity of the problem with the education system by arguing that our national English education has jeopardized the  status of curriculums by ‘uniformly refusing’ to systematically direct teachers to test or teach any of the 3 literacy basics as stated above.    He suggested to look at a set of data from the national English curriculum, revealing  how the current education system is lacking in teaching the above mentioned 3 key areas of English language as follows;

With this ‘systematic negligence’ done by the education authority, it shows how stark it can be to not even properly mention some of the most basic elements when it comes to teaching a national language  formally throughout the whole nation. What’s even more shocking is that the figures are reflective on 7 year levels in Australian primary schools, not just a single year.

He identifies the root of the problem as being an ideology of whole language ideology, which he argues that this has removed the literacy basics from Australian National Primary English Curriculum.

He suggests a following list of summary facts as the backup as he insists on this ideology precisely having functionally destroyed quality in basic literacy education nationwide;

• The 2013 national primary English curriculum by ACARA, is totally unable to help any primary teacher  in  the  job  of  teaching  children  to  either  spell  or read. Current primary English literacy curricula at all state and territorial levels are very little better if at all.
• Basic spelling skills,  read-out-loud  skills  and  alphabetic  skills  are  the 3  core skills which underpin literally every successful writing and reading task at school or  in the workplace.  Yet   since   at   least   the   early   1980s,   none   of   our government sponsored  literacy  curriculum  documents  has  contained  guidelines to  direct teachers at any level to the systematic testing or teaching of any of these 3 core skills.
•  As a consequence of this neglect, Australian government education systems at all levels between and including our kindergartens and workplaces have not systematically tested or taught the ‘literacy basics’ for some 30 years.
• Even Australia’s illiterate and semi-literate workers who have been supposedly re- taught basic skills (under the auspices of those government funded programs run by Australia’s  eleven   Industry Skills  Councils  and   DEEWR)  have  never been systematically tested and   instructed in any of the 3 foundational ‘literacy basics’ as described in  2  above.
• Since the early 1980s, literacy curricula throughout Australia   have   been oriented toward actually eradicating spelling from the testing and teaching of basic English at all levels: no other conclusion is possible. Later articles on this site will elaborate.
• The spelling-for-age level performance of our school students was last nationally tested all the way back in 1936.  Despite official denials, Australia’s yearly NAPLAN tests do not conventionally test accurate spelling skill.
• At least 70% of our exit secondary school students fail industry standards in  spelling
• And 72% of our exit primary school students, in at least Tasmania, fail in accurately sounding out words of 3 and more syllables: common English words such as consonant, imperative, survival and Australian heritage words such as Kakadu, Bandiana, Tingalpa.
• After  some  30 years  of  similar  curricula  to  these,  Australia  now  has  up  to  8 million  workers  with  basic  reading  problems  in  its  workforce  and  at  least  1.5 million students with serious spelling and reading problems in its schools.

To be frankly at the moment, I can’t really figure out how this ideology has led to underperformance of pupils in literacy education as I am not loaded with information regarding it in great details. But I can imagine the need for revision of the current NAPLAN test in place alarmingly arises as it is controversial in the fact that this sort of testing has been designed to improve pupils’ performance on a various aspects of literacy skills and yet some important elements in assessing any literacy performance are not even covered in the official documentation of the National Curriculum. Often it is thought that it is important to balance out the level of performance across all pupils from a various SES backgrounds, with frequent emphasis on disadvantages of pupils with migrant backgrounds like C. Ho (2011) states that “My analysis of the My School statistics presents a sobering portrait of the concentration of students from migrant backgrounds in public schools in poorer suburbs (p.9).  The complex nature of multiculturalism along with the disappointing underperformance on national average calls for even more well structured and systematic approaches to revising the current curriculum. Now Australia is facing against an array of Mt. Everest to climb over. 

Christina Ho (2011) Respecting the Presence of Others: School Micropublics

and Everyday Multiculturalism, Journal of Intercultural Studies, 32:6, 603-619, DOI:

10.1080/07256868.2011.618106

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=15608

Education geared for growth

Education geared for growth

Education industry … this is one of the sectors that makes Australia one of the most favourable destinations around the globe and that reinforces the multicultural identity of the modern Australia.

Andrew Robb, the minister for Trade and Investment presents his view in this media coverage from ‘The Australian’ concerning the importance of keeping up to date with the status of the Australian education industry- the nation’s fourth largest export, behind iron ore, coal and gold, and last year it had student enrolments of more than 500,000 earned 15 billion in revenue, and employed more than 100,000 people. The significance of contribution of the industry to the Australian economy depicts the ever-growing multitude of interrelation at individual, national and international levels as the figures that come with strengthened people-to-people, and institution-to-institution linkages that will last decades, as Andrew states.

But the current drawbacks, as Andrew identifies, include but not limited to the high value of the Australian dollar, a student visa system that was uncompetitive by world standards, and stronger competition from other countries and these are the contributing factors that resulted in a significant decline in the number of students since the peak of 630,000 enrolments in 2009 according to the article.  And he indentifies signs of a strong pick-up in the numbers and yet there is a pressing need to promote our education and training excellence.

What I tend to focus more on as one of the reasons for occurrence of the problems with education industry in Australia, however, is about intangible forms of struggle that are experienced by both Australian migrant residents and overseas students in common, more often than not.

Well, it has got a lot to do with cultural issues by the nature of it. A lot of times I have seen people-including myself in my early days of settlement into Australia-struggling with adjusting themselves into Australian society no matter what their purposes are to come and stay in Australia for a certain period of time whether it be temporary or indefinite. Quite often one of these forms of struggle is about understanding and practicing every day hidden curriculum type of thing which does not get taught explicitly most of the time but rather implicitly only if you familiarize yourself within a variety of settings in social context in any country. The nature of this thing dictates the realisation of the fact that it is only achievable through a generous amount of chances of social interaction with people of dominant culture (i.e. mainstream) in a number of different settings. But unfortunately, according to my own observations I have been accumulating so far, it is not necessarily as easy as it should be to get such opportunities for non-Australians to get used to hidden curricular elements in Australia. 

An educational institution is a place for social reproduction and as part of this social reproduction, they get together to learn how to exchange values from one another and gain emotional, technical and social nurturing. It is lacking in people’s efforts to actively seek for these things from one another, regardless of their backgrounds and why it is the case is partly demonstrated by G. Vass(2012) where he argues that there is an ongoing failure to account for the racialised underpinnings of the Australian educational setting(p. 1). The need for unifying all kinds of students by bringing them together through sharing of assistance for learning and acquisition of hidden curriculums for students of non-mainstream background is not well catered for.

Andrew Robb announced a new initiative for attracting more international students, called digital postcard competition where a competition to win a year’s free study in Australia along with lots of promotion about Australian education but I doubt it as anything more than just a single-use commercial trick unless there would be an improvement for the above-mentioned issue that is amongst the most important things keep in mind with.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/opinion/education-geared-for-growth/story-e6frgd0x-1226729533220#

Greg Vass, Race Ethnicity and Education (2012): The racialised educational landscape in Australia: listening to the whispering elephant, Race Ethnicity and Education, DOI: 10.1080/13613324.2012.674505

My Experience (Identity)

I am an oversea student from China. I came to Australia when I was 17. Now I’m currently a first year student in university and graduated from high school last year. I can still remember the feelings when I just arrived in Australia.

At that time, I basically know nothing about Australia. To me most people looks so different – different color skin, different color hair and different languages.  I felt really scared. I felt I didn’t belong. After a while I went language school, in there I learnt English and made many friends form different countries. At the same time, I was working as part time in hungry Jack’s. By doing all these, I started to accept Australia’s multicultural society. Now I feel really comfortable to live in Australia.  

I remembered in the first tutorial, we watched a video that a white man asking a girl who looks Asian “where are you from? I mean, where are you really from?” . This video was funny. And now I think people shouldn’t just judge people only by their appearance, because with different atmosphere people have different experience. With different experience people can always accept new things and not only be what they “look” like.

In my opinion, culture and identity can influence people and also change people in many different ways.

reference

Phillips, A. (2006). What is culture? In Arneil, Barbara and Deveaux, Monique and

Dhamoon, Rita and Eisenberg, Avigail, (eds.) Sexual justice / cultural

justice . London, UK : Routledge, 2006, pp. 15-29.

Wadham, B. Pudsey, J. & Boyd, R. (2007). Culture and education . Sydney:

Pearson Education. Chapter 1: What is culture?

Australia’s Religious Landscape

Australia’s religious landscape has changed dramatically since 1945. The most significant changes, which contributed to the currant religious groups, are immigration, denomination switching, and new age religions. Today I will talk about the present religious landscape in Australia since 1945, through the group of Christian adherence and no religion group. 

The number of Christian adherence’s percentage has been decreased from 1945 to 2006. There are a number of reasons for this. Following World War II many Europeans from countries with a catholic tradition such as Italy, Germany, and Netherlands immigrated to Australia. Also the end of the Vietnam War in 1975 led to a big increase of the refugee migrants in Australia. All these led to an increase in the number of Catholics; because of immigration changed, catholic became the largest and the most multicultural denomination in Australia. By comparing the 1947’s census to 2006’s census we can see an increase in the number of Catholics, and a decrease in the percentages of Anglicans. Due to immigration, Non-Christian adherences are steadily increased largely. Islam and Buddhism have rapid growth from 1976 to 2006. From the census data we can see that in 1947 Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam were not on the census because their numbers are too few to be shown, but in 1986 Buddhism became the largest Non-Christian adherence in Australia and in reference of ABS in 2006 Buddhists comprised 2.1% of the Australian population. Besides immigration there’s another main reason which is denominational switching. Denominational switching is the phenomenon of people switching from one denomination to another. There are many kinds of reasons for why people were changing denominations, for example, people dislike some of the rules of Catholics; there’s a better choice of church where the average of congregations are younger, their music are modern and the messages are clear. In reference of the census, from 1947 to 2006 there’s a big decline of the proportion of Christians, it went down by 24.0%, there’s also an increase in the category of No religion, and the number went up from o.3% to 18.67%. So this led to a big change in No Religion group as well.

Within no religion group there’s a big increase between 1961 and 1971; after 1971 the percentage of no religion group has been rising steadily. Also the not stated group has grown up from 10.9% in 1947 to 11.20% in 2006. There’s a big difference between “no religion” and “not stated”. No religion means the person who does not believe in a religion tradition, he does not associate with religion. However not stated means that a person who choose to not give his religion, it doesn’t mean that he has no religion. The total number of these two groups has grown up a lot since 1947. Some of the reasons for the growth of these groups are really simple, it could be the impact of immigration changed, more and more people who’s coming into Australia does not have religion; it could be people just didn’t really take it seriously, or it could be some people choose to believe in themselves instead of believe in God.

In conclusion, on the latest census which is the 2006 census, we can see that the Christian adherence is the largest group in Australia, it has the total of 63.89%; the non-christian group has 5.57% in total percentage; and there are 29.87% people who did not have religion or not stated. There are multiple reasons for the changes in Australia’s religious landscape. Immigration, denomination switching and new age religions has really made a big difference and helped in reshaped Australia’s religious landscape. 

Reference

http://www.australiancollaboration.com.au/pdf/FactSheets/Religion-FactSheet.pdf

http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/censushome.nsf/home/historicalinformation2006