IT for Education

Blogs are, depending on your viewpoint, either a democratic enabler of individual opinion or the dumping ground for every man and his dog's irrelevant banter. The truth is they are both these things, and everything in between too. Blogs have given every person with access to the Internet an outlet to make themselves heard. This is great, because now your average Joe can share his thoughts with the world in a truly empowering fashion. It's bad because as with everything, when everyone does it most of it ends up as garbage. Journalism has felt the negative effects of blogs more than others. When everyone can be a journalist, no-one is, or more accurately, if everyone thinks they are a journalist why would they depend on traditional journalism? A term has arisen in the wake of the rise of blogging, ' blogspam '. It refers to blogs where the only concern is not journalistic integrity but page views, as the more eyeballs you can get the more money your in-page adverts wil...

Stumbled across this while doing some research. Looks like an interesting site: http://www.edudemic.com/

The first week of ICT on my PGCE course has now happened. We kicked off with a look at a few utilities that might be useful as teaching aids. Hot Potatoes http://hotpot.uvic.ca/ Hot Potatoes is a suite of educational tools that let you generate web-based crosswords, word searches, quizzes and so forth. Judging from some of the feedback from the web it's quite highly regarded by teachers. It seems to be abandonware since 2009 though, so the UI feels very dated and the whole package is lacking in modern refinements we've rapidly come to expect. Still, there doesn't appear to be anything else available that could be a suitable replacement. Would I use it? Probably not. Undergraduate-age students are at that point where they've discovered their independence so solving a word maze might be seen as beneath them. Ironically, once you get to post-graduate ages you're more likely to find use for the tools as mature students have that bit more maturity so as not to sco...

One of the required blog entries in my assignment is to discuss the usefulness of reflective writing in effective teaching. I don't mention this because it is factually true, nor as an attempt to sound as if I'm answering like I'm doing a GCSE exam. I mention it because I think blogs - as a concept, if not always the execution - are an inherently reflective medium and communication format, so it's worth discussing why. Then I'll just segue into answering the question, all natural like. A blog is not long-form, 'one-shot' writing like a thesis or book. A blog communicates near instantly and favours ongoing, frequently updated topics. This lends itself well to reflective writing as it does to any introspective subject by capturing that self-analytical process in bite-sized chunks, unhindered by pesky academic guidelines that  expect you to be rational . I jest of course, and indeed blogging's greatest strength - democratisation of communication - is a...

This is my blog for the ICT module I'm doing for my PCET teaching qualification. It's my assignment basically, so I'll be talking about the role of technology in the teaching space while looking at different applications, websites and research. Although it's 'only' an assignment blog, I don't want this to just be an exercise in ticking the right boxes. I have a strong interest in technology; my entire working life has revolved around it, from veejaying in nightclubs to teaching in digital media. I'm into gadgets, web design and creative coding, and I'm an avid gamer. I would really like this blog to be authentic, enthusiastic and interesting. I'd like that if anyone other than my peers or tutors stumbles across it they may take something new from it at the very least. It will be a test of my writing skills, which have been almost entirely based in academia for nearly a decade. I'm sorry then, if I ramble or confuse or appear take a trip d...