Curriculum Archives | Page 2 of 3

Understanding Personalized Education in Schools

Posted on October 20, 2020November 2, 2022 by user

Personalized learning is widely debated among educators. While I am not writing this as an expert in this area, I want to use this opportunity to begin a dialogue with readers about personalized learning – what are your thoughts, experiences, practices, hopes?

In recent years, a great deal of attention and investment has gone into pushing initiatives and software by Silicon Valley in utilizing technology to enable personalized learning. This has been met with varying degrees of criticism (for more on this, you can check out this Education Week article by Benjamin Herold.) In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic propelling the shift to online learning, the suggestion that it’s a “good time” to try-out tech-driven personalized learning is reemerging. Even so, the start of the academic year has been met with varying degrees of success. Schools and communities that have a robust digital learning culture and infrastructure are thriving while underserved communities with the lack of access to devices and connectivity are suffering greatly, thus the learning gap is becoming (scarily) increasingly wider.

The definition and approach to personalized learning vary from educator to educator and from organization to organization – it really depends on your pedagogical viewpoint. In practice, we can be talking about the introduction of a platform/software that guides students through different learning journeys built on an algorithm, or to some schools, a loose pedagogical framework in whole-school curriculum redesigns.

According to Herold, we can summarize this model as follows:

Personalized learning can be tailored to students’ strengths, weaknesses, and areas of interest
Pace and instruction are used to design for each individual
Technology is greatly leveraged to track and measure student learning and develop “learner profiles”
Educational tech tools are used to develop a student”s “learner profile” to help customize educational content

Too often, nowadays, we try to find a tech solution to all that we do and often begin to lose focus on what is most important. Personalized learning is not about technology. Let us not forget the power and importance of teacher-student relationships and our role as teachers in inspiring and being beacons to our learners. The human element in our learning environments, be it in-person or virtual is more important than ever in these uncertain times.

Paul Emerich France, author of Reclaiming Personalized Learning: A Pedagogy for Restoring Equity and Humanity in Our Classrooms (2019) debunks five common myths about personalized learning and a great comparison between a “humanized” versus “dehumanized” approach to personalized learning. I find these two resources particularly helpful to refer to when I find myself needing to refocus my pedagogical approach when creating and improving our programs at BSD Education.

From Paul Emerich France, Reclaiming Personalised Learning (Corwin Press, 2019)

From Paul Emerich France, Reclaiming Personalized Learning (2019); Barbara Bray, Rethinking Learning (2019).

It is easy for us to say just use some software to guide our learners through their learning journey, but France’s resources remind us to dive deeper and consider wider perspectives and circumstances when we plan our curriculum because too often, students just simply need to know that you are there for them and to inspire them – something no algorithm can replace.

What are your strategies when it comes to personalizing education in your classrooms and schools? What are your struggles? How can we better humanize your journey in bringing digital skills learning into your classrooms?

You can reach me at ey@bsd.education at any time to continue the dialogue I want to hear from you!

Three Key Elements To Facilitate Successful Maker Learning (or Any Educational Intervention)

Posted on June 16, 2020November 2, 2022 by user

We have written about maker spaces and maker learning in past issues and why we feel it can be an important part of the curriculum. After helping many schools worldwide develop and facilitate maker spaces, our Vice President of Education and maker space expert, Mark Barnett, shares his 3 key elements for successful maker learning.

After starting my own maker space in 2013, a mobile maker space in 2015, and helping dozens of schools worldwide design, use and teach in maker spaces, I have learned quite a bit about what works, what doesn’t, and why. Schools have made great strides in adding maker spaces to their curricula with a growing interest in maker learning. Some of these schools have done a remarkable job, and others have been left wondering what the hype is all about.

I see that maker learning is just one of many education interventions that a school can facilitate. Other education interventions include social-emotional learning, project-based learning, or even curricular products for math and literature.

To implement any of these strategies or interventions successfully, there are usually 3 main factors contributing to the success or failure of implementation. Each of these factors requires thorough commitment, and even if only one area lacks commitment, the whole intervention is likely to fail.

Here are the 3 key elements of commitment required for maker learning (or any educational intervention):

Commitment to the tool or technology
Commitment to the pedagogy that supports the use of the tool or technology
Institutional commitment to the success of the tools, technology and pedagogy

Commitment to the tool or technology

For the case of maker learning, this means that the school must commit to tools, technologies, and materials that support maker learning. Commitment in this element looks like this:

Acquiring the tools and technologies needed in a makerspace
Providing the proper use and training of the tools and technologies
Ongoing support and maintenance of the tools and technologies
Continued training and development of staff using the tools and technologies

Commitment to the pedagogy

Most educational interventions have an accompanying pedagogy that is best suited to support the intervention. For example, maker learning has its own pedagogy that includes tinkering, play, design thinking, and constructionism. Commitment to the pedagogy looks like this:

Providing training, support and professional development to teachers
Creating work-groups or cohorts of teachers who can spread the pedagogy and help pass along knowledge and training to other staff
Sending staff to conferences to attend and present shared knowledge on best practices and strategies
Provide access to educational research in the field of the pedagogy to stay current with the evolving understandings and to learn from others

Institutional Commitment

This final element is the most important one and, from my experience, the one element that makes or breaks the success of a maker learning program (or any intervention)

Creating a core team of champions who are charged with the success of implementation and are accountable for success
A strong team of leadership who truly believes that the intervention has merit and is dedicated to the hard work required to see the success
Financial commitment to all of the above mentioned points

It really is a simple formula to follow, and it is easy to implement once you have thought through each key element. Typically when I work with new schools, we discuss all 3 key elements before deciding to do any work together to ensure that the school is prepared to commit to all 3 areas before any work is done.

Use these 3 keys to help guide you on the successful implementation of any educational intervention. If you want more information or have specific questions about maker learning and maker spaces, please feel free to reach out to me on Twitter or by email.

Introducing Artificial Intelligence in the Classroom

Posted on October 8, 2019September 16, 2022 by user

Growing up when sci-fi ruled the world with fictional narratives of intergalactic space travel, robots, and Artificial Intelligence; my 12 year old self would be disappointed that we can’t be served breakfast by AI robots in a biodome on Mars by now. While science hasn’t quite delivered those sci-fi dreams, the emergence of AI has definitely arrived and left us wondering, “what now?” Artificial Intelligence is a booming field of study with lots of controversy and confusion; especially for educators and schools. Questions that we have heard from schools and educators are:

Should we even teach AI?
How do we get started with AI?
How can we install JavaScript libraries for neural networks (like ML5)?
How can we ensure security and privacy with AI deployments?

As you can tell from the questions, there are varying groups from users that know quite a bit about AI, to those that are just interested in learning more. Let’s break it down in an easy-to-understand way and answer these questions so you can make informed choices about implementing AI for your students and schools.

AI is here, whether we like it or not. Our philosophy at BSD Education is to empower learners with the skills and knowledge to make AI technology solutions that also respect users by reflecting on empathy and ethical concerns of AI development. We do this by providing students with real AI software to work with in guided projects that teach students how to, for example: install JavaScript libraries (like ML5) for Natural Language Processing or how to set up an AI system that can make predictive sounds with a drum machine. Lessons that we teach are coupled with classroom activities on topics about the critical issues of bias in AI algorithms, security, privacy, current research in the field of AI and more.

We strongly feel that adding the ethical implications and empathy of understanding how AI is being used is vital to prepare students for the not-so-distant future of advanced AI robots and intergalactic space travel. This is a message that we purposefully weave into our curriculum because we value the teaching of empathy as a critical skill needed to prepare conscious global citizens who will be charged with building the future while using technologies like AI.

Don’t know where to start with AI at your school? That’s okay, it’s a complex subject that requires careful consideration and understanding. To answer the first question “should we even teach AI?”, I think that students should be taught about AI, and then, when ready, how to use AI and how to program using AI tools.

If you are looking for a great intro to AI and the ethics of AI, try this free and open-source resource from MIT that teaches middle school students about algorithms and how sites like YouTube, Spotify and Netflix use those algorithms to suggest new content to users. This could be a great starting point for a discussion about AI in your classrooms that can be easily implemented and taught.

If you want to dig deeper into the ethics of AI and current research on bias in algorithms, check out the work of the Algorithmic Justice League and start by watching this video about racial bias in AI facial recognition. It is important for students to understand the harmful side effects of some AI software that are currently in use.

Starting conversations with students about the social implications of AI leads to a better understanding of the subject and allows room for critical conversations about the future of technologies like AI. By inviting students to explore ethical concerns and dilemmas, we are opening the door for conversations to be about humanity just as much as it is about the technology.

So whether you are just dipping your toes in the water with AI or you’re ready to start a project with AI libraries and pre-trained neural networks, it is best to approach the issue by painting the full picture of the technology and the social implications of AI by exploring these topics with fellow educators and students. Want to learn more and join the conversation? Join the #AIEthics chat on Twitter and catch up with what you have missed so far, here.

If you are interested in learning more about our AI curriculum offerings from BSD Education, please reach out to us here or reach out to me at mb@bsd.education.

5 Things We Learned From Running Our Own Makerspaces

Posted on August 26, 2019November 2, 2022 by user

The interest in educational makerspaces has seen an explosive growth over the past few years; you can now find them all over the world: in schools, museums, libraries and even in local garages. As a makerspace educator I can testify that these unique spaces provide transformational opportunities for students to get hands-on with learning while picking up new skills. If you are thinking of starting one, or already have one, I have some great advice from my experience. Here are the top five lessons I’ve learned from my experience in designing, maintaining and teaching in makerspaces.

Define Your Purpose

When I work with schools that want to start a new makerspace, we start with a school team to help them define a vision and purpose of the makerspace. Some schools want a fully integrated curriculum-driven space, some want an afterschool space, and others just want to focus on robotics. Once you define the purpose of the space, you can start to think about the tools, materials and physical layout of the space. There is no right or wrong way, you just have to design for what is best for your school. If you don’t know where to start, then I would suggest to visit a few makerspaces and look at different spaces. You can even visit professional makerspaces and hackerspaces. Here is another article that I wrote about defining the purpose of your makerspace.

Tools not Toys

Once you define the purpose of your space, you will need to think about what tools will be needed. I have found that a wide variety of hand tools and basic tools are more essential than big expensive equipment like laser cutters and 3D printers. In order to facilitate a safe space with your chosen tools, it is vitally important to stress a safety protocol with tool usage that includes safety demonstrations and tool practice time. In my space, we allowed grade 1-4 students to start using full size hand saws, cordless drills and hammers after tool training and safety demonstrations. Our motto was always to treat materials and equipment like tools, not toys to create a safe space for all.

Accessibility

The school that I worked with in Hong Kong was an inclusive school that hosted learners with a wide range of skills, ability and height. Make sure to think about accessibility for all of your students as you design your space, keeping in mind things like table height, loud tools in one area and ease of movement around the space. Also, make sure to have a range of different sized protective gear like goggles, gloves and aprons.

Sustainability

A makerspace will need many different types of raw materials to work with, from wood, pvc, cardboard, plastic, sheet metal, styrofoam and others. Try to find a local vendor who can supply your material needs that can hopefully provide bulk orders and delivery to your campus as a bonus. The cost of restocking materials can start to add up quickly, so I recommend that you re-use as much as you can. When we would design something like a large wooden scale model, I would always ask the students to design it in a way that we can repurpose, use forever or disassemble and use the parts for another project.

Purposeful Play

The Lego Foundation has been publishing research on constructionism-based play-pedagogy for years and I find it to be absolutely essential reading material for any makerspace teacher. I think that a makerspace can be a valuable space to bring learning to life that is curriculum driven, and at the same time fosters exploration, creativity and fun in learning, as long as they are safe with the tools. This goes for the adults and teachers who are in the space as well, sometimes you’ll just want to play!

No matter what kind of makerspace you have or what kind of tools and materials you have, these lessons learned are sure to spark a conversation with your team. If you have any tips or lessons learned, we would love to hear those too!

Bonus:

Here are 2 invaluable resources that I highly recommend for any makerspace:

Fab Foundation Lesson Plans, classroom-ready lessons designed by makerspace teachers all over the world

Meaningful Making Books -free pdf download that includes lessons designed by k-12 FabLearn Fellows

Passionate Teaching: How to Inspire Students

Posted on August 13, 2019September 20, 2022 by user

What do you remember most about the teachers you encountered in your school days? There might have been the one joke your philosophy teacher made about Immanuel Kant in Grade 11 that still makes you laugh decades after. Or your English teacher who encouraged your Grade 12 class to get through some challenging literature pieces by allowing you to take a chance to connect with it through culturally relevant comparisons. Maybe your Grade 7 science teacher started their lesson by engaging the class in reviewing a recent sci-fi movie. These three teachers are linked by how they care about students’ success in their subject area. They can see the relevance in enhancing their lives – they want students to care genuinely! As a result, these teachers usually like to listen closely too because their passion is infectious.

What makes a passionate teacher?

Effective and memorable teachers are keen to spread positivity and genuinely enjoy teaching and engaging with students. In addition, they are reflective, open to change, and always welcome new ideas. But with all these great qualities, there is one joint driving force behind it – the passion for what they do.

Robert Fried defines passionate teaching in his book The Passionate Teacher: A Practical Guide (2001) as “someone in love with a field of knowledge, deeply stirred by issues and ideas that challenge our world, drawn to the dilemmas and potentials of the young people who come into class each day — or captivated by all of these.”

In Alfred Thompson’s post “Why Passion is Important for Teachers” (2007), he observed how a teacher’s passion is a powerful driver of student outcome and performance in the class. Thompson followed the progression of a mathematics teacher assigned to teach a computer science class. The teacher was experienced, but the lack of enthusiasm in computer science dampened the course’s learning. Thompson also mentions that passion is not something we can fake.

Then what can educators do if assigned to teach something they’re less passionate about in class? Luckily, passion is something that educators can cultivate.

Just get started – be inspired!

Passionate teaching might be difficult but try starting with simple things such as searching about a topic area. You might be surprised and find something you connect with. You can also watch some Ted Talk videos or podcasts about the subject area to get inspired.

Find a community

Talk to teachers who are enthusiastic about the subject you are trying to get passionate about. It is helpful to see the subject through another teacher’s eyes. This technique is powerful, as you will find new approaches to passionate teaching that you can try in your classroom. In addition, you can try to see how the teacher sees their subject as relevant to the students’ future. You may also find great communities online in Facebook Groups and especially Twitter under #edchat!

Try new approaches in your own professional development

It is unnecessary to reinvent the wheel when teaching a new subject that you are unfamiliar with. Many educators in your local community share tried and tested classroom approaches. Additionally, you can find relevant workshops, events, or social gatherings organized for teachers through a simple Google search. These resources allow educators to exchange ideas in new teaching areas such as Tech and Computer Science.

These are just a few ideas to get you started. Hopefully, they will also get you excited about the new challenges that may be ahead this coming academic year! Follow us on social media to see upcoming teacher events, ideas, and tips to enhance your classroom.

If you have any ideas, recommendations, thoughts, or questions, please get in touch with us at ey@bsd.education, and I would love to speak more about Passionate Teaching.

How Coding Projects Promote Design Thinking

Posted on July 30, 2019November 2, 2022 by user

When it comes to Technology Education at BSD, we hope to inspire students to create with technology and highlight the importance of developing solutions that solve real-world problems. Making any new technology should be rooted in a solid purpose to help people. We emphasize this by weaving technology education projects into all subjects and infusing them with Design Thinking skills.

Design Thinking is a process for solving problems creatively. The three core pillars of Design Thinking are:

Empathy — Understanding the needs of those you’re designing for.
Ideation — Generating a lot of ideas. While brainstorming is one technique, there are many others.
Experimentation — Testing those ideas with prototyping.

Design Thinking helps capture people’s needs, possibilities, and ideas for an advanced human-centered solution or product.

Let’s see how we prepare students on their Design Thinking skills via BSD programs of learning.

All of our courses end with creating a project for a specific use. This motivates students to learn about their end-users, their demographics, and how they will use the project efficiently. This helps foster students’ empathy – starting the process of Design Thinking.

After understanding the end-users, students will start to code their projects. Students learn the basics of coding and other coding topics, depending on the topic and level of the course. Based on the requirements of the project, students may learn additional technical skills like designing characters or logos, understand color theory or branding, or even writing copy for their project.

Moreover, students should share and test their prototypes with their peers and, if possible, with some end users using an automated URL or QR code. This helps them get real-time feedback and adjust their project based on the response.

For instance, students must share their games with their classmates for testing and feedback in our Game Development course. Based on feedback, students may add new challenges, stages, characters, update the scoring system, or rewrite the gameplay.

As in any game, the experience of the users is key to its success. So, while their peers are trying the game, they are asked to observe how it’s being played and request feedback.

Students will then need to consider the feedback they receive and learn to exercise their judgment as to what will ultimately be a compromise between the features they like versus the feedback they have received on what the users want.

Finally, based on the observations and peer feedback, students can determine how they can continue to improve their projects to test them again. However, this testing and feedback cycle is not limited to a single cycle. Instead, it’s repeated as often as needed to make the game perfect – emulating the Design Thinking process of prototyping -> testing -> tweaking -> testing. This is excellent preparation for their lives as a whole and an excellent exercise in giving and receiving feedback.

With technology becoming ubiquitous, it is an increasing and urgent responsibility to teach our students that technology is not the solution to problems but tools people use to solve problems. Therefore, to effectively solve problems, technologies should be built to keep the people using them at the center; employing Design Thinking skills helps achieve precisely this.

Learn Something New: Our Favorite Technology Education Resources

Posted on March 17, 2019September 20, 2022 by user

You’ve decided you want to learn a new technique for the classroom. Now comes the tough question: where to go? How many times have we found ourselves combing through various MOOCs, teacher Instagram accounts, university continuing education courses, and online teacher resource guides only to realize that a full hour has gone by and we still haven’t come to a decision?

Don’t worry, we’ve all been there! To make it easy for you, we have created a quick guide on some of our favorite resources for finding new techniques you can try in your classroom.

FutureLearn – they have a specific section for teaching, and a sub-section from primary teaching or STEM education so you can easily find something relevant. The courses are often short (2-3 hours per week, for 2-4 weeks) and can be done flexibly and over a longer period of time if needed. We particularly recommend reading the comments – often the instructors ask other students to suggest activities and have gotten lots of ideas there.
Twinkl – one of the best places to go for inspiration while lesson planning, it will give you ideas for new techniques to try and has all the materials ready to go in an instant. Again, it is really easy to sort by year group and subject so you immediately find something relevant to you. You do need to pay for access to the resources, but we often find it is a good source of inspiration to flip through the ideas in our subject area even if you don’t have a subscription.
Pinterest and Instagram – while social media is often thought of us a time waster, there are tons of amazing education accounts out there showcasing real teacher activities in the classroom. Some of our favorites on Instagram include @thsfoundry and @steamexplorers.
Technology providers – have a new technology that you want to use in your classroom but don’t know where to start? A lot of tech companies are more than happy to help you get started, whether it’s Raspberry Pi’s classes on FutureLearn or Google’s Teacher Center there are often a lot of free resources. And of course, if you use (or want to use) BSD’s curriculum we are always happy to help so just contact us here.

Boost Your Confidence in Introducing Technology Into Your Classroom

Posted on March 6, 2019October 4, 2023 by user

<h1>… <p>… <body>? Does it sound familiar or like a foreign language to you?

This is the answer we usually get when we work with non-tech teachers to make technology part of their classroom.

Teaching is fun but can also be terrifying, especially when you’re doing it for the first time. Adding technology you may not be familiar with, to enhance your students’ learning experience, may even sound more intimidating. But don’t worry, we have come up with top tips to make this potentially daunting experience, easy for you.

1. Learn with your students. Your students will love the opportunity to drive the learning and at times act like the teacher. Frame it as an adventure to explore together: “Let’s explore together, I know that some of you may have had experience with it before, let’s take this opportunity to learn from each other and together.”

2. Use the in威而鋼
ternet as a tool. A lot of technology experts use YouTube to top up their skills – whether to learn a new code or create a new tool. Can you use YouTube creatively with your students to learn and build something? For some classes with older kids, this can be a great way to change the learning environment. Besides, who would say no to watching YouTube for homework?

3. Work in partnership. Remember the idea to make your students the teacher? You can assign students a role to make them part of the learning – whether it’s the CSS Superhero or HTML expert – this is a great way to build their capacity as experts and confidence teaching their peers a new skill.

4. It’s cool to copy. In technology, it’s not considered cheating if you copy! In fact open-source code is how a lot of programs are built. The role of the programmer or product designer is to bring together existing pieces to make something useful and they only build new things where they need to. Don’t be afraid to look online for inspiration for your design or code, and focus on encouraging students to think of new combinations that make something useful in the real world.

Our Students Answer “What is Love?”

Posted on February 10, 2019September 20, 2022 by user

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner! We have found that it’s a great day to remind our students and ourselves about the value of recognizing the people around you that make life a better place, and sharing “love” and messages of appreciation.

But how do you share “love”? As a fun Valentines Day read, we wanted to show you responses we’ve received when we asked our students what love was:

“Love is sharing my last piece of candy for my sister”

Nicole, 9

“Love is being able to trust someone, more than you trust yourself”

Leo, 12

“Love is going to the carnival with Mommy and Daddy”

Ella, 6

“If I were going to say it like in the books, love is going to the ends of the earth for the person you love”

Ellie, 11

“Love is kissing and hugging a lot”

Olivia, 7

“Love is feeling happy and light”

Claire, 8

“Love is when everyone gets the same respect and trust”

Eric, 13

“Love, is peace and honor!”

Jason, 8

“Love is JT’s class” (referring to BSD’s Innovation Academy)

James, 10

“Love is anything that makes you laugh”

Shaurya, 11

What do you think of their answers? Aren’t they great! What do you think your students will answer if you asked them the same? We’d love to hear it! Tag us at #BSDLove2019 and get a chance to be featured in our upcoming newsletters.

Integrate Technology Into Your Subject: Sciences

Posted on January 28, 2019September 20, 2022 by user

Last week we discussed tech-ed versus edtech and introduced 3 reasons why you should bring technology learning into your subject. For the next 3 weeks, we will be sharing ways to integrate technology into different subject areas, to kick off this series, let’s begin with science.

Many educators would immediately consider bringing in hardware, such as robotics. However, this requires purchasing new kits. There are other quick and simple ways to inject tech into your existing lessons and activities!

We are going to look at the 3 main ways that technology enhances and supports the science classroom: improving data collection and analysis, supported visualization of abstract phenomena and the presentation of findings.

Improving Data Collection and Analysis

When introducing the topic of data to students, don’t stop with pen and paper! Introduce tech tools such as Google Sheets to help students organize their data for better analysis. For an authentic technology learning experience, introduce students to simple programming projects using JavaScript to create dynamic data visualizations that support their understanding of the relationships between their datasets. Through such activity, students will practice 21st-century skills in working with and interpreting meaning from data with the support of technology.

Visualization of Abstract and Intangible Concepts

In a school environment, some experiments and simulations are inaccessible due to safety or budget constraints. For many students, abstract and intangible concepts in science can become challenging to grasp without visualizations. This is where computer-generated simulations become extremely useful to support student understanding. Bring in simulation projects, such as a project that simulates the speed of orbit of different planets around the sun, a plant simulation game to learn about the requirements to keep a healthy plant or a game of Pong to understand forces. Students can be challenged to solve problems by modifying values of simple computing concepts such as variables, conditionals, and animations to represent a real-world process/phenomena through experiential learning.

Presentation of Research/Findings

Give students an authentic audience to write for. The next time you set a poster or report task or assessment, consider asking students to present their findings and research through an online poster, website, or information app. In planning to use digital artifacts, students are challenged to consider the user experience and will use graphical and organization devices effectively to present information in an engaging and dynamic way. An added benefit of this activity is the shareability of the completed artifacts. Practice online safety and digital citizenship by asking students to consider how they communicate information online.

As shown above, you don’t have to change your existing curriculum and sacrifice hours from your existing practices and curriculum to give students the opportunity to practice important tech skills! If you are interested in hearing more about the BSD cross-curricular project offerings, please contact us – we would love to walk you through what we have to offer to you and your students.