Emerging technologies for learning

Becta Government and Partners - Research - All publications - Emerging technologies for learning  Annotated

Emerging technologies for learning

 

These publications consider how emerging technologies may impact on education in the medium term.

They are not intended to be a comprehensive review of educational technologies, but offer some highlights across the broad spectrum of developments and trends. They highlight some of the possibilities that are developing and the potential for technology to transform our ways of working, learning and interacting over the next three to five years.

Emerging technologies for learning

Volume 2 (2007)

Download the publication Emerging technologies for learning volume 2 (please note this PDF is 3MB and may take some time to download).

This publication includes:

• Emerging trends in social software for education (PDF 470KB, Lee Bryant, Headshift)


• Learning networks in practice (PDF 508KB, Stephen Downes, NRC)


• The challenge of new digital literacies and the ‘hidden curriculum’ (PDF 385KB, Jo Twist, ippr)


• How to teach with technology: keeping both teachers and students comfortable in an era of exponential change (PDF 311KB, Marc Prensky)


• Games in education (PDF 596KB, Keri Facer, Futurelab; Tim Dumbleton, Becta)


• Ubiquitous computing (PDF 866KB, David Ley, Becta)

Summaries of each article are available.

Children film sex on their mobiles

Children film sex on their mobiles-News-Tech & Web-Personal Tech-TimesOnline Annotated

• This again highlights the need for teaching pupils about acceptable use and the need to preserve their digital identity
  - post by ictrambling

CHILDREN are using mobile phones to film each other having sex and are then sending the images to classmates.

Experts say the trend is growing and draw comparisons to the “happy slapping” craze in which children use mobile phone cameras to film assaults on members of the public.
...

Gill Mullinar, co-ordinator of the Sex Education Forum, part of the National Children’s Bureau, said children were computer literate at a young age, increasing the risk they would see graphic images they did not understand.

“What young people consistently tell us is they get too little sex education too late and it’s only about the biology of sex rather than the nature of relationships,” she said.

More shock at YouTube

I've just come across an interesting article on the BBC web site:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6226223.stm

School shock at vandal web video

A head teacher has spoken of his shock at seeing a video clip posted on a public website of a laughing pupil hurling a rock at a classroom window.
The shaky 15-second footage shows a clearly identifiable boy grinning as he strides up to throw the missile

What the article doesn't mention is whether this act was caught on CCTV or witnessed by anyone that would have reported the incident? If the answer to these questions is 'no' then surely there is also the positive side to the story: Vandals identified from Youtube video

The school now knows, and can prove, who commited the act as well as identifying two other students that were involved in the incident.

As ever there are two sides to any story - but which one makes a better headline?