I have been Chair of Governors at a large High School for the past five years. One of the initiatives we have introduced is for Governors to have direct access with departments in the school. This week I had the priviledge of listening to an revealing discussion between two of the more experienced teachers in one department. They have been responsible for helping develop study and thinking skills across the school. Their reflection was that having done this for a couple of years, they prehaps had disadvantaged their students because whilst they had really become engaged in learning, they may have unwittingly walked out the classroom without the information they needed for their exam.
There were real echoes here with the e-portfolio debate, around the question of just how useful they really are. Is an e-portfolio something that encourages individuals to discover and capture using multi media a variety of learning experiences or is it a means for individual's learning to be assessed for a specific purpose.
Of course there had can be elements of both however if an e-portfolio is being used for assessment there has to be a real sense that records should be opened to others for external scrutiny. There are of course questions about how this is done, but in all the systems we have designed there is always the fundamental pedagogical question that needs to be addressed, which is who owns the portfolio. If it is fully owned by the individual then how reliable is the assessment?
I can imagine the cries for those that espouse the benefits of livelong learning portfolios who will argue the importance of holding your learning documents in one place. However how many of us really need this and furthermore when do we actiually look at work we created in our various historical learning episodes.
If you don't face this fundamental question of ownership then e-portfolios creators will be constantly haunted by the So What question. Is this all about just creating a more interesting storing space than an attic.
We are very clear e-portfolios are there for a purpose. To actively support people with their learning journeys through the provision of interactive learning plans; an easy means to gather evidence and where required to put permissions in place for others to interact with the portfolio.
If they are not we might be reflecting like the teachers about whether we have actually missed the point. Like it or not examinations and assessments exist and well designed e-portfolios can help.
Thursday 24 November 2011
Tuesday 8 November 2011
What's the future for m-learning in the next 18 months
The pace of developments in mobile technology means it is hard to make judgements about how this will impact on learning and ePortfolio applications. The only sure thing is that it will have an impact.
Our philosophy has always been to create solutions that can be as ubiquitous as possible so that they can be used across the full range of computer software and accessible from all browsers. We have recently been applying the same approach to mobile devices. As a result many of our clients sites are now accessible from most of the browsers operating on modern mobiles. We have also started to create custom interfaces for some clients that work better on mobiles.
The only challenge we have is with i-based applications like the iPhone and iPad which can be used to access our sites however there is a challenge around uploading files. Put very simply iOS runs browsers in a very tight sandbox, access to files held locally on the device is not possible from a browser. The only solution is to create bespoke “applications” which can be installed on a iPhone/iPad which do allow access to local files. One of our clients has asked us to develop an application to allows users to be able to attach from iOS based devices.
There is much to admire about Steve Jobs. His design principle of keeping solutions simple is one to which we aspire. Our sites should be intuitive enough to use without the need to read a great manual. We however do not want to follow his approach of creating a ‘closed’ community, even if we admire the fact that it has been a great business model.
Consequently the question about what will happen to Apple post Steve Jobs is an interesting one for us. Our current view is that Apple will do the same again in the phone market that they have done in the PC market i.e. become a choice based on design/brand rather than cost and functionality. We are pretty sure that Androids growth will hit their bottom line as they lose market share. It is also conceivable that they will lose income from application sales and iTunes particularly if another music/entertainment supplier comes into this market offering more competitive rates.
We also think that it is possible that Amazon might start hitting Apple hard with the Kindle Fire, although we are concerned that Amazon they have a modified version of an earlier version of Android which would appear to be heavily tied to their "platform" and as such is not open as we would like.
Microsoft release Windows 8 next year will also be significant. This is being designed to run on PCs, Tablets and Netbooks and for the first time not tied into the x86 chip (Intel/AMD) but will be ported to run on ARM processors which are cheaper and less resource hungry.
So what do we think will happen over the next 12 to 18 months? We think there is a real chance that Apple will lose market share unless is does something drastic around the pricing of its products. They have done it before in the portable music player market which they now dominate. There is talk that Apple is currently looking to secure a large supply of 7" screens, the gossip being that they are going to come out with a lower spec iPad to try and stop Amazon and the Kindle Fire becoming a threat. They have the early adopters and now need the mass market.
Amazon is probably the one company that can take Apple on in this space, they have the client base, they have the content, and they have the global reach, their product price point with the Kindle Fire looks spot in to take tablets to the mass market.
It is not surprising HP dropped their touch Pad pretty much after launching it when you consider this market, however there are rumours that they will come out with a new offering and we are pretty sure it will be designed to compete at a lower price point. It was interesting to see they could not sell the touchpad at £400 but they went like hot cakes at £89.
Our sense is that Kindle Fire, when released internationally, will start a new wave of tablets hitting the market that are better priced for mass adoption. Increasingly the PC we all own will be used for serious work where a keyboard and the fine control of a mouse is required with tablets becoming the way we interact with technology in the home environment. Already we find an increasing number of people using their smart phones to “check” things out while in the living room and this would be so much better on the larger screen the tablet will provide. We think the Kindle Fire might have it right, it’s not all singing and dancing but it does do what most of us want for ad hoc use, read my email and check the web while relaxing at home.
With Apple, Goolge, Microsoft and now Amazon all seriously entering this market we could finally see the mass adoption of the tablet in our home and business environments. This could have a major impact on the portability of electronic devises to support learning and assessment.
Let’s watch this space.
Our philosophy has always been to create solutions that can be as ubiquitous as possible so that they can be used across the full range of computer software and accessible from all browsers. We have recently been applying the same approach to mobile devices. As a result many of our clients sites are now accessible from most of the browsers operating on modern mobiles. We have also started to create custom interfaces for some clients that work better on mobiles.
The only challenge we have is with i-based applications like the iPhone and iPad which can be used to access our sites however there is a challenge around uploading files. Put very simply iOS runs browsers in a very tight sandbox, access to files held locally on the device is not possible from a browser. The only solution is to create bespoke “applications” which can be installed on a iPhone/iPad which do allow access to local files. One of our clients has asked us to develop an application to allows users to be able to attach from iOS based devices.
There is much to admire about Steve Jobs. His design principle of keeping solutions simple is one to which we aspire. Our sites should be intuitive enough to use without the need to read a great manual. We however do not want to follow his approach of creating a ‘closed’ community, even if we admire the fact that it has been a great business model.
Consequently the question about what will happen to Apple post Steve Jobs is an interesting one for us. Our current view is that Apple will do the same again in the phone market that they have done in the PC market i.e. become a choice based on design/brand rather than cost and functionality. We are pretty sure that Androids growth will hit their bottom line as they lose market share. It is also conceivable that they will lose income from application sales and iTunes particularly if another music/entertainment supplier comes into this market offering more competitive rates.
We also think that it is possible that Amazon might start hitting Apple hard with the Kindle Fire, although we are concerned that Amazon they have a modified version of an earlier version of Android which would appear to be heavily tied to their "platform" and as such is not open as we would like.
Microsoft release Windows 8 next year will also be significant. This is being designed to run on PCs, Tablets and Netbooks and for the first time not tied into the x86 chip (Intel/AMD) but will be ported to run on ARM processors which are cheaper and less resource hungry.
So what do we think will happen over the next 12 to 18 months? We think there is a real chance that Apple will lose market share unless is does something drastic around the pricing of its products. They have done it before in the portable music player market which they now dominate. There is talk that Apple is currently looking to secure a large supply of 7" screens, the gossip being that they are going to come out with a lower spec iPad to try and stop Amazon and the Kindle Fire becoming a threat. They have the early adopters and now need the mass market.
Amazon is probably the one company that can take Apple on in this space, they have the client base, they have the content, and they have the global reach, their product price point with the Kindle Fire looks spot in to take tablets to the mass market.
It is not surprising HP dropped their touch Pad pretty much after launching it when you consider this market, however there are rumours that they will come out with a new offering and we are pretty sure it will be designed to compete at a lower price point. It was interesting to see they could not sell the touchpad at £400 but they went like hot cakes at £89.
Our sense is that Kindle Fire, when released internationally, will start a new wave of tablets hitting the market that are better priced for mass adoption. Increasingly the PC we all own will be used for serious work where a keyboard and the fine control of a mouse is required with tablets becoming the way we interact with technology in the home environment. Already we find an increasing number of people using their smart phones to “check” things out while in the living room and this would be so much better on the larger screen the tablet will provide. We think the Kindle Fire might have it right, it’s not all singing and dancing but it does do what most of us want for ad hoc use, read my email and check the web while relaxing at home.
With Apple, Goolge, Microsoft and now Amazon all seriously entering this market we could finally see the mass adoption of the tablet in our home and business environments. This could have a major impact on the portability of electronic devises to support learning and assessment.
Let’s watch this space.
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