ICT : Creativity and Communication
Firstly let me explain that this is a post documenting an exploration in the benefits of ICT, creativity and communication in learning. In many ways it is a post asking for opinions on an idea rather than presenting a definitive view.
Over the last few weeks I have been having a few interesting discussions with EdBiol about ICT and creativity in teaching. As part of our continual classroom improvement we have been looking at how we can develop the teaching of the duller aspects of our courses using ICT differently.
When it comes to creativity in education there is no better man to turn to that Sir Ken Robinson. The video below features his Ted talk on Creativity in Education and personifies the concept of invisible learning. In my opinion t is like watching a comedian on stage yet by the end of the twenty minute presentation you will be left considering the value of creativity from both a pupil and teacher’s point of view.
For those of you who are now thinking “Yes but I am not actually very creative” Sir Ken has the answer in the form of his book “Out of our Minds : Learning to be Creative”.
As part of these discussions I have been considering my own learning and the fact that I learn best (or perhaps only learn) when motivated and excited. There is nothing like a new piece of computer hardware or software to ignite my thirst for learning. Like any new toy I want to engage with it find out what it can do and then put it to work.
In teaching I hate to see ICT being ‘plugged in’ or ‘bolted on’ to a learning task. It is not only artificial but wastes valuable ICT contact time. The use of ICT in education like learning should be invisible, hidden and masked by the enjoyment of the actual activity the pupils are engaging in.
So, as a conclusion we have been looking at the less interesting topics of our courses, asking if there is any pupil excitement involved and if there isn’t we are coming up with interesting ways of adding excitement to the learning recipe.
In Science, one idea is to use the likes of Plasq’s Comic Life to create a photo comic documenting the stages of a science experiment. Previously I have used Comic life to teach duller areas of the ICT course (no one likes the Data Protection Act) and have found there is a two fold benefit. Firstly the pupils are enthused and excited as:
a) they are getting to use the phones in class
b) they are using bluetooth
c) they are being creative and making a comment
d) there is a level of competition
(Check out our Comic Life resources).
The second benefit comes in the increased level of learning that is derived from pupils having to actually communicate a particular topic. It appears when pupils have to communicate (with limitations which I will outline later) their desire to understand the topic in detail increases (motivated by the fact they want to be proud of their comic).
With reference to the limitations placed on communication one example is telling the pupils their comics must only be 8 images (or comic frames) Recently in a Moving Image Arts class we took two groups of pupils and asked them (individually) to write and tell a simple story using only still photographs. We allowed one group to use as many photos as they need and limited the second group to only six photos.
Those pupils who were able to use any number of photos tended to have upwards for 10 or more, the stories are unstructured and difficult to identify from the photos alone. Those who can only used six photos created concise, easily understood stories and their photographs were clearly thought out and rich in detail.
On asking the pupils what they gained from the activity those limited to six photos appeared to gain much more from the activity.
If we apply this to the Science / Comic Life project then asking pupils to visually describe a scientific process or experiment in only six comic frames forces them to consider each photo in detail. The pupils have to consider each stage in the process and decide which is the most important and thus included in the comic.
Perhaps we have stumbled across something that is obvious and as a teacher you have been doing for years ?
Hopefully Edbiol will write a guest post on the success (or failure) of the project in the next few weeks.
