Frontpage Project meetings
Notes from 8 November 2011 core team meeting
Present: Richard Pountney (RP), Jackie Marsh (JM), Julia Davies (JD), Guy Merchant (GM), Cathy Benett (CB), Anna Gruszczynska (AG)
Action points from meeting:
Re: 8 December event
RP to contact technical advisers (as of afternoon 9 Nov Gwyn Ap Hari (SmartAssess); Keith Helmsley (Learning Connections) and Richard Johnson (Sheffield Children’s Festival) have confirmed their availability, waiting for YHgFL to come back to us)
AG and RP to brief technical advisers before the 8 December event
RP and AG to put together a draft memo of understanding/briefing letter for schools
GM/JD (plus anyone else approaching schools) to mention 8 December meeting with project partners and technical advisers(11:00-16:00 for teachers at SHU)
AG and RP to organise the event – agenda, venue etc. and communicate to the team; provisional agenda – 9:00 teas and coffees, 9:30-11:00 tutors, then joined by teachers at 11:00 and technical advisers for 12:30 lunch with 16:00 finish
Re: dissemination
AG to submit abstract for OER2012 (meaning-making/digitally literate approaches to pedagogy)
GM to submit paper to UKLA
Team to think about dissemination strategy throughout the project
Re: evaluation
JD to contact Keri Facer and invite her to 8 December meeting if possible (or suggest that she attend virtually)
1. Update on progress so far
i. recruiting partner schools (see also the partner schools page for updates)
GM spoke to Sarah Butler - SHU didnt send any students to Campsmount this year
GM not yet sure about the connections between students/tutors
one more school - GM - Sarah (?) keen to join the project., Maltby where students are doing blogging for A-levels her students are going to be working witrh students and teachers, GM said we can provide technical support
We have to be careful about gender balance and not to go too "techy-bloke"...
JD contacted Notre Dame - Paul Haigh- his blog - very enthusiastic when JD rang him he said yes straight away, very keen, he is responsible for the school being a teaching school, part of his strategy is to use social media, he is working with TDA and the National College and he wants to create a sutuation where evry teacher is a researcher; PH is involved in getting people to use social media
had a meeting with Bronwym Maxwell, Mike Coldwell
RP explained our approach when we talked to Campsmount - not necessarily an ICT person; JD has a feeling that Paul would delegate the work,
RP asked - how would those ten individuals work together? it is not so much about technology but insights into technology...
GM mentioned we need balance - different populations, apporaches to embedding digital literacy within the curriculum, gender balance
CB mentioned that somebody like Jenny Coates - will try new technology out;
JD said that at the moment we are working with gatekeepers, but the actual digital leaders once we establish who they are might be women - especially when it's the English department...
GM's approach was to say - it is an exciting project about digital literacy but left the details quite open
the team discussed how to distribute the training money - we might pool it; 5,000 for training altogether
RP explained why we put the money into the bid - we imagined that the Digital Leaders would want some element of PDP - this decision would be made when we get the schools together as an item on the agenda
ii. recruiting PGCE tutors;
GM spoke to Sara Butler; mentioned that there are some institutional obstacles, Sara was having a discussion with her line manager and is hoping to be able to join the project; GM is hoping to involve Julia Myers - says she is unlikely to give any time but might be room for manoeuvre; should we buy somebody in with the money
CB mentioned we need to work out what we want exactly; RP had a brief conversation with Julia Myers
RP suggested to consider plan B and plan C -
CB and GM raised their concerns - what is the role of PGCE tutors? RP explained the "story" of the bid and also a meeting with the ITTE community and their plans to put together a module on DL
elements of digital literacy which span contexts and shift all the time; JISC are interested in how the DL focus is shifting; possibility of involving TELIC - GM argued that there is something about PGCE tutor that is quite central to issues of learning re: digital literacy
CB - in terms what we might be producing, the tutor might be putting together materials, readings, pedagogy within education; capturing student perspectives -there would need to be some work to articulate the pedagogy, trialling and exploring with existing students; final placement in the summer - work on developing the pedagogy, framing the case studies,
RP said - digital literacy of both students and tutors needs to be addressed, there is a reciprocal/reflexive element... CB said - this is reflected in how you approach the pedagogy; RP - if we talk about), RP brought in Helen Beetham's conceptualisation of digital literacy, he also mentioned the distinction between digital approaches to pedagogy/digitally literate approaches to pedagogy
JD mentioned that in her conversations with Mick and Andrey - they were taking their students up to a City Learning Centre (CLC) in Rotherham and work with Tricia Sharp; she will be teaching students around digital imaging; later in the year they plan to be involved with CLC again around May-June - a project called "teaching Sheffield" - they will be producing things and archiving them; an idea how students could record stories - map it out? the tutors would be exploring new ways of working with students but also learning new things themselves; in terms of our project we could be critical friends to the tutors?
GM said this has clear parallels with what Sara is proposing, getting Andrey, Mick and Sara together would work really well together, generates new ideas etc.
RP wants to have a group of people who have a very open mind and not necessarily an agenda; the danger of people having agendas when they join us; SCF has an agenda - personal/institutional agendas that need to be catered for; what sort of meta approaches can we use? RP doesn't doubt they are great people
RP mentioned the ITTE workshop on 7th and their method of working - we would like to see a similar environment
CB mentioned this is where the variety of partners helps; the work with the students would come from the school base practice
GM - there is an issue with the timeline, CB added that students go on placement May-June - so we could leave primary schools till then and later capture what students do on placement, students then come back and have two weeks
JD - great to have students meeting together
RP - get our colleagues to explore agendas, we could help them articulate what the DL agenda is for them, a meta-level conversation, what are the drivers, what are the digital futures - do we have a say in them? AG mentioned that teasing out people's understandings of DL is at the core of the project
GM came back to the question of the role of the tutors; RP argues we will leave space for people to work with students; we need to give an idea of scale - 11 days for PGCE tutors; CB says in primary is unlikely to find 11 days for just the student work - need for clarity in terms of how students are involved, RP said the package needs to be dynamic; there is a broad economy - RP mentioned we are celebrating the richness and diversity, we want the different levels;
JD said tutors need some clear guidelines - but need to be partners with us on the project; 11 days - responsibility for developing resources around teacher education, specific responsibility, we don't want to be "one level above"... we want to treat the tutors as experts and not to access the students
GM - we need to get together as soon as possible to discuss the ways of working together
2. Communication between members of core team
Please note that a project updates section has been added
3. Rough timetable for the year
AG presented an outline of project phases, the timeline is not fixed – the only fixed dates are JISC deadlines; the work packages are subject to change as well. The list of jobs is mapped onto the work packages, it is there to help the team manage their involvement with the project in the limited time they have, once again, it is not prescriptive and should be interpreted as guidance only
The team agreed we will need to make the timetable flexible and perhaps have different critical points for different partners, CB mentioned that we need to be aware of placement schedules (different for primary/secondary), exams etc.
We will have an a meeting on 8th December (9 for 9:30 at SHU) which will bring the partners together RP and AG will arrange the day; as JM suggested, this will be a whole day programme - meet with tutors in the morning then with schools and then bring in creative partners
In the meantime, RP will continue to broker with the creative partners; we will talk to SCF and look at ways they can work with schools
JD asked about the relationship with LoveBytes - RP explained that initially this was on the periphery but the relationship between SCF and Lovebytes is getting stronger now
4. Open Textbook - initial thoughts on format, platform, content, authorship, and timescales etc (questions we need to ask to guide us)
GM would like us to imagine what the propositions for the textbook are, something that teachers can access online - what is it that we are aiming to produce, GM would like videos with text wrapped around them; case studies of classroom practice with kids work, talking heads, possibly digital challenges (ILF project); a macro level how the school has shaped its views of digital literacy and why; perhaps blogs? we need an annotated links page (AG mentioned she will be setting up a diigo group), teachers and learners need to know what is available - a placeholder - a space where somebody visiting the resource could add content; a desktop - a personalised space, a profile - as an aspect to the textbook; we might want to try and construct a community
RP - schools and learners might consider OERs as a strategy for learning; we need to know what resources exist, have a section which we can populate with "stuff" - it is expected of us that we make some conception of ways in which DL and OER interact - bookmark that for now
JD asked if we want a forum - have more than a database of resources?
RP - we will have case stories - stories people tell about DL and there will be contextual resources
JD asked whether the textbook will be a local or a global space; this is something to consider
5. Project brand – collegial decision as to project title/acronym:
We decided to go for DEFT: Digital Futures in Teacher Education - DEFT (quick/skllful? would make for a nice and easy hashtag #deftoer3
AG will start setting up project presence (diigo, slideshare, netvibes etc.)
AG and RP reported on the ITTE event
7. Dissemination
OER2012 - delegated to RP and AG (1December deadline, GM and CB will be in Vancouver during the conference)
JM mentioned deadline for UKLA conference (3rd December); GM and JD will write the abstract
UKLA - that is soon as well - symposium (3rd December
RP reminded the team about money for dissemination (£1100 per university partner)
8. Evaluation
We discussed Keri Facer as a possibility, and an evaluation which includes both formative and summative aspects, this means the evaluator needs to be brought in ASAP
JD expressed some concerns about Keri’s availability but will contact her; let her know the amount allocated in the budget and invite her to attend the 8th December meeting with a possibility of virtual attendance
9. AOB
GM mentioned TeachFirst, they are a different constituency - good idea to think about them, GM not sure about the implications, the students don't get a lot of attention and are resource hungry, they could benefit from the project
10. Date of next meeting
8th December, 9:00 for 9:30 at SHU (exact venue to be confirmed), the meeting will involve schools, tutors and project technical partners
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