I’ve got a friend, who I deeply respect for her wisdom and intelligence, not to mention the amount of experience she has had. Anyway, she was talking to me about all the changes that we’re currently seeing in education. She said, (and I might be paraphrasing a touch here), ‘Keith, when you’ve been in education as long as I have, and I’ve been in education a long time, you get to see things come around again – and I ‘m not talking once or twice, but even three times!’

She was talking, in this particular instance, about the ideas revolving around integrated curricula; that is, when two or more subjects are taught together in cross curricular units, perhaps linked thematically. For example, you might teach a unit called ‘Healthy Living’, and mix Food Technology alongside PD/H/PE.

Anyway, despite all the bluff and bluster coming from certain sources about how vital and important this new ‘innovation’ is, my friend reckons she’s seen it at least 3 times in the past. Added to that, the current Parramatta Diocesan obsession with agile learning spaces is hardly new, either; I’ve got an article from 1950 talking about why it would be great to employ flexible learning spaces. The difference? I couldn’t spot one.

This got me thinking though… what about technology? Are we seeing something new here with Web 2.0 technology, or is it just a different version of the new thing? For example, let’s think about making movies in class – great activity, right? Is it something that requires the current level of technology, or has there always been the possibility of making movies?

Are the laptops of today just the calculators of yesterday?

I’ve had an interest in games for a long time, and I’ve always been a champion of their uses for educational purposes. I still remember having a stand up argument with a teacher at high school, where I argued that Sim City was actually a worthwhile vehicle for learning about finance and economics. I don’t think I won that day, but that might have been a question of method more than anything else.

This article caught my eye, though. Although hardly ground-breaking, it tracks the way more and more game developers are examining the educational possibilities inherent in their products. And when we say educational, we are not just talking about in schools – there are examples of medical professionals, security officers and others out there using games to learn. I particularly like the Descent rip off which lets you fly around in the human body. Hmmm….

It fits in quite nicely with Apple’s ideas about Challenge-Based Learning, which basically suggests our education systems need to change to be more like… Mythbusters! There’s a link here.

This might all be a little bit of blue sky thinking though – what do people really think? I know a number of teachers read this blog, and so do a number of students, too. Let’s hear your opinion.

So what do people think?

Okay, I don’t really do advertising on this site, but this one is free and really cool. This is what’s called a text-to-movie site; and it does just that – turns a script you write into a live performance, with a whole bunch of very cute actors and backdrops! All thanks to a little project called Xtranormal.

Very impressive. Here is the link.

And here is a video I made, introducing an assessment task for some students last year, just to show you how cool it is:

I haven’t posted too much here about iPhone development – normally I leave that on my iPhone development page, but I had to tell you about some of the fantastic resources available for developers on iTunes U.

If you are a complete neophyte, I recommend you check out: SEE (Stanford Engineering Everywhere). This has classes for the absolute beginner, including an introduction to Java, and C++.

If you are a little more advanced, then I suggest you check out: CS 193P (Intro to iPhone App Development.) Another Stanford course, this one is directly focussed on iPhone development.

Enjoy.

(Oh, and you can get the textbooks from Amazon, if you need, but they are not cheap!)

Education4u continues to make progress in my plans to open another income stream on the app store. I’ve developed a very simple system for administering quizzes via iPhone apps. Basically, this is the way it works: Firstly, we start off with a splash page, advertising education4u. Then there is a start page. After that, 10 questions are selected at random from a sample of about 30 or so. Each correct answer scores the player points. After 10 questions have been asked, there is a conclusion page, which explains how well you did, and offers you the opportunity to play again. Pretty simple, but effective, I hope. These are the apps that I’m planning to develop in this format:
Australian History
World War 1 History Quiz
World War 2 History Quiz
Vietnam War History Quiz
I’ve also been thinking about developing a quiz based on the Australian Citizenship Test. I’ll let you know how I’m getting on.

Anyone know how long it takes to get your app cleared on the iPhone App Store? I’ve sent my apps in (all fine, no problems with uploading images or binaries) and two weeks later, I’m still twiddling my thumbs and waiting for my apps to be approved. Very annoying. I’ve read somewhere that apps that you have to pay for (which mine are) take longer than free apps to publish on the store. I wonder why… Something else that is annoying – if you are developing and selling apps in Australia, then apparently you need to register your business for GST – which is ridiculous, because normally you only need to register for GST if you earn more than $75 000. If I’m in any danger of that, I’d gladly register for GST, but I really don’t think that’s a possibility. Anyway, I’ll keep you updated on my progress. but I’ll also post some screenshots from my apps.