I’m back in Singapore for my final week and today I’m visiting the National Institute of Education at Nanyang Technological University. My meetings have been with the Social Studies team and with the Curriculum Teaching and Learning Group but before I get into those I just thought I’d let you know about the classroom of the future here. It’s very different from the one at Learning and Teaching Scotland as it’s used for trainee teachers and for visitors to try and get people to think about how new technologies can be used in schools in the future. There are five pods with a different scenario in each but all using netbooks with added interactivity to download information from the noticeboards on a train or a bus for example, to collaborate with other students using translation tools, to play games on MUVEs etc. There is only one classroom bit where all the walls can be used as interactive whiteboards and screens in the table tops allow groups to work on the same piece of work before projecting it on to the walls. I know we probably have all the technology and that Glow will deliver quite a lot of that but being in the space it actually feels like a classroom of the future and not some random space with a label. There is a building programme here to create some schools where all these technologies can be used in practice, could be good to visit when they’re up and running.
Key words
What I’m reading
Citizenship and Values Education to the Rescue!
Flickr Photos
More Photos
Really like the sound of the classroom of the future – allows for truly collaborative work. Long way off for us though I would imagine. Do teachers get specific training in how to manage the technology? And are there any schools which have access to it at the moment?
We’ve spoken to some Singapore people visiting Scotland about their Future classrooms, and it does look interesting. Besides the conceptual difficulties of Reimagining learning spaces, the biggest difficulty is funding – not just set up but on a sustained basis.
Nick
Yes it’s a tough one, partly because of funding issues however I think Glow could accomodate much of what they were doing it just needs a bit more of a creative approach. Everyone has been doing e learning here during the H1N1 crisis so that they could stay at home, I’m not even sure whether we’re up to speed with that yet.
All the trainees get training in the classroom and a lot of teachers showed me their digital learning trails when I was out in schools. I did ask about sofware Nick if you remember we talked about all teachers having a laptop issued by the Ministry. Unfortunately no specifics for you but a general comment, ‘they put too much software on them and then they’re really slow.’
Cathy
Cathy,
Must confess I’ve been meaning to check out your blog for the past few weeks and I’m only now managing to do it. Looks like the trip has been really interesting and what better way to record it. Would be good to catch up with you when you eventually get back to sunny Ayr. Take care.
Bill
Hi Bill, great trip but exhausting and still final posts to write which I must do while things are still fresh. Would be great to catch up, I’ll be in touch.
Cathy
Cathy,
Sounds really interesting. Can’t see ICT in Ireland getting much support in the curren economic climate. Sounds like you have had a really interesting exploration of other education systems. Looking forward to catching up with you in the autumn.
Conor