The BYOD team would like to thank all of you for participating in the discussions and activities we created for this topic that is not only occurring in the world of education, but is also a significant reality in many other professional areas. The conversations were enlightening as well as engaging, and many of you […]
Continue reading Thank You From Week 9 – BYOD Posted in: Week 09:
I found it interesting when I came across this article where 72% of students surveyed in Ontario said that cell phones should not be used in the classroom as an educational tool. Some gave the warning that it is just too distracting for them to use in the classroom. This makes me think whether students […]
Continue reading I found it interesting when I came acros… Posted in: Week 09:
Welcome to week nine and this weeks topic of BYOD (Bring Your Own Devices) prepared by Lisa Nevoral, Suhayl Patel, Shaun Pepper, Scott Tammik and Tom Whyte. To view our BYOD website, please visit: https://blogs.ubc.ca/etecbyot2012/ We encourage you to participate in many of the activities and discussions questions as possible. We believe our topic is very relevant to many K-12 schools and districts and we would like everyone to learn about BYOD through meaningful conversation and posts. To help launch this weeks topic and provide a real world context to our discussions, please take a few minutes to watch the following video, which highlights the issues one secondary school is dealing with, as it considers the possibility of implementing a BYOD program: Enjoy your week!
Continue reading Welcome to Week 9 – BYOD (Bring Your Own Devices) Posted in: Week 09:
Excellent video. Great production values and flows well with the music and relevance.
Scott you are gifted. Well done all, very impressed.
On a different, and possibly more personal, note,
I would have loved if you opened the topic to outside the classroom as well. There is a BYOD movement in professional circles now which could have been relevant to the a classroom setting and offer a different perspective.
Stuart
Thank you for your positive feedback Stuart.
Indeed, while the video intro provides a focused, case study style, intro to BYOD in a secondary school setting, as the full introduction to our topic notes, ‘BYOD is not only an educational phenomenon, but can also be seen in the world of business and government’.
While our course in general maintains an educational lens in its perspective, you are quite right, that BYOD is a growing movement in general – likely for cost reasons in many cases I imagine.
Great introduction Week 9! I’m looking forward to your topic – it’s very relevant today and you’ve already got me hooked with your very polished opening video.
Peggy
Thanks Peggy for the compliment on our opening video. I hope that you gain some valuable knowledge about BYOD this week.
Excellent video. Great introduction to BOYD. You’ve got me thinking about the possibilities and the challenges, such as: How do you monitor? What about students whose families cannot afford to provide technology for them? Looking forward to learning more about BOYD.
Sophia
Sophia,
The questions you posed are all relevant in the discussion around BYOD. I hope that by the end of this week some of them will be answered.
Lisa
Very polished video. Looks great — got that great Apple feel to it!
BYOD is a very important topic and I’m so glad your team has decided to tackle it. I’m really looking forward to it. I’ve always been about bringing my own devices into the classroom just because it works better and it isn’t a “victim” to tech support. I say this in a positive manner. While I know that the techs have a lot of computers to look after there are many updates that are needed on a regular basis to keep programs/websites happy and safe. A simple Java update is a great example of how websites no longer work on school computers. Or incompatible versions of software like Garageband can make tech difficult to manipulate on computers.
This is still a problem on one’s own device, however, if I’m solely using my laptop, I understand the limitations and can work within them. I’ve also just received an iPad to be used in my classroom. It is assigned by the district and locked out by them as well. No password is given and all Apps on the iPad need to be pre approved before they can be uploaded. This exasperated the problem as the apps often update several times within a week and to wait for them to approve can be a frustrating process. It can take weeks, it’s like waiting for Apple to approve apps on the App Store!
BYOD — is a solution but it does come without support. Looking forward to the week
That sounds so backwards Jonathan, that you are given the tool, but no freedom to use it. I guess i’m spoiled at my school, as we are given the right to download, stream, and basically experiment with any and all resources. Our Grade 7’s recently went full BYOD as a test grade and our entire Grade 3-12’s will be bringing their devices next year. I have not breached the subject with our IT guys – as I have an idea of what they must be going through to prepare – but this week will afford me that chance. I’ll try to pick their brains and learn all I can about how the Grade 7 test has gone. I look forward to learning more about this subject. Great Video Week 9!
And in my district we are given iPads that come loaded with many apps but are also given iTunes cards should we wish to purchase more apps.
Kent – It was nice to have a forum to vent in 🙂 It is backwards. It was a struggle to implement things that year. It was interesting speaking with admin about it as they couldn’t be more supportive but were handcuffed by tech support restrictions.
I should note that I see value in what the tech group is trying to do. Protect their computers from viruses and malware from getting into their systems. On the other hand — the only way that we can innovate and bring 21st century learning teaching skills is for teachers to bring these tools into our classrooms. I’m willing to explore but I was turned away when I tried to approach it in the “right way”.
With many of the programs I chose to not “install” them, but run them off of a CD for example. Worked well.
We have outdated laptops and very little admin rights on the computers. I am technically not supposed to use Firefox or Safari on the laptop. There are very few iPads…or Apple products in general. There is one voice in the IT dept. that does not like Apple products and has said so. This has made it difficult to move ahead and try some of the great resources out there. We do not have a BYOD policy for students nor would I be able to bring my home laptop and connect to the internet. This has been very frustrating. While I am happy to hear about so many other teachers that are experiencing more freedoms and access to other technologies I am also worried where that will place my students when competing against others for work and school opportunities in the future.
You have raised some interesting concerns here Ken, pertaining to the equitable access of technology – concerns which are amplified by the use of BYOD. We generally consider the haves and have nots, within a single school considering BYOD, but what are the larger implications to students long term, when their school refuses to embrace technology? Our school of 2000 is also serviced by one IT staff member (shared between several schools), however luckily he is not biased to one technology or another. It’s frustrating when the needs of everyone are impeded by the preferences of one individual. Keep up the good fight Ken!
Great introduction video. I like and appreciate that it was both informative and has got me thinking before I delve further, but the presentation of it is really professional.
Thanks for the compliment on our opening video. I hope that you gain some valuable knowledge about BYOD this week.
Very professional introduction. You raised some interesting points. The one I worry about the most is affordability for students. In Mexico it is definitely an issue.
I’m looking forward to this week.
You bring up a very valid point. Not everywhere in the world may be ready or able to adopt BYOD any time soon.
I hope you gain some valuable information this week.
Great video – very professional. I think that BYOD in K-12 schools is inevitable just has it has made its way into universities and work place environments. I am interested in the way these programs are being implemented. There are obvious challenges, as your video, pointed out, and I look forward to finding out strategies around inequities, IT nightmares and re-training teachers specifically.
At my school (in China), a teacher recently had his hand slapped for breaking school policy by having students use their cell phones in a photo scavenger hunt. It seemed so absurd to me, because the project was such a cool idea, but technically they were breaking the rules. Perhaps this week can give me some more ammo to argue my own schools way out of the dinosaur age.
First off – an excellent video production. You raise very important points around the pros and cons, especially the challenge of not being able to provide a fair ground for all students. Also, monitoring student activity could be significant challenge for the school administration and could have negative implications due to lack of maturity at an adolescent age.
In universities, there is a slightly different challenge. Although students may be able to afford a device and also could probably self-monitor their on-line activities, the IT staff would limit the types of devices they would like to support as it is difficult to provide consistent user experience especially when certain software are not supported on certain devices. For instance, Flash animation or video is not supported on iOS devices.
Outstanding intro Group #9. Scott, I loved the video you created. You are in the wrong profession – you could work in the media industry! This topic is very interesting to me. We have discussed BYOD at my school are in the beginning stages of setting up the framework/policies need to support such a change. We are working on creating a student oath and getting our PAC to purchase some mobile technologies for student’s who may not be able to bring a device from home. I am excited to see if you group has any suggestions for storage of devices so that they are not stolen and what about inappropriate material that may be on the device prior to it arriving at school.
Hi Jen. Thanks for your encouraging feedback – I wish you were in the guidance department at my high school all those years ago!
A agree, storage and theft is likely going to be a challenge moving forward for schools with BYOD. Fortunately some computer technology, such as all Apple iOS devices and laptops, have a free cloud based service to help you “find your _____”, which may help to locate lost or stolen technology. Its a small start, but a life saver when you most need it.
Power is also going to be concern I think. Most classrooms in our 60 year old school have only a handful of power outlets for example.
Group 9 wonderful video and discussion around BYOD. I teach adult education, so BYOD is the norm and there is a colloborative learning approach between faculty and student when there are technical issues or with the introduction of new apps that will make learning and communication more efficient. Some faculty still struggle with the concept of a student using their mobile device, ipads and laptops during lecture but really this is the norm, a student leaves grade 12 in June and enters college or university 2 months later and the learning evnivornment changes from devices not permitted in the classroom to being the norm of a classroom environment.
My son’s grade twelve experience last year at a private school was the institution welcomed laptops for taking lecture notes and presentations, the network was locked but students would use their iphone hotspot or other devices to access the internet and most of the teachers were not aware of this. Mobile devices were not permitted but students were using them regularly in a disclosed manner. Hopefully all schools will embrace BYOD to better engage today’s student.
Thank you for shifting my perspective of this topic, by sharing your view of the contrasting use of devices, when students transition from secondary to post-secondary classrooms.
Group 9, thank you for your excellent presentation. I learned a lot about BYOD and enjoyed the process thoroughly. Your content is very focused, and the videos you made are of professional quality. The activities on the blog represent a wide variety of tools that are used to make a BYOD approach in the classroom engaging, and the discussion questions yielded deep thinking into the subject. Great job you guys!
– James
Before you publish your posting, please make sure that you select a category (eg. Introductions) as well as assign some meaningful tags (keywords).
 | joeltremblay on Week 11: Voice |
| joeltremblay on A3 Elevator and Venture |
 | manny on Photo App Elevator and Venture… |
| adi on My last participation :-( |
| adi on My last participation :-( |
manny 10:45 am on November 1, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Hi Colin,
This reminds me of a study I had read in a previous MET class. According to this study, an experimental group of students ranging in ages were asked to submit their mobile devices for a period of 48 hours. The results indicated that some of the students who were accustomed to using social media exhibited high levels of anxiety and depression similar to those withdrawing from drug addiction. Through my experience, when a student receives a bbm, tweet or facebook message, the temptation to check it is too high. There is no doubt that mobile devices pose a distraction and I think this is something we need to live with and accept if we wish to use them in education.
Manny
ETEC BYOD 11:13 am on November 1, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Interesting points, regarding the distraction factor. I would like to point out though, that the adults are (in my opinion) just as bad as the kids in terms of it being a distraction.
However, I also believe that this powerful tool should not be ignored, because at this time we are unfamiliar at its use, or even how to use it properly. Does more research, and strategies need to be implemented, yes. Should effective PD be developed for all age levels and professions, yes (especially considering when one of my staff members say a man texting, while riding a motorcycle).
Pandora has opened the box, and yes, all that is left inside is hope… So on that vein, what might we do as adults, educators, and potentially parents, to help ourselves and those around us learn appropriate use?
Thoughts?
Kent Jamieson 1:39 pm on November 1, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
For me i’m reminded of the discussions i’ve had around tech being a distraction and the fact that the pencil was once deemed ‘new technology’, and i’m sure it was fascinating, controversial and quite a hot topic of discussion. However, it is now an invisible resource, which i hope mobile devices to be one day. We’re far from that day, as we are just beginning to implement resources and programs that put digital distractions into the hands of students. I’m not arguing against the fact that cell phones don’t distract students, I just feel as many do in this class in that their potential clearly outweighs their detriment.
Peggy Lawson 6:17 pm on November 1, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Thanks for posting the link to the stories about that survey Colin. The distraction factor is very real, but I was surprised by the results . I’d be interested to see a wider sample being surveyed about this question. My initial tendency is to think that we need to help teach our students to deal with these distractions, putting phones aside while we deal with tasks at hand.
Peggy
Colin 9:00 pm on November 1, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Thank-you everyone for your responses and I do agree that I would have liked to have seen a wider sample of student surveyed. I always assumed that students would embrace having BYOD but if this survey is to be believed then teachers might actually face some resistance from students to the idea. That said I do believe that it is important for students to learn educational uses for their devices as well as to learn to manage the distraction factor of their cell phones.
kstackhouse 9:02 pm on November 3, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
Thanks for bringing this up. I am not sure that students would actually oppose it. I know that when I introduced Edmodo to my class last year they were very excited about the text notices and the app. I think that the distraction is an interesting factor. I think students need to learn how to be polite and purposeful mobile users. There are a number of issues related to what would be common sense etiquette practices that many people fail to practice. Talking to someone while texting someone else really bothers me, most students do this when together. As mentioned above, the temptation to check a notice is very high. However, I think we should model how to handle this. We can’t check our notices while we are teaching or during a parent conference. Students should learn more about this. Our school has discussed creating PSA videos to address some of these issues. Another common problem is the way technology is interrupting our sleep. I do random surveys with my classes and it is becoming more common that more students are being woken up by their devices throughout the night. The shocking part is to hear how many people feel compelled to reply to a text that woke them up at 2 a.m.!
Patrick Pichette 10:04 pm on November 12, 2012 Permalink | Log in to Reply
I agree with the others regarding the distraction factor. However, even if cell phones can be distracting due to the constant notifications we receive, I still believe that the educational and increased productivity outweigh the distractions it provides. Having said that, I think it’s extremely important that students be made aware of how to configure their devices in a manner that reduces distractions. I look at my cell phone and how every application seems to think that it is so important that it needs to notify me whenever it is done something. To minimize the distractions, I’ve configured my device to disable all applications from the Notification Center other than the ones I truly need there. On top of that, I’ve disabled Sounds and Lock Screen access for all applications that I do not need this constant disturbance from. This has drastically reduced the number of distracting pop ups, buzzing sounds and lock screen light ups that I witness on a day-to-day basis. Most people don’t spend the time doing this which means they receive way more distractions than they should.