Pedagogical Goals

By providing teachers with a professional development opportunity to work with iBooks Author, there are three primary pedagogical goals that I am attempting to encapsulate. The goals are listed in point form below and are discussed in greater detail below.

1) Increase motivation.
2) Increase student engagement.
3) Allow teachers and students an innovative way of delivering science curriculum.

1) Increase motivation.

When we think of motivation in education, the focus usually becomes the student but this is not always the case. Teachers also lose motivation after teaching the same curriculum for numerous years in the same redundant manner. Professional development opportunities arise and we are exposed to different pedagogies in the hopes of improving our own. It is easy to become consumed with minor details and burnout is quite common within our profession.

In the Learning for Use model, Edelson (2000) provided a framework in which technology supported activities must occur in steps: the motivation, construction, and refinement of knowledge. A key to the motivational piece of this model is getting the learner to experience curiosity towards a topic or concept. This can be thought of as a hook or sponge to a typical lesson plan and during my initial experimentation of professional development with iBooks author, the video below has allowed me to do just that. After viewing the ease at which iBooks can be published, the reaction turns from a curiosity to a demand for this knowledge. Furthermore, when teachers develop their own iBooks for student use, there is an intro media section that if put together right, is great at increasing motivation for their students. Ultimately, students are very inquisitive and will only show passion and motivation for a topic if their teacher shows it too.

http://youtu.be/b-WsMzOwmhI

2) Increase student engagement.

Student engagement is a long studied phenomenon and provides the basis for student performance. In the past few decades, our views on education have changed from the traditional behaviourist theory of how learning occurs to the more recent constructivist theory that emphasizes collaborative problem based learning. Teacher observations along with student attendance rates, particularly for ‘at risk’ youth is usually a good indicator of student engagement.

iPads are appearing in classrooms across North America and research in this area branches two key domains: the iPad device itself and the apps that support it. In their review on both of these domains, Murray and Olcese (2011) concluded that apart from the multi-touch interface, the iPad itself does not offer much more in a classroom setting than a typical computer would. Their research then moved onto how the applications that are being developed take advantage of the iPads hardware. Their analysis included a variety of educational apps within the education category of iTunes. They concluded that most apps emphasize simple drill and practice exercises or act as portals to information that is already available. Although the iPads hardware contains potential for more collaborative educational apps, the majority are designed with the behaviourist theory of learning in mind.

The research mentioned above is indicative of my initial experience with a classroom set of thirty iPads. They worked well in incremental doses but required heavy supervision as students would easily get disengaged from the Apps I provided. This contrasts from my experience with iBooks author as students enjoy not only working on Science tasks that I have made for them on iBooks author, but also creating their own. The overall response has been positive and allowing them to create their own iBooks has increased both student engagement and performance.

3. Allow teachers and students an innovative way of delivering science curriculum.

Since educations inception, the words fun, and school, were not to be mentioned in the same sentence. Why can’t learning be fun? This is a question that we are now answering with tools such as technology at our disposal. By delivering curriculum through innovative techniques such as iBooks Author, we are allowing student to have fun with the content and also subconsciously learn digital fluency skills that are transferable to other areas of their life.

The publishing attribute of iBooks author allows students to take ownership of content that they create and share with the world. All of a sudden, their project is not assessed by a single individual and handed back or placed on the classroom wall. By uploading it to iTunes, their works can now be accessed by millions of people around the world. Allowing students to create their own iBooks has many benefits for both the student and the peers they share them with. Research indicates that knowledge retention levels are highest when students teach others the content. Couple this with the research that indicates students learn best when learning from one another, the positive impact on learning becomes obvious.