Bob Harrison reads the runes from conferences and reports, and takes the pulse for learning and ICT

“Five-year-olds are fairly competent at using the internet,” said Vanessa Pittard, director of research and evaluation at Government ICT Agency Becta in her keynote address to the annual Association of Learning Technology conference (ALT-C) held in Manchester. But the notion of the “digital native”, espoused by author Marc Prensky in his book Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants in 2001, is beginning to look a little tarnished.

A recent Ofcom children’s tracking survey suggests: “The digital natives concept tends to overestimate the amount of knowledge that young people have about digital technologies and digital cultures.” And herein lies an important dilemma facing education.

It has been amplified by a recent US study - "Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in Online Learning: A Meta-Analysis and Review of Online Learning Studies" - which has concluded that “blended learning” (a mixture of online and face-to-face learning) is the most effective way to learn. These factors have enormous implications for education policy and capital programmes, especially as we face a period of spending restrictions.
 
While Partnerships for Schools chief executive Time Byles (above, in conversation with conference host Emily Maitlis) was bullish about the future of Building Schools for the Future at the PfS annual conference (he could not foresee any government cutting back on such an important national investment), the news from HM Treasury head of PFI, Charles Lloyd, is that the spend on capital projects will fall from 3 to 1 per cent of the GDP by 2014.

Whichever way you look at it, value for money will be the top priority
 
There now has to be serious reflection on the capital building programmes and the support provided for relevant and appropriate workforce development in the use of technology to transform learning. This is crucial, along with the boost needed in teacher confidence and competence in using ICT, which will be stimulated by the £6.5m DCSF-funded Open University/e-Skills partnership project announced recently.
 
Ex-headteacher and now e-skills project leader Debbie Forster, puts it this way: “We need to try and create a step change in the staff development provided for schools and colleges. Our mapping of current provision shows there is a lot going on but we need to ask is it the right provision and is it delivered in the right way?”

Survey shows that only small percentages of schools use full range of ICT

It’s an important question because a recent NFER/Becta Harnessing Technology survey shows that, despite the massive investment by the Government and the support provided by Becta, only 26 per cent of primary schools are using ICT to support learning in a full range of activities - and this figure falls to only 17 cent in the secondary sector!
 
The figures for further education are similar and, sadly, some technological innovations have had very little impact on learning. Interactive whiteboards, for example, have had a limited impact in primary schools but have made little difference to learning outcomes in secondary schools, despite the enormous investment, according to the research.
 
The government-funded £300m Home Access to Technology programme should help more than 1 million of the poorest families of whom 39 per cent have no internet access (only 7 per cent of whom have earnings above £27,000). But this will not address the need for a fundamental shift in how children and young people learn and are assessed within schools, even though it should ensure stronger parental engagement and expectations.
 
This context provides a dynamic background for another in the recent round of conferencwa, Handheld Learning 2009,which is coming up in early October in London. The range of speakers has been bolstered by additions like the straight-talking Ofsted chairman Zenna Atkins. Creativity and learning will get a lively outing from John Davitt and Tim Rylands.
 
With more than 1,000 delegates from around the globe, researchers, policymakers and practitioners (and a lot of young learners on the first day which is free), the debates at HHL 2009 will grapple with the prospect that wireless and mobile technologies could change the ways in which children learn, where they learn, who they learn with and, critically, how their learning is supported and assessed.
 
Fortunately the UK has been at the forefront of the mobile learning movement and leading lights Professor Mike Sharples (University of Nottingham) and Professor John Traxler (University of Wolverhampton), who also will be presenting, have ensured that there is some innovative thinking and practice already in our schools and colleges.
 
Some of these innovators will be celebrated at the Handheld Learning Awards presented at the conference.
 
There will be a strong research presence at this years conference and the programme is a smorgasbord of exciting and innovative workshops and presentations which should stimulate discussion, debate and hopefully inform education policy and the building schools for the future to ensure our children and young people are prepared for life in the 21st century.
 
Bob Harrison is an education consultant who works with the National College and the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA)

Web links
 
Handheld Learning 2009
Becta
ALT-C
'Evaluation of Evidence-Based Practices in Online Learning - A Meta-Analysis and Review of Online Learning Studies'
Partnerships for Schools
ICT/CPD project