Summer | Winter | 2015 | Volume 17 | Issue 3 International The magazine for School international educators International education in the digital age The case for outdoor learning | What makes an international teacher? | Why choose the AP? OpenApply The Paperless Admissions Office The Trusted Choice of 1,500 Leading International Schools Introducing OpenApply The better way to manage your admissions online OpenApply is designed for the modern admissions office. OpenApply helps to streamline and organize your admissions process by eliminating paperwork, improving organization and providing real-time insight into your applicant pool. It simplifies the admissions process for applicants & families from enquiries to enrollment. 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When accessing OpenApply, SSL encryption is used to keep your data safe. +1 866 297 7022 +44 208 133 7489 +852 8175 8152 +61 2 8006 2335 Email : [email protected] Visit : http://openapply.com Integrated Information Systems for International Education The digital revolution has certainly brought about a form of culture shock for many teachers who made it through school and university without Googling or tweeting Jeremy Hardy, see page 9 in this issue... comment 17 On IT, information overload and change, Nicholas Alchin 5 international education in the digital age Reconciling education with the digital revolution, Jeremy Hardy 9 Disrupting everything – big data and the age of the algorithm, Brian Christian 14 Online learning: providing the context for the real global classroom, Dennis Stanworth 17 From digital competency to digital literacy, Lucas Walsh 19 Digital learning outside the classroom, Julie Bytheway 21 Teaching remarkable disrupters, Jeremy Lewis and Ryan Barnett 23 The relative importance of technology in education, Esther Herranz Frías 25 How a VLE can have a measurable impact upon your school, David Horan 27 Building a platform, Lucy Stonehill 30 Learning online helps prepare students for higher education, Martin Oliver 32 32 Developing an online course, Hedley Willsea 35 regulars Forthcoming conferences 20 Science matters – reflections on the influence of technology in schools, Richard Harwood 37 Fifth column – What’s new about innovation? ET Ranger 60 features Why international schools may have a creative edge, Julian Edwards 39 Care ethics, active listening and international mindedness, David Young 42 Putting prospective IB students on course, Christian Alexander Klaiss 44 Preparing students for working life, Stephen Burnham and Annette Cil 46 Teach a child to change the world, Laurence Myers 48 From a philosophy to a T-shirt: living it, not laminating it! Michael Thompson and Meeta Varma 51 53 The essential benefits of outdoor education, Gareth Barlow 53 Teacher feedback: the breakfast of champions – and losers, William Powell and Ochan Kusuma-Powell 56 Preparing our students to be future leaders, Melanie Hilton and Ann Puntis 58 Why choose the AP? Amanda Briggs 61 What makes an international teacher? Inma Morales Rodriguez 65 Catching up with our students! Paul Young and Mark Leppard 67 Seeing our school through the eyes of a child, Matthew Savage 69 book reviews International Education and Schools, edited by Richard Pearce, reviewed by George Walker 73 Cover photograph courtesy of Sabrina Rech, UWC South East Asia Summer | Winter |69 2015 210x297+5mm_v3.pdf 1 3/3/15 14:22 C M Y CM MY CY CMY K Comment On IT, information overload and change The issues we are facing have echoes of the ancient past, argues Nicholas Alchin Should you care what I am wearing as I write this? Read on, This might suggest that in fact things aren’t so very different gentle reader ... after all; perhaps all the hype is nothing new; perhaps Making sure that the education we offer is meeting information overload is simply business as usual, dressed 21st century student needs is an ongoing priority for us up in a new phrase. But it can’t be as simple as that. Baillet, as educators, and part of our responsibility has to be quoted above, would have been hard-pressed to find what equipping students to use technology well. It’s especially Seneca wrote, whereas we can get to it in a few clicks. So relevant to international schools, as technology has enabled there are differences, for sure. internationalism; indeed one might go so far as to say that It’s also instructive to look at the history of new international schools and information technology are cousins technologies. The impact of the printing press is clearly in the family of modernity. Modernity has given us access to a difficult to overstate, but it took centuries for it to be felt. world of possibilities – not least increased lifespan and access The telephone might be a more relevant example, being to education, healthcare, travel and leisure. But of course it an early ‘information technology’. American sociologist also raises problems. Harvey Sacks writes that as the telephone was introduced In education, one aspect of the changes brought on by into American homes during the last quarter of the 19th technology that interests me is the information overload century, instantaneous conversation across hundreds or phenomenon – the notion that we are overwhelmed with even thousands of miles seemed close to a miracle. Scientific the internet, emails, images, adverts and so on. I read American magazine described it as “nothing less than a new somewhere that walking down a street in a big modern city, organization of society – a state of things in which every one encounters more data just in the form of billboards than individual, however secluded, will have at call every other someone in the 16th century would have come across in individual in the community, to the saving of no end of a year. This historical perspective intrigued me – especially social and business complications … a new organization of when I came across the following quotes: society”. Karl Marx, then alive in his final years, would have What is the point of having countless books been proud! And such phrases have been written about and libraries whose titles the owner could the internet many times. But Sacks goes on to point out scarcely read through in his whole lifetime. that in fact what we saw was not so new; instead it was the The mass of books burdens the student without pouring of existing human behaviour into fresh moulds: instructing him. “our goodness, hope and charity; our greed, pride and lust” Seneca (4 BCE – 56 AD) (sounds familiar?). New technology didn’t bring an overnight revolution. Instead, there was strenuous effort made to fit novelty into existing norms. In Victorian times, one of the We have reason to fear that the multitude of biggest questions revolved around decency: was it, for books which grows every day in a prodigious example, disgraceful to chat while improperly dressed? (You fashion will make the following centuries fall will be pleased to know that I always put on a suit when into a state as barbarous as that of the centuries writing, but I will spare you a selfie). I wonder how many of that followed the fall of the Roman Empire. our questions around email, privacy, community, will be seen Adrien Baillet (1685) as quaint and amusing in 2150. Mary Hayden and Jeff Thompson Editors John Catt Educational Ltd The following enquiries should be directed through Jonathan Barnes Editorial Director is a member of the John Catt Educational Ltd. James Rudge Production Director Independent Publishers Guild. Tel: 44 1394 389850 Fax: 44 1394 386893 Alex Sharratt Managing Director No part of this publication may be reproduced, Advertising: For Editorial enquiries contact copied or transmitted in any form or by any means. Madeleine Anderson, [email protected] Mary Hayden and Jeff Thompson Circulation: Email: [email protected] International School is an independent magazine. Sara Rogers, [email protected] Website: www.is-mag.com The views expressed in signed articles do not necessarily represent those of the magazine. The Accounts: [email protected] International School© is published by magazine cannot accept any responsibility for John Catt Educational Ltd, products and services advertised within it. International School© 2015 12 Deben Mill Business Centre, Old Maltings Approach, ISSN 1461-395 Melton, Woodbridge, Suffolk IP12 1BL, UK Company registration 5762466 Printed by Micropress Printers, Reydon, Suffolk. 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