I am increasingly worried when I heard the phrase "ICT is just a tool". It is in danger of becoming a one dimensional mantra that will be increasingly used to dismiss claims by anybody that wishes to study the area in greater depth.

As I see this, it is akin to dismissing writing as just a hand coordination skill, numeracy just a tool for numbers, literacy as just another language too, medicine is just a tool helping sick people. I am not suggesting that ICT is the equal of these, just that it misses the potential, scope and benefits of studying any topic in greater depth by trivializing what it has to offer.

I would like my students to show some passion and study great literature, explore self-expression through the arts, understand modern issues through open historical eyes and feel confident about tackling big questions with science.

It would be sad if they saw anything as just a tool, perhaps missing some of the rich social and cultural connections that work to make any learning area into a learning area with value and relevance. It is up to schools to figure out how we can best put all these pieces together to create a rich local curriculum.

Repeated cries 'ICT is just a tool' will become an undignified snub for the senior secondary students that I am teaching information technology and potentially undermine those who are considering tertiary studies or career options.

We need to call IT for what IT is.

I come from a teaching profession that is dominated by women and a school where most management and senior staff are women. I'll continue to grind my teeth when I am described as 'the token male'.

Any profession with a significant gender imbalance is the poorer for it.

In my field of Information Technology, gender issues are very real and growing. Two years ago, I blogged a report discussing problems by Google to recruit female engineers.  Last night I had discussed online with Pia Waugh some of the gender issues related to information technology careers. She indicated that it is "a problem that can only be overcome through positivity, inspiration and just being the change we want to see". 

As I now see this, just promoting technology technology gender horror stories will only work to further scare off girls and turn this into a self-fulfilling prophesy. Whilst it is a real and worsening problem, a chatfest about the issue will certainly not help things. Generally when I talk about IT as a career with parents, I smile and indicate offhand that as many girls do IT as boys.

It is only too rarely that a girl wants to join the computer games club we run after school each Friday. Odder when we consider this 2008 Brisbane news report about "Game Girls" that indicates that 40% game players are female. The boys in the games club seem to favour each others company. This is rather akin to the community sheds that blokes now build in the backyard to tinker with computers as reported by The Age in this "MenShed Worries" report. Considering that game playing or shed tinkering probably doesn't significantly drive any specific technology course or career interest, I probably dont need to worry as much about these trends.

In the classroom background I can continue to teach and ensure that there is a gender balance in promotion of results, interesting topics and role models etc. Occasionally this can raise the eyebrows of other staff. For now I can at least lay claim to strategies that make my classes gender neutral and frown at perceptions that it is a male dominated subject, feigning ignorance at the current state of affairs in the outside world. Lists such as The Most Inflencial Women in Web2.0 are a big help.


My 2009 VCE class roll indicates that as many girls as boys seem to have chosen to do a senior IT subject. I guess that I must be doing something right.

It has always been a struggle to motivate my students to even just complete a practice examination. Few will do these under examination conditions away from the classroom, and a some don't even bother turning up to the last few classes. I will admit to stalking outside the examination room with a lingering threat to glare at anybody tho attempts to leave early.

It tears my heart out to see them mechanically slog thorough an examination from start to finish, with no planning, wasting too much time on difficult questions or dribble out their knowledge with brief answers. Whilst teaching examination skills is important, this can be as engaging as relearning to tie your shoelaces or basic breathing. I am a bit feral at this point, jumping on desks, rap dancing, pulling markers from my socks, pulling treats from behind ears and issuing "survivor" certificates. I learned from Keith the value of keeping it fun.

Poor English skills and unfamiliar words will often undermine their understanding and confidence. Words like "Robust" are interpreted as something to do with Robots. Glossaries don't help, using the words in context do help. I learned from Donald the value of just reading the newspaper, asking good questions and using the "big" words in context and mandating a Moodle forum reply to stimulate HOT (Higher Order Thinking) replies.

It helps for me to trim the practice examinations in half so that I can run them over a period. After a flying marking session, I will sit down asap for an equivalent period. Students seem to only be able to learn 3 new things at each session so I find that this helps avoiding overloading their memory. I learned this from my own rotten memory.

Not all students have an supportive family network or even a computer at home. One once complained that his battery had run flat. I was gobsmacked to find out that he was living in a old car and reading under a recharged battery. Many have no stories so I spin yarns about those who struggled and won. They are delighted by the "Mr Mark" who hands out the rose and dog breakfast awards for exam questions and sigh relief at the nice people at the VCAA who just want to see them do their best. Much is true, some I synthesise from my own experiences.

I avoid playing the numbers game of marks, scores and averages by emphasising that we are really only racing against our personal best. When I visit the doctor, he usually snaps on the rubber gloves and prods a bit before telling me that I am still healthy enough with room for improvement. I am average but I think the average has moved (pokes at expanding stomach).

Anyway, I wish all my students the very best with their examination results. Whilst you race ahead and fill your lives with academic clutter and personal baggage, remember to revisit the good memories and hang onto your dreams.

Phil posted an interesting question on the Moodle mailing list about using tablet computers with interactive electronic whiteboards that got me thinking.  Yesterday at the VITTA conference I have heard Don mention about using a classroom set of cheaper graphics tablets, shared whiteboard software and a conventional projection system. This would work in a similar way to this flash based, ImaginationCubed collaborative drawing too.

I had a chance to see Elluminate, a slick Java solution. Whilst free for up to 3 users, it seems sadly overpriced when you consider any enterprise wide. A quick dig about the web showed me some cool open source software whiteboards under development that could be used in the classroom such as HiveBoard, DimDim or Drawboard.

There are a couple of different groups working to integrate these free tools DimDim into Moodle and another group at Cornell that has undertaken an even more challenging Moodle and Second Life integration with Drawboard and other project at San Jose State University.

All up, this is fun collaborative stuff that doesn't lock users or presenters into using a particular vendor or hardware system :-)

We are reinventing many aspects of business and schooling with a focus on networks. It imperative for teachers to understand and objectively enage with the new technologies that underpin these new distributed networks. It is an issue that our ASISTM cluster has been working through.

Glen Boreham, the new CEO and managing director of IBM, points out that Australia's information and communications technology needs to become more competitive to take advantage of new ways of working and doing business. Organisations are being replaced by highly responsive, globally resourced enterprises that do not think of themselves as organisations but as networks. We see this happening with the development of Linux, open source, eBay, Secondlife, blogging and many other web2 and other folksomony initiatives.

Glen notes that the skills of the future will come at the intersection of the disciplines of IT, science, engineering, mathematics and business yet sadly, the Australian education system fall short of supporting both a fusion of these skills and misses out from our fantastic first hand knowledge of other cultures and languages. The window of opportunity is fast closing. (March 2007 National Press Club address, Computerworld - March 2087- IBM CEO urges Education Revolution)

So what is going on in the minds of our students?The president of the Melbourne PC User Lyn Goodall group recently observed from their aging membership profile that young people don't have much of an interest in understanding the workings of technology. Rather, they seem to be increasingly motivated by the socialisation that happens online than the physical company of others. (The Age - bunch of old mugs)

We also know that technology has changed family relationships at home, sometimes for the worse. Whilst mobile phones and instant messaging can give children a stronger sense of individual identity and independence, these tools may also undermine the time that families can spend together, making it harder for parents to know what is going on in the lives of their children as mentioned in (The Age - Technology threatens family bonding, Parents should monitor childrens web use)

I guess that it is all about swings and roundabouts. With these new freedoms and liberties will come new responsibilities to manage these opportunities.

Parents are responsible to provide effective parenting and supervision of their children, technology should not replace this supervision or undermine this relationship. Similarly, if teachers are going to effectively and safely engage with this technology in the classroom, they need to consider safe collaborative and virtual learning sandpits such as Moodle whilst ensuring that their curriculum covers any important Internet safety issues.

Teachers don't all need to create a personal webblog for every lesson, a Secondlife account, edit a movie, program a game or jump online to play one. They all do need to keep open the channels of communication with their students and critically understand the challenges presented by web2 technologies, drawing upon the interests, language and cultural backgrounds of their students. We ignore this at the peril of our role as leaders in the lives of our students.

The revolution is real and it will not stop because our minds are closed shut.

4I read a negative report in The Age newspaper about IT as a course of study in Victoria. A key line that I picked out regarding the cause of problem was that :

"All the off-the-shelf, do-it-yourself and managed services have created a well-worn and safe rut. It is easier to follow than to innovate, to take risks."

Melbourne is trying really hard to package itself as an IT center for innovation. I am encouraged that I have the opportunity to work with groups at the cutting edge to support fellow IT educators. They all have moved beyond the well-worn paths and are exploring new territories.

James Paul Gee is the Tashia Morgridge Professor of Reading at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His new book, "Why Video Games Are Good for Your Soul", shows how good video games marry pleasure and learning and have the capacity to empower people.

Photograph of Tony, James and myself at a recent lecture by Gee organised by Bernard at the State Library of Victoria. You can also read the blog entry by Tony and the presentation slideshow posted to the ASISTM cluster. I have just finished editing my notes on my laptop. Following is my summary.

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Playing computer games is now a serious persuit. For example, with 6 million players, there are probably now more people addicted to the game World of Warcraft than alcohol. Video games are a form of art. They are made of stories, one made by the designer and another a virtual-real story that describes the players trajectory through the game.

Playing a video game is very different to reading a book. You begin to develop a set of meanings for a virtual place because of your relationship and memories for it.

Video games can combine cognition and emotion to create a virtual-real career story. They have the potential to teach content, skills and values. Performance before competence. We could go beyond just killing people with a video game, perhaps learning how to make peace, a new culture or language. Different games have different value systems. There is a danger when kids play only just one video game.

Contrary to some predictions, mot kids play games socially. The stories they tell are the stories of their group. Players are given tools that encapsulate the things that they need to learn. In multiplayer games, these tools and technologies include forms of collaboration, participation and interaction with real people.

Playing video games is a form of history to produce your own trajectory. History is not just understanding what happened, but what could have happened. Through solving problems, players accumulate experiences and develop a career. History happens children look back and compare their virtual trajectories by playing games such as Civilisation.

Players can now program and modify their own games. If children build their own game and story, they are beginning to design the learning for other people. What career will they give somebody else and what moral choices will they build in? These are powerful resources to give children to tell stories in their lives.