A day of Academic Work - On campus versus Home Office

It has been a while since I wrote about a "day in the life of girlprof". These two vignettes offer a brief glimpse and opportunity to compare pace, balance and wellness between an On Campus Workday Vs. a Home Office Workday. 

Campus Workday

Wake up. Start Coffee. Feed cats. Slurp coffee while doing an hour of email and preparation for a day of meetings. Shower. Dress in professional clothes. Nylons. Heels. Breakfast at home, or a smoothie in car on way to work. Drive 40 minutes to campus in rush hour traffic, often doing a hands-free phone meeting from car. Unpack bag, hit the restroom. Meeting, Email, Meeting, Phone call, Meeting, Email, Meeting. Lunch, if I brought one, mostly over my keyboard trying to get work done from meetings. If no lunch, granola bars or scrounged food bolted down between meetings. Afternoon meeting, meeting, meeting, meeting. Occasional drop-ins throughout the days. Sporadic walks across campus to a workshop. Drive 40 minutes home in rush hour traffic, often picking up takeout for supper, often doing a phone meeting from car.  Rushed dinner, sometimes with family, then catch up on a few household tasks. 

Home Office Workday

Wake up. Coffee with husband. Feed cats. Read email. Eat a cooked breakfast on a plate. Use actual silverware. Early phone meeting. Start a load of Laundry. Shower. Dress code casual. Bare feet. Zoom meeting. Do work from meeting. Zoom meeting. Put clothes in dryer, plan supper. Walk to mailbox and back. Zoom meeting. Lunch on deck sans laptop. Fold clothes. Prep supper. Zoom meeting. Check on garden, turn on sprinkler. Zoom meeting. Do work from meeting. Move sprinkler. Zoom meeting. Start supper. Turn off sprinkler. Greet children and talk to them after school. Do work from meetings. Enjoy a family meal. Engage in clean up and picking the night's activity. 

Of course, this is a simplified and aggregated example of two days, shared for the insights on pace, balance and wellness they might offer. The one vignette offers insight into the lack of balance an institutionalized workday can become and the other vignette offers insight into the wellness and balance that can come from working and living at home, often in bare feet, without gobbling over a keyboard.

Analysis of digital literacies in the Draft Alberta K-6 Curriculum (Brown & Jacobsen, 2021)

By Barbara Brown & Michele Jacobsen

Over the past couple of weeks, Alberta educators, curriculum experts and researchers have offered a variety of responses to the March 2021 Draft Alberta K-6 Curriculum [start here, here, here, and here]. One journalist gave the draft top marks, but most experts, after detailed and critical review, assign a failing grade. Dr. Carla Peck, Professor of Social Studies Education, Faculty of Education, University of Alberta, completed a detailed analysis of the draft K-6 Social Studies Curriculum and calls for a complete re-write. In a future post, we will address the clear disconnect between professional practice expectations of teachers (TQS), school leaders (LQS), and superintendents (SLQS) and the draft K-6 curriculum. The professional practice standards include competencies for applying foundational knowledge of First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples and culture in educational professionals’ work with children, and these ideas and concepts are only superficially addressed in the draft curriculum. 

An explosion of social media activity includes diverse commentary and sharp critiques that run counter the positive and defensive narrative from the ministry. We appreciate the detailed analysis of plagiarism in the curriculum documents provided by our colleague, Dr. Sarah Elaine Eaton, from the University of Calgary. The two of us (Drs. Brown and Jacobsen) have decided to weigh in on the relative lack of any meaningful role for learning technology and digital media in the draft K-6 Curriculum documents. Our initial analysis contributes a review of digital literacies and competencies, technology, coding and ethics from an educational technology perspective. The two of us hold teaching expertise and our doctorates in educational technology, conduct research in online and blended K-12 and post-secondary contexts, and have been involved in development of the Information and Communication Technology Curriculum (2000) and the Technology Policy Framework (2013) . We have both served as members of the School Technology Advisory Committee in Alberta. Alberta Education has been a world leader in the integration of technology for learning across the curriculum. The timeline of learning and technology in Alberta from 1975 to 2009 also includes various initiatives and research projects that we have both been part of and provides a foundation for our research in Alberta schools. We are also involved in designing and continually updating contemporary university programs for educators, such as the Leading and Learning in a Digital Age graduate certificate that invites critical inquiry on leading learning and teaching with technology across the curriculum. 

The following themes emerged in our analysis of close to 273 pages of draft curriculum documents including the competency progressions, literacy progressions, numeracy progressions, subject introductions and draft curriculum for ELA, Fine Arts, Mathematics, Physical Education and Wellness, Science, Social Studies, and Visual Arts. Our review does not include the French Immersion or French Language curriculum, Dance, Music or Drama. We suggest further analysis of learning technologies and digital literacy should include all of the draft curriculum documents.

Our initial analysis includes five key areas of concern related to digital literacies in the draft K-6 curriculum. First, we note that digital literacies and digital competencies are not part of the literacy progressions. We note that digital texts are referenced 5 times, as are vague notions of modes and media. We argue that specific reference to digital literacies and digital competencies must be included in the literacy progressions in a modern curriculum, especially if Alberta children are to learn how to navigate, evaluate and create knowledge in this post-truth era in which disinformation, appeals to emotion and fake news proliferates. 

Second, the outcomes that include the terms technology, technologies or digital are limited in frequency throughout the curriculum, include few expectations for the early grades and are unclear with a possibility for different interpretations:

• Words with technology appeared in 20 instances in the English Language Arts, Math and Science documents, and the term “technologies” also appeared in 20 instances but only in the Science documents. 
• In the English Language Arts K-6 draft, the first of three instances of technology appeared in grade 4. Based on our research, we are concerned about this omission in K-3 in the English Language Arts curriculum and discuss findings from one of our studies with early learners using technology here. The way the term technology and technologies are used in the draft curriculum are ambiguous. For example, in the Language arts curriculum in grade 6 – “Vocabulary is contextual and influenced by emerging or changing conditions, including technology” is vague and can be interpreted as optional. 
• In Math, the single instance of technology appeared in grade 5: “Create various representations of data, including with technology, to interpret frequency.”  
• In the Science curriculum, the term technology appeared in the introduction and started to appear minimally in grade 2. The term technologies appeared starting in grade 3. However, the terms technology and technologies appeared most frequently in the grade 5-6 outcomes. Even in the science curriculum, we noted the ambiguous use. For example, in Science Grade 6, the term technology is used as part of a list (e.g., computers, coding and technology). 
• Even though the term digital appears in over 130 instances throughout the documents, the term is mostly preceded by the term OR and can be interpreted as optional. For example, “use non-digital OR digital sources/texts” is commonly used in the English Language Arts curriculum. In contrast, a conceptual framework for emergent digital literacy from Australia used more precise language, “As we progress in the 21^st century, children learn to become proficient readers and writers of both digital and non-digital texts” (Neumann, Finger & Neumann, 2017, p. 471). The Australian authors clearly emphasize the use of both digital and non-digital unlike the ambiguous wording currently used in the draft Alberta curriculum. 

Third, we are concerned that the use of coding in the curriculum suggests that computer programming skills are sufficiently integrated in the draft K-6 curriculum. While computer science is listed in the practical skills section, coding is simplified in the learning outcomes as a mechanical process that can be done with paper/pencil. When we searched the 273 pages, the word coding only appeared in 17 learning outcomes and all of these instances were found in the Science curriculum grade 5, 6. The integration of coding is limited to learning in one disciplinary area and is absent for younger learners. Where are the “algorithms, technology and engineering to design solutions to problems” evident in the learning outcomes? These omissions in the draft curriculum stand in direct contrast to contemporary research on the importance of coding and computational thinking for all learners worldwide.  Andreas Schleicher, OECD Director (March 22, 2019), asked “Should schools teach coding?”, and presents important questions about coding and computational thinking that need to be better considered in the Alberta K-6 draft curriculum: “How can we focus learning on the “essence” of a subject rather than the ‘mechanics of the moment’? It is fair to question how working code on paper in a modern age offers any value beyond rote mechanics.

Fourth, we argue the curriculum should include explicit focus on ethics and technology at every age. The word ethics only appears in 3 instances and all of these were in the Science curriculum, grade 5. Here’s one of our recent books regarding the importance of ethical use of technology in digital learning environments to support our argument for increasing the curricular focus in this area. As they engage deeply in accessing and contributing knowledge a digital world, Alberta students and teachers need to be engaged in conversations and inquiry into contemporary issues such as personal privacy, access rights, copyright, surveillance, and security. 

Fifth, there is limited and superficial reference to technology and digital competencies in this draft curriculum. We would have expected a new curriculum to build on or further develop the concepts and ideas in the Learning and Technology Policy Framework (LTPF) from 2013. The LTPF, Policy Direction 1 described the direction for technology use with students: “to support student-centred, personalized, authentic learning for all students” (p. 5) and this could have been a great starting point for developing a contemporary curriculum for Alberta’s children. Instead, this draft curriculum takes us back decades in failing to adequately consider learning technologies, digital literacy and digital competencies for Alberta children. 

We recognize this is an initial versus comprehensive critique of the relative absence of meaningful consideration of educational technology in the draft. We anticipate and welcome more commentaries and critique to emerge over the coming days and weeks. Based on our initial analysis, we argue the ministry needs to go back to the drawing board to design a contemporary curriculum that prepares learners for their digital futures and digital economies, instead of our pasts. We also encourage everyone to get involved in the public engagement and provide feedback on the draft K-6 curriculum presented in March 2021.

Schleicher (2019), OECD, leaves us with this call to action: “To determine what tomorrow’s students should learn, we must assemble the best minds in a given country – leading experts in the field, but also those who understand how students learn, as well as those who have a good understanding of how knowledge and skills are used in the real world. Such knowledge sharing will allow us to more precisely determine and regularly re-examine which topics should be taught and in what sequence – without succumbing to the temptations of the moment” (P 9).

Some of the best minds and leading experts in their fields across Alberta, and school, classroom and university experts who understand how children learn, are analyzing, questioning and critiquing elements of this draft curriculum; will the Minister of Education listen? Or, will she continue to succumb to the ideological and political temptations of the moment?

Note: This post is also available on Dr. Barb Brown’s blog 

Feel free to connect with us: babrown@ucalgary.ca and dmjacobs@ucalgary.ca  

Twitter handles: @barbbrown and @dmichelej

 

Advancing Faculty Development and Graduate Supervision Online: A Global Dialogue Forum (Brown & Jacobsen, 2021)

Overview of our global dialogue presented with Beijing Normal University on March 30, 2021:  In this session we discuss the challenges and opportunities for advancing faculty development and graduate supervision in online learning. We dispel myths about online learning environments and discuss how digital innovations provide possibilities for faculty and students to learn and connect globally. We also share our experiences with engaging pre-service, in-service teachers, and faculty in professional learning through an online pedagogy series and graduate supervision MOOC.

Presentation Slides - PDF

University of Calgary Links:

Werklund School of Education Graduate Programs, University of Calgary- https://werklund.ucalgary.ca/graduate-programs

 

Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning, University of Calgary – https://taylorinstitute.ucalgary.ca/ (open access learning modules)

 

 

Other Related Sources:

Brown, B. (2019). One-Take Productions for Student Feedback. Education Canada Magazine, 59(2). https://www.edcan.ca/articles/student-feedback/

 

Brown, B. (2020). Using Zoom to create weekly video message for students. 

http://www.drbarbbrown.com/2020/06/18/using-zoom-to-create-a-weekly-video-message-for-students/

 

Brown, B., Alonso-Yanez, G., Friesen, S., & Jacobsen, M. (2020). High school redesign: Carnegie unit as a catalyst for change. Canadian Journal of Educational Administration and Policy (CJEAP), 193, 97-114.https://journalhosting.ucalgary.ca/index.php/cjeap/article/view/68066

 

Brown, B., Burns, A., Kendrick, A., Kapoyannis, T., & Delanoy, N. (2020). Adapting to changing K-12 contexts during COVID-19: Teacher education perspectives. In M. K. Barbour & LaBonte, R., Stories from the field: Voices of K-12 Stakeholders during Pandemic, Canadian eLearning Network, pp. 63-68. https://sites.google.com/view/canelearn-ert/

 

Brown, B. & Eaton, S. E. (2020). Using a community of inquiry lens to examine synchronous online discussions in graduate courses. In L. Wilton, & Brett C. (Eds.) Handbook of Research on Online Discussion-Based Teaching Methods (pp. 229-262), IGI Global. https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-7998-3292-8

 

Brown, B., Jacobsen, M., & Lambert, D. (2014, May 9-10). Learning technologies in higher education [Paper presentation]. In P. Preciado Babb (Ed.). Proceedings of the IDEAS: Rising to the Challenge Conference, (pp. 25-43). Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, AB, Canada.http://hdl.handle.net/1880/50588

 

Brown, B., Roberts, V., Jacobsen, M., & Hurrell, C. (Eds.) (2020). Ethical use of technology in digital learning environments: Graduate student perspectives. University of Calgary [eBook]  https://doi.org/10.11575/ant1-kb38

 

Brown, B. & Vaughan, N. (2018). Designing group work in blended learning environments. In R. J. Harnish, K. R. Bridges, D. N. Sattler, M. L. Signorella, & M. Munson (Eds.). The Use of Technology in Teaching and Learning (pp. 82-97). Society for the Teaching of Psychology web site: https://teachpsych.org/ebooks/useoftech

 

Donovan, T., Bates, T., Seaman, J., Mayer, D., Martel, E., Paul, R., . . . Poulin, R. (2019). Tracking online and distance education in Canadian universities and colleges: 2018. Canadian National Survey of Online and Distance Education, Public Report. Canadian Digital Learning Research Association. https://onlinelearningsurveycanada.ca/

 

Garrison, D. R., Anderson, T., & Archer, W. (2000). Critical inquiry in a text-based environment: Computer conferencing in higher education model. The Internet and Higher Education, 2(2-3), 87-105.

Community of Inquiry (CoI) Framework - https://coi.athabascau.ca/coi-model/

 

Graham, C. R., Woodfield, W., & Harrison, J. B. (2013). A framework for institutional adoption and implementation of blended learning in higher education. Internet and Higher Education, 18, 4-14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.iheduc.2012.09.003

 

Irvine, V. (2020, Oct 26). The Landscape of Merging Modalities. Educause Review, 4. 

https://er.educause.edu/articles/2020/10/the-landscape-of-merging-modalities

 

Jacobsen, M., Friesen, S., & Lock, J. (2013). Strategies for Engagement: Knowledge building and intellectual engagement in participatory learning environments. Education Canada. https://www.edcan.ca/articles/strategies-for-engagement/

Jacobsen, M., Brown, B., & Lambert, D. (2013). Technology-enhanced learning environments in higher education: A review of the literature. Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary, (80 pages).http://hdl.handle.net/1880/52244

 

Martin, J. (2019). Building Relationships and Increasing Engagement in the Virtual Classroom. Journal of Educators Online, 16(1), 9-13. https://www.thejeo.com/archive/2019_16_1/martin

 

Mazur, A., Brown, B., & Jacobsen, M. (2015). Learning designs using flipped classroom instruction.Canadian Journal of Learning Technology, 41(2), 1-26. https://www.cjlt.ca/index.php/cjlt/article/view/26977  

Note: This post is also available on Dr. Barb Brown's Blog

Feel free to connect with us for more information:

babrown@ucalgary.ca and dmjacobs@ucalgary.ca  

twitter handles: @barbbrown @dmichelej