Textbooks at the school?

http://www.apple.com/education/ipad/

A new kind of textbook. For a new kind of student.

Students will now experience the most amazing textbooks they’ve ever read. They can flip through a book by sliding their finger along thumbnail images of the pages. If they don’t know the definition of a word, one tap takes them to a glossary or dictionary. No longer limited to a single picture to illustrate the text, now students can flick through a gorgeous photo gallery or dive into an image with interactive captions. They can use a finger to rotate a 3D object to show a human brain from every angle, or have the answer spring to life in an interactive chapter review.

Design of Education

We want our children prepared for the future. Designing a school in such a way to meet current needs, we increase the probability of preparing our children for the future.

Watch the following video



Understanding the Past - Factory Model
Our current education system was designed to meet the needs of the an agrarian society and factory based economy - in early 1900's.

The model represented an extension of the factory: Students were grouped according to age; students were grouped according to ability; bells were used for transitions; teachers told the information, and students regurgitated the information. The students who succeed did, and moved onto college often becoming managers. Other students, found a job at a factory or some job that required little problem solving. Schools were in the business of sorting students according to those who could make it and those who could not. Graduates could expect having 1 or maybe 2 career changes in their lives.

At the time that the model of education was created there were about 700,000 students in high school, and approximately 1/3 went onto college. Remember, these were only the students that went to high school, but most students did not even go to high school!

Fast Forward over 100 Years...2012 - Information Age
The world has changed from the days for the original design of schools. Just looking at the numbers, there are about 17 million students in high school, which represents almost all of the youth in the USA. This is a change from the 1900's when a lucky few would attend high school. Compared to the past, students can expect to make a minimum of 5 career changes in their life time.

In this day, we expect all youth to problem solve, have a global sense, and be able to self-initiate education when needed.

The days of a linear factory model and the simple agriculture are gone. If our children work in a factory, they will still need to trouble shoot because robots and assembly lines of machines do the monotonous work. If the the child becomes a farmer, there is a plethora of innovations, technologies, and societal impacts that need to be considered regularly to create sustainable model. Most of our children will hold jobs that require them to gather and evaluate information, think critically, innovate and move forward with a concept.

What is my point:
Few things are as they were in 1900; school needs to prepare our youth for a different future - one we do not even recognize. The factory model design works very well for a factory model paradigm.

Our children are in an information age and will work in a global economy. We need to design education for a different need.

Watershed

A Global Geo-Literacy Project

http://watershed.geolit.org/

Teachers empower students with 21st century skills using project-based learning and Adobe software

Students today enter an increasingly globalized world and workforce in which technology plays a vital role. They must be good communicators and great collaborators. They also need a strong sense of responsibility, as well as interpersonal and project-management skills that demand teamwork and leadership. No matter how sophisticated classroom tools are and how well students meet targeted standards, students often need assistance in developing better learning and thinking skills, information- and communications-technology literacy, and dexterity in handling diverse life situations to succeed in the 21st century.

Enter project-based learning (PBL), designed to put students into a students-as-workers setting where they can learn collaboration, critical thinking, written and oral communication, and the value of a strong work ethic—all while meeting state and national content standards. At the San Juan Unified School District (SJUSD) in Northern California—which serves more than 40,000 students in 72 schools—5th and 6th grade students are engaged in meaningful, rigorous, and integrated project-based learning, facilitated by Adobe Creative Suite 4 Master Collection, Adobe Buzzword, and Adobe Photoshop Elements software.

“We’ve reached a genuine tipping point where educators are using technology—and Adobe software in particular—to achieve learning objectives. More than just building simple websites where students and teachers can post information, Adobe software can make project-based learning a reality to radically transform and improve the educational experience,” says Linda Ferguson, director of the Geo-Literacy Foundation & technology coordinator, teacher, and trainer for SJUSD.

BENEFITS

• Built 21st century skills such as technology literacy
• Transformed students from passive observers into active participants
• Successfully integrated technology into the classroom to ignite innovation and enthusiasm
• Defined a successful project-based learning approach
• Met standards on multiple levels
• Obtained funding and expansion from K-12 in progress

PROJECT DETAILS

A grassroots initiative with strong community ties
Along with teachers Kay Gilly and Joni Stein, Ferguson—who is also an Adobe Education Leader—has championed a project-based learning program for nearly four years called A Healthy Watershed – A Healthy Community. The San Juan Education Foundation provides funding for the project through its science, technology, and the arts (STARs) learning grants. The foundation’s goal is to advance education for SJUSD students in partnership with parents, educators, business, and the community.

Adobe software and the project-based approach turn passive learners into active participants, ignite innovation, and make education more compelling, personalized, and accessible. Students create models, videos, and write reports using Adobe software to demonstrate their understanding of key concepts throughout the program. The students can gain a richer understanding of environmental science by illustrating basic concepts, and their insights are often accompanied by a newly discovered enthusiasm for the subject.

“The San Juan Education Foundation is a grassroots organization that provides funding for effective project-based learning solutions,” says Ferguson. “Based on our successful work with integrating technology into education, students’ progress, and the formation of strong alliances with the community, we are confident about extending our funding into the future and expanding our presence more fully within the district.”

Forging a district-wide model for project-base learning
A Healthy Watershed – A Healthy Community, which currently involves roughly 100 students, starts at Albert Schweitzer Elementary School. Students build an understanding throughout the school year of the environmental issues affecting the local, regional, and statewide fresh water supplies, focusing on the American River watershed. Students are tasked with answering the overarching question: “How do our local rivers affect and shape our communities and the wildlife that rely on them?”

The project continues into John Barrett Middle School where second-year students extend their understanding of important issues involved in managing water resources and begin to see how people must work together to meet the needs of a growing community. Students step through a process of discovery that involves research, experimentation, field trips, self-expression, and learning through community service. Throughout the process, students learn how to make more informed decisions for themselves and the future well being of their community. Teachers involved with the program are working to form an alliance with a district high school to support a more widespread, district-level model for project-based learning that will help students advance their knowledge and extend their skills through each progressive grade level.

Communicating complex concepts through technology
A Healthy Watershed – A Healthy Community aligns closely with state standards for the 5th and 6th grades, including Earth Science, Life Science, Investigation and Experimentation, Research and Technology, Language Arts, Organization and Delivery of Oral Communication, and Visual Arts. The project provides students with an understanding of the issues surrounding the American River watershed, while building the processing skills necessary to evaluate a complex problem and present their finding in several formats.

Adobe software helps students compile and present their findings. The elementary and middle school students write reports using Adobe Buzzword, the free online word processor that is part of Acrobat.com. Buzzword looks and behaves like a desktop word processor, but it operates inside a web browser, so there is no software installation required and students can work on their reports from any place with Internet access. Teachers can comment on the documents using a rich set of markup tools to provide students with constructive feedback. Students use Adobe Acrobat Pro software to prepare reports in Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) for reliable printing or posting to the web.

Adobe Photoshop Elements is used for image layout and digital storytelling. Students construct charts, graphs, and images for slide shows and other presentations that demonstrate concepts and use Adobe Photoshop CS4 Extended to resize images for publishing to the web. More advanced students take imagery and live video footage into Adobe Premiere Pro and Soundbooth CS4 software to create detailed audio and video overviews of projects. Many produce striking, sophisticated pieces that look like professional news broadcasts.

Students use templates created in Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 to post their work on the program site at http://watershed.geolit.org/. They are also tapping into Adobe Flash CS4 Professional software to edit text files that are automatically animated using pre-developed scripts. “When students see how Adobe Flash Professional automatically animates text, they see the connection between the software code and the animation and gain a basic understanding of the power of software programming at an early age,” says Ferguson.

Preparing students for the professional world
With the possibility of expanding the program to high school students, Ferguson expects students to become even more adept in their use of Adobe software. Ultimately, she expects that high school students will be able to earn Adobe software certifications to boost their professional skills and enhance their career prospects.

Whether they are just starting out in 5th grade or gaining in-depth expertise in Adobe software, Ferguson attributes much of her success to the technology Adobe delivers to the classroom. She notes that Adobe software accommodates a wide range of technical abilities and gives students an easy starting point as well as the ability to expand their skill sets to become exceptionally advanced in their use of technology for communications.

“Whether students are just starting out or have a lot of technology experience, they can recognize the basic interface and functionality of the software right away, and transfer it to the full range of integrated software Adobe offers,” says Ferguson. “I watch the 5th and 6th graders, and I am amazed at their fearlessness, natural technical ability, and increased learning engagement when they are using Adobe software. I can’t wait to see what happens when this and similar project- and technology-based learning programs thrive and grow across other school districts across the nation.”

Get off to a quick start with Adobe software. Join the Adobe Education Exchange to access free teaching and learning resources contributed by a community of educators and the Adobe Education Team. http://edexchange.adobe.com

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What is Project Based Learning?

BY EDUTOPIA STAFF

Project learning, also known as project-based learning, is a dynamic approach to teaching in which students explore real-world problems and challenges, simultaneously developing cross-curriculum skills while working in small collaborative groups.

Because project-based learning is filled with active and engaged learning, it inspires students to obtain a deeper knowledge of the subjects they're studying. Research also indicates that students are more likely to retain the knowledge gained through this approach far more readily than through traditional textbook-centered learning. In addition, students develop confidence and self-direction as they move through both team-based and independent work.

In the process of completing their projects, students also hone their organizational and research skills, develop better communication with their peers and adults, and often work within their community while seeing the positive effect of their work.

Because students are evaluated on the basis of their projects, rather than on the comparatively narrow rubrics defined by exams, essays, and written reports, assessment of project-based work is often more meaningful to them. They quickly see how academic work can connect to real-life issues -- and may even be inspired to pursue a career or engage in activism that relates to the project they developed.

Students also thrive on the greater flexibility of project learning. In addition to participating in traditional assessment, they might be evaluated on presentations to a community audience they have assiduously prepared for, informative tours of a local historical site based on their recently acquired expertise, or screening of a scripted film they have painstakingly produced.

Project learning is also an effective way to integrate technology into the curriculum. A typical project can easily accommodate computers and the Internet, as well as interactive whiteboards, global-positioning-system (GPS) devices, digital still cameras, video cameras, and associated editing equipment.

Adopting a project-learning approach in your classroom or school can invigorate your learning environment, energizing the curriculum with a real-world relevance and sparking students' desire to explore, investigate, and understand their world. Return to our Project Learning page to learn more.

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