The image itself can be described as ‘boring,’ it is grey with some ambiguous text. It doesn’t give much away, is it shop sign? the back of a delivery wagon? Ambiguity always poses a creative challenge.
prequel
Better late than never!…….it’s been quite a few weeks now since Amy Burvall and Steve Wheeler set the #blimage challenge in motion. My invitation to participate together with a choice four images, suggested by Donald H Taylor was gladly welcomed. It’s taken longer than I would have liked to finally get on with it though.
Having grown up in Scotland, the Tunnock’s Tea Cakes did seriously tempt me and the perspective in the aerial shot suggested a few ideas. Howvere, cricket is a sport I can take or leave. So my final choice was the the Estd.2014 picture, which I think is more challenging. I believe any image, no matter how ambiguous, can stimulate discussion and learning. A theme I will return to this at the end of the post
With my interests in visual learning and open education the image made me reflect on educational content, including….
• the origins of educational content
• how the concept of educational content has changed
• ownership, content as a marketplace
• the future of educational content
Content & Co. Est d. 1658
One of the earliest, and perhaps still, best examples of early educational content is John Alto Comenius’s seminal Orbis Sensualium Pictus, (The Visible World in Pictures). It really is marvellous that anyone can now read this book and similar treasures freely online. To be able to access historic and rare books, in such quality and detail would have been unthinkable not that many years ago. I find its simplicity inspirational and always worth revisiting.
Orbis Pictus is the first book produced for school-children. Although its primary purpose was to help students learn Latin, and subsequently other languages, it offered much more. Richly illustrated with 150 woodcuts, (or copper engravings in later editions), the book condensed the known world into pictures. Each one a stepping stone on the path to further knowledge. This could be a early model for constructivist learning.
Luan Hanratty explains further in his blog TEFLideas;
There are no rule explanations. The learner is left to his or her own intuitions on the basis of connections between text, numbers and images to predict the meaning of the Latin translation. Thus the text embodies a natural, direct approach which stretches learners implicitly.
Although the approach is didactic, there is plenty of scope for individual interpretation. Orbis Pictus is a whole curriculum in a book. Alongside academic knowledge, it covers the the essential life skills of slaughtering, brewing, gardening and animal husbandry, and also promotes a sense of environmental awareness.
The book remained in use in schools for over 200 years. The methodology a progenitor for future educational resources and also comic books and children's literature. Its technique of numbering elements in an image is the precursor of the hot-spot.
Many of today’s visual learning resources and paltforms including; YouTube, Khan, info-graphics and MOOCs - all owe a debt to Comenius’s visual methodology.
….& the rest is history
Following the age of enlightenment, what is now commonly known as the educational content ‘industry’ emerged.
The growth of knowledge, ideas, and discoveries especially in science and technology meant educational content needed to be dovetailed into emerging curricula. Some of this content was developed primarily to deliver the specific knowledge required to pass examinations. Much of this could be presented as text books. A format, that relied less on visual information, and was economical to print in large quantities.
More extensively visual material was generally reserved for atlases encyclopaedias, and costly ‘reference’ books. It was or children's ‘literature’ and also later comic books.
Moving through the early 20th century….. technologies including photography, film, radio were regularly introduced into classrooms and lecture theatres. Developers of new technology often made spectacular claims………much as they do today!
Edison (was) a huge advocate of film in schools, which he prophesied would render books obsolete and would stimulate learning beyond people’s imagination, changing school life within a decade (Fabos, 2004)
Some educational content producers such as McGraw-Hill created films that offered an insight into their production and pedagogical values. Interestingly, these are still remarkably similar to the rules and grammar of contemporary educational video.
Established commercial companies, in the fields of engineering and technology soon moved into the educational space to create visual teaching content and resources. Western Union and Ford were very active here. Similar Edu-business models are still very much in evidence today. Companies including Google and Apple, appoint teachers as experts to help other teachers use their products and of course, (by default) add educational credibility in order to sell them.
Content is King…..
During the mid nineties, as computers and the Internet proliferated, this mantra reverberated along the information superhighway, sic. Technology seemed to offer new opportunities for content delivery, especially educational resources. The focus being clearly on the commercial exploitation of content.
“Content is where I expect much of the real money will be made on the Internet, just as it was in broadcasting.” (Gates, 1996)
A market for digital educational content established itself, print based materials were commonly replicated or augmented in digital formats including CD_ROMs. These sometimes included interactive learning activities. Encyclopaedias and Atlases were especially suited to this format. Such resources were flagged as a future digital curriculum, but for many the life cycle was short-lived.
This is encapsulated in the story of Microsoft Encarta CD/DVD. Within 15 years its original price had dropped from $400 to $99, and eventually (parts) made offered free online. In 2009 both online and physical editions were discontinued - and soon forgotten.
Better Internet connectivity brought about by the availability of broadband from early-mid 2000's onwards, meant high quality content migrated from local physical storage media to online servers. Distribution though, was still very much one way, top down traffic. From 2004 onwards Web 2.0 changed how we could interact with educational content forever.
Now and the (very) near future
Crowd sourced and user generated resources such as Wikipedia and YouTube now offer a significant to challenge to commercially produced educational content.
There is a significant increase in the quantity quality and availability of open resources hosted in online media archives. This can be attributed to an increase in digitisation projects and the use of Creative Commons (CC) licences. This new digital landscape is providing innovative opportunities for learning and research.
Presented with an almost unlimited choice of content, teachers and learners are accessing educational content from multiple sources, sometimes without regard to copyright. One only needs to look at the amount of YouTube download apps available.
Unfortunately many digital assets aimed at education use licences that are restrictive and inappropriate for learning in the digital age.
Some platforms including: The Google Cultural Institute, Google Maps, or YouTube (standard licence), allow free access to view or use, but they are copyrighted and may include advertising . Others such as Khan Academy include both Creative Commons and copyrighted materials. These resources provide some excellent and easily accessible opportunities for learning,
Open Content resources offer the widest scope for the potential for learning. The increasing choice of interactive tools, many of them online, can be used to create new educational resources. With some basic digital tools and skills open content such as that from the, the Ford Collection or Europeana can be remixed:
Open-data and APIs enable new creative resources to be built, shared and added to the digital learning canon. The computing and coding skills currently being introduced and taught in many schools may also prove an invaluable starting point for both teachers and children.
Even more importantly social media enables the sharing and curation of new content and ideas plus the opportunity to participate and collaborate on innovative projects.
Although they are well recognised in higher and tertiary education, OERs (Open Educational resources) are now beginning to catch on in the schools sector. In a significant project UK Leicester City Council is……
“ giving permission for staff at community and voluntary controlled schools in the city to openly license the educational resources they produce in the line of their employment.
Teachers in Leicester Authority schools now have a legal freedom and framework to develop and share their own resources. An initial conference launching this initiative attracted representatives from 48 schools and 5 universities.
Postscript
Images have stimulated learning since the earliest days of our species. Memory and magic, romance and ritual, method and learning all feature. It is marvellous how we still speculate and theorise on these images or are inspired to create new artefacts. Film director Werner Herzog believes that the Chauvet caves may have been an early version of ‘cinema,’ a theme which is also suggested by Donald Clark who writes
Could these images be intentionally instructional? What better place than the cold dark interior of a cave, that early chalkboard or simulator, where you experience the simulated fear of being the predator and also the prey?
Because visual information near,y always makes it easier to understand, interpret an idea, process or concept, most educational, media is usually used to reinforce a given text, subject or curriculum. Whilst there is nothing wrong with using an image in this way, #blimage remind us that images are capable of much, much more.
Now, at the start of a new term, it would be great to see the #blimage idea taken up in school classrooms across the world.
Therefore my challenge, rather than to any individual person, is to any teacher, anywhere…..
….show the image below to your class and so they can discuss, blog or make another artefact using it. Please share any outcomes a either in a class or individual student/teacher blog post. Please tag using both #blimage and #school.
- For younger children
2. For older children
Of course there is no reason why the age and picture suggestions cannot be reversed. I look forward to any responses you can share. Thanks for reading to the end!
