An Irish perspective on education for all who value teaching
Episodes
Saturday Oct 30, 2021
Saturday Oct 30, 2021
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
Theme tune composed by David Vesey.
On this episode of Inside Education, engineer Patricia Scanlon of Soapbox Labs discusses how improving how well software can recognise children's voices can support how teachers teach, assess and give feedback on reading and enhance equity in the classroom. Among the topics discussed are:
- How children’s voices differ to adult voices
- How voice recognition software has been found to be biased in favour of some populations over others
- How she became interested in applying speech recognition technology to education after watching her daughter experience the limits of educational software when she was learning to read and do mathematics
- Applying speech recognition technology to teaching reading – the software acts like a helpful adult who “listens” to and “assesses” the child’s reading.
- The software is used in dyslexia screeners, reading practice products, fluency assessment products, speech therapy.
- Use of the software at home and in classrooms
- The use of rapid naming as one of a suite of tasks in a screening tool that aims to predict dyslexia in pre-literate children, thus making earlier intervention possible
- The promise of voice recognition software for making school more inclusive for children of all abilities
- Applying the voice recognition software to languages other than English
- How practising reading can be formatively assessed using voice recognition software
- Feedback to encourage the student, to correct a child’s pronunciation of a sound, or to identify errors for the teacher
- Why Soapbox Labs’s niche is with children’s voice recognition software
- How they worked alongside teachers to develop the software
- Collecting data and looking at data privacy
- Future plans for developing the software
Tuesday Jun 22, 2021
Tuesday Jun 22, 2021
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
On this week's podcast I speak to Deirdre Hodson who works in the European Commission’s department for Education, Youth, Sports and Culture in Brussels. She provides a European Union policy perspective on technology and sustainability in education. Among the topics we discuss are:
- How she came to work in the area of digital education policy and her studies in the area
- Ben Williamson
- Neil Selwyn
- How her studies contributed to her work as a policymaker
- How the pandemic is likely to impact on policy and practice
- The need for schools to have digital strategies
- The importance of the school as a whole being the unit of change and of hearing the student voice
- The difference between emergency remote teaching and online learning
- How countries reaped the benefits of investment in digital resources in education during the pandemic
- Asking what we can learn from remote teaching and learning as a result of the pandemic
- Broadening the education infrastructure to include collaboration with libraries and museums
- The origin, purpose and launch of the SELFIE diagnostic/planning tool she was involved in developing
- How SELFIE has been used and a new SELFIE tool for teachers to be launched in October 2021.
- Report on Artificial Intelligence in Education
- Examples of interesting practices in digital education across Europe
- An account of a visit to a school in Finland and the phenomenon-based learning and to one in Austria
- Sustainability, digital technologies, accessibility and inclusion
- Risks and threats of technology alongside opportunities (e.g. data protection; student and teacher agency)
- Differences between aspects of a teacher’s job that are routine (e.g. marking) and those that are human (e.g. coaching and mentoring)
- Neil Selwyn Should robots replace teachers?
- Challenges of not being able to hold the regular Leaving Certificate examinations in 2020.
- The value of learning languages
- Erasmus and E-Twinning: Léargas
- Neil Selwyn’s book Distrusting Educational Technology: Critical Questions for Changing Times
Sunday Nov 01, 2020
Sunday Nov 01, 2020
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
My guest on the podcast this week is Dr. Pam Moran who is the Executive Director of the Virginia School Consortium for Learning and is a former superintendent of Albemarle County Public Schools.
Among the points we discussed in the podcast were the following:
- The role of a superintendent in US education
- Desmos software that is used to teach mathematics.
- The reintroduction of maker skills into US education in response to narrow testing and the benefits of it
MAKER LEARNING
- Students who take making courses
- Safety in maker learning
- Involving the wider family in maker learning
- How maker learning is reflected in the school curriculum
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT FOR TEACHERS
- Her thoughts on professional development that works best for teachers
- Professional development to help teachers teach online
- Flipgrid
EDUCATION FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
- What schools need to do to be more relevant to the twenty-first century (automation, climate change, working from home, demographic changes, superficial learning for tests)
- Edward Hess books: Learn or Die, Humility is the New Smart and Hyper Learning: Learning at the speed of change)
- How she would reform the mathematics and science curriculum to make it more relevant for students
- The book she co-authored, Timeless Learning: How Imagination, Observation, and Zero-Based Thinking Change Schools. Reimagining education using zero-based thinking
- Ira Socol.
- Yong Zhao episode on Inside Education.
- Catherine Cronin's interview on Inside Education.
- Pam O’Brien, Mags Almond, John Heffernan.
- Maya Angelou, Séamus Heaney
- Stories from the Pandemic.
- Website of Pam Moran and Ira Socol
Saturday Apr 25, 2020
Saturday Apr 25, 2020
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's episode I speak to Professor Yong Zhao from the School of Education at the University of Kansas. Among the topics we discuss on the episode are the following:
- We currently have the opportunity to reimagine education without schools: Do we have to do these subjects? Do we have to teach this much?
- A good time to teach global understanding, empathy and competency
- Innovation in education
- The importance of having an entrepreneurial mindset
- The Digital Pencil
- Alternative ways of organising the education of young people
- Difficulty of finding like-minded people in a small school
- Globalisation as the “death of physical distance”
- Globalisation is localisation of global forces
- Implications of globalisation for teachers
- Why everyone should have a local identity and affirm the identities of others
- Your uniqueness can only become valuable when it’s valuable to others
- Why schools encourage people to be independent and selfish rather than interdependent
- Schools as a place to bring about a better society
- Students as job creators versus job hunters
- Enhancing entrepreneurship in students
- Unintended consequences of education policies
- PISA test scores and the illusions of excellence, science, progress.
- His experience of being educated in China
- The impact of technology on education
- To compete with a machine, a person must avoid becoming one!
- Be unique and great in your own way; understand yourself, your talents and virtues.
- "Creative" means identifying problems worth solving
- Empty creativity versus good creativity – the need to have a domain to excel in
- What schools should be for: a place to equalise community resources
- David Berliner and Bruce J. Biddle The Manufactured Crisis.
- David Berliner as a former guest on the podcast
- Diane Ravitch’s blog: https://dianeravitch.net/
- If we want a better life in the future, we need to help our children create a better life for us
Monday Mar 23, 2020
Monday Mar 23, 2020
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's podcast I speak to my colleague in Marino Institute of Education, Ciara Reilly, about ideas for teaching online and offline while schools are closed. The initial impetus for our discussion was a padlet wall that Ciara developed to support teachers and which is available here. But our conversation covered many additional topics including the following:
- Where to start in online teaching and learning at primary school in particular.
- Digital Learning Framework.
- The value of having children work as a group rather than individually
- Use a timetable with children
- Singapore experience
- Acceptable Use Policies
- What teachers expect from students
- Planning for the future and online learning
- Risk of children spending too much time on screen
- The value of children being bored
- Use of iPads and use of textbooks
- Exam preparation for post-primary students
- Things you can do offline
- Hashtag for teachers to use on Twitter: #edshareie
And Ciara discusses many resources available to teachers and their students including the following:
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- Padlet
- Google Classroom
- Skype Classroom
- Zoom
- Google hangouts
- Aladdin
- Classdojo
- G-Suite for Education
- Microsoft Teams
- Google Docs
- Cúla4
- Quiver 3D
- Gonoodle
- RTE 10 at 10
- Body Coach, PE with Joe
- Bebras
- Khan Academy
- Epic Reading App
- Teach your monster to read
- Geoguessr
- Science Foundation Ireland
- Active School Flag and Run around Ireland challenge
- Seesaw
- Edmodo
- Webwise
- TikTok
- Net Nanny
- Apple Classroom
- Watchkin
- Twinkl
- CJ Fallon
- EdCo
- Folens
- PDST Distance Learning Resources
Wednesday Mar 04, 2020
Wednesday Mar 04, 2020
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
This week's podcast is a collaborative one with Darren Ralston from The Ed Narrative podcast. Darren was in Ireland to present a workshop at the annual conference of the Computers in Education Society of Ireland (CESI), which was held in Athlone on Saturday last. Among the topics we discuss on the podcast are the following:
- Integrating technology into one’s teaching
- The difference between an instructional coach and a learning technology integrator
- Using virtual reality in the classroom, using Google Expeditions
- How instructional coaches are organised in US schools
- Becoming, and working as, an instructional coach
- Managing his workload as a coach
- Comparing mentoring and coaching as interpreted in his setting
- How he got into teaching
- How he teaches literature
- How he chooses literature to teach
- Teaching drama – using comedic improvisation
- Brave New World
- 1984 by George Orwell
- Starting The Ed Narrative Podcast
- Equipment used for podcasting
- Selecting guests for podcats
- Neil Postman
Wednesday Oct 02, 2019
Wednesday Oct 02, 2019
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
Theme tune: David Vesey
My guest on the programme this week is my colleague in Marino Institute of Education and the person behind the social media identity, Little Miss Teacher. She is Clara Fiorentini and we talk about play, literacy, phonics, early years education and much more. Here are the topics we discuss and the times at which they appear.
- Why she started posting on social media (1’33”)
- Her thoughts on the new language curriculum and her interest in literacy, especially early literacy (7’00” and 24’11”))
- A typical day in her classroom (with a focus on literacy activities)
- Different kinds of play 12’03”
- The kind of stories she used in her teaching (14’35”)
- Phonics and literacy instruction (16’22”)
- Literacy in more senior classes (21’42”)
- The phonics programme she participated in developing, Sounds Like Phonics (23’46”)
- Her approach to teaching (26’48”)
- Returning to study for a master’s degree in children’s literature (29’50”)
- What schools are for 33’41”
- A teacher who had a significant impact on her (34’48”)
- Who inspires her (39’13”)
Among the resources and materials mentioned by Clara were the following:
Farmer Duck by Martin Waddell
Goodnight Mr Tom by Michell Magorian
The book with no pictures by BJ Novak
Rita Pierson – Ted Talk – Every child deserves a champion
Jen Jones on picture books
My recommendation:
Podcast: Speak-Up Storytelling with Matthew and Elysha Dicks
Book: Storyworthy: Engage, teach, persuade and change your life through the power of storytelling by Matthew Dicks
Wednesday Nov 07, 2018
Wednesday Nov 07, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
Theme tune composed and arranged by David Vesey
On this week's programme I speak to Ray Gallon of the Transformation Society about education outside the formal settings of school. I interviewed Ray at the 2018 annual conference of the Association for Teacher Education in Europe.
Among the topics we discuss are the following:
- How the phrase “knowledge is power” has changed meaning
- Educating outside formal school settings
- Working with different sized groups
- Presenting webinars
- How he organises his own learning
- Effective presentations
- How teaching is changing
- Ingredients of a good radio programme
- Difference between a radio programme and a podcast
- What inspires him personally and professionally
Wednesday Oct 17, 2018
Wednesday Oct 17, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney
This week I'm delighted to bring you the second part of my interview with Niamh Dunphy, the teacher behind the blog and social media resource Irish Primary Teacher. Among the topics we talk about on the programme this week are:
- Plans for developing Irish Primary Teacher
- Where she gets her lesson ideas
- Using the store to encourage users to remain on the website
- How she reviews products for the Reviews section
- Clothing and teaching
- What she likes most and finds most challenging about teaching
- Differences between teaching in England and teaching in Ireland
- Her favourite subject to teach
- What she has learned from teaching to date
- What are schools for?
- A teacher who had a significant impact on her
- Who inspires her
- Why she finds Instagram better than books
- A change she would make in her current school
- And much more!
Wednesday Oct 10, 2018
Wednesday Oct 10, 2018
Presented and produced by Seán Delaney.
On this week's programme I speak to Niamh Dunphy, the person behind the hugely popular Irish Primary Teacher, blog, Facebook page and Instagram account.
Among the topics we discuss in this first part of our interview are:
- Why she set up the blog, and pages on Instagram and Facebook
- Her positive and negative experiences of teaching in England
- What she knows about her audience
- Dividing content among various social media platforms
- How teachers support each other through social media
- What posts are most popular
- Dealing with trolls and negative comments
- How much time it takes