We have just finished helping the HOD Science at Bishops Diocesan College, Keith Warne, put all of his 200+ powerpoint presentations for the teaching of Grade 8-12 Science online. They are all freely available to view, use, download and modify! Here I have embedded his most popular one (over 120 views in 2 weeks) as an example:

Why do this, well ….

We find that many educators are willing to share content. I think that a willingness to share is a fundamental part of being a good teacher, isn’t that what teaching is actually all about. At the risk of getting somewhat distracted, I would even say that being a good teacher is about much more than just sharing knowledge/information but also in sharing in the identification, development and achievement of potential and dreams (Woah – it’s early!).

However, when faced with the prospect of sharing online they feel a little overwhelmed. There are a few obvious contributing factors some of which we can address and which I’ll list here:

• they don’t find a critical mass of content they can use online so their expectations about what is good enough to share haven’t been normalised;
• they don’t know the “best” place to share because they’ve not found much useful stuff and the internet is big;
• they seem to feel obliged to share everything, especially when they don’t see a critical mass of content in their subject area online; and
• they have too much stuff to share and its not well organised.

These are all legitimate concerns but the very size and nature of the internet and how people can collaborate online addresses them all:

• they don’t find a critical mass of content they can use online so their expectations about what is good enough to share haven’t been normalised; Nobody is forced to consume your content, allow them to decide if it is good enough or useful for them
• they don’t know the “best” place to share because they’ve not found much useful stuff and the internet is big; There is no best place to share it, so long as it is open, discoverable and has reasonable meta-data the internet search tools will find it and people will be able to use it
• they seem to feel obliged to share everything, especially when they don’t see a critical mass of content in their subject area online; The internet and many sites are some one of the best demonstrations of the “whole being greater than the sum of the parts”, look at Wikipeda and watch Clay Shirky’s Web2.0 Expo talk (transcript here if you don’t want to download a video) – I highly recommend it! and
• they have too much stuff to share and its not well organised. Start small because sharing content online will help get it organised, backed up and reviewed!

For Siyavula we really want to help get active participation going, not just consumption of content we’ve uploaded, and we’ve discovered a few things already:

• the content we’ve uploaded to Connexions does get viewed a lot;
• we really do receive feedback, testimonials and questions; and
• if content is uploaded in the authors’ name they will maintain it.

So, with the help of Upfront Systems, we decided to support some teachers sharing their content under the condition that:

• the content is uploaded to whichever of the following is most appropriate:
• FullMarks,
• Connexions, or
• Slideshare which now supports slides and videos,
• the content is licensed openly, and
• the content is uploaded under an account in their name.

This ensures that we slowly move towards critical mass in a few places, the content can be remixed and that feedback, questions and testimonials goes to the original author who is best equipped to respond. The last point is very important to me, if we want teachers to start connecting online then we must ensure that they can do so without going through any intermediaries. This point is driven home every time I receive feedback or a question on one of the Siyavula modules uploaded to Connexions because I am not the person best equipped to respond to a content/curriculum query and we have missed an opportunity to connect two educators.

A very quick note, there is no review process or special selection regarding who we work with, we started with Keith Warne because he gave up a day of his time to come to a workshop we ran and happened to have all his content with him on a memory stick and gave it to us. We seized the opportunity. There is more content from other teachers and other schools on the way and if you want would like some help getting your content online just let me know.

My blog post about Mbilwi Secondary School triggered an unexpected blast from the past, I was contacted by Dr. Azwinndini Muronga. I used to be a member of the UCT-CERN Research Centre at the University of Cape Town while working on my PhD and have had very little contact with the unit since beginning at the Foundation. Azwinndini joined the unit while I was there and is now a senior lecturer at UCT.

It turns out that Mbilwi has been doing an excellent job of interesting its students in science for many years as Azwinndini was quick to point out that he too attended Mbilwi. Azwinndini mentioned the possibility of going back to the school to talk to the students and I suggested that we might be able to support the school with some of the OER resources we’re looking to print and I think we’ve got a great opportunity to spread OERs, create new partnerships and even get Mbilwi feeding back into the OER world.

It was nice to be able to reconnect with Azwinndini as we really have an opportunity to give Mbilwi further recognition for their achievements as well as give me an opportunity to work on the UCT Physics Department to think about the impact of OERs (hint, hint).

The Sunday Times newspaper commissioned a study of South African schools which they released this last weekend. There is a lot of information in the report and one could spend a lot of time unpacking it. The Sunday Times chose to highlight some things that would definitely lead to a fair amount of debate, some of the classic ones being:

• same-sex versus co-ed schools, and
• girls being smarter than boys.

I’m not really very interested in venturing down either of those paths at this time, or at any time for that matter.

The report is worth a couple of blog posts but I’d like to start by just focusing on one school that was mentioned. Mbilwi Secondary School was ranked in the survey as the top science school in the country. It is a school that I have never heard and, I am quite sure, many other people had never heard of. I haven’t done any additional research on Mbilwi … yet, but there are somethings that jump out at me from the report:

• Mbilwi has large classes, and
• students have to share study guides.

Why do those fact jump out? Large classes and a lack of resources are often cited reasons for poor preformance at schools. Reading a little further they point out just how large the classes are (pupil:teacher ratio of 56:1) and that the school attributes their success to:

• identifying weak learners at the beginning of matric and providing extra support 4 days a week right up until the final exams,
• extra tuition on Saturdays, and
• focusing on more than Grade 12 but working to help learners from Grade 8.

These are the reported statistics that allowed them to achieve the top spot (Matric 2008 numbers):

• 201 Matrics cadidates
• Pass rate 100%
• Univeristy entrance 93%
• 309 A symbols
• 80% passed Maths with more than 50%
• 75% passed Science with more 50%

My take-away from this is that a lot can be done with the right attitude. If the learners didn’t want to learn the extra tuition wouldn’t mean anything, if the teachers didn’t care but were forced to provide the extra tuition they’d not do a very good job. The fact that they do it, do it well and that it is well received tells me that everyone involved with Mbilwi has reaslised that the problem is not insurmountable and that hard work can pay off, if everyone does their best working together.

Another point I can’t help but mention,  EVEN THE NUMBER 1 science school in South Africa will benefit from having access to FHSST, Siyavula and OpenPress to solve their resources problems.