James Cross http://jamescross.org.uk Education, technology, ideas, music posterous.com Wed, 17 Aug 2011 10:33:00 -0700 Social learning, online video and disruptive innovation http://jamescross.org.uk/social-learning-and-online-video http://jamescross.org.uk/social-learning-and-online-video

This is one of my favourite TED talks. Mark Pagel discusses how social learning, and the language skills that enable it, are responsible for all human achievement - from our rapid expansion across the planet, to the iPhones and iPads that we carry. It's our ability as a species to learn from each other, and to adapt and improve upon the ideas of others that sets us apart from other species - and he briefly touches on how the internet is starting to add fuel to the social learning fire.

One of the learning technologies that I'm most excited by is online video, and I'm convinced that our new-found ability to quickly share video (as broadband speeds grow and online video tools evolve) will lead to a tipping point in online learning. 

Of course, learning online has been possible since the internet was in its infancy - but up until now, it's been almost entirely a text-based affair. Now, I'm not decrying the power of text as a learning tool - it's always going to be a key part of our sharing and retention of knowledge. But for most of us, learning is a visual thing. It's also a human process, and we've adapted to learn best by watching other people do stuff, and imitating it.

Asking students to learn a concept by copying out of a textbook is considered to be 'bad teaching', and explaining a concept in an engaging and interactive way is considered to be 'good teaching' - and it's the human element of the latter that makes the difference.

From YouTube to the Khan Academy, we're starting to see great examples of people sharing their knowledge using online video. If I want to learn to play the piano, I can jump onto YouTube and pick from the 100,000+ videos that 'normal' users have uploaded. If I want to grasp the concept of multiple dimensions, this video explaining it through animation does the job very nicely.

As this network of user-generated knowledge, and the ability of everyday users to personally contribute to it grows, it'll be interesting to see if Clayton Christenson's model of disruptive innovation will play out - with on demand, student centric learning slowly creeping up on, and taking traditional education systems by surprise.

Online learning in many schools at the moment resembles the text-based internet of the past, with a few token Powerpoint files and Word documents uploaded after lessons. We often hear the phrase 'back to basics' in education, and that's exactly what schools need to start doing with their online provision - going back to the 'basics' of humans showing humans how to do stuff. And online video, at the moment, is the best way of them achieving that.

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/1404186/25872_698729743442_61108757_42790919_911388_n.jpg http://posterous.com/users/hcl42chOX5mWu James Cross James Cross James Cross Tue, 16 Aug 2011 10:48:00 -0700 What do Musical Futures and the Atkins Diet have in common? How ideas spread. http://jamescross.org.uk/what-do-musical-futures-and-the-atkins-diet-h http://jamescross.org.uk/what-do-musical-futures-and-the-atkins-diet-h

Mufuatkins
Chances are, you've heard of the Atkins diet. 

And if you're involved in education in the UK, you're probably also aware of Musical Futures, an approach to music education that's now in over half of Britain's music classrooms.

They're two ideas that very quickly spread far and wide. This wasn't down to savvy social media marketing, and it wasn't down to intensive advertising. The reason that these two ideas spread so effectively is because they're what Seth Godin would call 'virus worthy'. Seth argues that ideas can be engineered to spread quickly through word of mouth - and that's exactly what happened with these two approaches.

They both had a 'sticky' initial phase that gained attention.

Musical Futures starts with a phase called 'In at the Deep End', where students form groups, are given space, and are asked to prepare a cover version of any song they choose. Ask somebody about Musical Futures, and this is the part they'll probably remember.

Atkins starts with a severely restrictive phase, during which fatty foods are encouraged. Ask somebody about Atkins, and this is the part they'll probably remember.

Now, both ideas have far more to them than just this initial phase. Musical Futures is a diverse collection of approaches and ideas, and there are a number of phases that follow 'In at the Deep End' - and the Atkins diet is only so restrictive for a small amount of time. But in both cases, it's still this initial phase that caused their ideas to spread. Why these phases, and not any of the others?

These initial phases both went against conventional wisdom.

Classroom music, by conventional wisdom, should be highly structured and teacher-led.

Weight loss, by conventional wisdom, should be done through a low fat diet.

The initial phases of these two approaches turn conventional wisdom on its head, and that's why they're so sticky. They're a talking point in themselves - they encourage people to discuss the approach, and to have an opinion. People will disagree, and people will be polarised - but that's where their power lies.

Crucially, these initial phases weren't artificially added as shock tactics to aid publicity - in both cases they're true to, and are a distillation of the entire approach.

But having heard of an idea isn't they key - it's the 'conversion' of those who've heard the idea to those who actively apply it that matters. How did these ideas 'convert' so well?

The core ideas were freely available and easily understood

Musical Futures is a non-profit organisation, and Atkins is a commercial one - but they both followed the same path. Want to try Musical Futures in the classroom? Go and download the PDF book and watch the videos. Want to try Atkins? The entire plan is on their website, for free. Both offer their main idea as easily digestable chunks that can be quickly understood.

What can we learn from this?

I'm really interested in the way that ideas spread in education. Musical Futures stands up as a great example of how a great idea, that has the power to enrich the creative lives of millions of students, can spread so quickly and so cheaply (the whole project was undertaken with surprisingly little funding and staff hours).

I'm especially interested in what we can learn from educational ideas that have spread effectively under their own steam, and how this can be applied to other worthy ideas - especially at a time of immense change and pressure in schools. As well as looking at successful educational ideas, we also need to look at great examples from outside the education world.

There was another set of materials that were released around the same time that Musical Futures started to gain traction - the snappily titled Secondary National Strategy for Music. Although it was produced by a Government body and had lots of authority, funding and man-hours behind it, the lasting impact it had in classrooms was dwarfed by Musical Futures. I'm going to blog soon with a comparison of these two approaches.

 

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]]> http://files.posterous.com/user_profile_pics/1404186/25872_698729743442_61108757_42790919_911388_n.jpg http://posterous.com/users/hcl42chOX5mWu James Cross James Cross James Cross Mon, 15 Aug 2011 12:00:00 -0700 We Are The People We've Been Waiting For - full video http://jamescross.org.uk/we-are-the-people-weve-been-waiting-for-full http://jamescross.org.uk/we-are-the-people-weve-been-waiting-for-full

At at time when the UK is doing a lot of soul-searching, it seems a good time to post this video again. Following the lives of a cross section of young people, this film is a powerful reminder of the incredibly important role of education in shaping young lives. The introduction alone is well worth watching.

"The world is facing huge challenges, and they're growing daily in severity, in scale and in complexity.

It's no exaggeration to say that they're not going to go away - indeed, they will get worse, unless we can start to find solutions, and find them soon.

If we're going to survive, we desperately need the next generation to be smarter, more adaptable, and better prepared than any that have gone before."

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]]> Wed, 18 May 2011 13:53:00 -0700 Teachers and hackers http://jamescross.org.uk/teachers-and-hackers http://jamescross.org.uk/teachers-and-hackers

A while ago, I stumbled across David Hargreaves' article for the Demos think-tank, in which he argued that teachers need to be more like hackers. On the surface, there's a huge difference between the work that teachers and hackers do - but Hargreaves argued that there's much that teachers can learn from the way that hackers operate.

Hackers are hyper-connected. Innovation and knowledge spreads quickly - they quickly share what they've tried, what worked, and what didn't (as an example of this speed, many software bugs are exploited with incredible speed). There's also a huge amount of professional pride and peer-granted kudos that helps to fuel their contributions.

Hargreaves wrote about this idea in 2003, when user generated content and collaboration weren't a huge feature of the internet. Eight years later, we're actually fairly close to the model he envisaged, thanks to tools such as Twitter, blogs, and informal idea sharing and networking sessions such as TeachMeets that have arisen from these networks.

Some features of these educator networks that are similar to the hacker world: they're completely de-centralised and independent, with no encouragement from third parties (in teachers' case, government and other bodies). It's fuelled purely by teachers' love for sharing ideas and connecting with each other, along with peer gratitude and relationships. - Ideas are being shared quickly by teachers, and they're also being built upon and re-shared as adapted iterations by other educators. - Thanks to these networks and shared ethos, the way that many teachers approach their professional development and learning has changed. For these teachers, CPD is no longer a single school training day per term. It's now ambient. It's always-on, it's constantly evolving, and it's two-way.

Link to David Hargreaves' full article (the 'hackers' section is from page 53)

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]]> Tue, 26 Oct 2010 11:54:00 -0700 Now *this* is personalised learning. http://jamescross.org.uk/now-this-is-personalised-learning http://jamescross.org.uk/now-this-is-personalised-learning

 

This is Sal Khan, who founded the site khanacademy.org. Khan Academy is an organisation which aims to teach the world for free - through high quality videos on YouTube. It's disruptive, it's effective, and we're going to be seeing a whole lot more of this style of learning in the future.

There are now tools and networks in place which allow people to share, teach, and learn from each other - and they're starting to realise the potential and joy that this brings. Personalised learning and differentiation, in many schools, simply means the teacher making a few extra worksheets and putting some largely meaningless differentiated learning outcomes on the board. This kind of online teaching and learning on the other hand, allows students to choose their teacher, the pace at which they progress, and the order in which they learn material. It is truly personalised in every sense of the word.

Of course, real-life relationships will always be at the heart of education. But we need to start thinking about how we can blend these new types of teaching and learning with them, based upon what works best for the different parts of the learning process. Of course, online learning really comes into its own for students who aren't in mainstream education - and as a disruptive innovation, this is where its growth is likely to begin.

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]]> Tue, 21 Sep 2010 08:29:00 -0700 Doing nothing vs doing something http://jamescross.org.uk/doing-nothing-vs-doing-something http://jamescross.org.uk/doing-nothing-vs-doing-something

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At the moment, I'm reading Clay Shirky's new book

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'Cognitive Surplus'. The main idea of the book is that the internet is enabling people to use their free time in ever more creative and valuable ways, by allowing them to connect, share and participate more easily. He gives two examples at different ends of the 'value' scale - LOLCATS and Ushahidi.

LOLCATS allows people to make, share and view funny pictures of cats with captions. Ushahidi is a platform which allows for citizens to pool information during crises. Two platforms, completely different aims and values, but one thing in common - they allow anybody to quickly and easily participate. This allows people to jump the chasm of 'doing nothing' vs 'doing something', which opens the floodgates to the massive amounts collaboration and participation we're starting to see across the web.

I came across an iPhone app the other night which made me think about Shirky's ideas. It's the 'Glee' app (based upon the TV show), and it allows users to record songs, sing duets, and share their creations with the world. It's slick, quick, and easy - there are no barriers. All you need to participate is a mobile phone. Sure, the quality of much of the stuff uploaded isn't great, but that doesn't matter at all. Through this app, there are millions of people making music, and sharing it. I'd bet that this isn't something many of these people have done before. And that's amazing.

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]]> Mon, 29 Mar 2010 11:28:22 -0700 My first Teachmeet, and the power of teachers sharing http://jamescross.org.uk/my-first-teachmeet-and-the-power-of-teachers http://jamescross.org.uk/my-first-teachmeet-and-the-power-of-teachers I attended my first 'Teachmeet' last Friday night, and was blown away by the experience. Teachmeets are informal idea sharing sessions, where teachers get together and sign up to present either two or seven minute talks on things they've tried in the classroom. Aside from the inspirational presentations, a few things struck me about the teachers that were present. They had a DIY attitude to teaching and learning, they weren't afraid to try new things in the classroom and take risks, and they found great joy in sharing their ideas and learning from others. Most importantly, there was no doubt that all of this stemmed from a genuine care for the learning of the young people they worked with. No posturing, no plugging, just great ideas, shared enthusiastically - informal CPD at its very best. You can check out the whole night, in two parts, here and here. Thanks to Doncaster South CLC for providing the venue, and special thanks to @damoward for filming and @dughall for leading the evening. Here's my presentation from the night:

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]]> Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:56:00 -0800 Closing up shop http://jamescross.org.uk/closing-up-shop http://jamescross.org.uk/closing-up-shop

The high street has been a casualty of both the recession, and shifts in the way that people spend their money. We lost Zavvi because more and more people are now buying their music and movies online. We lost Borders because Amazon undercut them on price and convenience. When 'better and cheaper' is available online, bricks and mortar stores feel the brunt of this. The ones that don't adapt to this new landscape disappear. The ones that reconstruct themselves to amplify what the online stores can't offer have a better chance of survival.

Skip forward a few years into the future. Students can construct their own curriculum online, from blocks of content - either user or professionally produced. They can make contact with, and gain skills informally from others, through sites like School of Everything. They have most of mankind's knowledge in their pocket - along with any other new learning tools that might have emerged.

Are they still going to be coming into a Victorian building at 8am with their blazers on and top buttons done up?

Are they still going to be keeping their mobiles out of sight, and regurgitating information for high-stakes exams?

Are 'Sir' and 'Miss' still going to be in charge of what, how and when they learn?

Borders wasn't books - it was a shop that distributed them, until a more effective method of distribution came along. Similarly, schools aren't learning - they're institutions that deliver it en-masse. What happens when more effective and student-centric ways of delivering learning come along? Unless they start to transform themselves now, they might well find themselves being made redundant.

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]]> Fri, 26 Feb 2010 18:12:33 -0800 Compliance is easy to teach http://jamescross.org.uk/compliance-is-easy-to-teach http://jamescross.org.uk/compliance-is-easy-to-teach A great post from marketing guru Seth Godin's blog, that rings true more than ever in the run-up to the coursework/exam season... "Compliance is simple to measure, simple to test for and simple to teach. Punish non-compliance, reward obedience and repeat. Initiative is very difficult to teach to 28 students in a quiet classroom. It's difficult to brag about in a school board meeting. And it's a huge pain in the neck to do reliably. Schools like teaching compliance. They're pretty good at it. To top it off, until recently the customers of a school or training program (the companies that hire workers) were buying compliance by the bushel. Initiative was a red flag, not an asset. Of course, now that's all changed. The economy has rewritten the rules, and smart organizations seek out intelligent problem solvers. Everything is different now. Except the part about how much easier it is to teach compliance."

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]]> Thu, 25 Feb 2010 07:39:28 -0800 Video to explain e-learning to school staff http://jamescross.org.uk/video-to-explain-e-learning-to-school-staff http://jamescross.org.uk/video-to-explain-e-learning-to-school-staff Hopefully this is more engaging for staff than a powerpoint presentation! I'm hoping that 'try, share, learn' is a good way of promoting informal learning and development amongst staff - try something new, share what works, learn from each other. I'm aiming to make this different from the 'normal' way of launching initiatives at school. I want this idea to be 'sticky'. Hopefully by emphasising autonomy, adaptation of ideas and exploration, e-learning will be more exciting for staff, and they'll be more likely to give new ideas a try in the classroom.

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]]> Fri, 12 Feb 2010 07:11:51 -0800 Mobiles for parental engagement http://jamescross.org.uk/mobiles-for-parental-engagement http://jamescross.org.uk/mobiles-for-parental-engagement Spent most of last weekend creating a school mobile web app that gives the latest news, school information and lets parents contact the school directly from their mobile. Here's the (ever so slightly cheesy) video that I've made to publicise it on the school site...

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]]> Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:20:02 -0800 What cannot be measured http://jamescross.org.uk/what-cannot-be-measured http://jamescross.org.uk/what-cannot-be-measured A study once found that students could accurately judge the effectiveness of a teacher from a two second, soundless video clip of them teaching. These judgements were significantly correlated with end of term evaluations from students from the teachers' own classes, as well as comparing favourably with the judgement of the teacher's school principal. We're remarkably adept at making effective judgements, often subconsciously. I would bet that it's similarly possible to accurately predict a student's future success from a few moments of observation. I would also bet that an instant judgement made from seeing a student interacting with friends whilst walking along a school corridor would be more effective in predicting their life chances than one based upon their GCSE results. Similarly, the intuitive feeling you get from walking into a great, buzzing school is probably a better indicator of a school's effect on students' life chances than an OFSTED report that is based upon reams of data, and a standardised inspection framework. Education is obsessed with stuff that can be measured. Courses are designed around what can be assessed effectively - and things that can be easily assessed in a standardised way aren't what our students need to be learning. An exam can't measure the quality of students' interactions with others. Coursework can't measure the extent to which students are able to creatively think 'outside the box' - in fact, doing so can result in failure. I often have to say to students "this is great, but it's not going to hit the right bits of the exam board's mark scheme". Rigid, standardised assessment is teaching our kids that conformity equals success, and risk taking leads to failure. This was fine when we needed compliant workers for factories - but now it's not what our economy needs or rewards.

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]]> Thu, 28 Jan 2010 12:20:41 -0800 When British Gas is ahead of our schools, something needs to change. http://jamescross.org.uk/when-british-gas-is-ahead-of-our-schools-some http://jamescross.org.uk/when-british-gas-is-ahead-of-our-schools-some If you asked most people to name innovative institutions, British Gas and the Vatican probably wouldn't be top of their lists. Yet British Gas has just released an iPhone app, allowing customers to submit meter readings, and the Vatican has a highly successful YouTube channel. These new ways of interacting with customers and the world are now becoming firmly mainstream. Having a YouTube channel or a mobile phone app isn't 'out there' any more. It's becoming the norm. So, are schools also adapting to take advantage of these technologies? No. Both YouTube and mobile phones are banned within the walls of most UK schools.

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]]> Sat, 16 Jan 2010 19:16:43 -0800 BETT 2010 - some brief impressions http://jamescross.org.uk/bett-2010-some-brief-impressions http://jamescross.org.uk/bett-2010-some-brief-impressions I visited BETT for the first time today - an interesting experience, and also an enlightening one. It made me realise just how huge a commercial industry education actually is. Sure, the tools on offer were all impressive - 3D classroom displays and augmented reality software for instance. But these were being marketed to a sector where the effective use of technology isn't yet anywhere near widespread. What's technically possible is seriously disconnected from what's actually happening in classrooms. Huge sums of money are clearly being spent on the 'hardware' of schools (the tools and equipment) - but this is futile without investing in the 'software' (the teachers and approaches to learning). Flashy bells and whistles alone can't transform learning - but people, inspiration and contagious ideas can. I visited BETT for the first time today - an interesting experience, and also an enlightening one. It made me realise just how huge a commercial industry education actually is. Sure, the tools on offer were all impressive - 3D classroom displays and augmented reality software for instance. But these were being marketed to a sector where the effective use of technology isn't yet anywhere near widespread. What's technically possible is seriously disconnected from what's actually happening in classrooms. Huge sums of money are clearly being spent on the 'hardware' of schools (the tools and equipment) - but this is futile without investing in the 'software' (the teachers and approaches to learning). Flashy bells and whistles alone can't transform learning - but people, inspiration and contagious ideas can. I'd be really interested to hear from others who went along - please do comment!

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]]> Thu, 07 Jan 2010 11:52:32 -0800 Personalised learning? We ain't seen nothing yet... http://jamescross.org.uk/personalised-learning-we-aint-seen-nothing-ye http://jamescross.org.uk/personalised-learning-we-aint-seen-nothing-ye When I can put on the kind of glasses that are being used for gaming technology and absolutely be anywhere in the world, learning absolutely anything, with absolutely anybody, why am I going to go and sit in a Victorian building?… The more we talk about schools, the more we miss the point. They're not education, they're not learning, they're institutions.

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]]> Tue, 29 Dec 2009 16:56:18 -0800 Unexpected consequences of change http://jamescross.org.uk/unexpected-consequences-of-change http://jamescross.org.uk/unexpected-consequences-of-change Traffic authorities across the world have started to install LED traffic lights, in order to take advantage of their efficiency - as well as lasting longer than traditional bulbs, they're also much more efficient as they waste less energy through heat. During the recent snow, it's been discovered that this efficiency has a downside - whilst the 'inefficient' heat of the old bulbs melted the snow and kept the lights clear, the more efficient new bulbs don't. This has resulted in a number of accidents. Perhaps, as educators interested in change and innovation, we need to recognise that existing systems may have unexpected beneficial qualities that aren't immediately apparent at first. This needn't be a barrier to innovation; LED bulbs are clearly still superior to traditional ones. It's a reminder that we sometimes need to recognise the positive nuances of existing systems and ideas, and use creative solutions to design them into new ones.

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]]> Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:37:21 -0800 Kunskapsskolan in the UK - a disruptive innovation? http://jamescross.org.uk/kunskapsskolan-in-the-uk-a-disruptive-innovat http://jamescross.org.uk/kunskapsskolan-in-the-uk-a-disruptive-innovat I was interested to read in the news this week that Kunskapsskolan, a Swedish provider that's been in the educational press lots lately, has been approved to open two academies in London. Disruptive innovation often targets non-consumption at first, and I suppose the schools that often become academies are sorts of non-consumers, having struggled for whatever reasons with the usual ways in which schools are run. Interestingly, the way in which technology is being used by Kunskapsskolan is pretty close to Clayton Christensen's ideas about disruptive innovation in education, in his book Disrupting Class.

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]]> Sat, 12 Dec 2009 10:14:04 -0800 Mobiles, transparency and disruptive change http://jamescross.org.uk/mobiles-transparency-and-disruptive-change http://jamescross.org.uk/mobiles-transparency-and-disruptive-change I was pleasantly surprised to see such forward thinking by Zenna Atkins, the chair of OFSTED, in this talk from the Handheld Learning Conference 2009 (video at the bottom). She covers the change that mobile technologies will bring about in education - not only in terms of learning, but also accountability and transparency in schools. A striking example she gives is of her son emailing her a mobile phone video of a classroom gone awry. After ringing the school to say "there's a riot going on in D3", she received another video from her son, of a student shouting "there's a senior teacher coming" - and after the classroom quickly calmed, her son had his mobile phone confiscated by that same senior teacher. We've already seen mobile phones bring about radical new examples of accountability in the Police - instances from around the world of discrimination and brutality regularly find their way onto the news courtesy of mobile phone footage. How long will be it be before this starts to have an impact on education? Online reporting and parental engagement are buzz words at the moment, but over the coming years, these radical new mobile sharing technologies will start to make schools transparent in a much different, student-led way. To put the technology into context, an app was released for the iPhone last week which lets users stream video live, as it happens, to the internet. An example of my own - I once asked a student to put a mobile phone away during a music lesson. He showed me the screen, and on it was an app that listed guitar chords and showed how to play them. He was using it to teach a non-guitarist student to play chords. In this instance, following the school policy of 'see it and take it' would have been an injustice - both to his learning, and his ingenuity. We've seen from the music industry that when change isn't embraced and met head-on, it can have devastating effects. Mobile technologies present education with a potentially disruptive innovation. It's time that we started to seriously explore how we can use them positively in the school - because no matter how many posters go up on the walls, and no matter how many are confiscated, the kids aren't going to be putting them away any time soon. Another theme that Zenna touches on is consumer choice in education, and the increased impact that this is likely to have in the future. Topic for a (near) future blog post, I think!

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]]> Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:11:24 -0800 Why music teachers need to 'take to the internet' http://jamescross.org.uk/why-music-teachers-need-to-take-to-the-intern http://jamescross.org.uk/why-music-teachers-need-to-take-to-the-intern Guest editorial for Teaching Music I had a look at the latest version of Cubase today. A few incremental changes and improvements, but nothing groundbreaking. There’s nothing in there that would change the way that I teach. In fact, it’s been a good while since a new piece of ‘music technology’ tool had an impact on my teaching. It’s even been a while since I heard an album that’s defined by some new recording or production technology. We think of music technology as being related to recording and production, but the equipment related to both seems to have reached a plateau. My argument is that the internet presents the ‘next big thing’ in music teaching. The internet has brought about two changes that we need to take notice of as music teachers. The first is that the music industry has been decentralised. The second is that the students we’re teaching have ‘grown up digital’. I’m going to explore how we can adapt to these changes as music teachers. The music industry is in a state of confused flux, as the fallout from file sharing challenges traditional revenue models. Technology has democratised the industry. We’ve benefited from this before as teachers, with computer-based recording and production getting so cheap that high quality music could be produced in schools. Now, promotion and distribution is becoming so cheap, easy and accessible that anybody can get their music out there, without the backing of a wealthy label. In the past, a student who was producing great music faced a lengthy, uphill battle to get themselves known. Now, they can get their music online instantly, with a global audience. Getting a student’s track in record shops would have been unimaginable ten years ago. Now, a they could have their track for sale on iTunes, the world’s largest record store, in a matter of minutes. This is the world that our future musicians will be entering. Success won’t only be down to musical skill - it’ll also be down to self promotion, online networking and personal branding. Music technology teaching in schools is giving them the skills to make good music and record it well, but I’d argue that we also need to be showing them what they can do with these recordings, in terms of distribution and promotion. The second change is that the students we’re teaching today are part of this drastically evolving landscape. They’re the ones who are consuming digital music, who view the internet and social networking as an intrinsic part of their lives, and who are uploading twenty hours of content to YouTube every minute. They’re responsible for the radical transformation of the music and movie industries, as they expect content to be free and readily available. Their needs and expectations are changing things. Music teaching must adapt to cater for this new generation of music fans and musicians, just as the industry itself has had to. Performances from gigs live on forever as online bootlegs - so why shouldn’t performances from our lessons and school concerts? The music that’s being made in bedrooms across the world is making its way online for all to hear - why shouldn’t our students’ creations? Millions of amateurs are uploading and using ‘how to play’ videos, in an exciting resurgence of the ‘folk’ way of disseminating musical knowledge. Why can’t we be embracing this as teachers? Musical Futures has shown us that music teaching works best when it mirrors how things are done in the real world. Now it’s time for music teachers to take to the internet, showcasing their students’ work and sharing music and knowledge in a way that’s engaging and suited to the way our students are ‘wired’, and in-tune with how musicians and music fans in the ‘real world’ are using the internet to hear, share and learn about music. Make a class blog on Tumblr. Create a station on NUMU. Get videos of concerts up on YouTube. Promote school gigs using Facebook. Get students to create videos or podcasts explaining musical terms. Experiment, share and get the musical life of your school and your students online. Guest editorial for Teaching Music : I had a look at the latest version of Cubase today. A few incremental changes and improvements, but nothing groundbreaking. There’s nothing in there that would change the way that I teach. In fact, it’s been a good while since a new piece of ‘music technology’ tool had an impact on my teaching. It’s even been a while since I heard an album that’s defined by some new recording or production technology. We think of music technology as being related to recording and production, but the equipment related to both seems to have reached a plateau. My argument is that the internet presents the ‘next big thing’ in music teaching. The internet has brought about two changes that we need to take notice of as music teachers. The first is that the music industry has been decentralised. The second is that the students we’re teaching have ‘grown up digital’. I’m going to explore how we can adapt to these changes as music teachers. The music industry is in a state of confused flux, as the fallout from file sharing challenges traditional revenue models. Technology has democratised the industry. We’ve benefited from this before as teachers, with computer-based recording and production getting so cheap that high quality music could be produced in schools. Now, promotion and distribution is becoming so cheap, easy and accessible that anybody can get their music out there, without the backing of a wealthy label. In the past, a student who was producing great music faced a lengthy, uphill battle to get themselves known. Now, they can get their music online instantly, with a global audience. Getting a student’s track in record shops would have been unimaginable ten years ago. Now, a they could have their track for sale on iTunes, the world’s largest record store, in a matter of minutes. This is the world that our future musicians will be entering. Success won’t only be down to musical skill - it’ll also be down to self promotion, online networking and personal branding. Music technology teaching in schools is giving them the skills to make good music and record it well, but I’d argue that we also need to be showing them what they can do with these recordings, in terms of distribution and promotion. The second change is that the students we’re teaching today are part of this drastically evolving landscape. They’re the ones who are consuming digital music, who view the internet and social networking as an intrinsic part of their lives, and who are uploading twenty hours of content to YouTube every minute. They’re responsible for the radical transformation of the music and movie industries, as they expect content to be free and readily available. Their needs and expectations are changing things. Music teaching must adapt to cater for this new generation of music fans and musicians, just as the industry itself has had to. Performances from gigs live on forever as online bootlegs - so why shouldn’t performances from our lessons and school concerts? The music that’s being made in bedrooms across the world is making its way online for all to hear - why shouldn’t our students’ creations? Millions of amateurs are uploading and using ‘how to play’ videos, in an exciting resurgence of the ‘folk’ way of disseminating musical knowledge. Why can’t we be embracing this as teachers? Musical Futures has shown us that music teaching works best when it mirrors how things are done in the real world. Now it’s time for music teachers to take to the internet, showcasing their students’ work and sharing music and knowledge in a way that’s engaging and suited to the way our students are ‘wired’, and in-tune with how musicians and music fans in the ‘real world’ are using the internet to hear, share and learn about music. Make a class blog on Tumblr. Create a station on NUMU. Get videos of concerts up on YouTube. Promote school gigs using Facebook. Get students to create videos or podcasts explaining musical terms. Experiment, share and get the musical life of your school and your students online.

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]]> Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:24:26 -0800 Promoting the humble school concert http://jamescross.org.uk/promoting-the-humble-school-concert http://jamescross.org.uk/promoting-the-humble-school-concert Posters in corridors and letters home just don't cut it any more. For a while, we've found it really hard to get people from the wider school community to concerts - often the audience consists mainly of parents of the kids involved. So what's the best way to approach this problem? For our next school gig, we're looking to the way things are done in the 'real world'. We've got a popular city centre venue. We've gone for a short promotional YouTube video with rehearsal footage, and a Facebook 'event' campaign. The video's had over a hundred views in a couple of days, and the Facebook event is already being shared by loads of staff and students. Fingers crossed this approach will give us better results than a few posters on school corridor walls...

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