Claire Amos

Yesterday I read Maurie's blogpost ' Time to Calm The Farm - Schools are not in chaos ' which provided a much needed reminder about the power we have to make to decisions in how we lead our schools and lead the narrative about education during a pandemic. It was a reminder also, that for many schools, teachers and learners that continuing to learn online was not the end of the world, nor was mandatory vaccinations, it was simply something we could, and for the most part, are managing just fine. It did however make me ponder what feels like a undercurrent of much of the push back and clickbait media headlines and stories, this idea that we are living through this massive and shocking disruption and that all of it is getting in the way of our much loved and lauded normality, which many still seem to think we may be returning to at some point. Even those of us who realise, in our most rational moments, the chances of returning to life as it was at the beginning of 2020 is real...

With “the enviro-reckoning” taking place at the close of the 21st Century the world in which people live has radically changed. Humans finally recognising that how we co-exist with the planet had to do things differently if we were to have a planet to live on at all. 2100 marked the beginning of what was to be recognised as “c age” where humans attempted to actively undo the devastating impact they had on Planet Earth. This also marked the beginnings of “global decolonisation” as humankind recognised the need to move from globalisation and controlling other countries to localisation and leaving others be. In Aotearoa, established values and ways of being in Te Ao Māori flourished. Humans stopped travelling, exporting and importing and instead turned to technology to connect, to experience the world and to produce what was needed locally. Humans endeavoured to consume less, living smaller lives, in smaller spaces. Economic growth was recognised as a damaging concept and linear economi...

June Wall presenting at Future School Learning environments can be defined as a set of physical and digital locations, context and cultures in which students learn. Wall argues that environment IS important as it can shape how we behave and learn within it. She talks about the five cases - the zero case, the digital case, the side by side case, the embedded case and the classical case. Couldn't quite capture the meaning of each, but she concluded that the embedded case. Found this explanation Learning environments can be defined as the set of physical and digital locations, contexts and cultures in which students learn. Five typical cases of learning environments can be distinguished with respect to their relation to digital devices: 1. The zero case: there are no relevant physical or digital relevant stimuli in the environment of a person. The cognitive representations of the person can be formed rather independent of the outside world: thinking, dreaming, visualising ...