21st century schools - the development of blended spaces?

Click here for a video which considers the infusion of technology in schools, and the resultant enriching of learning spaces. Technology is forefronted in this video - do we need to give equal consideration of the spaces in which they are used?

Virtual classroom video

Click here to link to a video on virtual classrooms

Blending Learning Spaces

Having developed a blended learning approach to the PGCE course, the next step is to begin to consider the spaces in which we learn. Two obvious spaces are classrooms and cyberspace (in the form of the virtual learning environment). However, learning is far more ubiquitous than this, and therefore I've spent a week taking photos of all the spaces I think I have learned in during that time. Some are very much linked to personal, reflective spaces, such as my office at home. Here, there is varied technology, including a laptop, desktop PC, both of which can acces the internet, plus my mobile and an e-reader. Therefore, there has been learning in the form of reading, writing and course development.

However, there are other, very different spaces where learning has also occurred but in a very different sense. Classrooms have been used, and the type of learning has been far more social, but also reflective in terms of considering the learning students are achiving, and how they are achieving it. Once again, technology is central but serves a different purpose.

The types of learning which are occurring are different in different spaces, but are in many ways linked. This then suggests that as the recognition of the mutiplicity of spaces in which we learn becomes more explicit, the theories we use to explain the learning which occurs within them, and how they connect to each other must be more complex. Hence, the notion of linking blended leanring, and learning spaces, i.e. blended spaces which need new pedagogic theories to support their understanding.