Streaming video on demand: The situation in Greek schools today, with a view to possible implementat

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Streaming video on demand The situation in
Greek schools today, with a view to possible
implementationD. M. Garyfallidou, G. S.
Ioannidis and A. Lotsaris The Science Laboratory
University of Patras Greece.
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Local IT history or rather pre-history - In the
early 80s few teachers in Greece knew how to
use a personal computer. - School labs were very
rare- First labs appeared in high-schools around
1990 - A computer course was added
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The attitude of the high-school teachers towards
computers was sceptical to outright negative.

• This attitude is understandable and it was due to
  the following reasons
• They thought it would be very difficult for them
  to learn how to use computers properly.
• They could not see the advantage in using them as
  administration tools at school.
• They could not foresee the impact of computer
  usage during the years that followed.
• - In addition all the prevailing operating
  systems at the time were lacking a GUI seemed too
  abstract and remote for non-scientists to follow.

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• The revolution came in the 90s with the
  appearance of Windows 3.0 (and all that followed)
  with their friendlier environment on the one
  hand, and the emergence of cheaper WINTEL -
  compatible PCs on the other. It was not a
  revolution planed by anyone in particular the
  market forces did it by themselves, in a chaotic
  fashion.

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The current situation

• When they thought it was the right time the E.U.
  and then all the national or regional
  Ministries of education in European countries
  decided to act although they were late to serve
  education. Therefore they decided to incorporate
  computers at every school level and to train all
  teachers to the use of ICT. Appropriate funds
  were allocated for this purpose.

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The current situation

• The Greek ministry of Education about one and a
  half years ago worked out a plan to train all
  local teachers (both primary and secondary) to
  use computers.
• In accordance with the most optimistic forecasts
  available at that time, the ministry assumed that
  a 60 of the teachers would be interested in
  taking the program and, therefore, they planed
  the training according to this percentage.

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The current situation

• As an example of what followed we will take
  Achaia, a region with a population of 320,000 in
  the west south west of Greece
• In Achaia region, with a total of 5,200 teachers
  there were 3,200 applications on the first
  semester of the training (whereas they had
  estimated that there would be no more than
  1,000). Last semester, there were still 1,000
  applicants of which only 300 were selected to
  attend. Demand is, therefore, still very high.

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The current situation

• Looking in a larger area, the figures are
  similar. It is now little more than a year from
  the starting of the training program, and already
  some 56 of the teachers have been trained while
  there is still great demand from the rest to be
  trained as well.

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The current situation
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The current situation

• The actual number teachers trained in the whole
  Greece can be seen. As we can see about 75,000
  people out of 126,000 permanent staff have been
  already trained. This is a 60 rate, which falls
  to about 46 if we include the non-permanent
  categories, some of which include people shifting
  between different kinds of jobs.

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The current situation

• Training on such a scale could not be managed
  effectively using simply paper and pencil.
• An MIS program was developed specifically for
  this purpose.
• Greece was divided into small areas, and local
  administrators were appointed.
• The schools organising the training can only
  apply via Internet to the MIS directly, which is
  then publishing the approved classes.
• The program tests for conflict of hours amongst
  trainers and keeps the trainee data

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Motivation for the teachers to participate

• All teachers that participated were given some
  cash in order to buy a computer
• All teachers that participated and all the
  educators, have a permanent e-mail address in the
  pan-Hellenic school network for free, as well as
  space for personal web-pages
• All teachers that participated and all the
  educators, will very soon have free dial-up
  Internet access

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The problems faced

• The reading material offered was only in CD
  form, and was of limited use.
• Apart from that it refers to MS-Office 97, a
  version that is now hard to find even in school
  labs!

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Evaluation

• The evaluation process of the level of knowledge
  achieved by trainees, has not yet started, but
  will follow shortly and will be of a form similar
  to ECDL. Those who pass the automated,
  web-controlled test will receive an official
  certificate to be used in education.

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Current ICT conditions in Greek schools high
schools (hardware)

• All secondary schools have a computer lab.
• The computers in the lab normally are connected
  on a LAN, sharing a printer, and an ISDN Internet
  access.
• They all have a beamer, a digital camera and a
  scanner
• There is an e-mail account for each school for
  administration purposes.
• There are some secondary schools that have more
  than one computer lab.

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Current ICT conditions in Greek schools primary
schools (hardware)

• There was a program whose aim was to equip with
  computers primary schools that asked for it, but
  the paper work needed was so complicated that
  many headmasters could not deal with it, and they
  avoided the effort.
• There are also various practical problems such as
  space to locate the lab, the security of this
  space, and the employment of a person responsible
  for lab operation and maintenance.
• Anyway, and despite all these problems each
  primary school should have at least one computer
  for administration purposes, ISDN Internet access
  and an e-mail account.

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Current ICT conditions in Greek schools high
schools curriculum

• Computers as a subject are included in
  secondary-school level curriculum and there is a
  specialised teacher for this subject. The
  curriculum contains training in many different
  computer programs such as
• 1. Programs lacking educational target per se,
  such as
• Word processors
• Spreadsheets
• Data Base Management Systems (DBMS).
• Encyclopaedias, dictionaries, geographical
  atlases, thesauri.
• Internet browsers
• Presentation software.
• 2. Educational software
• 3. Programming languages

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Current ICT conditions in Greek schools primary
schools curriculum

• The curriculum for primary schools is not very
  clear. The ministry-run pedagogical institute
  has only published some guidelines for anybody
  who might be interested.
• Curriculum is not defined strictly, and usually
  it is a teacher hired by local authorities or
  parents associations who teaches computers
  after-hours.
• Therefore, the quality of the tuition depends on
  the qualifications (and the interest) of the
  person hired.
• This is in no way reflecting the money offered to
  him/her.
• It is only related to his/hers knowledge of the
  subject and his/hers teaching abilities.

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Current schoolteachers ideas and attitude

• Schoolteachers are now convinced that computers
  and computer applications are very useful for
  every one
• They also start to believe that it is possible
  for them to learn how to use them, at least at a
  basic level
• They believe that their students should learn how
  to use the computers (as they have to learn
  reading and writing), that computers will be very
  helpful as a teaching tool and that it gives new
  horizons to teaching and learning.

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Current schoolteachers ideas and attitude

• but they still feel afraid to use the computer in
  their class
• Windows O.S. and packages like MS-Office change
  in appearance or functions and it is difficult
  for teachers to follow.

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Current schoolteachers ideas and attitude

• Many other questions of a more practical nature
  arising, such as
• How can we install and set-up a new program?
• What should we do when we receive a message that
  we havent seen before?
• What should we do when the screen freezes?
• What should we do when a virus enters?
• How a virus enters?

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Suggestions for improving computer acceptance and
computer usage in schools

• First of all teachers should not be expected to
  be responsible or even to spend time dealing with
  PC lab maintenance.
• If enough such persons could be found, it would
  be highly desirable if the people responsible for
  maintenance were computer experts/pedagogists

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Suggestions for improving computer acceptance and
computer usage in schools

• There is a lack of good educational software,
  good encyclopaedias, as well as Internet pages
  written in our language.
• Some (limited but quite remarkable) effort has
  been done recently but the CDs have not reached
  the school labs yet (due to licence issues)
• We should also mention the frequency Microsoft
  programs change. We need new licenses in order to
  install the new version of software and the total
  cost could be rather high.

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• An observation that came out of the discussions
  with teachers is that most of them have accepted
  and already have used video presentations (in
  their classical VCR form or even film form). In
  fact most teachers have used them at one time or
  another.
• Streaming video is not common, yet.

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• It is well known that the economic strength, the
  progress and the wealth of all modern societies
  is based on Science and Technology. Therefore the
  education should, also, aim to attract a greater
  number of young pupils to study science and
  technology, so as future scientists and engineers
  emerge from them. Therefore more emphasis should
  be paid and more time should be devoted to
  science and technology lessons at school.

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• It is also assumed to be true that, in the near
  future, all school leavers will be expected to
  change totally different jobs for three times in
  their working lives.
• Therefore
• the ability of the individual to search for new
  information,
• to acquire new knowledge and, ultimately,
• to train him/herself is vital for his/her
  career.
• Schools should, therefore, give the skills to all
  pupils to proceed along such route. They should
  encourage pupils to search for information in the
  Internet and learn by themselves

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• Streaming Video is a good method of introducing
  new ICT in everyday school practice, and by that
  we also mean schools that have limited or even no
  experience in introducing ICT in teaching their
  practices.
• Most of them have already used video
  presentations (in their classical VCR form or
  even in film form of all types of format) and
  they were enthusiastic with the opportunity to
  easily find and use more high quality videos in
  class.

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• One scenario could be that the teacher selects a
  single video, the whole class attends the video
  and
• Then they discuss the subject presented.
• The class has to answer certain questions.
• They have to visit the school science laboratory
  and perform the experiment they show.
• We can, of course, use one of the
  3-abovementioned points or any combination of
  them.

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• Another possible scenario is that the teacher
  suggests a number of appropriate videos in that
  case
• The class can be divided into different groups
  and each group should find certain info and
  present it to the rest.
• The students could all have the same aim but
  they can select how many of the videos they will
  use.

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• Another scenario could be to use the videos in
  special hours after the normal class hours for
  self-learning. In this case, there might even be
  no common subject to be studied from all
  students. The teacher suggests thematic areas
  e.g. these videos are good for History, these for
  Physics and so on and each student (or groups of
  two) can decide what to see according to their
  interests.

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• In all these scenarios students can work by
  themselves, or can be divided into small groups.
• Working in small groups is, of course, most
  beneficial for the students.
• Teams can work either competitively or even
  cooperatively
• All the above didactical scenarios can also be
  easily realised in a day-long school or in
  locations that students can visit at any time
  (for example houses of knowledge).

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Pedagogical scenarios for streaming video on
demand

• Empirical Didactic Conclusion Although streaming
  video-on-demand is relatively new as a technique,
  and although it does require greater amount of
  facilities (broadband links for start) it is, we
  feel, a lot easier to incorporate in schools,
  even of a traditional kind with little or no IT
  integration in their everyday teaching practices.
  This is due to the flexibility of the medium,
  allowing itself to be used in a variety of ways.
  Higher technology does not necessarily mean
  higher complexity in its usage (as we have
  experienced many times in the past). We strongly
  believe that there is a real case for streaming
  video-on-demand in schools now. This could lead
  to higher computer acceptance as both teachers
  and pupils become more familiar with ICT.

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The practicalities of high-speed internet for
Greek schools availability and cost

• Internet where we can achieve a theoretical
  speed of up to 8 Mbps and practically about 1-2
  Mbps. The starting cost is 420 (including VAT).
  The cost of connection per month is related to
  the amount of data downloaded and is shown in the
  table below. If a user exceeds his monthly
  allowance there is a further charge of 0,05 for
  every MB in excess.

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The practicalities of high-speed internet for
Greek schools availability and cost
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The practicalities of high-speed internet for
Greek schools availability and cost
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Conclusion
Due to all of the above, one cannot help but be
hopeful that (despite the high initial cost)
streaming media techniques will soon be tried
out, on a trial basis at least, in Greek schools.