Some more Useful Stuff!!

 In times of rapid change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
- Eric Hoffer

 

Try this cool tool. Great for the Smartboard.  Visuwords - an online graphical dictionary and thesaurus. Talk about making links... It's a stunning resource.

 Here is the link to the WickED site on TKI which Warren mentioned this morning. Interactives, games and I think the Information Station is a sound template for learners to base their information search on.

 

Another Web 2.0 site aimed at providing a publishing place for children to share their writing.

http://www.kidpub.com/

 

Hello, India? I Need Help With My Math - More evidence of a Flat World - get someone in India to take care of your domestic chores and homework support. From the New York Times

 

You've got an Ipod for your music; when will you get one of these for your books? You can buy books for it from Amazon.

 

We are moving from:
“do your own work” to “work with others”
“just in case” to “just in time” learning
“hand it in” to “publish it.”
- Will Richardson

 

 

Is the following a worry????

 According to the National Science Foundation (NSF, www.nsf.gov/statistics), the average U.S.
citizen understands very little science. For example: 

• 66% do not understand DNA, “margin of error,” the scientific process, and do not believe in evolution.  
• 50% do not know how long it takes the earth to go around the sun, and a quarter does not even know that the earth goes around the sun.
• 50% think humans coexisted with dinosaurs and believe antibiotics kill viruses.

On the other hand, according to the NSF, the general public believes in a lot of pseudoscience. 

• 88% believe in alternative medicine. 
• 50% believe in extrasensory perception and faith healing.
• 40% believe in haunted houses and demonic possession. 
• 33% believes in lucky numbers, ghosts, telepathy, clairvoyance, astrology, and that UFOs are aliens from space.
• 25% believes in witches and that we can communicate with the dead. *

 

And did you know that:

In Shanghai, a new building of 30 stories or more has been completed every 12 days for the last six years.

 

The computer is the primary instrument for intellectual and creative work in our society.
- Gary Stager

Skype, Voicethread and useful links

Skype is a great tool for the classroom. Suddenly video conferencing, once a complicated, expensive process is within the reach of any computer user. It's as simple as using a telephone, except that with webcams involved you can see who you're talking to!

If you have friends or family overseas, commiunicate with them via Skype or consider using Skype with your class in Term 4 http://share.skype.com/sites/en/2006/12/using_skype_for_global_telecon.html

This story is worth revisiting - a school using Skype to communicate with a pupil who has leukemia

More Class skype advice: http://coolcatteacher.blogspot.com/2006/10/using-skype-in-classroom-or-just.html

If anyone wants to use Skype to communicate with a class overseas this term, Let me know!!!

---

Web Tool for Learning:

VoiceThread is a pretty cool and easy way to produce audio visual photo albums. I think there are a number of ways you could use it in the classroom.

What is a Voicethread?

In the classroom?? Mrs Buchanan

Or a PD presentation Jack's monster cards


The ministry of Education is publishing some guidelines on dyslexia. You can find them here: http://www.tki.org.nz/r/literacy_numeracy/lit_dyslexia_e.php


Library Week is next week! This site has links to various activities designed to coincide with library week. http://www.libraryweek.org.nz/index.php

Interface is a New Zealand ICT magazine which you will be able to find in the staffroom. Lots of case studies, information and ideas for expanding the use of ICT in your class.
Interface free lesson plans! http://www.nz-interface.co.nz/lesson_plans.cfm


Make your own online assessment rubrics. These sites have web based rubric makers on them plus some useful templates.

http://rubistar.4teachers.org/index.php
http://myt4l.com/index.php?v=pl&page_ac=view&type=tools&tool=rubricmaker
And lots more stuff on rubrics:
http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/assess.html

Comprehensive list of ICT related links from Western Australia. This site covers a wide range of areas with links to further information. Anything you wanted to know could be found here!
http://www.det.wa.edu.au/education/cmis/eval/curriculum/ict/index.htm

News Clips:

Second Life for 6 year olds:
http://www.stuff.co.nz/4225702a28.html

Club Penguin : In August Disney paid $US350 million for Canada-based Club
Penguin, with a promise of $US350 million more if it meets its traffic targets.
Club Penguin says it has 10 million users, of whom 700,000 have managed to
persuade their parents to pay subscriptions of a few dollars a month so they can
use virtual money to buy clothes for their penguins and furniture to decorate
their igloos.
They can go waterskiing, hang out on the beach, play games or
work as waiters in the pizzeria.

Something for the classroom in 5 years? CONTEX Z450 3D printer

Inquiry, Videos for Teaching and Google Earth/Sky

This post and all archived posts and links are available here.

Following on from Monday, I really believe that using ICT can help you implement meaningful inquiries in your classroom. It's worth reading the Min of Ed's action plan called Enabling the 21st Century Learner: e-Learning Action Plan

Consider the use of webquests or similar as a way of individualising the inquiry process using ICT. They also can help you with the scaffolding around the process.

This Wiki has links to various Inquiry resources : http://fitzil.wikispaces.com/Inquiry+Learning

Steve has mentioned Kath Murdoch and Tasmania. She has done a lot of work on ICT and Inquiry and is well worth listening to and reading about. There are a couple of her books in our library, notably:

Classroom connections: strategies for integrated learning and Planning curriculum connections: whole-school planning for integrated curriculum

Here are some useful links too:

• http://www.ltag.education.tas.gov.au/Planning/models/inquirymodel.htm
• http://www.ltag.education.tas.gov.au/Planning/models/default.htm

I don't really mean it!

Internet Video Tools for the 21C Classroom:

Animation and poetry. This could be a way of bringing poetry alive. A thoughtful animation of the well known poem:

The Highwayman - Alfred Noyes

Could this change the way you teach poetry? Children could create their own examples using Photostory 3 or Powerpoint.

UK English standards for year 5 for this poem (Note that the filename .nbk is for the Smartboard notebook)I thought this one was good too. The Piano Well worth a look and you can see the UK resources for this video here and here.

Another way of creating online slideshows is using Animoto. Here is an example created in just a couple of minutes......
Wellesley Football 2007

Animoto 30 second shorts are free to make - give it a go and consider how you could use it in your classroom.
Other online slideshows:

• http://www.slideroll.com/
• http://www.onetruemedia.com/otm_site/create_slideshow
• http://www.spresent.com/v2/

Not really video as such, but an interesting way of looking at the news through headlines. Click on the headline to read the story - You can play with the config to get just New Zealand stories..

http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

This photo is amazing! Space station floating above Aotearoa! 12 Dec 2006 ( I can see Wellesley boys jumping off the wharf!) - http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/gallery/images/shuttle/sts-116/html/s116e05983.html

And continuing the space scheme, the latest version of Google Earth lets you look at space (our sky) in the same fashion with high resolution imagery. This has to be a great tool to use with a Smartboard. Download this version of Google Earth from the Wellesley Intranet. Let me kno if you have trouble installing it.

No relevance to videos or ICT but this link has a good diagram of the main coffee types - so that you know what you're asking for (or making). I heard some order a Vienna coffee the other night but I don't know how it's made. Can't see any mention of a Vienna here though. Any ideas??
http://www.lokeshdhakar.com/2007/08/20/an-illustrated-coffee-guide/

Google, Digital Natives and more on Smartboards

Google are a major force in ICT and their influence is growing. I'm currently playing with igoogle, which partly points to the future direction of the web - a more personalised home page - IGoogle .


I believe Google earth have improved the resolution of imagery over New Zealand. Might be worth a look. Found your house yet??


More in Google Earth

• 2007 Tour de France route
• New 7 wonders of the World see the winners in Google Earth
  

There are a number of tools for educators available from Google. Here's a list: http://teachdigital.pbwiki.com/googletools

What you don't want to see when you've just run out of petrol:

And, I love signs which provide clear information:

Try this New Zealand Census at School - register your class to take part: http://www.censusatschool.org.nz/

Digital Native

Marc Prensky's suggestiuons for useing Cell Phones in the classroom: http://www.marcprensky.com/blog/archives/000043.html

This page has links to more of Marc Prensky's work: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/

Smartboards.....

Some more sites with interactive whiteboard resources:

• http://www.waukesha.k12.wi.us/WIT/SmartBoard/specificapps.htm


• http://eduscapes.com/sessions/smartboard/


• http://www.clarion.edu/admin/computing/classrooms/resources.htm


• http://www.prometheanplanet.com/uk/server/show/nav.914

This is an interesting world clock with a lot more data besides. Watch the earth gradually warming up and CO2 emissions increasing.

Put it up on a Smartboard and stimulate a discussion. How many bicycles is that now???

Finally, Do you drink green tea? Concentrated chemicals derived from green tea dramatically boosted production of a group of key detoxification enzymes in people with low levels of these beneficial proteins, according to researchers at Arizona Cancer Center. See Biosingularity

Links for Learning July 2007

Try some of these learning links:

http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1626519,00.html
What different families eat in a week - photo essay from Time magazine which is an interesting and graphic way of showing what different families from aroud the world eat in one week.

Maths Week 2007: http://www.nzamt.org.nz/sites/cms/

Reading Books - have a look at the forum, quizzes etc in the Reader's cafe
http://english.unitecnology.ac.nz/readerscafe/
Or take a look at Book Backchat: http://english.unitecnology.ac.nz/bookchat/home.php















More Maths? MC Escher? Try the Schmuzzle site - a mildly addictive, gentle sort of maths game...http://shmuzzles.com/shmuzzle/shmuzzle.htm
More stuff here: http://shmuzzles.com/more_shmuzzling.htm








New to Te Ara (NZ Encyclopedia)
Sea life web site. Fantastic looking resource http://www.teara.govt.nz/EarthSeaAndSky/SeaLife/en
Weather Resource: http://www.teara.govt.nz/EarthSeaAndSky/ClimateAndAtmosphere/Weather/en
Natural Environment: http://www.teara.govt.nz/NewZealandInBrief/NaturalEnvironment/en



Worldmapper is a collection of world maps, where territories are re-sized on each map according to the subject of interest.
There are 366 maps, also available as PDF posters. Use the menu above or click on a thumbnail image below to view a map.
http://www.worldmapper.org/



Why news organisations are edgy: More than 59 million people (37.3 percent of all active Internet users) visited newspaper Web sites on average during the second quarter of 2007, a record number that represents a 7.7 percent increase over the same period a year ago, according to custom analysis provided by Nielsen//NetRatings for the Newspaper Association of America. In addition, newspaper Web site visitors generated nearly 2.7 billion page views per month throughout the quarter, compared to slightly more than 2.5 billion during the same period last year. The second quarter figures are the highest for any quarter since NAA began tracking these numbers in 2004.


And finally, ever noticed the blindspot in your car when you are about to change lanes? Try adjusting your mirrors slightly:
http://www.cartalk.com/content/features/mirrors/index.html

ICT Learning Challenges #3 - Digital Photos

Using your Smartboard.

This teacher has used the record feature of the smartboard so that her children can create small videos of maths strategies - then posted them to Youtube. Could be a powerful tool for creating learning animations...... (If you can't see the embedded video, click here.)

What is this? (answer below)

Digital Photos.

Extract from the Infinite Thinking Machine Blog:
http://www.infinitethinking.org/2007/05/youve-got-to-see-it-to-learn-it.html

Marzano's (2001) strategies for increasing student achievement are important in Visalia (and in many other districts), so we discussed ways digital cameras (and Picasa) could be used to support several of these research-based strategies, including the following:

• Ask students to compare or classify images.
  
• Ask students to delete, edit, or re-order images to facilitate analysis of the information at a deep level.
  
• Create a slide show to recognize student effort, achievement, and mastery.
  
• Create a slide show to illustrate time-sequence, or cause-effect patterns.
  
• Use images to document individual and group accountability - or to facilitate group reflection.
  
• Use images to support “corrective” feedback. (The instant nature of digital
  images – and means of sharing digital images – can facilitate timely
  feedback.)
  
• Use images taken with your digital camera as cues and advance
  organizers.

In preparation for the workshop I also combed the web for inspirational ideas using digital cameras and Picasa in the classroom. I offered the participants a list of a dozen ideas:

1. Slideshows for Back to School Night or Open House
   
   
2. Slideshows of Performances, Celebrations, Assemblies, or Field Trips
   
   
3. Photo Yearbooks (For a school, a class, or a club!)
   
   
4. Photo Journalism, Documentaries, or Dramatizations
   
   
5. Time Lapsed Photography (Especially in science!)
   
   
6. Class Books (Think big books!)
   
   
7. Story Books (“Digital Story Telling”)
   
   
8. How-To Guides (Address non-fiction standards!)
   
   
9. Exercises in Classifying, Categorizing, or Compare and Contrast.
   
   
10. Photos as Anticipatory Sets, Writing Prompts, or Review
    
    
11. Document Learning (Great for parent conferences!)
    
    
12. Photo Portfolios (Can be used for student presentations, too!)
    

Other ideas for using digital photos in the classroom:

http://its.leesummit.k12.mo.us/digitalmedia.htm

100 ways to use digital cameras in the classroom (Scholastic)

10 Tips for Taking great photos

The Register of Known Spam Operations (ROKSO) database collates information and evidence on known professional spam operations that have been terminated by a minimum of 3 Internet Service Providers for spam offenses.
200 Known Spam Operations responsible for 80% of your spam.

And, sadly, for the conservation club:

10 animals that won't exist in 10 years

Answer:

Shift Happens

This is a really compelling slideshow - interesting for anyone but especially for teachers. You might want to share it with your class.



This slideshow comes via Slideshare a an online application where you can share slideshows - useful for a class??

ICT and Challenges #2

We can all take digital photos but everyone can benefit from editing photos before using them. Computers come with simple tools for photo editing, but Web 2.0 has meant you can now edit your photos online for free.


In the sites below you can resize, remove redeye, change the colour and add a huge number of other creative effects. Sometimes it's appropriate to edit them for effect. The photo at the top of the page has been cropped, recoloured and darkened to produce the effects shown. However, even if you only use the rotate, cropping and brighten tool, you'll end up with much better quality photos.


If you take digital photos and don't use an editor, you're only doing half the job.

Digital Photo editing:
http://pixenate.com/
http://pixer.us/
http://www.picnik.com/

How could you make digital photo editing a challenge for your learners? Powerpoint, Photostory 3 and Moviemaker are all tools which can be used for creating a photo story.

Photo stories are really powerful means of persuasion and Moviemaker and Photostory will let you add text, commentary, background music to your digital photos and produce the end result as a video. Have a look at the examples embedded in the 7N Blog and Performing Arts Blog


More on Searching

One of the major issues I have is kids searching for information using a search engine like Google and very general keywords - needle in a haystack stuff - 50 million hits - might as well drop them off outside the National Library on a Saturday evening for all the quality information they will find....

A solution: As well as teaching them to be discriminating and clever searchers, try this: A Google tool which will enable you as the teacher to select which websites Google searches. Got that?
Tell it which websites you want it to search! Easy to set up and place in your Class blog. Remember your class blog doesn't just have to be used for communicating with parents. Use it as a classroom tool as well.

Why wouldn't you do it????

Here's an example: I have put the panel below onto our Climate Change page and also onto the Wellesley Search Page. It will only search the websites on that page. I can continue to add or remove websites from the search engine as I need to. Is this useful? I'd call it essential!

Try it:


Create your own custom search engine here: http://www.google.com/coop/

When a Question becomes a Challenge

I like the idea of learning challenges. We used to do technology challenges - things like create a sequence of events which will result in a mouse trap being triggered and a balloon bursting or firing table tennis ball as below. I remember that small groups of children spent lots of time discussing, planning and executing their process.












I guess we don't tend to do this stuff any more because of "curriculum pressure" but I have been thinking about challenges and learning lately. Children often respond well to challenges. Often when I do some work with a class on Logo - a simple maths programming program - I find them in the ICT room at lunch time trying things out ....playing ...experimenting. This is in preference to more sophisticated bells and whistles type games which they could be using at lunch time. What is it about Logo which captures them?
I once set a challenge to design one click Logo bicycle using simple logo commands. Here is one boy's response:
















How much time would this code have taken to think about, experiment with and check? Believe me, a lot of time!
Here's the result:

It's the same with something like Google SketchUp. Show children the basics and they will always take it further. Go into the ICT room at lunchtime at the moment end you will find half a dozen children experimenting with SketchUp.

Perhaps we need to include more challenges in everyday learning. Jamie McKenzie encourages questions which set up a challenge with the very nature of the question.

• What did James Cook get wrong?
• Was James Cook a good leader?
• Which is the better city - Wellington or San Francisco?
• What is the best thing about living in Wellington?
• How will Helen Clarke be remembered?
• What makes a good leader?
• Why do people live at Castlepoint?
• Should all endangered species be preserved?
• What is the price of progress?
• How is a hero different from a celebrity?
• Why does the rain fall?
  

Or the challenge of "decoding" an image. Look for an image you can use on Flickr:



What is this all about?
How was it created?
Is there a story behind it?
What does it say?


Creative Commons Originally uploaded by ocean.flynn.

Or a riddle:
What is so fragile that when you say its name you break it?

It amounts to persuading children to leap off the scaffolding - both that provided by teacher support and the "scaffolding" of raw information. Any learner can copy and paste but can any learner use the information to answer a challenging question or resolve a challenge?

In the next few weeks I want to reinforce the ways in which ICT especially can help create think inducing challenges.

Questioning

Well done all of you who are maintaining your class blogs. They look good especially when they are regularly updated. Wednesday afternoon we will look at blogs if you are having trouble or have any questions.
























One of the key parts of the Inquiry Process relates to questioning. This is so critical and difficult to fine tune in the classroom. Andrew does a lot of work with Essential Questions with 78T and Jamie McKenzie deals with questions comprehensively. It's worth revisiting some of his articles:
An index of a large number of questioning articles.

Some useful J McK articles:
http://www.questioning.org/sep04/irrelevant.html
http://www.questioning.org/questionpress.html
http://www.questioning.org/may04/serialquestioners.html

And especially the gargoyle article - Christine and Andrew probably remember this:
http://fno.org/feb01/pl.html

Socratic Questioning - http://changingminds.org/techniques/questioning/socratic_questions.htm

And I have ordered a copy of these books:















































Another take on essential queations:
http://mrscaldwell0.edublogs.org/2007/03/09/166

Interesting Stuff on the Web:

Well then, who's responsible for global warming on Mars??? If Mars is warming up as well, and there are no humans or motor vehicles on Mars.....
Mars is being hit by rapid climate change and it is happening so fast that the red planet could lose its southern ice cap, writes Jonathan Leake.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1720024.ece

Videos for educators: http://www.nextvista.org/ A growing site with downloadable educational videos.

Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining case for creating an education system that nurtures creativity, rather than undermining it:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/66


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrp-FT51zPE Table tennis but not as we (I) know it!


Using tags in art museums - a new way to find things you're interested in: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/28/arts/artsspecial/28social.html?ex=1177646400&en=7a58b2951a48dbad&ei=5070


Student Art - Sydney: http://www.insideartexpress.com.au/exhibition/walk_through

Global Warming

With next term's inquiry coming up, don't forget to use the EPIC resources which can cover anything from Encyclopedia Britannica online to world periodicals like National Geographic and New Scientist. You can't afford to ignore this information source:

EPIC (Login details on Intranet Page)

Speaking of global warming.... there are a couple of interesting houses here. One belongs to George Bush, the other to Al Gore. I wonder which is more eco friendly??http://www.snopes.com/politics/bush/house.asp

I wonder what they do with their pastic bags. Maybe they don't use any:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/03/27/environment.baggs.reut/index.html

More Wellesley Global Warming Sites

This New Zealand history site provides history by date. Would be a useful thing to use with your smartboard:

http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/calendar

Youtube for teachers! Worth a look to see what sort of videos are being posted by teachers for teachers.

http://www.teachertube.com/

A Blog aimed at teachers, focussing on the next generation of learners:

http://www.nextgenteachers.com/

A social network for teachers! Classroom 2.0 -

http://classroom20.ning.com/

The World in A4 Paper:

http://www.petercallesen.com/index/index2.html How can anyone be so creative with just a plain bit of A4 paper????

Searching Again, Smartboards and TV on Demand

From: Those Dark Hiding Places: The Invisible Web Revealed - Robert J. Lackie, Associate Professor-Librarian, Rider University

"The Web," according to Chris Sherman, Internet search expert and Associate Editor of SearchEngineWatch.com, "is increasingly moving away from being a collection of documents and becoming a multidimensional repository for sounds, images, audio, and other formats." Because much of this information is not accessible to many general search engines' software spiders, we need to look for specific search tools that will lead us to this hidden content. Some of these tools include directories, searchable sites, free Web databases, and a few general and many specialized search engines. Begin searching with...

Directories and Portals when you:

• have a broad topic
  
• want selected, evaluated, and annotated collections
  
• prefer quality over quantity
  

Invisible or Deep Web [searchable sites and databases] when you:

• are looking for information that is likely in a database


• are looking for information that dynamically changes in content
  

Search engines [general and specialized] when you:

• have a narrow topic


• want to take advantage of the newer retrieval technologies
  
  
  http://www.robertlackie.com/invisible/index.html#engines
  
  

SmartBoard Resources:

http://education.smarttech.com/ste/en-US/Ed+Resource/Software+Resources/default.htm

http://education.smarttech.com/ste/en-US/Ed+Resource/Lesson+activities/International+Lesson+Activities/Aus_NZ-+Notebook+Activities/ (specific Australian and New Zealand stuff)

http://www.newdealedzone.com/whiteboardres.html

http://eduscapes.com/sessions/smartboard/


http://www.unit5.org/foxcreekimc/smartboardresources.htm

http://my-ecoach.com/online/webresourcelist.php?rlid=9346

http://www.smart-education.org/

These should keep you busy for a while....quite a while! Don't forget to try using Google Earth or Google maps with your smartboard.

This looks to be an excellent Global Warming site - From American Radio works. I'll add it to our list of sites. http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/earlysigns/index.html



Maths manipulatives: http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/vlibrary.html

It's the time of the year for sore throats. If you feel one coming on, it might be worth trying this remedy: http://www.myfinancialjourney.com/archive/frugal-cure-for-a-sore-throat

Who says house prices can't drop? Try selling your house in Detroit! http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070319/ts_nm/usa_subprime_detroit_dc;_ylt=Aov5dA96IapEm53NtFaK6N0EtbAF

The way of the future? Have a look at TVNZs video on demand site. Look at the previews of TVNZ shows or watch the Lions play the All Blacks at Carisbrook in 1966. (Before my time, but Steve would remember it.) http://tvnzondemand.co.nz/content/ondemand_index/ondemand_skin

Shrinking the World Tools and Busy Teachers

I've put a site which contains links to Climate change information. Have a look and see if you can use it, or suggest some more sites. I'll update it with more links as we go.

Wellesley links for Climate Change

I mentioned Google maps last week. Did anyone have a play? Just open it up and type in any address in the world.... yes that's right!... any address in the world for a zoomable map which shows the actual address on a map or if you like the satellite image. There are a growing number of web tools out there that pull together web features in a useful way.

Or have you tried Google Earth? Again there are huge possibilities for using Google earth in the classroom. If you want some ideas try these links:

• http://www.googlelittrips.org/
  
• http://www.juicygeography.co.uk/googleearth.htm

There are other search engines than Google. In fact their are about 500,000 of them. Maybe in a school a talking search engine is good idea. Ask the question and hear the answer. Here are two of them - both "manned" by women interestingly enough.

Try ask Vox:

And if you really want the full on search experience, try Ms Dewey. But she's not for kids and don't keep her waiting for too long.

Spreadsheets

I often think we don't use spreadsheets enough. Excel is a powerful tool which can be used to achieve a range of tasks - not just graphing! If you haven't used a spreadsheet in the past, have a look at this useful list of relevant ways of using spreadsheets in the classroom.

http://www.west.asu.edu/achristie/CTC/spreadsheets.html

Busy Teachers

This is a repeat of a quoted blog from last year. It's from Dean Shareski in his Blog Ideas and Thoughts of an EdTech and I think it bears repeating:

Our culture is obsessed with being busy. When’s the last time you asked someone about their job or life and they didn’t use the word busy? It’s worn like a badge of honor. To even hint you might not be busy, conjures up visions of laziness and lack of ambition. As we plan various activities and events for schools, I’ll often hear, “that’s a busy time for schools”. Tell me when it’s not a busy time?

That fact that everyone is busy should be a given by now. It’s almost akin to breathing. Should I preface every statement about my current state of existence by stating that, “I’ve been really breathing lately….consuming a lot of oxygen.”

I’m trying to stop acting like I’m so busy and telling everyone how busy I am. No one really cares and it’s nothing worth talking about. Telling folks about how busy you are creates too many negative images. Talking about busyness does not usually leave the impression you love your job. I do love my job so maybe I don’t think of myself as busy. My job is to support teachers. When a teacher asks for my support, I figure out how to help. I don’t need to remind them how busy I am because they’re just as busy. I want to give people the impression that I have lots of time for them. They need to feel relaxed and I’d like to alleviate some of the stress they might be feeling in their daily grind. Life and work shouldn’t be taken so seriously. Relax. I’ve worked with some great people that I know were extremely busy but always had time to chat with me about work, life and I dare say it, even fun, non-work related stuff.

I think this is the type of classroom we ought to be creating. One where teachers have lots of time to work with students and there is less a sense of panic and mayhem and more one of calm and reflection. Is this possible?

How could we achieve this in our classrooms?

Maps, Pictures and Interesting Stuff.

The diagrams below come from David Warlick - who recently keynoted at the Learning in Schools ICT conference in Rotorua. I think it's a useful illustration of the changing nature of schooling.

School 1.0 is traditional classroom structure - the teacher being the centre of the classroom - the font of all knowledge:

The second diagram represents the modern classroom - a blurred definition of who is learning an who is teaching - more sharing, facilitation and interaction

There are some very powerful web technologies available you you to use with your class. How about mapping?

Do you get your children to draw maps?

I think it is a useful skill but I don't know.... In an age where you can alternate maps and satellite images with a click of a mouse, you've got to wonder whether or not there is a more powerful mapping activity to be had than simply drawing a map:

Have a look at Castlepoint - Here's the google map found with Google maps and the key words Castlepoint, New Zealand. Zoom in and click the Satellite Image and then the hybrid image:

Castlepoint, Wellington, New Zealand

or Mataikona? Mataikona, Wellington, New Zealand

• I have put a Wellesley College location map on the website.

These maps and images can be printed off then drawn on etc. - Use with a smartboard.....

Or you could use this web site which uses google maps, to plan, map and time your walk, run, cycle or swim. Punch in Wellington, Eastbourne or Lower Hutt and set it to work. Classroom applications????

For more teaching ideas there is the Google sponsored Infinite Thinking Machine, a Blog which aims to provide ideas to help teachers and students thrive in the 21st century.

This article by Stephen Downes titled Elearning 2.0 really sets the scene for a lot of the things I have been talking about in the past six months.

As we approach the halfway mark of the new millennium's first decade, the nature of the Internet, and just as importantly, the people using the Internet, has begun to change. These changes are sweeping across entire industries as a whole and are not unique to education; indeed, in many ways education has lagged behind some of these trends and is just beginning to feel their wake.

Full article found here!

And (in case you haven't read enough) this week's New York magazine has an article called:

Kids, the Internet and the End of Privacy: The Greatest generation gap since Rock and Roll

A mixture of interesting Websites:

• Create your own wall sized posters with this online poster creator. Just upload your image!
• 100 words and pictures which define the Time. Ten by Ten
• What's the most popular word? Look at the word count.
• Amazing use of images. One family's photos over a 30 year period.
• Ever wanted to know what's special about any number?
• Let them sing for you! Very clever - just type in the lyrics and click the arrow. (I tried Taumarunui)
• Ahh, digital bubblewrap!!!!
• And for all those difficult questions, ask Calvin's (Calvin and Hobbes) Dad for the real answers.

ICT making a Difference

Great to see the Blogs up and running. Remember we can link to a web page if you want to add a photo album. That would involve me uploading the photos to our school website. If you wanted to be totally self sufficient you could use Flickr - create a class account and upload photos to there. Here are some Flickr instructions. And for more ideas on using Flickr in the classroom.

Some of you may have used Skype - the internet telephone service which can enable you to talk or videophone your friends across the internet free.

Here is an example of a class using skype to include a class member who has cancer and has to stay at home. A great example of using the technology to make a difference. Only takes 5 minutes......
inclusion video (right click - save target as then double click downloaded file)

We all know that learners need to learn - be taught - better search techniques and strategies. This web site has a wealth of information that will help you and your leaners towards information fluency.

More on searching. Jamie Mckenzie february article titled Putting an end to Topical Research. Jamie is always worth reading and pondering over.

Please remember to try and have a look at EPIC. Link and logon details are on the Intranet.

Question of the Week: What is mathematical about this cabbage type?

Blog if the week: Blog of proximal development - this post talking about passion based learning

January 2007

January 29 2007

Thinking about ICT

New year reflections and all that - I think it's time to outline where I am with learning, thinking and ICT. So.... I  am committed to exploring ways of making learning more relevant, meaningful and powerful. I think our path to inquiry learning is the way to go when it allows for student empowerment, personalised learning paths and open ended investigations. This has to be the best way of occupying the 1200 or so hours each student will spend with us this year.

Supporting this we need to provide a responsive support structure - scaffolding which provides signposts, checkpoints and support throughout the process. Obviously I have a particular interest in the way ICT can fulfil this role. I've used learning modules for years - this is a really simple way of providing direction and support for enquiry based learning. We have applications such as Inspiration which help with planning and thinking as well as the Wellesley Toolbox which contains thinking and planning tools.

The Wellesley search page has advice on choosing keywords plus links to various topical information searches. It is worth being aware of what is here. I don't think it's a good process to blindly rush to Google, yet that is what students often default to. We need to work on the thinking they do before they start looking for information as well as when they find it.....

 We now have a very healthy ratio of computers to children across the school. Close to 1 computer for 2 children - Enough for our students to feel that when they need to use a computer, there will  be one there. But also enough for us to be able to plan learning explorations which fully use the digital world on tap. There is a growing array of tools and resources out there on the web just waiting for motivated teachers. Have a look at the links below and, via this Blog, I will continue to highlight these during the year.

Powerful learning occurs when the learner is curious and motivated and ICT is a powerful enabler. Watch the video at the end of this section. I used this with my maths class last year - interesting big numbers - but obviously there's a lot more in it!

 

• Where we are with ICT 2007
  • PC School Web Spider
  • Class web
  • Professional Development
  • Digital demons
  • Intranet
•  What's happening out there?
  • Time magazine
  • The World is Flat
  • Blogs, podcasts and wikis
  • Social Bookmarking

 

• How does this affect learning?
  • Personalised learning
  • Managed learning environments
  • 2006 - 2016 Learning Map
  • Information Fluency

 

The Video

 

Whats happening to newspapers....

Seven reasons for texting your teen/s

Have a library of books? Share it with a worldwide book group here. Interesting concept really.

 Could this be the final chapter in the life of the book?? Interesting Times article featuring Google's Book search.

And an interesting viewpoint from an Independent School librarian.

Another article on the use of video games as a learning tool.

Online archive of millions of original articles, photos, maps etc. American at this stage but what about NZ archives