Facebook

Although i have mentioned social networking sites before i have only briefly ventured into myspace. Well this week a friend asked me to check out Facebook, and now i am hooked. I am slowly turning into a tech freak, spending all my free time on the computer (which with three children is hardly any).

This is a much better site than what i have seen of Myspace. The fact that you have to invite people in to see your detals must deter bullying in teens, however i am not sure if you can erase a friend after they have been granted entry to your page, with teenagers a best friend can very quickly become an enemy. It would be interesting to find out. I think that this sort of site allows children to be involed in social networking, however in a safer setting. (possible PDHPE- interpersonal relationships use?0

Need to research in further detail

How cool is this?

Tim on his blog has a link to a really cool website where you can publish students work as a newspaper clipping. This would be great for the class’s weekly newsletter or for the class to publish the latest classroom news for the rest of the school.

i wont spoil it by putting one up, but check it out at Tims blog or at the Site.

Social Networking

Big thank you to Linus for refering me to Classroom20.com, a social networking service dedicated to education. This is a fantastic site and was awarded the 2007 Best use of SNS award from Edublogs, definantly check it out.

Just quickly, a teacher on classroom20.com posted a video that demonstrates how we need to be very critical when assessing the authenticity of resources from the internet. This short film shows penguins flying, and has been created by the BBC and is a great example to show children that all may not be what it seems. Children could easily mistake BBC as a reputable source, however the clip is made for advertising purposes and may or may not be true. It poses a great question too, one that i cannot answer “do penguins really fly?”

We must always question resources, be critical thinkers and this clip is a great teaching tool to reinforce critical analytical thinking in the classroom.

You Are Not Alone

One thing that i have found while researching for this Blog assignment, is the massive amount of support out in the WWW, for teachers to become global share-ers. For instance, i click on to one site – say Edublogs, and select one link, and before i know it, i have been reading fascinating articles, tips and stories, viewed videos, have been read to and connected with hundreds of teachers on an infinite list of topics and experiences. In this time i have lost rack of the number of sites i have linked through, countless hours have slipped through my fingers and i find it hard to drag myself away from this valuable fountain of knowledge, i could easily spend days lapping up the info.

Recently i found a website that has responses from teachers answering a variety of questions from Techno-phobes and the technologically challenged, a great discrete way to have your questions answered and help you to feel a bit better about starting to use technology in the classroom.

I also found a cool video that pokes fun at the schools and centres that dont implement technology into their classrooms.

Support and a gentle shove in the right direction!

My Learning Space

For those who have not yet stumbled upon this site My Learning Space is a global community of educators, not unlike Edublogs.

I found a useful link on this site for the Top 10 (actually 11) learning tools for 2008. Worth checking out, thought i should share it.

Podcasts and ESL

After i read Stephens blog on Podcasts and the ever distracting background noise, while responding with a tip for reducing this, it occured to me that Podcasts would be a terrific tool for ESL students.

Podcasting would provide ESL students with speaking and listening tasks that are scaffolded and supported and would allow opportunities to speak and practice their English without the stress of an audience. Teachers could also use these podcasts as reference for assessment and reflection of achievement for all class students, especially ESL children.

Podcasts could also be used effectively by the classroom teacher to provide activities for ESL students to complete at home, these could be simple tasks such as pronunciation exercises, or extension tasks, such as listening and comprehension tasks to be completed in class time. Activities could be created for the whole class and be re-structured for ESL students (whole class listening activities would require a computer lab, and headphones). Modified whole class activities with an ESL focus, would assist these students with their English without takin them from the classroom, thus minimising the associated distress with out of class remediation.

I am sure there are lots of other uses for Podcasts, but this is one area that is rarely mentioned in any KLA, and needs to be voiced. With more time many exercises / activities could be created for the speaking and Listening strand, and especially with ESL students in mind.

IWB’s (interactive white boards)

My first views towards this technology were initially quite negative, however, recently my opinion towards IWB’s have changed dramatically. While i still dont know a great deal about Interactive Whiteboards, what i have learnt from reading the paper Exploring pedagogy with Interactive Whiteboards. A Case study of Six Schools , is that they have many uses in the modern classroom and support authentic/context based education, a philosophy for which i feel strongly for (see Teaching Aspirations).
As i read along, i was begining to think of ways that i would implement the technolgy, and started to become excited about the vast prospects of such technology, such as interactive art lessons where students could actively apreciate the artwork on screen – writing all over it, pointing out its features and attributes, something that could not happen using an overhead or data projector. Similarly, teaching moments could easily be expended throughout any lesson – when students ask a question, teachers can easily use the internet as a class to look up the answer, thus providing the knowledge the student seeks, reinforcing research/investigative techniques, all completed in an interactive student based manner.

Unfortunately i have not come across such technology in any of my practicum schools, so i have not had the opportunity to see first hand IWB’s in action. Hopefully, more and more schools will be implementing the technology and it wont be long before i am learning how to navigate this innovative teaching tool.

Digital Natives

Jenni M has posted a great video clip called “Digital Natives” on her page that supports my current views on education and curriculum reform.

I believe that the way that most teachers current teach children is particularly outdated and urgently needs to be addressed – see my Teaching Aspirations statement. Jenni’s video demonstrates that in order to reach todays students teachers are need to use technology, and unfortunately in Western Sydney teachers (from all of the prac’s that i have attended) use very little or no technology in their classrooms, perhaps due to fear of technology, lack of appropriate equipment and little time.

I strongly feel that teachers need to be brought up to speed with technology, and that those who fear its use will be pleasantly suprised at all of the educational benefits.

** Update** i have since found a great link on My Learning Space that outlines 7 Key Traits of the Net Generation, these are useful to assist teachers in providing our Net Gen students with Authentic learning experiences – take a look.

Jack and the Beanstalk –

Here is a great example of using technology in the classroom. This video could be used for assessment purposes, to be posted to a school or community website and integrates several KLA’s. Not to mention that it is really cute!

Download Video: Posted by sandiadams at TeacherTube.com.

Kirsty’s Podcast – The teacher I want to be

here is a small podcast outlining the type of teacher i hope to be.

kirstys-2nd-podcast.mp3

Here is the link to Shift Happens