EdgeoftheSeat

Up to the minute info!

2011-11-30T12:32:00.001-08:00

Sadly due to little fingers, my iPad suffered a mishap a week ago. I finally got time to take it into YooBee to be sent off for a replacement screen. With much reluctance I handed it over with the promise it would only take a week to be fixed.
Two days later, me being me, I wanted more information. Had they sent it on yet? Was it just sitting somewhere waiting? I could ring YooBee, but I would just get 'Yes, we have sent it, shouldn't be too long now' stuff.
Aha, enter icloud.com and find my iphone. Yesterday I watched my ipad make it's way up the South Island and cross the strait to spend the night in Wellington. Right now it's sitting in a truck stop in Taupo!

Talk about up to the minute information.

Back again?

2011-09-11T16:34:00.001-07:00

It's been quite a while since my last post, life and work seemed to conspire to leave me no room to blog.

Then Google release an iOs app for blogger and I have to give it a try. We'll just have to see if it makes me a better blogger...

Screentoaster.com

2010-11-04T16:16:00.000-07:00

During the Kidz@conference, I had to use a computer lab and couldn't use my laptop to screencast.
Screentoaster.com to the rescue! An online screencasting tool, it allowed me to capture the work the kids had done during the workshops and save them so that thye could take it back to school.

Here is a handy how-to gujide I found on Scribd.com to help you get started.
Screen Toaster Step by Step Directions

Meet the Zimmer twins

2010-11-02T23:16:00.000-07:00

I have been taking workshops with kids and teachers exploring the Zimmer twins website at the Kidz@conference this year in Dunedin. (www.zimmertwins.com).

This is a great site if you or your class want an easy way to create animated stories, or to add something to your language programme. With built in story starters, it makes a great spot to stimulate reluctant writers or to explore a theme or topic.

Here is the handout from the workshop.

Meet the Zimmer Twins

Poptropica

2009-11-16T17:52:00.001-08:00

Poptropica is a massively multiplayer online game and virtual world, targeted at children ages 6 to 15, where players can travel, play games, compete in head-to-head competition, and communicate safely with each other. There is a role-playing component as players are encouraged to finish "island missions" and get medallions.

Once a player enters Poptropica, he chooses an island to explore; each island has a central mission. To travel between islands, the user boards a blimp with the Poptropica logo, which shuttles between the Main Streets of the various islands.

Early Poptropica was the first island created for Poptropica. Players encounter the original settlers of Early Poptropica who are in distress. They are 8 bit arcade characters much like pilgrims who are missing items from their village. While finding the various objects, the player encounters, among other characters, a giant and a very large spider. On Main Street, there is an art museum with works by artists such as Leonardo Da Vinci, Vincent Van Gogh, and Georges-Pierre Seurat.

Shark Tooth Island was the second island released in Poptropica. The scenario revolves around the inhabitants of the island who are being troubled by a fierce shark. The player must help the citizens by exploring within the island's ancient temple ruins and subduing the giant shark, called Booga, with a special concoction. The player then has to rescue a boy and a professor from an island where they were marooned by Booga.

Time Tangled Island is the third island released for Poptropica. The scenario revolves around a malfunctioning time machine made by Professor Peter P. Pendulum that has distorted history. It is the player’s job to go back in time and set things right. During the quest, users encounter major historical figures such as Thomas Edison, Lewis and Clark, Leonardo Da Vinciand more. Once the player has restored the future, they can go forward in time to see what the future holds, and visit themselves 50 years older. This island was created in conjunction with the editors of Fact Monster to maintain historical accuracy

24 Carrot Island is the fourth island released on Poptropica. The Poptropicans on 24 Carrot Island are in trouble. Someone has stolen all their carrots, citizens are disappearing, and the economy, which appears to be based on carrots, is in ruins. The player has to face an antagonist named Dr. Hare, who has built a giant robot bunny inside what was formerly a carrot cake factory. Dr. Hare is apparently using the carrots to make fuel for a rocket that will send his giant robot into space, from where he can control everyone's mind. The character must free the kidnapped citizens from Dr. Hare's mind control and stop his evil plot.

Super Power Island is the fifth Island released for Poptropica. A giant radioactive meteor has crashed into Super Power Island's county prison, freeing six criminals and giving them super powers. Now they are wreaking havoc on the island, committing various crimes. The player must defeat five villains using wits alone, and earn the power to fly.

Spy Island is the sixth island released for Poptropica. In this plot, a new threat to the residents of Poptropica has been discovered by Poptropica's top three spies, but the spies have been captured by an evil group called B.A.D.. The residents of Spy Island are losing their hair, apparently due a B.A.D. plot. The player/agent must use his wits and top-secret spy devices to rescue the three spies and defeat the nefarious plan.

Choose Your Own Adventure: Nabooti Island was the seventh island released on Poptropica. This island was made in conjunction with the publishers of Choose Your Own Adventure books. The Nabooti tribe is looking for five missing jewels from the mysterious Nabooti totem. The player flies to various locales across Africa to find the jewels and return them.

Big Nate Island is the eighth island released on Poptropica. This island is based on the comic strip Big Nate, written by cartoonist Lincoln Peirce. The player is on a mission to find a long-lost time capsule which, if found, can save the school from demolition. The player will need help from Nate and his friends to complete the quest. Unlike other islands, Big Nate Island is drawn in the style of the comic strip by Peirce.

Astro-Knights is the ninth island released on Poptropica. The princess of the Kingdom of Arturus has been kidnapped and taken somewhere into space. The player must build and customize a spacecraft and use it to rescue her. The player will visit various planets in his quest and will have to fight regurous beasts. The island contains numerous allusions to Arthurian legend, such as the kingdom being named "Arturus", three knights being named Cador, Peleas, Gawain, and the villain's name being Mordred.

(Info from Wikipedia)

It's Art, it's Science, it's Cool!

2009-11-16T17:23:00.001-08:00

50 Years of Space Exploration
Originally uploaded by Adam Crowe

Speaks for itself really...

Movember!

2009-11-03T17:07:00.000-08:00

Hi, I am growing a moustache this year for Movember. I have decided to put down my razor for one month (November) and help raise awareness and funds for men’s health – specifically prostate cancer and depression in men.

We also have a team, Mo-Kari, and you can donate to any one of us, or the whole team if you wish. What many people don’t appreciate is that close to 600 men die of prostate cancer each year in New Zealand and one in ten men will experience depression in their lifetime - many of whom don’t seek help. Facts like these have convinced me I should get involved and I am hoping that you will support me.

To sponsor my Mo, you can either:

• Click this link http://nz.movember.com/mospace/241065/ and donate online using your credit card

• Write a cheque payable to ‘Movember’, referencing my Registration Number 241065 and mailing it to: Movember, PO Box 12 708, Wellington 6144

Remember, all donations over $5 are tax deductible.

Movember is now in its fourth year and, to date, has achieved some pretty amazing results by working alongside The Cancer Society and the Mental Health Foundation of New Zealand. Check out further details at: http://nz.movemberfoundation.com/research-and-programs.

If you are interested in following the progress of my Mo, click here http://nz.movember.com/mospace/241065/.

Also, http://nz.movember.com has heaps of useful information.

Thank you

Machinarium

2009-10-18T18:54:00.001-07:00

Hi everyone! Remember Samarost? A great game for provoking creative thinking in writing and problem solving, and has been used in many a classroom.

Well, Amanita Design, the creators of Samarost has released Machinarium, their new point and click adventure.

This time the action revolves around a little robot, cast out from a mechanical city by accident. He must find his way back home, rescue his girlfriend and prevent a gang of robot hoodlums from setting off a bomb.

Each area is packed with visual detail, from intricate backgrounds to fluidly animated characters. Machinarium's world is not a still piece of scenery, it's a living, moving environment loaded with personality. There's so much to look at it can be difficult to know where to start. Somehow, though, you always catch wind of a puzzle on the screen and can manage to discover what needs to be done.

The graphics are slightly different to Samarost, this time done in scratchy pencil style, but stills retains that unmistakable Amanita feel, and will foster a whole new round of creative writing prompts for eager kids.

Machinarium is a magnificent game, and that's all I really need to say. You'll be hooked the moment you see the robot store an item in his belly.

You can try out the web demo at http://www.machinarium.com, which gives you the first three screens to solve.

Noodle docs now available on Sribd.com!

2009-09-07T17:25:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone,

I'm trying my hand at publishing. I've created a series of posters featuring Noodle. They are available for purchase on the Scribd.com Store.

There are currently Thinking Hats, Inquiry, Blooms, Key Competencies and Smarts posters available.

Check them out and see what you think...great for a bright addition to any classroom!

Here is a sample.

Noodle Inquiry

Enviroschools New Zealand

2009-06-24T17:43:00.001-07:00

As you may well know, the Enviroschools programme is being shut down by the National Government in December this year.

I have been involved with a number of Enviroschools around the Dunedin area, and I have to say it is one of the most transformational programmes I have seen.

This IS education for our future, about learning to make the right choices now, so that we have a planet and a future that we want, not one that that is an inevitable outcome of the path we are currently on.

Spread the word far and wide...keep the Enviroschools programme running

The week that was

2009-06-01T14:03:00.000-07:00

And here I am again...re-entering the blogosphere. I may bounce on impact with the atmosphere, so bear with me folks.

I was working with a teacher on her action research. She is looking at blogs and digital imagery with her junior syndicate. The issue she had was that she found it hard to keep her blog up to date, and said she would struggle to make a weekly post. I found this hard to swallow until I reflected that I have not made any posts this year! Oh the pot calling the kettle black...

So here I am grabbing a spare moment to share my week with you. I thought this would be a good way to share what I have been up to and hopefully you'll find something interesting in amongst it all.

Monday: Audacity with year 3 students at St Mary's Kaikorai. Lovely bunch, full of enthusiasm! We decided that since this was a one off lesson we would do something that they could use in the classroom and carry on with themselves. We chose to make readers for the year one kids in the class next door. So they practiced their best speaking voices, learned how to record, cut, generate silence and export the finished product as an mp3.

Tuesday: In the morning, comic life with year 4 kids at Wakari school, then working with my robocup team in the afternoon. They are a very keen, bright group and I hope we are on to a winner with our theme for this year's competition!

Wednesday: Spent some time at St Peter Chanel school, talking with their ICT lead teacher about action research, and audacity as an assessment tool. Great session and she was really enthused and ready to get stuck in to it! After lunch I was at Calton Hill school helping with their school website. They are using the Edublogs platform to create and manage their site (thanks to Greg at Outram School for his inspiration for this!), and are finding it really easy.

Thursday: Musselburgh school, talking Garageband with the music teacher. She had not had a chance to play with this tool and wanted to see how she could use it as part of her programme. Then talking blogging with the ICT Lead teacher. She is using Edublogs again for her classroom blog, and really enjoying it. She has a strong environmental focus on the blog (Musselburgh is an enviroschool), and the enviroschools facilitator just happened to pop in for a visit while we were chatting. We got to talking about my 'If I could change the world' project that I started in 2007. Lately we have got quite a few more members from around the world, and I was saying that we needed more NZ classes to join up. Hint hint....

The afternon was lost to a massive migraine....not pretty so I won't talk about it!

Friday: Had a super session with Opoho School teachers in the morning. They had taken a teacher only day to explore their english curriculum and I talked to them about ICT and literacy. I shared Suzie Vesper's slideshare presentation (Thanks Suzie!) and they scribbled down ideas frantically all through the morning. We looked at a few things in depth such as Voicethread and Youtube. Many of them were completely unaware of the usefulness of youtube channels despite being regular youtube users. Just goes to show that there are hidden depths to just about everything!

It's milestone time and all my spare moments have been used to oversee the creation of this document for our cluster. We use Google Docs to collaborate and it works really well (despite a few queries and worries over deleting other people stuff!).

I had an interesting conversation with Jill Hammonds, our National Facilitator about milestone reporting, and showing change in schools. I now have a rubric made up that I put at the top of the milestone to help guide schools in their reporting.

As I was driving to school this morning, I was thinking about change in schools and how it was like algae. Yes, algae.

Algae sits in spots around a body of water, and it is not until their is a change to the system that growth occurs (usually a rise in temperature). If you get the exact right change occurring then you experience an algae bloom...and the whole bay/stream/whatever gets covered in algae.

My point is that change usually happens in pockets in schools. There are teachers who pioneer change and run with it, teachers who come aboard slowly and those that struggle with ICT. This sometimes means it is hard for schools to report global change within their schools in milestones, and this leads to shallow reporting.

It is not until something happens to globally shift the mindset of teachers that an ICT algae bloom occurs, and an ICT contract does not guarantee change, just a hand in adjusting the environment to encourage change.

My question of the week is...what would trigger an ICT algae bloom in your school? Or have you had one and how did it occur?

Learning at learning@school

2009-02-24T18:16:00.001-08:00

It's 3pm on day one of learning@school, and I'm listening to a teachers experiences with SOLO taxonomy and ICT. I think it is the first time she has presented and she is doing really well. It's a hard thing to present to a room full of silent people.

It highlights one of the key positives of this conference and ictpd in general, that it encourages sharing and collaboration, and that we all have something to share.

It is getting harder for me to pick my breakouts, trying to find new ideas, tools and concepts to take back to my cluster, so I'm usually really pleased when I can take a couple of things out of breakout. So far it's been a good conference!

Into 2009

2009-02-11T15:10:00.001-08:00

I'm back at the keyboard again, ready to start a new year of blogging and learning.

I deliberately didn't touch the blog over the break...I guess thats why they call it a break!

This year I am lucky to be a co-facilitator in the Otakou Cluster for their final year of the contract. My partner is Emma Barker from Musselburgh School, and we should make a good team. Plenty of ideas to run with as well which is great.

I think we will go with action research as we did with the Hills cluster last year. There was such a great result both from confident ICT users and particularly from those teachers that were hesitant at the start but by the end of the year ended up with a published project! I still get daily notifications that this project or that has been made a favourite by someone on scribd.com.

I am continuing some ICT support as well for a few of the Hills cluster schools, with some interesting projects including environmentally friendly buildings, DVD projects, and collaborations between schools.

Jo, my lovely wife has changed year levels and is now teaching year 6. For those of you that read her blog (r6fairfield.blogspot.com)...it is no more. It has morphed into r8fairfield.blogspot.com!

This week I took my son for his first school visit. He is off to Fairfield as well, so there is no drama for him and he is keen to get stuck into school learning. In fact he was mistaken for a year 1 pupil...

Learning@School happens in a couple of weeks, and the Otakou Cluster is taking a big contingent of 20 teachers. It'll be great to share this experience with them, and we'll have loads of new knowledge to share when we come back. I'm presenting a Scratch workshop.

Look forward to catching up with you all over the year.

Ch ch ch changes

2008-11-24T14:02:00.000-08:00

Change happens to all of us, if we wish it or not. I guess the challenge for us is to harness that change for our own benefit.

When I met my lovely wife Jo, she hated computers, in fact she didn't even own a TV. Maybe that's too harsh, she just didn't understand how they fitted into her idea of what learning was.

I used to step nervously into her classroom, and try to gently push her around to seeing how ICT could make a difference for her and her students. Today, she maintains a class blog (and it's a great one too!), is an expert on multiple intelligences and inquiry learning, and is using a wide range of ICT tools to support her classroom programme. In fact, I almost fell on my face when I went to bed one night to find her reading a copy of Interact magazine intently...and it was her copy!

I've been working on our cluster exit milestone for the past few weeks, and it has been amazing to reflect on the massive changes that schools in our cluster have undergone during the contract period.

When we started the contract, we had schools with older pc's, one interactive whiteboard in the whole cluster, some digital cameras and video equipment. There was a wide range of understandings of 21st century learning, inquiry and thinking skills.

And now? Huge...not just in hardware, and the use of that in classrooms, but in the understandings of teachers. Schools that have changed the way that learning is perceived and facilitated. The walls in our cluster walls have turned if not transparent, then quite translucent, with the understanding that learning is not something that is 'done' to us in a classroom, but something that is everywhere and whenever.

You can see some of the 'learning journeys' from our cluster schools on our cluster wiki, and also you can read through some of the action research that our teachers have undertaken this year.

It is exciting times, our contract is coming to an end, but the cluster continues. I look forward to seeing what will happen in the future.

Shift Happens NZ

2008-10-13T16:00:00.000-07:00

I am preparing for a staff meeting next week, and as part of that I have updated the Shift Happens presentation with some NZ statistics. It's essentially the same but with some key data changed...

Unconferencing at Ulearn

2008-10-12T15:12:00.001-07:00

Today I spent time at the 'unconference' sessions at Ulearn. An unconference is a conference where the content of the sessions is created and managed by the participants during the course of the event. It is a BYO session in which delegates can introduce a topic, discuss an opinion, or share a viewpoint about a subject.

The principles of 'Open Space' unconferences are:

Whoever comes are the right people.
Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
Whenever it starts is the right time.
Whenever it is over it is over.

I connected with and shared about Netvibes. In 2005, netvibes pioneered the personalized homepage as alternative to traditional web portals. Netvibes lets individuals assemble all in one place their favorite widgets, websites, blogs, email accounts, social networks, search engines, instant messengers, photos, videos, podcasts, and everything else they enjoy on the Web.

I had a great discussion with Richard van Dijk from the Educated Kiwi about the wiimote interactive whiteboard. He had some great tips for pen design and shared how Te Puke High School are using them in classrooms. There is great potential here and I plan to go back and work some more on my own designs.

I shared Adobe Connectnow with Jamin Lietze. Connectnow is part of their Acrobat.com suite. It is a virtual meeting tool and combines desktop sharing, shared documents, whiteboard space and video chat all within the one tool. Our cluster will be using Buzzword, Adobe's online word processor to write our final milestone draft, so it will be good to see if we can use this tool in that process as well.

And finally I joined in a discussion with Neil Melhuish, David Young and Fiona Grant about the future of ICTPD in NZ. Neil was looking for feedback and ideas on the ICTPD contract. No firm view on what ICTPD may look like in the future...still early days yet.

All in all, this has been a great conference experience this year. A good mix of future thinking with some practical classroom tools and ideas to take back to my cluster.

Day two at Ulearn08

2008-10-12T14:54:00.000-07:00

Day two at Ulearn started off with the Microsoft Innovative teacher awards. Big congrats to both Deidre Senior at Oamaru Intermediate, one of the four lucky winners to be heading off to Kuala Lumpur for the International awards, and to Allanah King from Nelson, who was a runner up.

Steve Carden gave the Keynote speech for the morning. He is a Harvard Business school graduate, and is currently the GM for Business development at PGG Wrightson.

Steve also founded the First Foundation, a non-profit organization that matches bright, gifted students from under privileged backgrounds with business mentors so that they can further their education in their chosen field.

His keynote addressed the changing nature of business in a rapidly globalising world, and how this will impact on New Zealand's future workforce. He talked about the changing face of education and social connectivity that is emerging and how we as educators can help future citizens adapt in this fast evolving world.

His underlying message was that it is our ability to connect with and motivate our students which often has the most lasting impact for our students. Our moments when we manage to shift or engage a student with one sentence can have life long effects.

"Be the best teacher you can be"

For someone who professed to have no education background, and a 'rocky' experience with the school system, Steve managed to get over a minutes applause at the end of his address.

Ulearn so far... Keynote One

2008-10-08T15:50:00.001-07:00

Well it is day two at Ulearn 08, and my breakout has just been canceled, which is a bummer because I was really looking forward to getting to grips with actionscript in Flash.

So I'll try and be productive and fill you in on some key ideas and points that have stood out for me so far in the conference.

Yesterday we were treated to a keynote shared by Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and Will Richardson. They talked about the need to progress from merely sharing and connecting with others, to true collaboration and contributing to change. Her point that I most resonated with is that we now have as teachers an almost moral obligation to make sure that our students are equipped with 21st century skills. No longer can we justify that reading, writing and basic facts are our core learning areas.

I have some teachers in my cluster that are 'reluctant' technology users, some that are embedded in their teaching ideology...and they are great teachers. But the fact is, they won't be great teachers for much longer if they do not change and adapt, and this is a hard pill to swallow. I've heard the argument that schools can't incorporate inquiry learning, thinking skills, personalised learning because of decile rating, social demographics and behavior problems within the school.

"We just can't do that, because our kids would just run riot!". But it is these schools where it is needed most. These are the schools whose students do not always have access to a safe environment where they can explore, grow. If you are not going to provide them access to the tools they will need to succeed in the future, the ability to not only communicate, but to collaborate and make change...what is the point?

For me, the bottom line is, if you are a passionate teacher, excited about educating the future generations of NZ society, you will need to be just as adaptable as the learners in your classroom. You cannot say "the way I teach is fine, and it'll stay just fine."

Will Richardson put out the thought that in the future (and the future is now!), employers will be googling potential employees to see a 'true' picture of them as a person rather than looking at a paper CV. When my daughter is applying for her job at Apple when she leaves school, will the fact that she had a blog at age 7 have more weight than her high school exam results?

Will said that we need to teach our students how to live in an online connected world, that at the moment we have tech savvy kids that have no idea of how to have a productive presence on the web. Instead we are bombarded with millions of Bebo and Facebook pages filled with bikinis and drinking. Our task is to educate them to not only share their experiences appropriately and safely, but also how to tailor their online persona into something that complements and promotes them as a person.

How are you preparing your students to be Googled in the future? Change for the children.

Assessment and Inquiry Learning

2008-10-08T15:17:00.001-07:00

Apologies to all that this is a little late...

Live blogged from our Hills ICTPD Cluster seminar with Kath Murdoch 5th September.

Clear, explicit learning intentions (know how, do and be)

The Essential Question - Provide a lens or funnel for the inquiry, prompts investigation and models an inquiring disposition.
These may be teacher constructed or co-constructed with kids.
They should capture the essence of the inquiry
They should be broad with opportunities for multiple 'answers'
They should matter - to more than the students themselves
And they should contain significant concepts.

Clarify your intentions - what do you want students to understand through this inquiry?
A good understanding will be open and complex. eg: Although people are very different, there is a lot about us that is the same.
Avoid values in your understandings.
Understandings should be developmentally appropriate, inclusive of transferable concepts, demonstrable, 'Universal' (is it true for everyone?), and student friendly.
Remember, teaching intentions are assessment intentions. Take time to develop understanding and skill goals. Link these to the curriculum framework and make these expectations clear to students.

Explicit and co-constructed success criteria

Low achievement is often due to students not really knowing what is expected of them.
Co-constructing success criteria with your students helps them to build understanding and means a more valid assessment.
Show examples of both high and low quality product and have the students analyze the elements of each.

Careful Focus on prior learning and subsequent planning

It is important early in the inquiry to gather some baseline data to enable a valid assessment of growth.
This data should reflect both the understanding and skill of the students.
More than one tuning in strategy is preferable
Keep records to assist you with monitoring the students progress and for self assessment, and it is an important source of information for teacher planning. Lots of use of graphic organisers etc.

Pedagogy that encourages continual 'revelation' of thinking and understanding (especially through strategic questioning)

Time to rehearse answers,
Fish bowling: Group of students engaged in activity are observed by rest of class.
Think Pair Share
Assessment through play at junior level...be open to it at all times!

Formative and summative assessment - tasks embedded in the unit - assessment AS learning.
When well developed
Self and peer assessment - as well as teacher led.

Website find of the day: http://www.inquiryschools.net

My brother Rhys

2008-09-21T01:39:00.000-07:00

My brother Rhys lost his battle with cancer last Sunday. Some of you who read my blog may have met him, and some of you have not, but I have found the importance of stories and that the best way to gain immortality is to share those stories.

Rhys was only 35 years old, he was my younger brother, and it was a one in a million chance that this has happened to him. So here goes, I'll share some childhood stories and help him live on. I hope one makes you smile and will stick in your memory.

I have been privileged over the last week to get to know my brother through other people eyes, to see him as the people he worked with knew him and loved him. Rhys worked at Park Road Post as a film editor in the DI department. I had no idea until last week of the very high regard he was held in by the Wellington Film industry, as was shown by the nature of his funeral and those who attended. If nothing else, go see 'Rain of the Children', a brilliant film that would not be the same without Rhys' influence.

Rhys loved adventures, and we got into plenty of those. I can remember at an early age that we wanted to build a hut together, and lacking a tree to build it in, we decided to create an underground one behind the garden shed at the bottom of the garden. I think we were about 6 feet down before dad found out what was happening.

We lived in Appold Street in Dunedin for most of our younger childhood, and the street itself provided plenty of adventures. It was very steep with a wicked hairpin bend at the bottom. An awesome and death defying circuit for go karts, scooters and bikes.

We both saved for our first bikes, Rhys got a BMX bike and I got a ten speed. I was always slightly jealous that he could ride and jump his bike around the abandoned section near the bottom of the street and I always begged him for rides...he always shared.

When it snowed, new opportunities for mayhem arose, and as you can imagine, having a steep hill with a hairpin bend made for perfect sledding. I’m sure the speeds we got up to made the neighbors hair curl, and of course we never thought about traffic. I can vividly remember one snow day when Rhys missed the bend and sailed on down the bank into the bush below. There was a path that led down through the bush and he had managed to land on it and slid for almost a kilometre before stopping. It took him about half an hour to drag the sled back up the steps to meet me.

We loved our holidays on the farm with our cousins, Alistair, Dougald and Hamish. We though it was a wonderland of fun, and even when we were working it was good times. Huts built in hay stacks, cutting barley, duck shooting and driving cars, tractors and bikes before we were at high school made us the stuff of legends.

Rhys got his love of music from Dad. Dad had a fantastic sound system, and was forever trying to improve the quality of sound from it, and whenever he bought a new linkage or component, he would call us in to compare pre and post sound. Rhys could always hear it, I just nodded along, but we would all have superb conversations about a huge variety of music and artists.

I remember when he was in about the fifth form, he had to do a project on Dunedin. He chose to go out and interview local bands, the ‘Dunedin Sound’ as it is now known. He talked with the Chills, the Bats, The Clean and many more. He not only interviewed them but got to know them and would often hang out with them long after the project had finished. I was always immensely proud that he had done that. Even then he would go the extra mile for his passions.

We are gadget boys, we both have always loved things that plugged in and had buttons on them. Dad brought home a Dick Smith computer when we were in our early teens, it must have been one of the first home computers ever available...it had a tape cassette drive and took about half an hour to boot up. We would spend rainy weekends punching machine code into it, so that by Sunday night we could chase a little green dot around the screen with a bigger green dot, but we loved it.

He always followed his passions, the biggest example of this I know of, is his leaving New Zealand to follow Heather to Japan. She is a passion he never got tired of following.

Before he left, he studied Russian and History at University, but on the side got into film studies and I think in the end film studies won out. Later, we always had the super 8 Rhys and Heather film festival when they returned each year from Japan, artfully chronicling the vivid snippets of life that so captured Rhys’ imagination. So it was no surprise to hear that he was going to the South Pacific film school when they both returned from Japan.

He was the fun uncle, our kids always loved when the Bonneys from Wellington would visit, because Rhys would always take time to play and spend time with them. Train sets, dress ups and soccer games. They loved his hugs and then would clamber all over him, much to their delight and our dismay. He was one of those people that children just warmed to immediately.

It’s hard to understand that he is no longer going to be part of our adventures in the future, but I am immensely glad of the times that we have already shared. Rhys lived a life full of love, experiences and achieved dreams. A life at 24 FPS. I miss you Rhys, but you are forever in my heart.

Robocup Nationals

2008-09-06T02:12:00.000-07:00

Today was the big day, the Robocup Nationals held at Point View School in Auckland. The school is massive, and has a large multi purpose building in which the event was held. Their were over 70 teams from all over the country gathered for the day.

The Auckland regionals were being held at the same time, which meant a busy day with lots of events to watch, but it also meant stiff competition for us, with 25 teams to compete against in our division alone.

We had our interview at 9.30am and it went well. Next time though we would keep a build log which would have detailed our learning journey with the robots.

Our turn was after lunch so we got a chance to see most of the other teams in action before we had to take the stage. There were some very creative entries, including star wars robots, modified Robosapiens, and a robot with a diamond ring! For many schools this was their second or third time entering the competition.

Our performance went off without a hitch, and was really well received by the crowd who gave us a huge round of applause, which gave us a really good buzz.

It was a bit nerve racking when they called the schools for the finals, and they didn't call us! We found out later it was just by a hair that we missed out and that we had come 5th in the competition.

It's been a really awesome adventure and learning experience for our team, and we''ll take back ideas and determination to try again next year for an even better result!

Kelly Tarlton's

2008-09-04T23:07:00.000-07:00

We had an awesome day at Kelly Tarlton's! We arrived just in time to see the stingray feeding which was really exciting. They are so big and graceful and it was amazing watching them swim up to the keeper and take food from her.

We then went on through the tunnel to see all the fish swimming around and above us. It was so interesting we had to go around about three times!

We watched all the fish in Fish Alley being fed. Piranha, Lionfish, an Octopus, coral fish and some massive crayfish that Michael got to feed by hand...yes, he does still have all his fingers!

We then went on the snow cat ride which took us through the penguin exhibit and taught us a little about the habits and habitat.

A big thank you to Josh's Dad for organising such an amazing experience for us to have in Auckland!

By this time it was lunchtime so we headed around the road to St Heliers for a bit of lunch.

Michael's Dad told us about an exhibition of street art in town, so we headed there, with a quick detour over the harbour bridge. Catherine and Luke managed to hold their breath for the entire time over the bridge, that's just over a minute.

By the time we got back to the hotel, we were all tuckered out and ready for a rest, a swim or a read before tea.

It's a big day tomorrow, so we'll have a last team meeting tonight and we'll be ready to put our best foot forward for Wakari School and Dunedin tomorrow!

Our school day in Auckland

2008-09-04T14:42:00.000-07:00

Well, today we started the day by jumping in the pool!

Before we even had had breakfast, we were in our togs and had hit the water! The day today is very warm and sunny and it was awesome to think that we were not going to school today to do spelling... stay tuned for more adventure later..

The Adventure begins!

2008-09-03T23:42:00.000-07:00

Today the Wakari Wizards set off for our Auckland adventure. It was very exciting getting on the plane and heading off into the big blue yonder. For Catherine, it was her first experience of getting on a plane, so she was extra specially excited.

Flying high above the fluffy clouds the kids chatted, read books and played on game machines as the miles flew by beneath us.

We arrived weary but still excited, late in the afternoon and made our way to our hotel. After getting bags unpacked the kids went to check out the hotel's pool which got the big thumbs up!

Wakari Wizards win!

2008-08-03T15:26:00.001-07:00

In the weekend, my team of clever young robot designers from Wakari school gained first place in the Otago Regional Robocup dance section. Needless to say there was much excitement and jumping around..

They had worked very hard over the past few weeks, designing their robots, decorating them and creating the dance performance. Both robots and humans had to be part of the performance, so there was quite a bit of discussion, thinking and timing to make sure everything went according to plan! In the end they came up with a fantastic concept and had a lot of fun along the way.

The day was heaps of fun with secondary and primary schools from around Dunedin all gathering to compete in the three sections of soccer, search and rescue and dance. Out team loved the opportunity to see what other schools had been up to and to see a variety of different Lego robots in action.

Now we have to prepare for the national competition on the 6th of September in Auckland. So it's back to the workroom to discuss, think and practice ways we can tweak the performance... wish us luck!

Olympic Island

2008-07-27T15:01:00.001-07:00

Our cluster is running a loose cross cluster activity around the 2008 Olympics.

Classes are going to share their experiences and activities through a series of blogs that we have embedded on our cluster homepage. You can view them here.

It is a simple and easy way for students and teachers to connect and collaborate throughout our cluster, and we hope it will be very successful.

To add to this I have created an online activity called 'Olympic Island' which will run over this term. It is built on an idea/class activity that I used to do with my year 3 kids back when I had a classroom, and they used to love it!

It involves creating your very own island and adapting it for a specific purpose, in this case the Olympic Games.

I plan to throw through in some curly questions and challenges over the term to stimulate some higher order thinking and create discussion, and it should be a lot of fun.

There are only 50 places available in the activity, and I'd like to invite any of my readers, or people you think might be interested to join up. It's free, and if it works really well, I might look at running more themes in the future.

Check it out at http://noodle.21classes.com

Playtime!

2008-06-23T14:14:00.000-07:00

The Spore Creature Creator gives Spore fans, and those who are creatively curious, the first hands-on opportunity to design their own species and share it with their friends. All creatures designed with the Spore Creature Creator can be imported into the full retail version of Spore for PC and Mac when it launches on September 5, 2008.

“We are thrilled to finally be putting the creative tools of Spore into the hands of players around the world,” said Will Wright, chief designer, Maxis. “The amazing creations players design this summer will help populate the game universe we all enter when Spore ships this September, so in a sense, the Spore Creature Creator is the birth of Spore.”

Spore, the highly anticipated game from the creators of The Sims™, gives players their own personal universe in a box. Create and evolve life, establish tribes, build civilizations, sculpt entire worlds and explore a universe created by other gamers. Spore gives players a wealth of creative tools to customize nearly every aspect of their universe: creatures, vehicles, buildings, and even UFOs. Players can then seamlessly share their creations with the world or explore infinite new galaxies created by other gamers.

Today I had a play around with the Spore Creature Creator Demo. Wow! It's only a little taste of the experience you will get with the full Spore Game, but this little bit was just plain fun. The creature creator is part of the second phase of the game. You can create your creature with full control of spine, body shape and body elements such as legs and arms heads etc. Then you can 'paint' your creature giving a you a totally unique animal of your very own, and all in glorious 3D.

But the fun doesn't stop there, click the test button and now you can make your creature walk, dance, roar, laugh, jump, flip...the list goes on. The amazing thing is that your creature is animated in real time. Change your creature and change the way it moves... here's my first creature attempt.

You can capture screen shots and even movies of your creature in action. You can even capture an 'avatar' which creates an animated gif you can use on the web.

Once you save your creature, it is added to the 'Sporapedia', an online beastiary of user creations, and yes you will see these creatures in the game.

And this isn't the full game!

Will Wright spoke at a recent TED conference about Spore, and it was interesting to hear that he follows a Montessori approach when designing his games. He talks about his games being toys that are open to exploration and discovery, and that the experience of playing the game in your own way is a goal in itself. And he openly used the word 'Educational' when talking about his game...usually that is enough to kill a commercial game dead, and yet this is one of the most highly anticipated games in years. You can check out his full speech here.

I look forward to more Spore fun in the future...

How to tweak your blog

2008-06-19T15:56:00.000-07:00

Ok, so it seems that some of you would like to know how I have tweaked my blog. So here goes...some instructions.

Create a new banner for your blog. Use whatever program you like, I used Comic Life because I love it's ease of use. When you have created your banner you need to export it as a jpg, gif or png file. A blogger banner is usually 760 pixels wide. The easiest way to do this I have found (on a mac) is to use the built in screen capture tool. Shift Command 4 will let you select an area of the screen to capture...and if you haven't noticed before it also tells you the size of the capture area...in pixels! So just drag over your creation until you have selected an area that is 760xWhatever...and you're done.
Upload your banner into blogger. Go to Dashboard, layout, and then click on edit in the header section. A pop up window will appear. Choose 'get image from computer', browse for it, make sure that you tick the box that says 'Instead of Title and description'. Wait for your picture to load, and click save.
Yay, you have a new banner!
To alter the background image of your blog, you need to delve deep into the world of html. Here is some digital scuba gear to help you...
First you need to have an image that you want to have as a background, and it needs to be online. That means an existing picture that is on the web, or one that you have uploaded to a photo sharing site such as Flickr or Photobucket.
Next you need to go to the layout section of your Blogger Dashboard again and then choose 'Edit HTML' in the top menu.
Scroll down until you find the Body { tag. you should see something like this...
/* global
----------------------------------------------- */
body {
margin: 0;
text-align: center;
min-width: 760px;
background: #4386ce
color: $textColor;
font-size: small;
}
Add these edits so that it looks like this...
/* global
----------------------------------------------- */
body {
margin: 0;
text-align: center;
min-width: 760px;
background: #4386ce url(put the web address of your picture in here) no-repeat top center fixed;
color: $textColor;
font-size: small;
}
Your background picture needs to be large enough so that it will cover your background. My background is 1660 pixels wide, so that it will suit most screen resolutions...too small a picture and you will have coloured bands at the sides of your blog. Anything 1280x1024 or larger should suit. Take care the file size is not too large otherwise your blog page will be slow to load.
If you wish, you can alter the transparency of your blog as well. In the body { section after where you have pasted the background image info, paste in this code...
filter:alpha(opacity=75); -moz-opacity:0.75; opacity:0.75; }

Change the transparency level by changing the numbers highlighted in red. Vary the numbers between 0 to 100 for the line 1, or 0 to 1.0 for the lines 2 and 3. All the numbers must be at the same level, for example 75 for line 1 is equal to 0.75 for lines 2 and 3. The lower the number, the more transparent your blog is. If you don't want it to be transparent, set the values to 100, or 1.0.
Preview your template to make sure it looks ok...if it does save it.
Finished!

Playing with blogger

2008-06-18T13:48:00.000-07:00

After creating a blog for Lily the other day, I wanted to make it as 'Lily friendly' as possible. I created a new banner for her using Comic Life, and then played around with the 'Edit HTML' functions in the blogger layout section...and her new look was born.

My lovely wife Jo came home and saw Lily's blog... "Great!" she said "Can you do mine?"...and so Room 6's purple cloud of learning was reborn.

After all this hard work, I thought that there was one more blog that could do with a makeover...mine! And so here is my new look...Edge of the Seat, adventures in the sea of knowledge. Enjoy.

Playing around in the blogger layout section reminded me that this tool is so very flexible and can be molded to fit your personality...or that of your classrooms! Don't settle for others standards - make your own!

The Wonderful World of Lily

2008-06-16T14:31:00.001-07:00

Last week my daughter brought home a fantastic story she had written in class, and she was itching to show it to us. She read it out with great pride and expression before tea that night.
"Wow, that's a great story Lily." I told her, "Maybe you could get that put on your class blog."
"Our class doesn't have one yet." she told me.
"Hmmm, well would you like your own blog?"
She turned to look at me her eyes shining...and The Wonderful World of Lily was born.

So please welcome the blogosphere's latest writer, you can read her stories and writing at http://lilycb.blogspot.com, I'm sure that she would love to get some comments from all of you out there!

Wiimote Whiteboard...next steps

2008-05-08T18:31:00.001-07:00

Today I managed to get my wiimote whiteboard up and running. Using Uwe Schmidt's software I managed to connect my macbook pro to the wiimote successfully. This had a few issues, as it usually hangs or disconnects the wiimote when you first start it up. Removing the wiimote from the built in bluetooth preferences, and then starting the wiimote whiteboard software seemed to help.

The more I used the software the better it seems to get at connecting the wiimote. Once that is done it is just a matter of calibrating the pen, just like on any other IWB, and away you go.

There are some major differences in how you use the pen, and that led to it's own frustrations. The pen is always on, and to make a left click you turn the pen off. This does take some getting used to. You can also right click, but i have not been brave enough to try that yet.

The resolution was pretty good. I placed the wiimote on top of the ceiling mounted data projector in one of our classrooms, and it managed to see most of the board. A little fiddling to find the perfect spot and angle would make an improvement. I might try attaching it to a top corner of the board and pointing it down across the board.

Next step today was to redesign my pen. I found it too hard to keep remembering to push and release the switch to make the pen work. My mark 2 version has a pressure switch at the tip, so that when you press it against the board it turns on. The pen is much more natural to use, and works really well (despite being held together with tape!). Here are some pics of the mk2 version. Cost to build then pen...about $6. The IR LED is bought from Dick Smith seems to do the job OK, but a more powerful LED will give a better result. Try taking one out of an old TV remote.

Can I see it being used in the classroom? Possibly. You would need to get the pen design just right, it seems that this is a critical element. I would want to find a way of putting the wiimote on ac power, there are adapters available that do this, but not sure where to buy in NZ. Other than that, yes, the software works well, and I'm sure will only get better. There is a huge number of developers out there trying to adapt Johnny's work, and he himself has done amazing things.

It's been a fun experiment.

Blogged with the Flock Browser

The Wiimote Whiteboard Experiment.

2008-05-07T15:00:00.001-07:00

I have been following with interest Johnny Lee's work with the Nintendo Wiimote, turning it into a cheap interactive whiteboard ( as in about $100!). If you have not seen this in action check out his TED presentation or have a look at his webpage (http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/wii). Here is a youtube peek...

I showed the video to Tony, our project director and he was keen to try it out too. So after a quick trip to Dick Smith, I was able to get all the equipment needed. Over the next few weeks I'll keep you posted as to how I get on. For the moment, I have thrown together a quick ir pen, using a vivid marker shell, an ir led, a couple of wires and a battery. Version 2 will have a switch to turn the led on and off.

I have also located a mac version of the whiteboard software. Uwe Schmidt has created a Java version of Johnny Lee's software, and I'll be giving it a go. Fingers crossed!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Nelson ICT Conference

2008-05-04T16:44:00.001-07:00

On the last day of the term break, I was lucky enough to be invited (and flown) up to Nelson for the day, to deliver two workshops for the Nelson ict cluster conference.

When I left Dunedin, early in the morning, it was trying hard to hail and snow, so I was quite looking forward to a day in slightly warmer climes. True enough, Nelson was cool but sunny, a definite improvement, much to my family's digust (my lovely wife had to run outside and rescue the freezing rabbit from it's hutch in pyjamas and jacket due to my naturalist daughters urging).

I had two wonderful sessions filled with enthusiastic teachers looking for new ideas. Instead I introduced them to Scratch and Powerpoint Animation. All joking aside, it was great seeing teachers completely absorbed in learning something new, and at the end of the day, one comment stood out for me. "At the start of this session I thought I was completely over my head, but now I'm hooked and having fun". Awesome. It also gave me a few smiles when I saw people from my first workshop still playing on Scratch during the keynote speech afterwards...

Thank you Rachel and Nelson for inviting me to be part of your learning, I am very grateful.

I look back at how our Hills cluster has grown over the past three years, and I am still tickled pink when someone tells me "I tried this for the first time and it was fantastic/awesome/great" and this is happening almost on a daily basis now. Sometimes we don't get a chance to stop, take a breath and reflect on just how much we have grown and developed, not just in our skills but in our attitudes to learning, our ability to take risks and try new things. Take a moment to think about your "ICT journey" and let me know how things have changed for you. I know I am a very different Learner/Teacher than I was three years ago...

A World without Oil

2008-04-06T16:58:00.001-07:00

Today while I was catching up on my blog roll, I stumbled onto this website "World without Oil".

In May 2007, over 1,800 people combined imagination with insight to create World Without Oil (WWO), a realistic simulation of the first 32 weeks of a global oil shortage chronicled in 1,500 personal blog posts, videos, images and voicemails. World Without Oil was an alternate reality game – when submitting their stories, its players pretended the oil crisis was really happening.

Even though the game is now over, you can still access the lesson plans they created so you can run your own world without oil unit. I thought that this would be a great idea to incorporate into my "If I could change the world" project. So I have now created a group within change the world and I am inviting you to join it!

It's week one: Oil reserves have just run out in the Middle East and refineries are shutting down worldwide. From this day forward the only oil available is what is left in storage. Here in New Zealand petrol prices jump straight to $3.50 a litre...

Think...
What would happen in the first week?
How much oil does the world actually use in a day?
What is it used for?
How would this affect your life?

Join us a changetheworld.ning.com/group/worldwithoutoil and contribute your ideas...

Handipoints is very handy!

2008-04-03T16:55:00.001-07:00

I found out about this particular website thanks to Suzie Vesper, from the Petone Foreshore Cluster. She is great at finding these little gems!

Handipoints is an online task and goal chart system for kids. You can create custom charts with tasks that your child does each week. These could be household chores, homework or even exercise! Your child then ticks off the items they have done each day and you as a parent get to grade them (if you wish). Set up some goals/rewards for your child to aim for and it tracks their progress for you.

I signed up Lily (7)and Gabe (4), our two kids to see what their reaction would be. They both have spot charts on the fridge at the moment, and we wanted to see if this be more engaging for them. After sitting down with each of them and choosing some tasks (making the bed, getting dressed, brushing teeth etc) they got to choose some things they wanted to have as a reward. Lily chose a few things, for example, some baking time (50 points), and her big goal is a barbiegirl mp3 player (500 points). Gabe chose a new batman toy and a new train.

In addition to powerful parenting tools for Task and Goal management, Handipoints features HandiLand, a fun virtual world where kids adopt their own cartoon cat and use their points to buy clothes and gear for their cat. Lily loves these sorts of things so this was just fantastic she thought. I was surprised to see that Gabe was really into it as well, each day he asks to see how 'his cat' is doing...

I really liked the way you could set up custom tasks, goals and rewards for kids, and that rewards did not have to be 'things', they could be quality time activities and such.

This could even be used in the classroom as a behavior managment tool...

Anyway, Lily earned enough points the other day to cash in one of her low level rewards but she chose to keep saving to get to the 'big prize'... will keep you posted...

Welcome to Panwapa

2008-03-26T20:46:00.001-07:00

Today I stumbled across this website in my internet browsing. It's a fantastic resource, with loads of potential. I noted that there are already 116 New Zealand 'Panwapas'...

From the site's press release:

Elmo, Big Bird and Oscar are world-renowned, but it's their new counterparts, "Azibo," "Athena," and "Baabra" who are the focus of a new worldwide initiative. Children today are growing up in an increasingly interconnected world full of opportunities and challenges that require them to develop new skills and perspectives. To meet this need, Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit educational organization behind Sesame Street, and The Merrill Lynch Foundation have created a Worldwide Kids initiative called Panwapa.

Panwapa, which means "here on this earth" in the Tshiluba language, aims to foster the foundation for global citizenship and community activism in young children, ages 4 to 7. Featuring an entirely new group of Muppet characters, Panwapa consists of an interactive website, www.panwapa.com, a DVD, and print materials that are available in five languages to children around the world—Arabic, English, Japanese, Mandarin and Spanish.

A team of international cultural experts, early childhood researchers, educators and media specialists from nine countries and organizations such as Oxfam, UNICEF, and the World Bank first came up with the idea for Panwapa in 2005. Multi-national teams from Merrill Lynch and Sesame Workshop worked with the advisors to develop content for the program, focusing on messages of global citizenship for young children.

The international advisory board, led by Dr. Charlotte Frances Cole, Vice President for Education and Research at Sesame Workshop, developed five broad educational goals for the project:

Awareness of the Wider World: An understanding of the linkages between local neighborhoods and communities and national and global issues.
Appreciating Similarities and Differences: An understanding of and respect for similarities and differences among the people of the world and the interconnectedness of the world's systems.
Taking Responsibility for One's Behaviors: An awareness of one's actions and one's impact on others, the willingness and desire to take responsibility for one's actions, and an effort to seek ways to make the world a better place.
Community Participation and Willingness to Take Action: A desire to participate in and contribute to one's community locally and globally, as well as a willingness to take action around persistent issues and work through them to effect meaningful civic improvement.
Understanding of and Responsiveness to Economic Disparity: An understanding that all people share certain basic needs and disparities in resources affect individuals' abilities to fulfill these needs -- and a desire to address these disparities.

The website, www.panwapa.com, is the center of the initiative. The experience begins on Panwapa Island, a floating island that travels the oceans of the world, where children and their caregivers will enter the virtual Panwapa community and meet newly created Muppet characters such as "Athena the Owl" and "Azibo the Monster." Children will be able to travel around the world and visit with Panwapa kids from other countries, watch interactive movies, learn words in other languages, and collect Panwapa Cards by going on international treasure hunts.

"21st century children live in the global village from the moment they are born. The sooner they learn to think of this as a wonderful, fun adventure, the better global citizens they will grow into," stated David Woollcombe, Founder and President, Peace Child International and Panwapa Advisor. "I am delighted that Sesame Workshop has taken upon itself the task of introducing its young audiences to their global neighborhood: their experience and creativity equips them better than any other organization to ensure that young people all over the world come to view the global neighborhood as a cornucopia of opportunities."

Change the world for $15

2008-03-17T18:28:00.000-07:00

A global publishing phenomenon about changing the world is hitting NZ stores. With over one million copies sold worldwide so far, the NZ edition, Change the World for $15 offers 50 simple, everyday actions to change the world that are easy for anyone to do.

It is the product of the global social change movement, We Are What We Do, that believes:
Small Actions x Lots of People = BIG Change

With simple actions such as Give Blood, Turn off Unnecessary Lights and Shop Locally, the book encourages communities to connect with each other and create collective change.

Action 31, Turn off the tap whilst brushing your teeth perfectly demonstrates the We Are What We Do formula: this wastes an average of 26,000 litres of water per family per year. By turning the tap off, the average NZ street could save enough water to fill an Olympic size pool every year.

I am going to link this in to the "If I could change the world" Ning project. Perhaps your class would like to undertake one or two of the actions in the book and share it in the change the world project...

Action Research

2008-03-03T11:57:00.001-08:00

This year the teachers in our ICT cluster are undertaking an action research project. These projects can be either individual or group based.

Over the past week we have run a series of "kick start" workshops to help teachers form their research questions, start planning and research. We looked at how to use Google's advanced search function (lots of amazed looks here!), and talked about the "Deep Internet".

On our cluster website we have set up an area to support action research. One part of this area is our action research cafe, a discussion area where teachers can talk about their projects, ask for help and share experiences and resources. We have made this area public and would like to encourage teachers and educators from outside the cluster to join in the conversations taking place there. You can access the area by clicking here.

Already we have some exciting topics posted, and more are still to come. We hope to have many of these published and available for viewing by the end of the year.

Come and join in!

NZSL Tour of Second Life

2008-02-27T18:00:00.001-08:00

BubbleShare: Share photos - Play some Online Games.

On Wednesday evening I took a group of New Zealand teachers for a short tour education tour of Second Life. This was a continuation of the breakout workshop I did in Rotorua with Jane Nicholls, in which we formed a second life group named NZSL, New Zealand teachers in Second Life.

We started out at the Discovery Educator Centre on Eduisland 2. Here we looked at creating landmarks, teleporting and using voice and text chat.

We then moved on to the Teacher Network Centre to look at the free educator resources they have on offer there, lots of landmarks, tips and tools to help teachers and students build resources in second life.

From there we teleported to the San Fransesco Assisi recreation. A truly amazing place, lovingly recreated in second life...it gives a very different perspective than looking at a flat photo on a page or website!

A stop at the SL Planetarium gave them an opportunity to look at the solar system... fantastic for science learning.

Our last stop was into the world of literature...Wizard's Alley, better known as Diagon Alley from the Harry Potter Books. Visit the Leaky Cauldron, walk into the marketplace to buy a broom or a wand... or go and look through Hogwarts, and stop to talk with the "students" there.

This took over an hour to visit just these four places and we are keen to do another tour soon. If you would like to take part, you will need to have a second life account, and log into second life and join the NZSL group, we'd love to have you on board.

What I learned at Learning@School

2008-02-24T16:02:00.001-08:00

Well, the learning@school conference has come and gone like a herd of stampeding gazelle. I'm still not sure if I was a cheetah waiting for an opportunity to pounce or a meerkat trying not to get run over...

It is a busy, busy time, and this year it was busier than usual having to deliver two workshops as well. These both went well (although it IS very hard to deliver an interactive workshop on second life when you have no internet...) and I made some great new connections with teachers from all over the country. For me this is one of the main strengths of a conference like this, the opportunity to meet other teachers and build those connections across classrooms and schools.

Several thought provoking keynote speeches made me think in a variety of ways, and I'll post more on them when I manage to get my thoughts in order.

I managed to get to three great breakouts this year. The first was on Numbers, the new spreadsheet application in iWork 08. Why some of the superb features have not been included in excel years before baffles me. It was great to work in a spreadsheet and have so many handy and intuitive tools at hand.

Next I went to a workshop with Robyn Garden from Southland Girls High. Robyn was part of the digiops Project ACTIVate. This looked at action research with interactive whiteboards. Her presentation was on the action research process and I picked up some great tips and resources to share.

Lastly I looked at MARVIN, the new software application that has been picked up by the software licensing agreement. Wow, an amazing package, and I'm going to have to put back my bootcamp partition just so I can play with it some more, as unfortunately it is a PC package. MARVIN allows you create real time animation with a variety of 3D avatars with speech and text as well.

I am now keen to share all that I have seen with my cluster schools, and run some staff meetings and workshops!

Off to Learning@School 08

2008-02-17T17:01:00.001-08:00

Well, it's time to pack the bags, and head off to Rotorua for Learning@School 08 tomorrow.

I always look forward to this conference (even though I do miss my beautiful family while I am gone!), as it is a chance to catch up face to face with those I usually only 'see' digitally, and also to make new connections. I look forward to the blogger's cafe and other experiences...

This year I am presenting two workshops, one on cluster websites, and building virtual communities. This is a workshop that I have promised a few people to do, and I'm a bit nervous about it as I really do not consider myself an expert at these things. I constantly struggle to promote and improve our own cluster site. I do hope it will be a great think tank session though, and a chance for people to get together and share resources and tips for creating a successful cluster site.

The other workshop is on second life in education. I'm doing it with fellow facilitator Jane Nicholls. It is a quite ambitious project as we hope to have at least 20 people online and in-world exploring the educational possibilities of virtual worlds. A good test of the Novotel's broadband bandwidth! If all goes well, it promises to be a fantastic session and attendees will come away with a huge bag of digital...err...virtual resources.

Bring on the learning!

Kath Murdoch Seminar

2008-02-03T19:56:00.001-08:00

Here I am, at the Art Gallery rearranging the furniture because the chairs were all in rows and Kath does not like lecturing to a room full of rows... "It's just not inquiry like" she says... yay...I hate rows too.

We start the day talking about the importance of goal setting and understanding the way we learn. Things such as learning styles and multiple intelligences come in to conversation.

After some lively discussion during an true/false activity, Kath helps us all construct a wonder wall about inquiry learning. Our questions are:

How can we make inquiry work with different ages levels? How do we account for the experience and developmental stage of our learners?
How do you manage the balance between teacher and student directed learning?
The role of content and process in the inquiry process.

So...what makes it 'inquiry'? Word Splash: understanding-driven, collaboration, metacognition and reflection, prior learning, active investigation, self-regulating, sustained and connected, authenticity, differentiation.

Some underlying principles

Inquiry learning involves working with students prior understanding and experience to challenge, reconstruct and deepen understanding. New concepts and information are best understood when we help students reveal their preconceptions about a topic. New learning must be connected to prior experiences and 'ways of seeing'.
Inquiry learning involves students in exploring questions of significance. Investigation of questions - some teacher determined , some student determined and others co-constructed...is the essence of inquiry to investigate these questions in an active and sustained way.

'Where are we up to?' chart. Use this tool to allow self regulation in students during the inquiry topic. Also allows teacher to see when students are ready for conferencing.

What makes a good integrated inquiry focus?

Will it be engaging?
Is it suitably generative?
Is it worth learning about?
Is there potential for active investigation?
Is there potential for action?
Does this topic provide a context for meeting curriculum expectations?

"We want to give out students time to explore what intrigues them, and we want to make sure they visit the important sites they might miss without guidance. Teachers need to map out the landscape and highlight some of the most important places to stop." Tina Blythe, 1988

What makes a quality understanding goal?

It is elastic/fluid. Allows for a variety of view points and directions within it.
Contains transferable concepts.
Are demonstrable by students.
Avoid value judgments.
Are not facts or low level knowledge.

Tuning in is not just immersion in topic, it is reconnaissance and assessment. What prior knowledge and experiences are your students (and yourself) bringing to this investigation? The major purpose of this phase is assessment.

What do I already know and think about this?
How do I think this works? What's my theory?
Do I have any questions about this?
Why is this worth learning about?
Where are we headed?

The sorting out phase is what you do to make meaning from the data you have gathered during the finding out phase. The Arts are a powerful method of sorting out ideas and concepts.

Text to activity
Text to self: In what ways does this text relate to your own self?
Text to text: In what ways does this text relate to another text? eg: book, film, song.
Text to world: In what ways does this text relate to the things in the world?

Going Further
Revisiting your initial questions, coming up with new questions. Chances for personalizing learning and new tangents.
Use of contracts and scaffolds to structure students learning.
Wonder boxes: Individual boxes which contain students questions. Students take them out during investigation to share,sort, and perhaps rewrite or answer them.

Today was a great opportunity to listen to, talk with and share ideas with Kath, and I look forward to bringing her to our cluster in September!

Essays and the accelerating juggernaut of the future

2007-12-17T13:21:00.001-08:00

Today I came across this great ad, thanks to a link on the fischbowl blog. Watching it reminds me a little of Sir Ken Robinson's speech on creativity...the part when he talks about Gillian Lynne, the choreographer for the 'Cats' musical, and about how she was considered 'different' until her parents took her to a specialist who told her to dance.

Here is the video, have a look.

For me this video had me sooo much wanting to see the adult girl holding HER creation in the future, but alas, we do not find out...but lets hope.

It also made me wonder about what our kids dream our future will be like...and do they do it as much as we did when we were kids?

The reason I ask this is because the future is coming at us so much faster now...instead of having years to wait for the next innovation, there is something new every single day... just reading the CrunchGear blog makes my head spin sometimes. So anyway, this made me think, with all these innovations do our youth have the time or energy to look far into the future, or are they just surfing the crest of the innovation wave?

Was it easier to dream when we were kids than it is for our kids today? If so, how do we as educators help them to nuture their creative, dreaming spark? Your thoughts please.

7 things you should know about...

2007-12-12T14:27:00.001-08:00

The EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative's (ELI's) 7 Things You Should Know About... series provides concise information on emerging learning technologies and related practices. Each brief focuses on a single technology or practice and describes:

What it is
How it works
Where it is going
Why it matters to teaching and learning

7 Things You Should Know About...pieces provide quick, no-jargon overviews of emerging technologies and related practices that have demonstrated or may demonstrate positive learning impacts. Any time you need to explain a new learning technology or practice quickly and clearly, look for a 7 Things You Should Know About...

Some of the opics covered:

Skype, Citizen Journalism, Data visualization, haptics, cyberinfrastructure, twitter, wikipedia, facebook, rss, creative commons, open journaling, digital storytelling, e-books, google earth, youtube, virtual worlds, screencasting, augmented reality, instant messaging, blogs, virtual meetings, wikis, podcasting, social bookmarking

Animating with keynote 08 (pt1)

2007-12-02T20:45:00.000-08:00

I have been kicking around the idea of including some video screencasts with helpful tech tips for a while now, ever since starting to play with Jing.

So now after finding a couple of gems in Keynote 08, Iain's itty bitty tech tips are born...stay tuned for more!

Today's two episodes are on using the new alpha masking in keynote, and then using motion paths (move action) in builds. Both of these things are already available in the pc version of powerpoint, and I have seen some superb examples of animation using this technique, but those of us with macs have had to wait a while longer. Now you can :)

Creating computer games

2007-11-15T14:48:00.001-08:00

Over the past two sessions at Opoho School I have been working with students to create their own computer games using the free program scratch.

Their inquiry topic for this term was "Our place in space", so we have created games with a space theme. The students had no experience of the program beforehand, and these games were created in half a day. Once created they are then uploaded onto the web to share with the world.

They are now exploring how they can include some of the learning they gained as part of the topic into their games...stay tuned for updates! They'd also love some comments on their games, so head over to our hillsictpd scratch gallery and check them out.

Mars Mission: Use the arrow keys to move, collect health packs to increase your score and move to new levels. Watch out for asteroids!

Learn more about this project

Day two of Otago Southland regional meeting

2007-11-03T22:20:00.001-07:00

On Friday we were hosted by beautiful Bluff Community School for the day. Marg & Warren stood in for Jill Hammonds and took us through some online resources on the new curriculum.

The ICTPD Workshops on designing the new curriculum contain some great information and resources and is a valuable site for anyone undertaking this process. You can find it here and in the useful websites link on the cluster website.

Marg also showed us the waikatopd wikispace which had resources from their recent workshops with Sharon Friesen from the Galileo Project in Canada, and Ewan McIntosh from Scotland.

The heart of the Galileo Project is inquiry-based learning, and their site has some wonderful resources to support teacher's understanding of it. Check it out here and in the Useful Websites.

Ewan McIntosh is an educational technologist and teacher of French and German. Based in the Edinburgh area he frequently gives talks and workshops around the world, trying to find new and better ways of using emerging technologies in education.

Check out his educational software wikispace here.

Day one of Otago Southland Regional Meeting

2007-11-03T22:00:00.001-07:00

We were treated to an interesting day visiting Invercargill schools to look at interactive white boards in action. Thank you to Pania for setting up a varied and engaging day. The classrooms we visited had had their IWB's at the most for one year, and at the minimum for only a term.

Highlights of the the day were as follows:

Year 1&2 children using the white board and comic life software to make a digital story. The combination of the two tools (software and hardware) was marvelous, allowing a lot of discussion and letting them all participate and take ownership of the project. One used the pen, one with a wand and another with a wireless keyboard.

Thinker's Keys activity based around the BAR key. Year 8 students had to apply the BAR (Bigger, Add, Replace) key to a recycling bin, and draw their prototype on a flip chart. A lot of group work, critical thinking and discussion in this activity, and each group added their own page to the flip chart so that at the end the class could discuss the similarities and differences in designs.

Year 6 inquiry topic set out in a flip chart, with each stage and activity on a different flip slide. As the class participated in activities in their topic they added slides to the flip chart. Y charts and other graphic organizers were used to sort out their thinking, and at the end of their topic they had a digital record of their learning journey.

I came away from the day, more convinced than ever that IWB's can be used in engaging, innovative ways and that we are only limited by our imagination and experience. It was great to see classrooms where the IWB was not the focus of the classroom, but a much needed & utilised transparent tool.

Reflections from Hills ICTPD

2007-10-14T23:38:00.001-07:00

Today I spent two very enjoyable sessions talking with teachers from our cluster about their experiences this year in their quality learning circles.

We will be podcasting discussions from each of our QLCs over the next two weeks, and we hope that you find them both enjoyable and informative.

Today we have a discussion from the thinking tools QLC and Tony Reid talks about his experience with animation in the classroom.

We are trying out Podbean.com as our podcast host, you can access our podcast page here.

Thank you for sharing guys! If you would like more information on some of the things covered in our podcasts, then please leave a comment and I'll follow it up for you...

K12online 2007 is nearly here!

2007-10-10T15:46:00.001-07:00

I have just been viewing the pre-conference keynote for k12online 2007 by David Warlick. For those of you who have not heard him speak, he has some interesting things to say and will provoke some great discussion among your staff! You can view the keynote here.

'K12online is a completely free, web based ICT conference that spans the globe. It is a conference by educators for educators around the world interested in integrating emerging technologies into classroom practice. A goal of the conference is to help educators make sense of and meet the needs of a continually changing learning landscape.'

It runs from the 15-27th of October and has some great speakers, including New Zealand's own Derek Wenmoth. You can see the schedule here and check out the presentations.

As everything is web based, all the presentations and follow up sessions will be available on the site, and you can also subscribe to the video feed and have them delivered straight to your laptop if you wish!

The strands for this year are:
Week 1
Strand A: Classroom 2.0
Leveraging the power of free online tools in an open, collaborative and transparent atmosphere characterises teaching and learning in the 21st century. Teachers and students are contributing to the growing global knowledge commons by publishing their work online. By sharing all stages of their learning students are beginning to appreciate the value of life long learning that inheres in work that is in “perpetual beta.” This strand will explore how teachers and students are playing with the boundaries between instructors, learners and classrooms. Presentations will also explore the practical pedagogical uses of online social tools (Web 2.0) giving concrete examples of how teachers are using the tools in their classes.

Strand B: New Tools
Focusing on free tools, what are the “nuts and bolts” of using specific new social media and collaborative tools for learning? This strand includes two parts. Basic training is “how to” information on tool use in an educational setting, especially for newcomers. Advanced training is for teachers interested in new tools for learning, looking for advanced technology training, seeking ideas for mashing tools together, and interested in web 2.0 assessment tools. As educators and students of all ages push the boundaries of learning, what are the specific steps for using new tools most effectively? Where “Classroom 2.0″ presentations will focus on instructional uses and examples of web 2.0 tool use, “New Tools” presentations should focus on “nuts and bolts” instructions for using tools. Five “basic” and five “advanced” presentations will be included in this strand

Week 2
Strand A: Professional Learning Networks
Research says that professional development is most effective when it aims to create professional learning communities — places where teachers learn and work together. Using Web 2.0 tools educators can network with others around the globe extending traditional boundaries of ongoing, learner centered professional development and support. Presentations in this strand will include tips, ideas and resources on how to orchestrate your own professional development online; concrete examples of how the tools that support Professional Learning Environments (PLEs) are being used; how to create a supportive, reflective virtual learning community around school-based goals, and trends toward teacher directed personal learning environments.

Strand B: Obstacles to Opportunities
Boundaries formalized by education in the “industrial age” shouldn’t hinder educators as they seek to reform and transform their classroom practice. Playing with boundaries in the areas of copyright, digital discipline and ethics (e.g. cyberbullying), collaborating globally (e.g. cultural differences, synchronous communication), resistance to change (e.g. administration, teachers, students), school culture (e.g. high stakes testing), time (e.g. in curriculum, teacher day), lack of access to tools/computers, filtering, parental/district concerns for online safety, control (e.g. teacher control of student behavior/learning), solutions for IT collaboration and more — unearthing opportunities from the obstacles rooted in those boundaries — is the focus of presentations in this strand.

Kerpoof!

2007-09-19T19:36:00.001-07:00

Found another neat website for kids (and kidlike adults) today. Called Kerpoof Studio.

What is Kerpoof? The answer to that is not so simple. It allows children to create artwork in a variety of themes and styles that they can print, e-mail, create greeting cards or coloring pages. There are more than 45 Kerpoof settings available in the Art Studio ranging from wacky cartoon worlds to historical worlds, animal habitats and many more. There are quite a few little tricks the app uses, including controlling lighting in real time and multiple character animations.

Kerpoof is all about having fun, discovering things, and being creative. And yes, I made the picture in kerpoof...

Pain and triumph

2007-09-17T14:34:00.001-07:00

A bit of a personal post this time.

For the last year I have been training for my black grading in kickboxing, and this past Sunday, the big day was finally here. Three hours of utter complete mind blowing exhaustion and pain later, I had achieved something that I never thought I would do six years ago. So why did I do it?

I started kickboxing when a friend and I got bored of running around the local area, and another friend of his suggested we try kickboxing. We duly signed up and found that it was a) quite fun, b) relaxed and c) gave the best all round workout we had had in our lives. After a couple of years my friend dropped out, but I continued. One reason was because I liked the exercise, it really suited me, but the other surprising reason was that I liked the people. I had built up a little social network of people I only saw once or twice a week, but whom I would consider good friends, and who demonstrated this by coming and supporting me through my grading. It only goes to show that humans build social networks wherever they go and that these social networks are essential to our well being. Thanks guys!

All my family came to support me as well, which I was blown away by. The amount of love and support I have received over the last week has left me humbled and awed. Jo, my lovely wife, was fantastic (she took the photos, some taken when I think she had her eyes closed because she couldn't look :). Her favourite is the one of me with cotton wool shoved up my nose, I think she wants to enlarge it and hang it on our wall... ), and both Lil (7)and Gabe (3) sat through the whole three hours as well, eyes glued on the ring!

It's true what they say about it being mostly a mental thing, you drag yourself through the physical, your body goes into a kind of robot/instinctual mode and your mind has to do the hard work. This is something that I have found has been very valuable to me, that building up of mental fitness, perserverence and mental toughness, something that I can use in my everyday life.

Anyway, enough said. I'll finish by saying that kickboxing is a GREAT form of exercise, and you can do it without ever having to get cotton wool shoved up your nose!

2020 and beyond

2007-09-14T00:54:00.001-07:00

I love discovering what people think our future will be like, the ideas and innovations they think will change our world. I find it fascinating that so many things that we that thought "pffftttt, that'll never happen!" when we saw them in the movies are now emerging as fact. And also I get a chuckle from those things that we thought would make it and which have just failed to hit the mark at all...

I was reading a new pubication from futurelab in the Uk entitled "2020 and beyond". Looking into the murky world of the future it proposes several scenarios and their implications for education. They have based these scenarios on research and development that is happening NOW.

A couple of things (actually a few things) caused my mind to go into hyperdrive. The first was the idea of a "life recorder", a device that would capture an audio/visual record and then enable you to recall it whenever and wherever. Microsoft are already working on one. Lost your keys? Rewind a couple of days and say "search for keys" and your recorder dutifully shows you the exact moment you misplaced them...

What does this mean for us in the classroom? When you can bring up facts and events in the blink of an eye (literally!), will the ability to search and archive information become paramount? What will be the goal of education when all information, from fact to skills advice is constantly available to us?

What about privacy? What would an EULA (end user license agreement) look like for one of these babies? Ouch...

Thinking Tools Workshop @ Maori Hill School

2007-09-10T00:01:00.001-07:00

Today I had a session with the teachers from Maori Hill and Fairfield school. We spent a staff meeting looking at a variety of thinking tools and how they could be integrated and used throughout the inquiry process, in particular, which tool could be used at each stage, and examples of how they could be used.

Thinking tools are great for getting questions not answers. Use them to promote and provoke deeper and wider thinking in your students. Using the right tool at the right time can lead to wonderful discussions and jump off points.

Today we focused on Six thinking Hats, Thinker's keys and Visible Thinking, and looked at them through the theme of "Life in the 22nd Century"

For those of you who have not met visible thinking, here is a quick run down and a link.

Created by Harvard University's Project Zero team:
"Visible Thinking is a flexible and systematic research-based approach to integrating the development of students' thinking with content learning across subject matters. An extensive and adaptable collection of practices, Visible Thinking has a double goal: on the one hand, to cultivate students' thinking skills and dispositions, and, on the other, to deepen content learning. By thinking dispositions, we mean curiosity, concern for truth and understanding, a creative mindset, not just being skilled but also alert to thinking and learning opportunities and eager to take them."
weblink: http://www.pz.harvard.edu/vt

We also looked at some of Tony Ryan's revised Thinker's Keys. In particular, the action key, prediction key and ripple key.

I have to say that having your lovely wife in the audience certainly keeps a presenter on his toes, especially when she keeps talking when you're trying to move on, and asks some sticky questions, but that's what helps make a great session. Thanks Jo!

I have put in the box below some supporting resources. In here you will find the presentation from the workshop, two of Tony Ryan's books (Mindlinks and Thinker's keys for kids), The Visible Thinking Routines, and a Matrix of Inquiry and Thinking Tools.

Progression with Key Competencies

2007-08-23T17:36:00.001-07:00

We are having a lively debate on how and why you would level the key competencies.
One group thinks that it is important to have a measuring stick that would show progression within a key competency, so that next steps could be planned for student growth.

The other group believes that it is important that the competencies are left open to interpretation and that they should not be narrowed down and confined.

Boils down to "What are we assessing and why?"

Rose Hipkins, assessing KC's

Systems and Policies
To improve teaching and Learning
Lifelong learning - on a personal level (reflective learning)

Talking about when assessment happens, bringing up McTighue and Williams Backwards design

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Wrestling the new curric...choke hold imminent

2007-08-23T17:03:00.001-07:00

In beautiful Queenstown to talk about new curriculum with peers and those wiser than myself... live blogging ideas from the morning, so please forgive my stream of conscience typing.

Children know the how, but necessarily the why and then when. So the role of the teacher involves helping students to use the skills in a way that enhances their learning and adds to the depth of their learning.

Our world has changed so much since the 'modern' education system first appeared, but the way in which education has been delivered has not kept pace.

As student become more fluent in inquiry based learning the skills gained are transferred into other areas of life. These skills have to be explicitly taught and highlighted before change will happen.

Teaching critcical literacies and thinking - not just to be an information gatherer, but to be an information miner (propect, mine, sort, dicard, refine)

Looked at Stephen Downes post, How to be successful, thinking about how we could match up these ideas with the key competencies.

Try this out for size...
Managing self: How to empathise, how to stay healthy, how to value yourself, how to live meaningfully
Thinking: How to predict consequences, how to distinguish truth from fiction, how to learn, how to be creative
Using symbols and texts: How to read, how to communicate clearly
Relating to Others: How to empathise, How to value yourself
Participating and contributing: How to communicate clearly

Quote from Jill: "Too much homework, kids going home and plugging in to TV and playboy machines" (Room erupts into laughter...)

Ownership of Learning: Kids need to be involved in creating their learning experiences and environment, otherwise they will not be engaged.

Quote from Christina: An 18 year old says that she has hated her school life, and that now, just when she is about to leave she is being asked what she wants to learn, for the FIRST time. And we wonder why kids get turned off learning...

Matching the "Talk" that a school does about it's learning environment with what is actually happening. Do your classrooms reflect your school's vision and values? Can you kids demonstrate it?

How do you start school's on this journey? Where do you start? What does it look like? How do you assess it?

Final New Curriclum will have "Engaging and planning pack" which is designed to give schools kick off points for implementing it.
Seminars for principals will be held once the document is released. Website is being revamped.
More digital stories and case studies to come.
School support services are gearing up to provide workshops and support for schools.

Success indicators

clarity about what learning and why
evidence based pedagogy
significant themes evident
second languages
foundations are literacy, numeracy and key competencies
equity
secondary presence, engagement and achievement.

Key Changes in final Document

Treaty of Waitangi - more overt
Values - stronger focus on sustainability
Te Reo/NZSL included as offical languages
Designing school curriculum rewritten
Explicit statement about requirements, purpose and scope added
Vision - connections to the land added
Teaching as inquiry added to pedagogy

Cluster Site revamp

2007-08-21T15:30:00.001-07:00

I've shifted a few things around on our cluster website, to make it easier to find some of the nuggets that are getting buried in the ever growing site.

We now have a 'Life long learners' section, which contains a professional readings database, a book list, unit library and a blogroll of classroom blogs within the cluster. Each of these sections can be freely accessed by anyone, and perhaps more importantly...can be contributed to.

So please, come on over, check out the resources and feel free to add more or email me with suggestions.

Visioning the future

2007-08-16T16:50:00.001-07:00

I have been working with teachers going through the visioning process for their school. This is always a daunting task, and sometimes it is really hard to see where you want to go in the rapidly shifting educational landscape.

Luckily I have come across a few sites and resources that may provide some help in this process. The latest one I have stumbled across, thanks to Wes and his blog, comes from a joint effort between the KnowledgeWorks Foundation (KWF) and the Institute For The Future (IFTF) .

Their interactive map is a forecast — a credible, internally consistent view of how future forces will affect the components of public education. They do not claim it to be a prediction! Since the future as spelled out in the map might plausibly happen, you can make use of it to spark your thinking about education, regardless of whether or not the map turns out to be a perfectly accurate prediction.

One of the values of a map like this is that it allows you to hold in your mind, at once, the complexity of several forces of change. After familiarizing yourself with this high level overview, you'll be able to dig in deeper to specific spots on the map, and play with interconnections across the map. This process can stimulate discussions that allow for new insights about the future of education and new strategic decisions about your school's plans and actions.

The map was created by aggregating the opinions of relevant experts who created intensive case studies based on field research.

Popular Science - Future of the Environment in Google Earth

2007-08-15T00:32:00.001-07:00

Popular Science magazine has a special issue dedicated to the topic of "Future of the Environment". As you might expect, the articles describe many ways that science is being used to either understand issues facing the environment, or to find solutions to help solve those issues. It appears all of the stories are available for reading online. Not only that, but they have produced their own Google Earth environmental KML layer to highlight some of the interesting environmental issues around the world. It isn't a fancy collection, but some of the placemarks include image overlays for demonstrating visible changes to the environment. And, I found the descriptions of the issues and science technologies pretty fascinating.

Similar content is available in Google Earth's built-in layers under "Global Awareness", such as: UNEP: Atlast of our Changing Environment, WWF Conservation Projects, and Appalachian Mountain Removal.

See other examples of environmental information available using Google Earth:

Mindmeister

2007-08-13T18:56:00.000-07:00

I have been trying out Mindmeister, having a look to see how it is different from other similar sites such as Gliffy and Thinkature. The best feature I have found so far is the ability to do this.

Cool, embedded in a blog! As I collaborate and work with others, adding and changing ideas, they should be updated in this post, or in a website... imagine the possibilties.

I would welcome any ideas and thoughts on this particular mindmap, ( I'm just starting to put my ideas down) and am very happy to collaborate with those who would like to. Let me know!

Life as Music

2007-08-13T18:44:00.001-07:00

This video reminds me of Sir Ken Robinson's speech on creativity, and picks up on some of the points from that speech. It's a great "take time to smell the roses" clip.

Alan Watts (January 6, 1915 – November 16, 1973) was a philosopher, writer, speaker, and expert in comparative religion. He was best known as an interpreter and popularizer of Asian philosophies for a Western audience.

He wrote more than twenty-five books and numerous articles on subjects such as personal identity, the true nature of reality, higher consciousness, and the pursuit of happiness, relating his experience to scientific knowledge and to the teachings of Eastern and Western religions or philosophies. (Wikipedia)

And yes, it is by the duo who brought you South Park!

Embedded Video

I can't wait for the future...

2007-08-08T16:57:00.001-07:00

Thanks to Chris Sessums for the link to this video. A vision of the future from 1967...and it is interesting that a few things are now reality, if not quite in the same form. I guess the challenge for us is to spot the functions of the future and the form will follow...

Embedded Video

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The Randomness of Me

2007-08-08T14:58:00.001-07:00

I got tagged! If this was paintball, i'd be pink and yellow all over...
I think I have left this a little late, and everyone that I would tag has already posted...what to do, what to do? Here's some randomness of me anyway :)

First, the Rules:
* Post these rules before you give your facts
* List 8 random facts about yourself
* At the end of your post, choose (tag) 8 people and list their names, linking to them
* Leave a comment on their blog, letting them know they’ve been tagged

1. I have a brother who works for Park Rd Post in Wellington, his name is in the credits of King Kong
2. I training for my black belt in kickboxing, grading is 3 days from now (sympathy is accepted!)
3. I had no personal sense of style...I owe it all to my JO!
4. I am addicted to gadgets. My first computer was a Dick Smith with a cassette tape drive that my Dad brought home
brand new. It took 10 minutes to load a game of space invaders!
5. I used to work as a theatre technician. I have worked on over 150 stage shows and concerts.
6. I haven't read the latest Harry Potter book yet (I want to...), the last great book I read was "Mistborn" by Brandon
Sanderson
7. I wear contact lenses.
8. I have a very sweet tooth. Bring on the chocolate :)

You've probably been tagged already but here goes...

Jo Purple (Love you!)
Allanah K
Greg Carroll
Lyn Ross
Andrew Churches
Rachel
Suzie Vesper
Rochelle Jensen

A map for School 2.0?

2007-08-08T02:21:00.001-07:00

I stumbled across this handy pdf poster in my quest for things to help me understand school 2.0. I thought it was a really neat and easy way to help facilitate discussion within a staff, or with school community about vision. You may or may not agree with the ideas in the poster, but it will help start a conversation!

school20.pdf

Mechanical vs Organic

2007-08-05T00:48:00.001-07:00

I don't know whether this post is just a product of my having seen the Transformers movie last night or not, but after twittering with Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and friends about what learning 2.0 is (in under 145 words...that's all twitter allows), I had to stop and think about learning and school, and the differences between them.

I had read an article a while ago (can't remember where) about the future of the web and such forth, and the thing that struck me was this person's viewpoint that the web was like a living organism, and rather than each stage of the web being a separate entity, they were merely stages of the same entity, but evolving in complexity. I don't think I've quite explained it right, but it struck a cord with me.

It seems to me that school should be seen not as a mechanical process (which is was/is because of the needs of the industrial era), starting with raw materials and producing a finished product at the end of a long linear production line, but rather, as an evolving entity, growing, adapting and changing to it's needs.

Surely we cannot fulfill the changing needs of students if the place where they learn does not also adapt and grow. Have we just had an education system that has been stuck in toddler mode for the last 150 years?

Learning on the other hand, is something that happens inside..you. Is the way in which we learn changing? Can it change? Perhaps so, historically much of learning was about remembering, facts & figures. Now, there is too much to remember, and you can access all the facts & figures you can eat at a moments notice. So learning changes from remembering to connecting.

Connecting to people, places and sources of information, being able to sort that information and remix it to make new understandings...is this what learning 2.0 might be? Or is this just a load of waffle? Let me know what you think...

Cool Google resources for the classroom

2007-08-02T16:17:00.001-07:00

Today I found a link to some great posters for your classroom from Google. They range from web search tips (my favourite), to using Google earth, book search and scholar.

I especially liked the Search tips for kids poster, it shows in a very clear and linear way how to run a web search, and uses several of the less known functions of the Google search engine. check it out!

Google have also produced what they call crib sheets, which are guidelines to several of their applications. They give you a brief overview of the product, plus some handy tips and ideas for using them in the classroom. I have also put them in our downloads section of our cluster website.

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25 types of blog posts

2007-07-26T14:36:00.001-07:00

I found this link to a great presentation about diffrent types of blog posts. When I looked through the slideshow, I found that I only did about three! Worth looking at if you would like to hone your blogging skills. Thanks to Rachel Boyd for the link!

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Who needs Singstar?

2007-07-25T20:57:00.001-07:00

I was working with my Digital Music/Audio QLC this afternoon, and showed them this website. Singshot is an online karaoke community, and you can join for free.

You can choose from hundreds of songs to sing from, and record your efforts on the site, and listen and comment on other aspiring singers talents as well (no flaming allowed!).

You can even attach your webcam and turn your recording into a music video, and yes there is even a genre section for kids, so that you can get your students to give their renditions of "Do your ears hang low?" and see how they stack up against the rest of the world...

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Technorati Tags: music web2.0

More cool websites...

2007-07-23T00:55:00.001-07:00

I went mining for good websites last night, and came across a few gems. The Highlights for me were these two sites. Check out my del.icio.us site for more.

MyAbodo is an interactive toy that lets you shape a house to suit you. Change your stuff and see how it shapes the climate.

When you're done, you can join an abodo neighbourhood, share your abodo with other people and get started with changing the world for real. It's a neat tool to illustrate our household environmental impact, from energy useage to recycling and sustainable food sources.

The New York Philharmonic have a superb kids area on their site, and this is the games room. Here you can try lots of different activities with an orchestral theme. Very kid friendly and lots of fun!

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Adventures in Second Life

2007-07-23T00:15:00.001-07:00

I have had a bit of time to spend exploring Second Life in the last week. There has been a lot of discussion about SL by educators around the world over the last while, and I thought it important to experience it for myself.

It has been an interesting time, to say the least. I managed to navigate my way around and find some places and people of interest. At first look, many people may dismiss SL as a game or a chat environment, but it is more than that. It is truly a virtual 'world', and just like the real world it is filled with both the good, the bad and the ugly. I managed to find lots of good, and nothing ugly during my visits.

From an ancient Egyptian pyramid, space museums, an entire island with artificial life forms that have their own virtual ecosystem, and even Diagon Alley from the Harry Potter Books, all lovingly recreated in a 3D space. And you meet people there, and communicate and talk about what you see and experience.

In the picture above you can see me, I'm the dragon (forgive me, it was a themed get together), and all the other 'people' are educators, talking about how second life may be used in education.

Can it be used in the classroom? Maybe, no, not sure yet... it would be a bit like letting your kids off in the middle of New York city and saying "Have fun, learn lots!". They would learn a LOT, but not necessarily the things you want them too! And of course their safety would be in question.

But it is an indicator of the future, and if you want to have interesting conversations about teaching and learning it is most certainly worth a visit

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Technorati Tags: secondlife

The Purple Cloud of Learning

2007-07-21T22:39:00.001-07:00

This week I helped my lovely wife Jo set up a class blog. She has done a wonderful job of it, and is really making it into a tool which both she, her students and parents use.

Blogs are wonderful tools for linking together school, home and the wider world. Jo's class's topic for this term is "who are our neighbours?" and they are looking at the similarities between our 'kiwi' culture and those of our neighboring (and perhaps not so close) countries.

Please have a look at it, the address is http://r6fairfield.blogspot.com, maybe it might give you a few ideas, or maybe you would like to join the conversations happening there!

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Is there depth beneath the Surface?

2007-06-18T15:40:00.000-07:00

Microsoft are releasing a new technology called Surface, I kind of think of it as IWB2.0.
Here is a youtube video which may explain it more ably than I can.

It seems to be targeted at retail and hospitality industries, but on their website they also talk about placing this technology in schools. Cool!

Imagine having these for desks in your classroom, and One giant one on your wall (or maybe it IS your wall!), kids working together manipulating digital data, photos, work, whatever.

It can interact with objects and devices that you place on the surface, so imagine placing a leaf, or bug on the table and it magnifying it by 500 times and giving you the power to manipulate that image.

Exercise books? Maybe, or do we just get our pens and write, draw and create on the table itself? We would not be losing skills, just updating them for the 21st Century...

And of course, they are connected...to other tables, the web, anything and everything.

Jane Nicholls posted about Jeff Utech's podcast, On Deck. In Episode 7 he is talking with some kids about this technology and one said that it might replace the teacher. NOT! I hope that I am more than a walking whiteboard and encyclopedia to the people I teach, and I KNOW that all of you are. But, I can see so much potential for this technology in the classroom to empower the way that I learn with my learners. I can't wait.

How long do you think it will take? Any bets?

Technorati Tags: microsoft surface janenicholls technology

Are you this balanced?

2007-06-11T13:50:00.000-07:00

I found this video in Miguel Guhlin's presentation video feed. This is a fantastic resource bank for anyone preparing a presentation!

For me this video is all about creativity and balance. Each part has a role and works without flaw, often in unexpected ways. Wouldn't it be wonderful if all the different types of networks we used worked this well? Our classrooms, computer networks, our computers! Our professional development networks, our home/school networks, intra and inter school networks...the list goes on.

I know I'm not particularly balanced...but I think you all might have guessed that!

Technorati Tags: ictpd ict networks balance creativity miguelguhlin presentationresources

Got your gumboots on?

2007-05-30T18:28:00.000-07:00

I have been reading and listening with interest to the discussions and keynotes at the time4online conference. Lots of great talk about online collaboration and web 2.0 stuff.

But I am very aware (and I keep telling my cluster teachers!), that we are in a rapidly changing world, and my brain keeps thinking "What will web 3.0 be like?" and "How will it impact our students?".

I have schools considering MOE Network upgrades, have they thought about web 3.0?

I found a recent PC Magazine that has an article (April 10, 2007, pages 74-79) about Web 3.0.

The article suggests that Web 3.0 might be like this:

o The semantic web, in which machines interact with data based on meaning and context rather than just text and tags.

o The 3D web, in which you can enter immersive environments, like Second Life.

o The media-centric web, in which machines find similar graphics and sounds, not just keywords.

o The pervasive web, in which the web is in clothing, appliances, and so forth, not just in computers and cell phones.

How will this affect our classrooms? Are we ready for it? Because it is coming soon, sooner than you probably think, and I worry that schools may be swamped or left stranded by the tidal wave that the web is about to serve up. Please leave a comment and tell me what your experiences and ideas are...

Technorati Tags: web3.0 change ict

You can help!

2007-05-29T17:15:00.000-07:00

Jane Nicholls is doing her efellow research on podcasting and oral literacy, and she would like to hear from teachers using this medium.

She is interested in authenticity:

Audience
Context
Purpose
Self confidence

If you can provide an example of your students demonstrating any of these things she would love to hear about it and incorporate it into her study. You can leave a comment on her blog, telling her about your experiences. Remember to tell her where you are from!

Technorati Tags: janenicholls podcasting efellow research

Look what Derek found!

2007-05-29T14:39:00.001-07:00

I am amazed by all the cool stuff that Derek manages to dig up on the net these days. Here is another piece of pure gold that you can use to engage your students in some wonderful learning opportunities. Thanks Derek!

ElectroCity - environmental education

Just received an email from my electricity supplier in Christchurch - telling me of an educational website they are sponsoring called ElectroCity. It's worth checking out - reminds me a lot of the SimCity projects that I used to run with kids at school - dividing into groups to see who could create the most successful city, and using the experience to discuss issues such as taxes, transport, recreation, governance etc - and coming to understand the issues involved in designing and maintaining a city.

ElectroCity is very similar, although its focus is on teaching about about energy, sustainability and environmental management in New Zealand. I worked my way through the very well constructed tutorial an can see real potential in this being used as a virtual learning experience in the classroom.

There's a resource area for teachers, a very helpful FAQ area, and some pretty impressive prizes being offered in two categories, one for schools and one for public contributions.

The game is designed to be played online - but something I found to be of interest is that there is an option to download a limited version of the game that runs on any computer and doesn't need internet access, with two versions available, one for MacOSX and one for WindowsXP. (I haven't had the chance to try these yet, so can't vouch for what they're like).

If I was back in a class again I'd certainly be looking at this as a useful learning resource - some notes from the website explain why:

ElectroCity is not a win or lose game. There are lots of different ways to play and you can set your class specific objectives. For example, if you wish to try a green approach, a win might be considered any city with 50,000 people and an A rating in the environment category. Or you might focus on economics and get the kids to go for the most money.
ElectroCity is designed to be flexible, so you can use it as you wish. A whole module that deals with energy, the environment, tourism and growth could be centred around the game, mixing formal lessons with fun interactive game play. You could return to the game again and again over several weeks and compare how the kids played at the beginning with how they play at the end, putting their new knowledge into practical use and getting the kids to assess what they've learnt to help them make better decisions in the game.

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Technorati Tags: environment, digital learning objects, ict

K12 Online 2007

2007-05-23T01:16:00.001-07:00

K12online 07

Announcing the second annual "K12 Online" conference for teachers,administrators and educators around the world interested in the use ofWeb 2.0 tools in classrooms and professional practice! This year'sconference is scheduled to be held over two weeks, October 15-19 andOctober 22-26 of 2007, and will include a preconference keynote duringthe week of October 8. This years conference theme is "Playing withBoundaries." A call for proposals is below.

OVERVIEW:
There will be four "conference strands"-- two each week. Twopresentations will be published in each strand each day, Monday -Friday, so four new presentations will be available each day over thecourse of the two-weeks. Each presentation will be given in any of avariety of downloadable, web based formats and released via theconference blog (www.k12onlineconference.org) and archived for posterity.

FOUR STRANDS:
Week 1
Strand A: Classroom 2.0
Leveraging the power of free online tools in an open, collaborative andtransparent atmosphere characterises teaching and learning in the 21stcentury. Teachers and students are contributing to the growing globalknowledge commons by publishing their work online. By sharing allstages of their learning students are beginning to appreciate the valueof life long learning that inheres in work that is in "perpetual beta."This strand will explore how teachers and students are playing with theboundaries between instructors, learners and classrooms. Presentationswill also explore the practical pedagogical uses of online social tools(Web 2.0) giving concrete examples of how teachers are using the toolsin their classes.

Strand B: New Tools
Focusing on free tools, what are the "nuts and bolts" of usingspecific new social media and collaborative tools for learning? Thisstrand includes two parts. Basic training is "how to" information ontool use in an educational setting, especially for newcomers. Advancedtraining is for teachers interested in new tools for learning, lookingfor advanced technology training, seeking ideas for mashing toolstogether, and interested in web 2.0 assessment tools. As educators andstudents of all ages push the boundaries of learning, what are thespecific steps for using new tools most effectively? Where "Classroom2.0" presentations will focus on instructional uses and examples of web2.0 tool use, "New Tools" presentations should focus on "nuts andbolts" instructions for using tools. Five "basic" and five "advanced"presentations will be included in this strand.

Week 2
Strand A: Professional Learning Networks
Research says that professional development is most effective whenit aims to create professional learning communities — places whereteachers learn and work together. Using Web 2.0 tools educators cannetwork with others around the globe extending traditional boundariesof ongoing, learner centered professional development and support.Presentations in this strand will include tips, ideas and resources onhow to orchestrate your own professional development online; concreteexamples of how the tools that support Professional LearningEnvironments (PLEs) are being used; how to create a supportive,reflective virtual learning community around school-based goals, andtrends toward teacher directed personal learning environments.

Strand B: Obstacles to Opportunities
Boundaries formalized by education in the “industrial age”shouldn’t hinder educators as they seek to reform and transform theirclassroom practice. Playing with boundaries in the areas of copyright,digital discipline and ethics (e.g. cyberbullying), collaboratingglobally (e.g. cultural differences, synchronous communication),resistance to change (e.g. administration, teachers, students), schoolculture (e.g. high stakes testing), time (e.g. in curriculum, teacherday), lack of access to tools/computers, filtering, parental/districtconcerns for online safety, control (e.g. teacher control of studentbehavior/learning), solutions for IT collaboration and more --unearthing opportunities from the obstacles rooted in those boundaries-- is the focus of presentations in this strand.

CALL FOR PROPOSALS:
This call encourages all, experienced and novice, to submit proposals to present at this conference via this link.Take this opportunity to share your successes, strategies, and tips in“playing with boundaries” in one of the four strands as describedabove.

Deadline for proposal submissions is June 18, 2007. You will be contacted no later than June 30, 2007 regarding your status.

Presentations may be delivered in any web-based medium that isdownloadable (including but not limited to podcasts, screencasts, slideshows) and is due one week prior to the date it is published.

Please note that all presentations will be licensed Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported.

As you draft your proposal, you may wish to consider the presentation topics listed below which were suggested in the comments on the K-12 Online Conference Blog:

» special needs education
» Creative Commons
» Second Life
» podcasting
» iPods
» video games in education
» specific ideas, tips, mini lessons centered on pedagogical use of web 2.0 tools
» overcoming institutional inertia and resistance
» aligning Web 2.0 and other projects to national standards
» getting your message across
» how web 2.0 can assist those with disabilities
» ePortfolios
» classroom 2.0 activities at the elementary level
» creating video for TeacherTube and YouTube
» google docs
» teacher/peer collaboration

KEYNOTES:
The first presentation in each strand will kick off with a keynoteby a well known educator who is distinguished and knowledgeable in thecontext of their strand. Keynoters will be announced shortly.

CONVENERS:
This year's conveners are:

Darren Kuropatwa is currently Department Head of Mathematics atDaniel Collegiate Institute in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. He is knowninternationally for his ability to weave the use of online social toolsmeaningfully and concretely into his pedagogical practice and for"child safe" blogging practices. He has more than 20 years experiencein both formal and informal education and 13 years experience in teambuilding and leadership training. Darren has been facilitatingworkshops for educators in groups of 4 to 300 for the last 10 years.Darren's professional blog is called A Difference (http://adifference.blogspot.com). He will convene Classroom 2.0.

Sheryl Nusbaum-Beach, a 20-year educator, has been a classroomteacher, charter school principal, district administrator, and digitallearning consultant. She currently serves as an adjunct faculty memberteaching graduate and undergraduate preservice teachers at The Collegeof William and Mary (Virginia, USA), where she is also completing herdoctorate in educational planning, policy and leadership. In addition,Sheryl is co-leading a statewide 21st Century Skills initiative in thestate of Alabama, funded by a major grant from the Microsoft Partnersin Learning program. Sheryl blogs at (http://21stcenturylearning.typepad.com/blog/). She will convene Preconference Discussions and Personal Learning Networks.

Wesley Fryer is an educator, author, digital storyteller andchange agent. With respect to school change, he describes himself as a"catalyst for creative educational engagement." His blog, “Moving atthe Speed of Creativity” was selected as the 2006 “Best Learning TheoryBlog” by eSchoolnews and Discovery Education. He is the Director ofEducation Advocacy (PK-20) for AT&T in the state of Oklahoma. Wesblogs at (http://www.speedofcreativity.org). Wes will convene New Tools.

Lani Ritter Hall currently contracts as an instructionaldesigner for online professional development for Ohio teachers andonline student courses with eTech Ohio. She is a National BoardCertified Teacher who served in many capacities during her 35 years asa classroom and resource teacher in Ohio and Canada. Lani blogs at (http://possibilitiesabound.blogspot.com). Lani will convene Obstacles to Opportunities.

QUESTIONS?
If you have any questions about any part of this, email one of us:

» Darren Kuropatwa: dkuropatwa {at} gmail {dot} com
» Sheryl Nusbaum-Beach: snbeach {at} cox {dot} net
» Lani Ritter Hall: lanihall {at} alltel {dot} net
» Wesley Fryer: wesfryer {at} pobox {dot} com

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Thirsty horses

2007-05-16T18:59:00.000-07:00

I've been reading a bit about change, resistance to change and androgogy (adult learning). Why is it so hard to get people to change? Come on, you know it is for your own good, we can see the bright future, so why can't you etc etc....

I too have my moments of frustration just like David Warlick, when a teacher says "Who's going to teach me how to do that?!", but I set it aside and point quietly to the screen...just click over here...
But the truth is, we are a generation that was taught...to be taught. We weren't expected to go out and learn for ourselves, learning was feed to us by our wise and benevolent teachers. The expectation was that the teacher was the expert, far more knowledgeable than the student.

This is no longer true. Our kids are growing up in a digital world, filled with a rapidly expanding and changing landscape of information, requiring a different set of skills to make sense of all of it (or at least the bits they are interested in), so they must by force of need be life long learners.

And we do too. How can we expect our kids to be doing this when we are not modelling it for them? If you are wanting rich, deep discussions and thought provoking content on your classroom blog/podcast/wiki, have you as a teacher contributed to it? Do you have your own blog that you model to the students? Did you sit down and say "I'm going to teach myself how to blog, now where can I start?"

There is a saying "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink", which is a little ridiculous, horses can smell water from over a mile away, you don't have to lead him...he'll drink if he's thirsty!
The question should be "How can I make my horse thirsty?"

Leave a comment, I'd welcome your thoughts...

Technorati Tags: androgogy davidwarlick learning change

Zero Footprint

2007-05-16T14:20:00.000-07:00

I was reading Derek's Blog where I found this link to a handy environmental impact calculator for kids. I also see that Jane has blogged it over at ICT U Can! as well.
From a group called Zerofootprint.com they have this to say about their calculator.

First launched at the Kitchener-Waterloo Children’s Museum, and available on the web at www.zerofootprintkids.com, our interactive calculator is a free educational tool, offered to teachers, organizations, and families who want to teach their kids that the choices we all make are important not only today, but for many years down the road, and not only for us, but for people and ecosystems around the world.

How great is that? I thought that this would be a great discussion point, resource and tool to use in both our "How to be a superhero in less than 10 days" unit and the "If I could change the world" global project.

Give it a go and see how you come out, then leave a comment and tell me how you got on. Is New Zealand really a 'green' country? Or could we do more?

Comic Life Windows Beta released!

2007-05-10T11:49:00.001-07:00

The folks over at plasq software have just released comic life beta for windows, so now you windows users who have been looking in envy over your mac brothers shoulders can try it out for yourselves!
Here's what they have to say:

We are pretty darn excited to announce this ... Comic Life for Windows beta has started! As it is a beta, you will no doubt come across bugs. But don't be disheartened - that's why we are having a beta, so we can get rid of those pesky little bugs! You can find out more and download the Comic Life Windows beta here. Know some other good testers? Students and Teachers especially! Let them know please.

plasq.com - Main >

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Publishing Images and work

2007-05-07T22:20:00.000-07:00

I have had many interesting discussions over the past couple of weeks with the learning circles in out ICT cluster. One them that has come up several times is the fact that now students can put information on the web in many different ways and are no longer constrained to having their school website be their sole presence on the web.
The issue is that many teachers are unaware of these methods and sites (blogging, youtube, myspace, bebo...) and these tools are not covered in school's internet publishing policy.
And just because kids are publishing work does not mean that they understand the nature of publishing in a digital world. That once you have put a photo, image or piece of work on the web, you have released control of it and cannot take it back.
So show this video to your class and discuss what it means for you...

Heroes in the hallway

2007-05-07T17:06:00.001-07:00

I found out about this YouTube video from Jane Nicholls in her ICT U CAN! Blog. A very simple yet clear message about bullying. The thing that resonated with me about this particular video was how well it could fit in with our cross cluster unit "How to be a superhero in less than 10 days", particularly if you were looking at how our students could be personal superheroes. Please check it out, it is something for both teachers and students to view and discuss.

Educational Origami and IWBs

2007-05-06T14:58:00.001-07:00

Andrew Churches has written an interesting blog entry on his Educational Origami Blog about Interactive Whiteboards. It is well worth a read for those of you who are using or are interested in investing in this tool. Click on the link below to check it out.

Thanks Andrew!

*IWB’s and the development of pedagogical skills

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Penguins, Monkeys and Multiple Worlds

2007-05-04T18:31:00.001-07:00

This article from the New York Times...
BTW...my daughter is doing this too now...

My Daughter, the Burger-Flipping Penguin
MY 9-year-old daughter, Clementine, is working in the food service industry these days.
As soon as school lets out, she ties on an apron and starts flipping burgers. She must be pretty good at it, too, because the other day she earned $50 just for slapping a few pieces of lettuce onto buns.“Shouldn’t you be wearing a hairnet?” my husband asked her.Clementine barely glanced up from the computer, where she sat clicking away to “assemble” fast-food orders — virtual meat patties, tomato and bun — as quickly as possible to earn more “cash.”“Dad, pretend I’m not here,” she said. “I can’t talk right now or I won’t make enough to buy a scooter.”
My daughter lives in two worlds. In one, she is the same small person I have always known, the one who chews on the end of her braid when she reads. But in the other, her imagination runs wild as she plays online at the kids’ social network sites where she and many of her friends recently persuaded their parents to open accounts for them.When she pretends she’s not here, sometimes Clementine is a penguin who waddles around onscreen and visits her friends’ igloos at Clubpenguin.com (where a monthly subscription costs $5.95). Other days, she holds down a job or fixes up a house for her onscreen monkey at Webkinz.com (where the cost of membership is $8 to $15, the price of a stuffed animal that comes with a code number to activate an account).
As online sites aimed at capturing the attention of the pre-MySpace set proliferate, children ages 8 to 12 seem to be effortlessly making the leap from the real world to the virtual, both at these sites and other, free sites like Imbee.com (where parents still must enter a credit card number to activate the free account), Whyville.net (which has advertising) and Nicktropolis.com (where they get a heavy dose of Nickelodeon brands like SpongeBob SquarePants from videos and games).It’s parents who can’t keep up. Even after being reassured by representatives of these sites that they guard my child’s privacy and by psychologists that sitting at a screen for hours won’t kill her imagination,
I wonder what she’s doing, whom she’s talking to and — here’s the part I find most mysterious — why it’s fun.
This is a generation gap I may never bridge, having grown up in a time when typewriters roamed the earth and grazed alongside rotary dials. When I was Clementine’s age, we had a telephone exchange named “Terrace” and my phone number was TE3-2748.Am I the only parent lost in the 21st century?
“No, but it definitely complicates the parenting process,” Marjorie Taylor, the head of the psychology department at the University of Oregon, said during a phone interview. “Children fairly quickly are surpassing their own parents’ expertise in understanding online worlds.”“It reminds me she’s going to surpass me in all kinds of other ways, too,” I said. “I was hoping to be dead, or at least very old, before that happened.”
Professor Taylor commiserated. “These are new territories we’re exploring here with this generation of children, with technology moving as quickly as it is,” she said. “We tend to think they can’t understand the difference between fantasy and the real world, and that’s just not true. Here’s a way we can see them moving back and forth.”
Maybe the answer was to explore the territories with her. If I watch her moving back and forth, I’ll get my bearings. Won’t I?
“Let me get this straight,” I said to Clementine the other day as I watched over her shoulder. “You are hanging out right now with someone named Cleaters, who just invited you to his or her house? Who is this Cleaters person? And don’t all those bright colors and beeping things give you a headache?”
“I don’t see anything beeping,” Clementine said. Taking the concept of multitasking to a new level, she smoothly navigated a pull-down menu to sign up for some shift work in an underground mine; monitored the fluctuations in a chart that tracked the hunger and health levels of her monkey, and clicked on a box that sent a message that said “Hi” to this Cleaters person.
“It’s not a Cleaters person, it’s Annie,” she said patiently. “You know Annie. You’re friends with her mom.”
“I am?” I said.
“Sarah,” Clementine said patiently. “You were talking to her at school today.”
“I feel dizzy,” I said. “How did that roulette wheel thing suddenly get onscreen and why are you spinning it?”
“To get a hundred dollars in kidzcash,” she said.
“What’s that?”
“Money to buy a backyard for my monkey,” she said.
“Why?”
“So we can invite Cosmogrode over to see it and then, if we are lucky, Cosmogrode will invite us over,” she said.
“What will we do there?” I asked.
“See if she has the banana couch.
”Ah, of course. That makes perfect sense. Not.
I needed a translator. So I phoned Susan McVeigh, a spokeswoman for Ganz Inc., the Canadian toy manufacturer that launched Webkinz.com two years ago as an accompaniment to its Webkinz line of 41 plush animals.
“Can you tell me what kids are actually doing on this site?” I asked.
“No,” Ms. McVeigh said. “We are not supposed to be tracking what they do online.”
“From what I can observe, my daughter appears to be headed for a career in fast food,” I said. “Why does she enjoy this?”
“Kids say it’s fun because they get to be a bit more in control than maybe 9-year-olds are in the real world,” Ms. McVeigh said. “What we tried to do is appeal to just about every range of interest. Some kids like to work, or look after pets, or decorate. Just like in life, you can follow your fancy.”
Or, as Karen Mason, the spokeswoman for Club Penguin, put it, “We offer children the training wheels for the kinds of activities they might pursue as they get older.”
I went to the kitchen. There, I was happy to find Clementine was now considering a career in veterinary medicine. She had become Dr. Quack’s assistant, dispensing bandages, ice packs and medication to various animals.
“How do you know what treatment to give?” I asked.
“By the symptoms,” she said.
“I don’t see any symptoms,” I said.
“Shh,” she said. “I have to concentrate.”
“Terrace3-2748,” I said.
She asked, “What’s that?”
At least I know one thing a 9-year-old doesn’t.

Online sites-online sites for children - New York Times

Blogged with Flock

Yeah Baby!

2007-04-28T16:27:00.001-07:00

For those of you who need a knightrider fix, or miss the 80's, here is a cure!

Mini USA has made this series, you can view all the episodes at the website hammerandcoop.com, or find them on YouTube.

Any way here's the trailer. Groove on!

A glimpse of the future?

2007-04-25T12:34:00.001-07:00

I saw this post this morning on David Warlick's blog, I have to say, it sounded like fun. I just hope that we will not be playing with a digital ball because it is too toxic to step outside the mall!

All pessimism aside, this sort of technology has many aplications in education, along with the perceptive pixel as well, imagine being able to hold the planet Mars between your hands and study it in detail! Or an extinct animal...a microscopic animal enlarged manyfold...a poisonous/dangerous creature...a molecule...

Playing with Light

I walked over to the Inner Harbor at lunch, to find some good food and some quiet. I ate at Phillips, in what was essentially a food court. After I finished, and was walking back through the mall area, I saw a young mother and her daughter, perhaps two years old, jumping around on the floor. As I eased over, I realized that there was a projector mounted on the ceiling, directly above them, projecting a game court on the floor. There was a digital ball (of sorts) bouncing off of the projected walls, and the two were trying to step on the ball the change its course to the opposing goal.

It was one of those times when you just seen, for the first time, something that you suspect will be huge in the future.

Technorati Tags: warlick education technology baltimore new emergingtechnology

technorati tags:Warlick, technology, emergingtechnology

Ooh!...I found a new thing

2007-04-23T16:31:00.000-07:00

Hi all you facilitators that are using interact for your clusters. I have found out that you can embed some of those lovely widgets that we put in our blogs into the interact system as well.

Check out my File Box, on our cluster page! What I did was paste the html code into a note, and left the title empty. I then clicked add, and was left with a bunch of ugly html code on my page. Then I cicked the edit button, and when it loaded the edit page, there was my widget... so I clicked modify and much to my surprise, the widget works perfectly! Yahoo!

You get what you wish...err...write for

2007-04-22T15:01:00.000-07:00

I have to share this story with you.
At the end of last term, my wife and I went to parent interviews at our daughters school. At the point where we start talking about written language, her teacher says "I heard the exciting news! When is it arriving?"
We both looked puzzled...when was what arriving?
"The kitten...you know the one from celine's parents?" she repiled.
We had to confess that we knew nothing about a kitten.
"Oh," she replied, "but she's written all about it in her book!"
And then she proceeded to show us the most remarkable piece of writing. This was not a STORY about a kitten, not a request for a kitten, no. This was a report about how her parents were getting her a kitten from one of her classmates parents, and that it would be arriving home for Easter...oh, and she was going to call it Shelley.
This all turned out to be perfectly true...all except the bit about us getting it. Right, we thought, imagine her face if we actually DO get the kitten, and it IS there when she arrives home after school on the last day of term...
I can't show you the video of what happened...you don't want to see what a six year old girl having a heart attack is like..but here is a picture of Cleo (not Shelley)

My secrets of success...

2007-04-22T14:53:00.000-07:00

Ouch, I've been tagged, not sure if I should now be wandering around like a stunned deer for the next few hours...

Miguel would like to know ...

List the top 5 to 10 things that you do almost every day that help you to be successful. They can be anything at all, but they have to be things that you do at least 4 or 5 times every week. Anything less than that may be a hobby that helps you out, but we are after the real day in and day out habits that help you to be successful.
Source: Around the Corner v2 - MGuhlin.net, Ed Tech Journeys' Guest Blogger, Sylvia Martinez (GenYES Blog) writing on this meme by Thea Westra, Simply Successful Secrets

I guess the first thing to note, is that I am constantly amazed that I am successful at anything...I am chronically unorganised, a bad communicator, and have a head stuffed full of so many ideas that they tend to come out in random, haphazard fashion! But here are some things that help me reign in the chaos...

1. I am curious

I want to know about all the latest stuff, so I start my morning checking my blogs, email, online communities to find out what is happening within my spheres of interest. Then I surf the web for 15 minutes, to hopefully BROADEN my spheres of interest...sometimes this takes longer, it depends if I find anything interesting!

2. Me Time

I need some time that is my own each day. I find that having so many things whizzing around in my head means that by the end of the day I am quite mentally exhausted. So I have some time that I can sit down and do something quiet and calm the mental storm. It might be reading, playing a game for a bit, or patting the cat(s!). But the main rules are that it must NOT have anything to do with work, and it may not be exercise (that's separate!)

3. Kickboxing

I started kickboxing almost 6 years ago, and am now training for my black belt. This was not a goal when I started, just something that has come about as I have progressed. The reason I started kickboxing was as an alternative to running, and I found something that I have come to love. Physically fit helps mentally fit I have been told, and as a teacher I know I need to be both! This is also time to blow out the cobwebs, de-stress and get a great all round workout - give it a go!

4. Kiss my wife and kids

As I said before, I am a bad communicator, and sometimes I can't carry a conversation to save myself...much to Jo's annoyance! Again with the head stuffed full of things, I need to slow down, kiss my family and tell them that I love them, because they put up with me!

5. Read a book

I need to read before I can manage to sleep at night, again something to wind things down. I like to read things that stimulate my imagination, and spark my sense of humour, laughing and smiling are important to me. I have been known to wake up Jo in the middle of the night because I was laughing in my sleep...

6. iCal & a Google account!

Because I am naturally unorganised, I need a good system to keep the information flowing for my teachers and to help organise my life. I use iCal and then upload my calendars to my google account and my teachers can then check for items there or can subscribe to my google calendar...and I've found this works really well! So well, that I'm on the brink of ditching iCal and just using google calendar.

There you go, a few things from the top of the head...

Oh, and tag

Allanah King
Rachel Boyd
Rachel Jeffares
Rochelle Jensen
Lynn Ross
Fiona Grant
Andrew Churches

The Essential Classroom

2007-04-01T15:14:00.000-07:00

I had to take my daughter Lily to the doctors this morning (earache...ouch), and while I was waiting I thumbed through an old issue of Time magazine...as you do.
I was reading an article called 'First thinking, then building', and a passage caught my eye, here it is.

Diller and Scofidio are getting work. For decades the husband-and-wife designer team of Elizabeth Diller and Ricardo Scofidio was known mostly--make that entirely--as architectural theorists, deadpan funny conceptual artists and intellectual bomb throwers. In all those roles, they made a name for themselves by questioning the most basic premises of architecture. It would be hard to imagine, for instance, a more thorough rethinking of what makes a building than a project they completed for the Swiss Expo 02. The Blur Building, as it was called, was a "structure" made entirely of water vapor, produced by a framework of 31,000 computer-controlled spray nozzles configured on a multilevel platform in the middle of Lake Neuchâtel, near the town of Yverdon-les-Bains, and linked to the shore by a walkway. Visitors could approach and enter this hovering fog bank while asking themselves high-minded questions like, What really is an enclosure? Where is the line between inside and outside? And, while we're at it, where am I?
Although the Blur Building was both a crowd pleaser and an ingenious intellectual conundrum--just how many elements can you subtract from a building and still have it feel like a place?

I thought, this is a question that many teachers are now asking, looking at the idea of School2.0, what elements are essential to a classroom? How do you know when you are in one? I don't have a clear answer myself for this yet, and would be fascinated by your opinions. Leave a comment and let me know your thoughts!

If I could change the world...

2007-03-29T14:05:00.000-07:00

After reading about Kathy Sierra and the stopcyberbullying campaign, I was lost deep in thought about the world that our children will inherit. It occurred to me that it would could be a powerful thing if children from around the world could voice their concerns, and brainstorm possible solutions to some of the issues that face our blue and green marble in space...before it turns into a brown marble in space!

The tools to do this are certainly available...Web 2.0 is an awesome thing!

So, I set up a social network at ning.com, 'If I could change the world', with the idea that this could be a place where children could raise their voices. At the moment I have three main issues that can be tackled. But if this takes off, who knows what might happen?
1)Poverty
2)Pollution
2)Violence

I have started the project with three ways you can contribute.
1) Artwork: Get kids creating artwork that offer solutions or ideas about global or local issues
2) Blogging: Write posts about these issues
3) Video: Create a 1 minute video

So this is my little attempt at starting something to help change the world for better, but it will be YOU who help make it come true, so please, come join the site and contribute, and spread the word!

Time for something serious

2007-03-28T01:41:00.000-07:00

This Friday has been deemed "Stop Cyberbullying day", and it highlights an issue that is becoming more and more common in our digital world. You may have heard of text bullying, and that is part of the problem but cyerbullying includes things like making violent, slanderous or demeaning posts and comments on blogs, using web tools such as bebo and myspace to harass or defame others, and much more.

And these are things that our kids are explosed to, they are using these digital tools and shouldn't have to be subjected to any kind of bullying, cyber or not.

The blogging world has become painfully aware of this issue over the last few weeks as famous technology blogger, Kathy Sierra, has been the subject of death threats in her blog and on others, and as a consequence is afraid to leave her own home, and has cancelled keynote appointments.

So...CRY FOUL! Talk about this issue with your kids this Friday, visit the netsafe.org.nz website and do a little reading. Help make a stand and say that this will NOT be tolerated in our digital world.

And now for something funny...

2007-03-28T01:25:00.000-07:00

Go on, I know that you'll smile!

How to be a good blogger

2007-03-14T23:23:00.000-07:00

I found this slideshare show on Rachel Boyd's blog today (http://rachelboyd.blogspot.com), thanks Rachel! I thought it was great, so I will put it in here for you guys. I have set blogging as my own little goal for the year, when I was a kid I used to HATE diary writing, so this is a bit of a challenge for me, but as the slideshow says, you need to have passion and authority, and now I have a lot of the first and maybe a little of the second!

Check out slideshare too, it's another great web 2.0 tool!

TUANZ 2007

2007-03-11T14:22:00.000-07:00

Well, here I am sitting in the Ascot Hotel in Invercargill, listening to Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach talk about 21st Century Learners. She is delivering a message that is often heard these days. The future is NOW and things are changing FAST!

Kids today are DIFFERENT, they are socially motivated, like to learn WITH technology, not ABOUT it, like to learn with others, in their own time, and in their own place.

Does your classroom cater for this kind of learner? Our kids today are more techonolgicaly capable than us, and can adapt to new and emerging technologies naturally while we struggle with the instruction manual.

But this is something that should be keeping us all on the edge of our seats. While there may be 1.5 exabytes of new information being produced this year....how much of that information is useful to us? How do we filter, locate and evaluate the knowledge that we need?

Now it would seem, we need to be Multi-Literate teachers, that is someone who understands the many ways that technology interacts and intertwines with academic and interpersonal life. A teacher now has to figure out how to gain control over those aspects that impact teaching, social, and professional development. Easy huh?

And I'm not necessarily advocating that you have to change your mind about technology, as Sheryl said, you had a choice, you grew up in world world where the pace of change allowed you to make a choice. But, your kids don't...things are changing to fast, they are living it, breathing it and using it everyday...until maybe they get into a classroom.

Things to keep you thinking, on the edge of your seat.

Consultation fees...

2007-03-05T23:46:00.000-08:00

I was working with a group of year 5/6 students yesterday on a piece of animation. We got to play with cars, blue tack, a toy garage and cameras and stuff, what more could you ask for? There was a lot of learning involved, group work, collaboration, storyboarding (mentally!) and discussion. After an hour and a half I left them to their own devices with the skills I had taught them.

Abut an hour later, working in another classroom on the other side of the school, I had a discreet "excuse me" by my shoulder. It was a delegation from the team I had been working with before. They had not only conned their relieving teacher into letting them carry on for the day, but had tracked me down to ask MORE QUESTIONS! Imagine...the absurdity of it all, surely they had had enough? No, they wanted to know how to do this, and then how to do that...I looked at them and gave a quick grin, "You do realise that there will be ongoing consultation fees for this?" I asked. "No," they replied, "how much will it cost us?"

Hmm, not only wanting to ask more questions, but willing to pay for it! They tracked me down a further four times during the day, all in different places, so they must have really wanted to learn more. For me, this is a great example of the power of ICT to engage and motivate students.

The stuff that keeps me on the edge of my seat waiting to see what wonders these kids will produce in the future!

A new plane of existence?

2007-03-04T22:53:00.000-08:00

I have been reading a lot of articles about the educational potential of virtual worlds such as 'Second Life'. From virtual campus' such as Ohio and Harvard's where you can enrol in their courses with hundreds of other virtual versions of people from all over the world, to the adventures of teens in the world of Habbo.

Nickeloden has already released NickWorld, where kids can rub shoulders with SpongeBob Squarepants, play games and view video episodes all from within it's online world.

Is this the next big thing?

Will, in ten years time, we all have virual sides to ourselves, and use these selves to attempt things that would not be possible in the 'real' world? Or...will the virtual world become integrated into what we now percieve as the real world? In ten years time rather than going online to visit spongebob's place, maybe we'll just bump into him walking down the street one day...

Me and my blog...

2007-02-25T12:21:00.000-08:00

Well, after last week I have migrated to blogger.com, since I have a google account.

I spent last week in Rotorua, at the Learning@school conference, and my brain is fit to burst with all the ideas that have been crammed in there from the many excellent speakers over the week.

The Keynote speaker at this year's conference was David Warlick, and I was lucky enough to attend a couple of workshops with him as well. On Friday morning...yes right at the end of the week, you know when your brain is supposed to be shutting down from information overload, I attended his workshop on RSS. The tag line he put at the end of his workshop blurb was 'prepare to be on the edge of your seats', and I guess I was.

But after the workshop, I spent some time thinking, and my thoughts went something like this...

As an educator I would like to spend as much time as I can ON THE EDGE OF MY SEAT. I want to be constantly amazed by the capacities and invention of learners, whether they are kids or adults. The day that I say that my job is boring, or that the same thing happened today as yesterday, will be the day to throw in the towel, not because my learners have failed me...but because I have failed them.

The edge of the seat is also not a particularly comfortable place to be, and as a teacher/facilitator I would like to be always trying new things, stepping out of my comfort zone just a bit in order to further my own growth.

So...the purpose of my blog is to share those experiences which kept me on the edge of my seat, and also to get you the readers to share your experiences as well...what kept YOU on the edge of YOUR seat?