It’s Elementary!

Tamra Lanning has created a very useful blog, specifically for primary (elementary) school teachers. It’s Elementary is developing a nice collection of literacy, numeracy and other tools suitable for primary aged students.

It's Elementary

Although It’s Elementary is a new blog, readers can immediately tell that Tamra is a committed teacher who loves her job. You can find Tamra on Twitter: http://twitter.com/tamralanning

Term 1 Events in the Victorian Virtual Conference Centre

Krystie Alleaume, the Senior Project Officer at the Innovation and Next Practice Division of the Victorian Department of Education and Early Childhood Development has sent the following information for all Victorian teachers. (Please note that your school does NOT have to have a subscription to Elluminate to access these sessions. Just ensure that you have Java enabled on the computer you wish to use and that you have a headset and microphone to communicate with.)

We have some exciting free events planned for Term 1 in the Virtual Conference Centre. Most of these do not require you to sign up. To join a session, you can now:

1.      Visit our event calendar at: http://www.education.vic.gov.au/researchinnovation/virtualconferencecentre/program/default.htm

2.      Click on the date of the event you wish to attend.

3.      Click on the title of the event to see more details.

4.      Click the session link provided and join the conference up to 60 minutes before it is scheduled to begin.

5.      You can also have an automatic email reminder sent to you by selecting ‘Remind me by email’ from the ‘Other Event Actions’ drop down box.

Spread the word among your colleagues about our new monthly professional learning series called ‘Monthly ESL Matters’. And for those of you that joined our weekly Tech-Talk Tuesday sessions last year, you’ll be pleased to see that they are back on the calendar for Term 1, 2010.

TERM 1 EVENTS:

·       Monday 1 March – “Classroom Video Production – Part 2: Post-production and editing”, presented by Brendan O’Brien (Hume Region)

·       Tuesday 2 March – “Tech Talk Tuesdays: What a Bright Idea – Blogs for professional networking”, presented by Judith Way and Anne Mirtschin

·       Thursday 4 March – “Introduction to Microsoft OneNote 2007”, presented by Ben Walters (Microsoft Corporation)

·       Tuesday 9 March – “Prep Assessment Period: The English Online Interview”, presented by Victoria Hall

·       Tuesday 9 March – “Tech-Talk Tuesdays: Building a Digital Classroom”, presented by Anne Mirtschin

·       Tuesday 16 March – “Gaming and Social Networks in Education”, presented by Adrian Camm (McGuire College)

·       Tuesday 16 March – “Tech-Talk Tuesdays: The Power of Mobile Technology in Learning”, presented by Louise Duncan (Shepparton High School) and Anne Mirtschin

·       Thursday 18 March – “Introduction to Microsoft Communicator and LiveMeeting”, presented by Jonathan Spellman (Microsoft Corporation)

·       Tuesday 23 March – “Essential Web 2.0 Tools for Educators”, presented by Narissa Leung (Loddon Mallee Region)

·       Wednesday 24 March – “Monthly ESL Matters: Reporting and Assessment for ESL students”, presented by Janet Saker and Daina Coles (ESL Unit)

·       Thursday 25 March – “Global Projects with iEARN”, presented by Rob King (Gippsland Region)

·       (Term 1 Holidays) Tuesday 30 March – “Tech-Talk Tuesdays: What is needed to bring education into the 21st Century?”, Discussion group facilitated by Anne Mirtschin

Looking forward to seeing you again soon in the Virtual Conference Centre!

Weblist

Joyce Valenza recently tweeted about this useful tool. Weblist is:

  • a social listing site that allows users to create smart lists from URLs, photos, music, videos, documents and files.
  • The smart list will then be displayed in thumbnail view for easy browsing, sharing, and organization.
  • Useful or organizing research.

Weblist

You can also share your weblists and access weblists made by others.

With a very handy tutorial, Weblist is very easy and intuitive to use. The results are attractive and well organised. Some of the weblists already on the site that are suitable for schools include:

An excellent resource with lots of educational applications.

SLAV turns 50!

The School Library Association of Victoria is 50 years old! Happy birthday SLAV. To celebrate, there will be a multitude of events occurring during the year. To keep in touch with these, SLAV have set up a Ning:

SLAV50 ning

and a Facebook account:

SLAV50 Facebook

as well as information on Twitter via @SLAV50.

New, current and former members are encouraged to make contact via one of these three avenues to help us all share and celebrate.

Science Museum

The UK’s Science Museum has some excellent online resources for teaching and learning.

Science museum

Covering ages from 3-16 (via Foundation and Key Stages 1-4) there is a variety of resources such as:

  • Foundation and Key Stage 1 (ages 3-7): sounds, bubbles and force
  • Key Stage 2 (7-11): electricity, forces and motion, light, materials and sound
  • Key Stage 3 (11-14): electricity and magnetism, energy transfer, light and materials
  • Key Stage 4 (14-16): how science works, electricity and magnetism and materials.

Each area of study includes:

  • Educational objectives
  • Key student learning
  • Materials needed
  • Practicalities
  • Open ended investigations
  • Extension work
  • Links to everyday life

Educators can also subscribe to the ‘Educators’ e-news‘ for updates. This site is highly recommended.

Feature blog – Rhondda’s reflections – Wandering around the web

Whitefriars College Head of Library and Information Services (and School Library Association of Victoria President) Rhondda Powling began her extensive blog in June 2008. Rhondda posts several times a week and always includes a list of useful tools.

Rhonddas blog

Rhondda explains about the development of the blog:

As a teacher librarian in a Melbourne boy’s secondary school I have a unique role,  with a cross-curriculum view as well as working with teachers in specific subject areas.   I need to keep abreast of what is happening in the wider world, and I don’t just mean the sometimes narrow, educational world of secondary schools. The Web world allows me to access so much information that can be useful for my own professional development as well as giving me tools and ideas to for student learning and teacher education.

I want our students to leave our school with, if not a love, than a healthy interest in learning.  I would like to have a part in inspiring young people in their learning during their school years and, when they leave our school, they do so as well-rounded learners, confident that they have the tools to cope with, or problem-solve, anything that may come their way.

I try to support the teachers I work with, both in the classroom and as part of the curriculum team by sharing new ideas, tools, educational theories, etc. or creating tools they can use.

This site was set up for me to take the time to reflect on what I have learnt about the web and what I have learnt about what is working with students. I also see the blogging world as one that everyone can share create a collective knowledge far greater than if we were on our own.

Reflecting on teaching and learning is an important aspect of being a teacher. Rhondda’s blog provides not only an outlet for her reflections, but a forum for other people to join in her thoughts and discussions. As an RSS subscriber to Rhondda’s blog, it is always amazing to see her vast lists of useful tools that appear on a weekly basis. A blog definitely worth checking out!

Gliffy

Gliffy is a very cool drawing and drafting tool.  Free access and ease of use will appeal to many users including teachers and students.

Gliffy

With the ability to create:

  • floor plans
  • diagrams
  • flowcharts and
  • technical drawings

there are many possibilities for educational use as well as personal use. Visual Communication students may find it useful to create floor plans and technical drawings while Humanities, Science, Maths and English could take advantage of the flowcharts and diagrams for planning and mindmapping.

Gliffy offers a library with a large range of shapes and items. Once completed, drawings can be exported jpeg and png and files can be shared or published to the internet.

Library staff planning a new or updated library could use the floor plans and anyone designing or building a new home may find the floor plans worth while.

Gliffy has free and premium accounts. The academic account is free.

Taking Diigo beyond the bookmark

For anyone who hasn’t yet used Diigo, or anyone who uses it purely as bookmarking links for students may find the information on ‘Taking Diigo beyond the bookmark”  from Keith Crawford useful. Keith is a blogger who says

My site is part of my mission to help people and organizations understand how to use technology to accomplish their mission. I’ve been helping organizations implement technology for 10 years as a Network Engineer and I’ve been blogging for the past 5.  My desire is to help individuals and organizations realize the transformative power of technology.

His post on Taking Diigo beyond the boomark is an excellent one. With examples of both educational (such as creating reading lists for teachers and or students) and personal uses (DIY recipe collection), this post really makes you think about how the power of Diigo can be applied to many situations.

diigocheck

Worth a look, a think and a discussion with colleagues to see how you can take Diigo beyond the bookmark. You can access the Bright Ideas Diigo bookmarks here.

ALA great websites for kids

Thanks to Helen Boelens for passing on another great site. The American Library Association and the Association for Library Service to Children have developed a page entitled ‘Great websites for kids‘.

ALA great websites

Each site listed has a brief summary, a link and an age guide. Although some sites are not particularly relevant to Australia or other countries, there are many that are. Worth a perusal.

Guitar Hero World Tour at Preston Girls’ Secondary College

To help engage and enhance student interaction at the VCAL level (alternative year 11 and 12), Preston Girls’ Secondary College teachers Les Kyle and Judith Way have developed wiki that houses a unit of work based on the wildly popular Guitar Hero video game.

PGSC GH

While the main foci of the unit are literacy and numeracy, Les and Judith hope other skills will come out of the program. The program will begin in term 1, 2010. Les and Judith explain:

Introducing literacy and numeracy at senior years is always difficult. It always needs to be embedded into types of work the students find interesting and what better way to get the students’ attention by using Guitar Hero as a starting point.

Upon forming their ‘bands’, students will be blogging about imagined tours, CD releases, booking and travelling to venues around the world and so on. Numeracy skills come into play when deciding who much to pay roadies, how much tickets will cost and how the money will be split between the band. Students will need to be aware of their audience when blogging and develop a convincing history of their band.

Other skills such as cooperation and collaboration, problem solving, researching and investigating, mapping and creativity. Students will also be learning how to use web 2.0 tools such as Big Huge Labs to create posters, tickets and CD covers. Voki or other sites will be used to develop avatars and students may film their ‘concerts’ to upload to teachertube.

We hope that this unit of work will grab the students’ imagination and keep them actively involved for the entire time.

(With thanks to staff at Perth and Kinross Schools in Scotland for the seed that developed into this wiki.)

Hopefully the students enjoy their numeracy and literacy lessons! It will be interesting to hear how it all goes.