Why Blog?-Classroom Blogging

Over the last few weeks my teacher friend Rach and I have been introducing blogging to our Year 7 and Year 8 students. Rach is a first-year-out teacher who is new to our school this year and who also teaches Physical Education and Outdoor Education. She is also a bit of an IT freak and loves nothing better than mucking around on the computer at night when she probably should be preparing amazing IT lessons for her Yr 7&8's. Only joking Rach-you can do all the surfing you like 'cause you seem to have it all in hand.
Anyway, we team-teach 4 periods a week and this 2o year veteran primary teacher (oh that is scary, I've just realised that I have probably been teaching almost longer than Rach has been living) is really enjoying this opportunity to team teach, learn more and more new stuff from both Rach and the kids.

Having said all this though I think one of our key challenges is to think about why we should, could or would use this method of publishing in the classroom.
a few questions that immediately come to mind-and I don't necessarily have the answers.

• Will it improve student literacy?
• If so - How?
• If not- Why not?
• Will it engage students in the writing process?
• What do we get students to write about?
• What is our role in the process?
• How can we harness this authentic writing and journalling opportunity to also teach and develop writing and thinking skills? (It's the old Reading Recovery teacher coming out in me)
• Do we allow free reign for topics or do we maintain some direction or control?
• How do we maintain the privacy of our students?
• How do we ensure their protection?

I'm sure there are heaps more questions to ask and many more issues to explore. Another time...

How good news travels

Isn’t it amazing how news travels around the web. I clicked on this link that a good friend sent me. She is great at forwarding anything along educational lines that she thinks would be of interest.
I looked at it and was thinking it looked like an interesting website.
http://www.shambles.net/web2/comingofage/
Once I looked at it I then realised that this was something that had come to me last week via another mailing list and I had already printed it out ready to read.
I guess it makes you realise that our world is getting smaller and that belonging to online communities ensures that someone will pass it on if they think it is important enough.
To me it illustrates the value and generosity of the online educational community. But it also illustrates the importance of teachers being part of this community. Not just because you are interested in ICT but because you must be informed and up to date.

Another Blog-ICT in the Classroom

ICT in the Classroom
this is a link to a blog that has been developed by another Australian teacher which looks at the challenge of integrating ICT into the classroom.
I will be looking at this with interest especially. I think our biggest challenge is to upskill our teachers and students so that they are using ICT seamlessly and easily in their educational work. But that means at some stage we also have to think about how we also create opportunities for teachers and students to get the skills they need to use ICT seamlessly in their curriculum.

Cool things I saw shopping in USA

OK I'm back in Oz. And now I have some time to reflect on a few experiences over in that huge shopping mall on the other side of the world.
8 hours to kill in LA before flying on to Portland. What is a girl to do but go shopping? Well there is no other choice for this girl.
But even for a seasoned shopper like myself there were a few eye openers and interesting observations.
So here goes...
Things we don't do in Australia... or things that I haven't seen

• line up in one line and wait to get served (maybe in supermarkets but not in clothes shops)
• 
  sign for credit card on LCD screen (we still sign on paper) see pic
• 
  get our shoes shined in the street
  
• buy our newspapers from containers in the street( we buy them at the newsagent or get them delivered)
• have ice skating rinks in the middle of shopping centres with kids learning how to ice skate
• people drving everywhere with mobile phones to their ears. (illegal in Australia)
• people driving on the right hand side of the road
• me having to remember to walk on the right hand side of the street cause I kept on walking into other people
• having to remember to tip people (we don't do it here)

There were lots of other cool things that I saw that I'll add to in the next few days.

Flying is like being a sheep getting shorn

2 hours to Sydney-13 hours to LA-8 hours stopover-3 hours to Portland and I got here.

A few thoughts about flying.
It occurred to me while getting on a plane for the third time that flying in economy class is a bit like the way my dad used to draft sheep when I was growing up.

Picture this...
Sheep-When it was time for shearing all the sheep would be herded into the sheep yards.
Humans-When it's time to fly we humans all make our way to the giant sheep yard in Melbourne called Tullamarine Airport.

Sheep-Once the mob of sheep got to the sheep yards they were herded down a long corral and were sorted by my dad into the rams, the ewes and the wethers.
Humans-we get to the airport, we line up in great long lines and get herded through the check in counter into First Class, Business Class and Economy.

Sheep-if it looks like rain they are rushed through the yards and into the shed ready for shearing where they wait for hours
Humans-we are told that we have to be at the airport three hours early and then we sit and wait for hours for our plane.

Sheep-each sheep is dragged out by the shearer and stripped of all their wool. Their wool is then picked over by the wool classer and all the bad bits are picked out.
Humans- we go through customs, get picked over, all the bad bits (like sharp things and metal stuff) are picked over or checked

Sheep- the sheep get shoved down a shute and out a little door and squashed into a yard to wait for the other sheep to be shorn.

Humans- in ecomony class you walk down a long corridor and into a plane that has all the people squashed in as tight as possible.

And that's why I think we are sort of like sheep getting shorn when we fly:

Sitting in my Motel Room in uptown Portland, Oregon.

Well here I am in my motel room having flown across the other side of the world to see new things, meet new people and learn new stuff.
How, you say, did this happen? Luck, more than anything but also the generosity of Intel and particularly their educational program Intel Teach to the Future Essentials http://www.tmd.com.au/education/ that provides integrating ICT in the classroom training for teachers all over the world including the Australian states of Victoria, Queensland and NSW, the influence of the Victorian Ed Dept and the kindness of Wedderburn College for letting me come.
So here I am and what I plan to do is to document this experience via my blog so that you, dear reader, can get an idea of the experience of one teacher flying across the other side of the world to meet other teachers from all over the world.
The image that I have added is at the beginning of my journey taken from Melbourne airport as I was waiting to board the United Airlines flight. 27 hours (included an 8 hour stopover at Los Angeles) here I am. More to come...

VITTA Conference

my mind is swimming after spending three days at a conference in Melbourne talking and listening with teachers of ICT. The thing that struck me most was hearing about how rapidly the world that our students live in is changing and therefore what that means for us as educators.
what do the kids that we teach know about technology? more so what don't they know...
I stopped in Bendigo on the way home to catch up with my sister and her four year old son Ned. He was playing with a leap frog The Wiggles game thingy and the way he interacted with it made me think all the more about what his world is going to look like.
It's mind blowing.....to him it is so natural and clearly part of his world. He loves nothing more than when his Aunty Anne gets out her laptop so that he can visit The Wiggles website.
can't wait to talk with my kids tomorrow at school about what I learnt.