Recently I signed my grade 8 technology class to be a Sounding Board for the Flat Classroom Project Wikis on Uploading, Workflow Software and Wireless Connectivity. We were assigned the task of reading through these three wikis and providing feedback on: Content (clarity, quantity); Communication (between the students as collaborators) and Wiki Presentation (design, use … [Read more…]
Digiteen experiences in the “Nearly Now”
My recent experiences in the Digiteen Ning and a new incident involving my students starting a Digiteen Group that made fun of Canadian Stereotypes has gotten me thinking about Stephen Heppell’s idea that the ‘nearly now‘ of online spaces has interesting educational implications. In this post I’m hoping to refine some ideas about what are … [Read more…]
Reflections on Blogging in the Classroom
This week I am participating in a Knowschools course on Blogging in the Classroom. It has been a stretch for me to try and actively participate in this course as well a keep on top of the mountain of other things that usually take up my day, but it has been worth it. Our latest … [Read more…]
Obama, Social Networking, and Digiteen
There have been a bunch of thoughts swirling around in my head over the past week that I really have to write down so that I can move on to other things. My experiences as a teacher involved in the Digiteen Project this year have gotten me thinking alot about how to engage teenagers in … [Read more…]
Digi Teen Stories
This year I decided my grade 9 class would join the Digi Teen project, an amazing global collaborative project dreamed up by Vicki Davis and Julie Lindsay. As participants in this project my grade 9 technology class is engaged in researching different aspects of digital citizenship and collaborating with peers from other countries to edit … [Read more…]
I have a teacher blog, now what do I do?
The post below is copied from the one I posted to our school intranet to try and give our teachers some ideas for their new blogs. ___ I wanted my first post on this particular Blog to be as helpful as possible to all the teachers who have suddenly found themselves with an online workspace, … [Read more…]
Playing with Google Forms
I’ve just created a form I want to get my students to fill in at the beginning of this year. I will have every class for a half hour to discuss the AUP and the links between technology and Approaches to Learning. I want to also use this time to collect some data about how … [Read more…]
Jennifer James
I just came across my notes from a Jennifer James presentation I went to a few years back. It really resonated with some of the other books I have been reading recently like The World Is Flat and A Whole New Mind. I thought it was worth re-posting. The morning’s keynote speaker was Jennifer James,a … [Read more…]
Blogs, RSS and Technorati
OK, blogs I get. It’s taken me a while but I understand. I started out just visiting a few blogs and gleaning some interesting insights. Then I discovered RSS and the incredible way that it allows me feed the information that I want directly to my computer. I’m even beginning to understand the value of … [Read more…]
Phoenix Mars Mission
I’m really enjoying keeping up to date with the events happening on Mars through the Twitter feed NASA is publishing. At the same time I find myself in awe of the technology that allows us to be in communication with a robot on a planet so far away. It took 9 months for the Phoenix … [Read more…]