Eportfolios

Having spent a day training to use our ePortfolios in the new Learning Environment we are getting has given me time to look at and play with the features within it and to realise the potential of the what this tool can offer to students from all ages.

It is exciting! Long term I see that students will leave college with 11 or more years of records of their progress. There is also potential along the way for the students to interweave some of their personal achievements, successes and interests. Therefore, how will we as teachers manage this? How we will role model, guide and possibly lead best practice? Will we get students to reflect, comment, manage feedback in their ePortfolios as well as collect their best, final copies of the work that they do.

Seems to me these are discussion we will need to have in order to be 'talking the same talk'

A colleague of mine got me to set myself the goal of blogging today so here I am. I have been working on creating some online activities about communications for our middle school students. I am keen to make one of those an interactive one where students set up a google account, and encourage them to create a gmail address with a user name that doesn't make them sound as if they are some criminal in the making with a weird hobby! While I was at the gym I was trying to plan how to set this activity up and how I could do it in a learning platform and make it so that it wasn't linear and that there was a fair amount of choice in it.

Hot on the heels of the uLearn conference in Christchurch where, once again, the message was that our students are not linear learners, I am trying to create resources for students where they can learn in the way that mirrors the way that they think best. If I was still working in Montessori education it would be easier, I would need only a realistic context and purpose and the student would plan (with help and support where needed) their own learning path with their purpose and relevance clearly set out before they started.

Finding a balance between giving the students structure for their learning path and letting them choose and plan their own study is a fine line particularly as the students often don't know their own learning styles enough for them to know what or how much they need.

One of the most important things as an educator is that I keep on looking for this line with each and every student, an even harder thing when students are at a distance. But then if it was easy everyone would be doing it!

Today on what I consider to be almost fully a holiday day (that is hardly any school work to be done!) I reflect that while I have been doing housework chores and preparing to go away and baking etc etc, I have

• tweeted,
• updated my FB status,
• checked google maps,
• used metlink to check out bus timetables,
• used whitepages,
• updated my iphone
• been into a virtual world to have a 'clean up' (that was the work bit)
• skyped 3 different people
• blogged

Where would we be without computers, wi-fi and the Internet? I just can't imagine my life without these tools.

Interestingly enough in a recent survey one of my students commented that time in the virtual world could easily mean she would spend too much time on the computer and that wasn't a good thing.

How much time is too much time? How do we support students and parents to achieve an appropriate balance? What/how do we role model to them?

More questions than ideas or opinions today! But as colleague of mine recently reflected, its great being a learner and thats just what I am, definitely in this area, for sure!

Virtual World

During term 1 and 2 this year I was part of a group of Australasian teachers who experimented in a virtual world. We learnt to move, build, embed and collaborate. We made some learning resources and then we reflected on the pros and cons of it all.

Over the last week I have been meeting daily with a group of 11 year 7-10 students in this same world. They have had free range to enter when they like, to communicate with each other and to build.

The skills they have learnt in only 5 days has been outstanding. They are highly engaged and while learning themselves they are also teaching each other. I haven't explained anything to them other than to set some guidelines and reminding them of their responsibilities in the world.

While they are having fun ... some questions spring to mind

Is this a good platform for students to learn in?

How could it best be used?

How do you manage students in this way?

Facebook in Education

Does FB have a place in everyday education in NZ? It seems to me that we mostly hear of the woes, the bad stories, the fears.

What about this - FB is in the face of a huge percentage of our students from late primary age onwards. If we want to send them messages, alert them to upcoming events, show them interesting news items, youtube videos etc etc isn't it a good idea to use a platform that they use, often many times a day? Why aren't we taking this opportunity and making it a place where school can go and mix it along with their friends and social life. Why do we need to consider it so out of bounds? If we do this aren't we simply then admitting that this is a 'no go' place for adults and that by this assumption we are assuming/accepting that kids are acting inappropriately?

Now don't get me wrong I am not advocating that we share our own personal accounts with our students, not at all, rather I am suggesting that we use school/community pages which students and their families can follow.

In my experience students are extremely open in the way they share their lives, their ups and downs and their friendships on this global stage. By showing that we expect that its an ok place to be mixing it up with them, then we are putting ourselves in a position where we can regularly, as teachers discuss the netiquette and safe practice that they should be using. Teaching netiquette should be part of every day classroom curriculum. Here is a great video demonstrating in a very real way how we could potentially be teaching how to look after our digital footprint.

what do you think?

Introduction

This is my first post of my learning journal. This is where I will talk about how my work is going. I will comment on what is going well and why I am pleased with that work. I will also reflect on what I am finding hard and maybe what I could do to improve this. It's also a good place to make some comments as to how I am managing to keep up to date with work and what I might need to do to help with this.