Student centred learning is an theory that seems to have gained popularity in education communities over the years. Wikipedia defines this type of learning as “putting students first … focused on the student’s needs, abilities, interests, and learning styles with the teacher as a facilitator of learning. Teacher-centred learning has the teacher at its centre […]
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A Life Our Students Will Never Know
Over the holidays, while attempting to be less “connected”, I’ve been thinking about how much technology seems to be increasingly infused into our day-to-day lives. With laptops, smart phones, iPads, iPods and other portable devices becoming so common place, gadgets are no longer something we go to, they come with us. This clearly brings about […]
Students Learning From Their Blogging Buddies
I seem to be continually uncovering more and more benefits to educational blogging. Aside from the advantages that I’ve shared here and here, having your class involved in the educational blogging community allows students to learn from and with their peers from all around the world. In my class we often use our blogging buddies’ posts as inspiration for classroom activities, […]
Quality over Quantity
I’ve been thinking about how important quality over quantity often is when it comes to effective teaching and learning with blogging, global collaboration and technology. Here are some thoughts… It’s not about how many blogging buddies your class has but about having deep and ongoing connections with classes that you can learn with and from. It’s […]
School is out for 2011
2011 has been a fabulous year! In true “Kathleen Morris style”, I have taken on a lot and juggled many different pursuits, but it is all worthwhile to reflect on what has been achieved. Some of my 2011 highlights include: Global Collaborative Projects – I LOVE working on global projects with my students. Some of […]
Benefits of Educational Blogging Video
The benefits of educational blogging is something I have discussed many times on this blog. Kelly Jordan and I regularly speak to teachers at our school and around the world about blogging. Rather than us always selling the benefits we decided to make this video with our students to highlight some of the advantages of […]
Doing Things the Long Way
In many ways, technology can be time saving. Especially if you know the best way to use it! Yesterday I attended and presented at the 2011 VITTA (Victorian Information Technology Teachers Association) Conference. One of the sessions I attended was run by Andrew and Beverly from Mitcham Primary School. They gave a terrific presentation about […]
Looking Back 2004-2011
I finished university at the end of 2003 and started teaching in January 2004. Like all graduate teachers, the beginning of my teaching career was a steep learning curve. Fortunately, I felt like I had a lot of role models around me on staff. As I embarked on my career, I remember thinking a lot […]
Troubleshooting Computer Problems: Using Posters In The Classroom
I am a big advocate of training my students to become as independent as possible with technology. Many technology users can get bogged down with “technical issues” which can take away from the benefits of using the tools. As I have written about before, I try to make my use of ICT explicit to my […]
Blogging with Very Young Students
As most readers will know, blogging is a big part of my Grade Two classroom. Over the past few years I have worked out strategies and processes to make blogging work for my seven and eight year old students. While my students are young, I have found with explicit instructions, high expectations, clear routines, parent […]
Guest Post about Twitter on PLN Challenge
As I have blogged about before, Edublogs supports a Student Blogging Challenge and Teacher Blogging Challenge which are two excellent forms of free professional development. The current Teacher Blogging Challenge is called “30 Days to a Whole New PLN”. There will be two or three posts each week about setting up, enhancing, and participating in […]
Student Blogs in 2011
Last year, I wrote a detailed post about the process I follow for setting up student blogs. Click here to find it. It is getting to the time of year where Kelly Jordan and I are thinking about which students will be the first to earn their own blog. We are thinking of starting with […]
The Power of ClustrMaps
This post marks another milestone on this blog A huge thank you for all your support! More than two years later, I am still enjoying writing this blog more than ever due to the wonderful community of readers and supporters I am a part of. I use ClustrMaps to keep track of visitors both on […]
Are you on LinkedIN?
Recently I read on the oz-teachers mailing list a warning for teachers about using social networking sites unprofessionally. This UK article, suggests that teachers should be cautious of what they post online and check what information is available about them. Teachers are warned that schools are scouring social networking sites and googling potential candidates for […]
Keeping up with Blogs
I became a proud iPad 2 owner this week and it’s been a steep learning curve to learn as much as I can about my shiny new tool! After getting my iPad I was inspired to work on updating the blogs in my Google Reader. I know I’m not alone in being a little neglectful […]