A fine day of learning.
I really rather enjoyed my first experience of giving a presentation to colleagues from other schools from all over Scotland. For some reason I wasn't anywhere near as nervous as I thought I was going to be. Maybe that there were only 12 delegates in my session helped...you don't know what you missed! Unfortunately due to my over exuberance to get started I forgot to press record on the marantz and so didn't record the session as intended.
I picked up quite a lot of information during the course of my presentation. Namely that the willingness of teachers to get to grips with this sort of stuff knows no bounds but unfortunately their enthusiasm is quite often bridled by others who may have control over the IT situation either in school or within the authority. There are some quite worrying stories such IT people who when asked about uploading videos from You Tube said "What's that?" There seems to be a desire on the part of authorities to block some/all of web 2.0 technology rather than allow it to be used in schools to help educate students on its safe usage. (I know Ewan's being going on about this for ages now.) Youngsters are going to use it at home so why ban it in school? As a profession we need to be aware of all these applications and how to use them.
During the morning I attended the plenary session with Stuart Hay et al from the Anderson High in Lerwick. (Their story of travel adversity brought back fond memories of my time in Shetland.) I came away brimming with thoughts about how we can use/adapt similar ideas if our application to the british Council is accepted. mainly ideas on how to share what we can do with African partners:
• film science experiments
• film/record debates in mod studs
• use different age/stage groups in MFL (ie older native speakers challenge younger TL speakers)
• see/hear ourselves as others see/hear us
• presenting our locality to others
• student research - students have been asked to assess effectiveness of school
• shared images course - open to all ages/stages - enables youngsters to have access to higher MFL learners/NS
• I am looking forward to investigating their website.
• Although school is doing heaps one thing stuart said struck home: YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE AN INVENTOR
To close the plenary Robert McKinstry identified some interesting quotes by Stuart:
• "Almost every department has a virtual and an active timetable"
• "Bringing the world to the classroom"
Surely if we can get a project like this off the ground we will improve
unquestionalbly the level of interdepartmental communication within school.
Later that morning I attended a seminar on the use of mobiles in the classroom.
It was interesting in that i think I now know how to go about blogging via my phone
and I also got some great ideas about how to put them to good use in class for
things like directions around school.
So overall I found it very interesting. I have also come back with a vague idea about producing more "commercially" viable podcasts. Not in the profit making sense but can I set up a programme in school where kids produce podcasts in whatever subjects as ordered by departments. Eg if history want a resource on Civil Rights can we produce one for them???
I think I would like to speak to Mark Pentleton about this one.
But as my blog title says..."So much to learm...so little time"
PS I also learned that it's Communicate DOT 07 and not Communicate 07.
You can download my presentation here if you want. (It's a big file so be patient)
Download communicate.07 - Try It and You Will Learn.mov
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