Israel reflections

I have now been in Israel for 3 days and have learnt so much about this fascinating country! It has been amazing to visit Nazareth and see the remains of the cave where it is thought Mary lived! Today we sailed on the Sea of Galilee and walked in the ruins of Capernaum where Jesus did most of his ministry. It has been a time of lots of thinking for me – what it was like for Jesus growing up in a poor, barren place like Nazareth; how he might have worked in the building trade with Joseph in the nearby town of Sepporah; why he chose to take the journey of several days walking to reach the Sea of Galilee where he chose to focus his ministry. Did he like being near the water of this beautiful place? I feel very grateful for this experience so far!

Three days to go

I am in the process of packing for a holiday of a lifetime in Israel. I will be one of 26 pilgrims from St Ambrose, Brunswick, following in the footsteps of Jesus. Who knows what surprises and awe inspiring experiences lie ahead of me!

Coming conferences

I have 3 conferences coming up in the next two months – Slide2Learn in early July, REC conference in August and VITTA conference in August where I will be running a workshop  ‘Personal Learning Networks and Curating’. What I have been thinking is that what I am looking forward most is to see my PLN  Twitter friends in person rather than the presentations so much . Most of professional learning now comes to me from Twitter, Facebook groups and Scoopit everyday and Tweetmeet once or two in term.  What is most exciting is to put a face to a twitter handle and to share ideas with others! Oh how times have changed!

Edmodo

1. I”ve been using Edmodo over the past term with my Year 10 RE classes and think its great!  I can post assignments  for my students, easily create quizzes and post discussion questions. They ,in turn, can load in their completed assignments, even if their  files are fairly big, complete quizzes and have them automatically graded and respond to each other in discussion questions. They see it as a type of Facebook , but it’s closed to just our class and I can monitor their comments. Inerested to hear about other people’s experiences with Edmodo.

New Ed-Ted site

This is a great new site for teachers!

Use engaging videos to create customized lessons.

You can use, tweak, or completely redo any lesson featured on TED-Ed, or create lessons from scratch based on any video from YouTube.

http://ed.ted.com/

Why most teachers don’t know what they don’t know.

My Island View

Most professions have professional journals. Professional journals have long been the method by which innovations to professions have been introduced. Lengthy articles explaining the: who, what, where, when, why and how of an innovation in the profession was spelled out for all to read. Follow-up journal articles weighed the pros and cons. Journals historically have been a form of print media, but with the advent of the internet many are transitioning to a digital form in addition to the printed version.

The process for innovators to get things published in these professional journals can be long and arduous, but the pay-off is usually worth the wait. These journals have readerships of great numbers of people in the very profession that specific innovators want to reach. There are: journals for Medicine, journals for Law, and journals for Education just to name a few.

At one time, to keep up with the…

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A year on my Twitter PLN

Someone asked me the other day how having a PLN on Twitter has affected my teaching. It made me stop and think.  My first thought was that it has encouraged me to use new technologies in the classroom such as Google docs with my Year 9’s and blogs with my Year 10’s. But thinking further, I believe the best benefit has been on my whole outlook on education:

– I have grown in my conviction about the importance of an inquiry approach to leaning

– I no longer believe summative assessment is the best way to go, that in fact it can be a hindrance to learning. I am still stuck with predominately summative assessment at my school but I have started to experiment with peer assessment and other forms of formative assessment

– I have got to meet so many enthusiastic teachers at TeachMeet Melbourne and through the State Library PLN course and twitter #vicpln. This has bouyed on my own enthusiasm for learning

There are probably other benefits that I could identify,  but I know, overall, that this PLN has been the best thing I have every been part over my many years of teaching! I am trying to share the idea of PLN with other teachers but it is a slow process. How many teachers are out there who don’t know what they are missing out on? So onward to 2012!

 

TeachMeet Melbourne

Experienced a wonderful example of teacher enthusiasm and passion for engaging students at a new venture on Friday – a TeachMeet which was held at Pascoe Vale Primary School from 1-2.30 pm. It was organised purely through Twitter and resulted in about 40 teachers from primary, secondary, state and private/catholic schools gathering together to share ideas. About 6 different teachers shared a Web 2.0 tool they have used with their students. One teacher, Jess McCullock, shared a poem she had written about Magical Moments with students:  Check out    #tmmelb t.co/bedEoL6K

To follow tweets about the gathering, search for #TMMelb on Twitter.

The next TeachMeet will be either this term or early next term at Holy Family, Mt Waverly

World Religions on a budget

Just experienced a great World Religions excursion with Building Bridges in the CBD the other day for the cost of a train ticket and $5 entry fee!

1. Train to Flagstaff gardens and time reflecting on the historical significance of this former burial site

2. Short walk to Koorie Heritage Centre in King St. (small but interesting and they run sessions there for students)

3. Short walk to Melbourne City Mosque, Jefcott St. West Melbourne- talk by Saraa – fabulous speaker!

4. Train/tram to Flinders St station for lunch in Federation Square or nearby cafes

5. Tram down Swanston St to St Kilda Rd. – Melbourne Hebrew Congregation – beautiful synagogue and 2 entertaining rabbis to talk to us

6. Tram back to Flinders St and short visit to St. Paul’s.

Great walking around the city- so much to offer

FUSE

FUSE (Find/Use/Share/Education) is an online resource directory hosted by DEECD. It is a searchable database of links to websites, resources and tools, as well as other resources specifically produced for the site. The links have been selected by DEECD staff, or submitted by teachers. All of the resources have been checked and approved by staff at the Department. 

Some very helpful resources here!

https://fuse.education.vic.gov.au/pages/Teacher.aspx