A big “hat tip” and heart felt thanks to Teaching Australia for the wonderful celebration they put together last Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in Canberra. The organization of the event, the variety of sessions and the venues were top class and really enjoyable.

There were many highlights:

The ceremony at Parliament House, and meeting the Deputy Prime Minister, Julia Gillard made the honour “real” and won’t be forgotten any time soon.

Meeting the terrific Anne Mirtschin f-2-f. Anne’s friendliness and sense of humour kept me laughing (and talking!) the whole time.

Sharing the amazing things that are happening in schools around the country, and being inspired by the teachers and leaders who are instigating the innovation and successes. Truly exciting!

Learning new sharing and thinking techniques and strategies courtesy of Eric Frangenheim.

Talking to teachers and leaders from across the country, across sectors and across stages – thinking, exploring and wondering together – trying to solve problems and make a difference.

Laughing during Peter FitzSimons’ after dinner speech at the National Portrait Gallery. I wish I could tell jokes like that – they just don’t come out funny when I try to re-tell them. Guess you had to be there – ;-0

The friendliness and support of the Teaching Australia crew – Peter, Anita and Helen. Thanks for your care.

Listening to Andrew Douch reflect on the wonderful opportunities he has taken advantage of whilst remaining true to himself and his beliefs. I like what he said about the need to share what you are passionate about with others – stand up and let people hear what you have to say – its not about you but about the students and what’s best for them.

It was an honour to be part of this celebration / event, it’s not often that teachers are recognised in this way. Thank you to all.

Future Directions in Literacy Conference – Sydney University

This term I have been using the wiiMusic Game with my class to develop knowledge and understandings about music. Here are a couple of posts from my class blog – 09AllStars – all about what we’ve been doing.

wii’ve Got the Music

We are studying music for the next few weeks, and we will be using the wii to help us explore and experience a huge range of instruments.

We used our Golden Time today for the intial taste of what the wii can do – everyone had a quick turn at playing an instrument and we all had a bit of a laugh as well.

Stay tuned for more posts on what else we are doing with the wii Music.

Exploring the wiiMusic

Over the past week we have been playing the wiiMusic in small groups so that we can practise the activities and get better at the games.

We have been playing lots of different instruments and hearing and accompanying many different tunes. Its quite hard at times to play tunes that you haven’t heard before. We have found that you get better – and it becomes easier – the more you practice and the more familiar you are with both the instrument and the tune.

We have found out about “pitch” by playing the “Pitch Perfect” game – you have to listen carefully to match the notes that are the same, or put the notes in ascending order by listening to them. Sometimes this is hard, and the timer is counting down so you have to hurry!

wiiMusic – Perfect Pitch from KimPericles on Vimeo.

Future Directions in Literacy Conference – Sydney University

I have used the wii in my classroom quite a lot over the past two years, here are notes on a number of games I have used  with my Stage 3 (Years 5 & 6 ) class.

Pwii – Tennis

Here’s a blog post my class wrote when we used the wii for our PE lessons.

Mario and Sonic at the Olympics

It was a bit of a surprise to find ourselves using this game for poetry! However, a stand out of the game were the different characters and their individual responses to winning or losing the athletic events. Each of the characters were different colours and we discussed how the colours reflected each character’s personality.

Then students thought about the colours themselves, and how each colour looked, felt, smelled, the emotions it evoked, and even the tastes it reminded us of.

Lastly we put both aspects together and wrote poems that showed how the colour and the character  linked together to really show what the characters were like.

My colour jumps with joy and relief!

My colour sounds like a creaky hall way.

My colour feels optimistic.

My colour feels like the mysterious night sky

Literacy is my home, my comfort zone: I know what to do and what to expect.

So I’ve been a bit uncomfortable for the past few weeks, as our wiiMusic unit develops and grows.

Enabling the students to discover, explore and make connections with what they know and are familiar with about music and what they are learning about music through playing with the wiiMusic game, is a vital part of the learning cycle.

We have been talking our way through the game, the concepts and the terminology, investigating ideas and thoughts more fully through art as well.

We’ve written some informational texts, but I have been uneasy and at a bit of a loose end and I think it’s because I haven’t been able to harness the fun and excitement of the wiiMusic game into the literacy learning of the class.

I have tried to placate myself with thoughts that my students are learning about music – the language, the sounds, the instruments etc – but I was a little apprehensive about the lack of meaningful literacy moments that I could take advantage of.

I LOVE creating and crafting texts with my students: of playing around with writing so that it connects to readers and says exactly what you want it to say – but the opportunity had not arisen ……. Until today!

Today we shared ideas -

We built on each others words,

We explored vocab together,

We searched for the appropriate phrases,

We put images into words.

We created together!

This class is different to the classes I’ve had over the last couple of years: as a group they are much more reserved, they are less confident in themselves, there are fewer risk takers, there are more early phase ESL students in the group, and as a group they are less academically engaged in school.

So the strategies I used

⇒ were modified,

⇒ the positive reinforcement more frequent and specific,

⇒ the scaffolding was greater,

⇒ the re-phrasing and modeling more explicit, and

⇒ thinking time was more individual rather than shared

But the results were astounding!

Once the initial shyness was overcome there was much clapping and supporting of the efforts of all!

A shared purpose.

A shared pride.

A shared success.

Writing rocks!

I have felt like I have been slugging it out for the past 6 weeks or so – desperately trying to get back into school mode and working with my class again after being away for a couple of weeks of long-service leave at the end of last term.

Re-connecting with my class was crucial as we had a number of students added to my group and so we had to get to know each other and sort the social and academic groupings all over again.

It’s been hard work: time and thought consuming, problematic and frustrating all at once.

There’s been social issues, behaviour issues, routines issues, learning issues, attitude issues and friendship issues – tears, tantrums and tirades!!!!

But …..

Just when you think “that’s it!” – “I’m over all this” – a moment happens …..

A spark is ignited, fanned by some positivity and fuelled by some camaraderie and I think, maybe, we’re off……..

Onwards and upwards!

Let’s go AllStars – light the way!

Image: ‘Light it up …‘ 
www.flickr.com/photos/25047883@N00/209662750

I was introduced to Mouse Woman today, a cute and cheeky character found in stories from the Haida, one of the First Nations bands of the North West coast of Canada.

Mouse Woman is a shape changer, a narnauk, who lives and travels between the human and spirit worlds, helping and guiding young people in need by offering suggestions, options and alternatives.

Mouse Woman, or Grandmother, likes life to be balanced and works with humans and nature to equalise good and bad, right and wrong, and deal with the humans or spirits who had upset the order of the world.

As payment for her help, Mouse Woman loves wool, which her ravelly little fingers like to tear into a lovely, loose, nesty pile of wool.

The stories, written by Christie Harris, are refreshing, fun, mischievous, scary and thought provoking. I ‘m sure that I will be using the stories with my class. They will be great for discussing and exploring positive values, symbols and actions, and even ideas of natural balance, ecology and rights and responsibilities.

The stories also give a wonderful insight into traditional Haida life and beliefs – the descriptions of the forests, coasts and oceans are beautiful and poignant. The social structures and way of life in the Time Before are also shown and explained.

I’m so glad that I’ve met and fallen under the spell of Mouse Woman – and I hope she will join me back in my classroom to share her adventures with children on the other side of the world.

OR

“GOING TO WHERE THEY CAN FIND YOU”

Today’s keynote was presented by Eleanor Duckworth who, according to the conference website: 

“…. is a former student and translator of Jean Piaget, Dr. Duckworth grounds her work in Piaget and Inhelder’s insights into the nature and development of understanding and in their research method, which she has developed as a teaching/research approach, Critical Exploration in the Classroom. She seeks to bring a Freirean approach to any classroom, valuing the learners’ experience and insights. Her interest is in the experiences of teaching and learning of people of all ages, both in and out of schools. Duckworth is a former elementary school teacher and has worked in curriculum development, teacher education, and program evaluation in the United States, Europe, Latin America, Africa, Asia, and her native Canada. She is a coordinator for Cambridge United for Justice with Peace, and is a performing modern dancer. ”

The ideas that resonated with me are:

•       “work at it, work at it” – you can’t make certain things happen (like thought, imagination, different ways of thinking) so you need to “go where they will find you”
•       we must put learners into contact with the physical world
•       students take their own learning seriously when there is someone there to talk to, listen to
•       “critical exploration” within the classroom = long term in depth study/exploration by students over time
•       accept all ideas from the students – it’s the teachers role to then take these ideas further and deeper – and the ideas can become more playful
•       explore
•       wonder
•       question
•       play ……… and surprising things will happen!
•       encourage students to find the mysteries in the something ordinary
•       a study of “something” – pose a question – explore, notice, share, question
•       all ideas are open/equal/possible = truth is in the subject matter

I am currently in Vancouver, BC, attending the 7th International Conference on Imagination and Education where I have been introduced to the work of Dr Kieran Egan and the Imaginative Education Research Group (IERG).

” Imaginative Education is an approach to education that effectively engages students’ emotions, imaginations and intellects in learning.

The Imaginative Education Research Group has developed theories, principles and practices designed to explain, describe and implement this approach.

Imaginative Education offers a new understanding of how knowledge grows in the mind, and how our imaginations work and change during our lives. The IERG has developed innovative teaching methods based on these insights that offer new ways of planning and teaching….”

The 2 day, pre-conference workshop, showed alternative ways of thinking about education and the different kinds of understandings that come into play as children grow and develop and make sense of their world.

Examples of classroom applications demonstrated what the approach look liked in action, and planning frameworks were shared and explained.

We then spent some time trying out the approach by playing a number of thinking games/activities and beginning to plan lessons using the  frameworks to encourage creative and imaginative ways to explore traditional topics and content.

There were lots of opportunities to share ideas and questions about IE and this was really important so that our early thoughts could be clarified as we contemplated incorporating this approach into our teaching toolkit.

Check out the IERG website for more info, research, examples, resources and lesson/unit ideas.

I think my brain is about to explode!

Today was the third 7 hour, all day workshop that I’ve attended over the past four days – have to make the most of my NECC experience!

A plethora of web2.0 tools were presented enthusiastically as a way of teaching various (and varied) reading skills across the grades. From phonic awareness, to vocabulary, to comprehension, to talking and listening – all apects of reading instruction were comprehensively covered.

Linking assessment  was always stressed and ways and examples were demonstrated. The importance of always ensuring that the use of a tool is based on its relevance to the learning task and outcomes, was also constantly reinforced.

Ideas and examples of teachers and classes using these tools in a variety of ways was really helpful to visualise the use of web2.0 in the reading classroom:

• Using simple voice recordings (and using Vocaroo to embed on blog or wiki) for multiple purposes – such as identifying rhyming words, syllabification,fluency, reading out loud, oral instructions, books onto a podcast for listening to whenever you like (family members can record books for class to listen to).
• Making simple word/vocabulary alphabets for class topics and units or basic English words for ESL students using Yodio – where you add voice to digital photos.
• ClassTools.net have lots of games that you can adapt to your class’s needs. There’s a random name picker – try matching rhyming words or homophones or opposites.
• Some great hands on and practical examples of using Voicethread were also shown to help students develop fluency when reading, to develop critical thinking and responses.

A frenetic paced session where Hall Davidson from Discovery Education  illustrated the many ways that students could demonstrate their learning using video.

I must admit that I haven’t used video as much as I should in my classroom – all of those cords and missing bits and pieces that went with the school video recorder – but it’s just getting easier and easier with video capable cameras and phones – and the FLIP cameras we have now.

Using the tools readily available in classrooms, Hall took us step by step through the technical aspects (usually just click, copy, paste) of the programs and apps he was using.

He shared how easily students were able to control and manage the videoing of their learning and he shared quite a few very interesting and fun projects to try.

Sessions such as this act as a springboard for ideas for teachers who then are able to pass on the excitement, tools and opportunities for their students to use.

Keeping the videos in the hands of the students must remain a priority – to ensure that it’s the students driving their own learning.

I’d hate to be the one in control of the video – that would be taking all of the powerful learning, organizing, planning, rehearsing, delegating and negotiating fun away the people who need to be demonstrating these very skills.

BOSS – Can I book our FLIP video cameras for ALL of next term?? Please???