WOW!
What a busy 2 days of learning and networking (Both physically and in a 'internet' sense). It was brilliant to see what was happening all over the school.
Thank you to all the delegates who attended and a special thanks to all the presenters, both featured and local!
So, in keeping with my '10 things' vibe, here is what I will take from the Summit 2014:
1) YouTube is huge and getting bigger!
Starting with youtube.com/edu which collates education videos on the regular youtube.com, to the personal youtube channels and then the video editor Youtube continues to redefine itself as an educational smorgasbord!
2) IFTTT
One presentation and a demo slam confirmed that the time of IFTTT has arrived. If you haven't explored it now is the time!
This brilliant tool allows a user to create 'receipes' (or just use the ones other people have shared) to manage and maintain the internet of things.
3) Chrome Extensions
Little tools that make life simpler, look around to find the ones you like and make chrome work for you!
My favourites are CheckerPlus for Google Calendar, Docs Quickly, TabCloud (My personal best extension!) and OneTab which come a close second.
Just remember that with the pace of internet development these do change often.
For more extensions for education check out this doc: 50+ Chrome Extensions for Educators
with permission from Jake Duncan
4) Google+
Dee Lanier did a workshop on Google+, and this platform is growing fast. Time to get involved:
Check out Dee's resources on his doc or get involved in the new Google Educators Group South Africa
5) It not about the app!
Many sessions talked to the idea that we need to concentrate on ensuring that our teaching is solid and not based on teaching the app but rather the Child (Adult?). There seems to be a move towards ensuring that the pedagogy is correct before we concentrate on the technology. This will ensure that lessons are designed to stimulate and grow the knowledge and enthusiasm of both teachers and students!
6) Paperless
Not only is the conference paperless (although some felt uncomfortable with this) but Glenn Jones of Western Province Prep School presented a session on using scripts to enhance the paperless classroom. This is definitely a growing trend and it will be interesting to see how teachers adapt to a paperless classroom.
7) Personalisation
The growing trend for people to choose different devices for different uses makes it vital that the 'internet' works for the individual and for each student and teacher. The trend is to customise the experience for each individual and allow them to decide how to make things work for them.
8) Gamification
With badges, both electronic and stickers, handed out throughout the conference, the trend towards gaming the classroom has grown over the past year. Helen Robertson the Content Coordinator at Mindset Network did a great presentation on planning and preparation for the gamified classroom.
9) Custom Searching
One tip I picked up was on how to create a custom search engine for use on a blog or in class. Sean Hampton-Cole, who is Edtech Integrator / Senior Teacher at Crawford College Lonehill, shared a whole bunch of resources for his talk and among them are the instructions to set up a custom search engine
10) The people
Once again, the greatest buzz from #gafesummit was the time I spent talking to and networking with teachers from all over South Africa and the world. Thank you all for coming to Dainfern College and see you next year!
For the lowdown check out https://storify.com/ajegbers/gfesummit-za
Monday, 7 July 2014
Monday, 19 May 2014
2nd Language on a Tablet
Over the last few weeks I have been asked, by a few teachers at school, to help them plan second language lessons using a tablet.
Ideally a tablet or computer should not be the focus of a lesson plan but rather an aid to the completion of a task. I, therefore, asked the teachers what topics they were planning on covering and the time-frame (in terms of lesson time) we had to cover the topic.
In collaboration with the teachers, and taking the content and time-frame into account here are some of the idea's we came up with:
1) Comic to written work
From
to 
App Smashing is the new thing! So using this as an idea step one will be to get the students to create a photo comic book. In this comic (which they are allowed to create in their first language) the students will have to act out a story and photograph the action. Then they add the dialogue in the form of speech bubbles and captions.
Once the dialogue is complete it will be translated into the second language using Google Translate (As pointed out by another teacher, it is not always advisable to translate whole sentences, rather use translation apps to translate words. Thanks, Nicole!) and everyday dictionaries. This should allow the students to relate new second language words to their first language context.
In step 2 the completed comic will then be published and used as the basis for a written dialogue:
Ben: "Hello!"
Fred: "Hello, how are you?"
During this part of the project the teachers will focus on using and correcting punctuation and grammar in the second language. They will discuss similarities and differences between punctuation and grammar in the first and second languages and the students will, hopefully, start to understand proper punctuation and grammar usage in the second language.
Once the dialogue is complete the student will have 2 pieces of work that are the same content in different formats.
Step 3 will use both of these in aiding a 'formal' piece of written work in the form of a descriptive essay. The comic will be used to aid the student in describing the scenes (using the pictures the students themselves created) and the dialogue will be fitted in at the appropriate places in the story. This can be done in first language and translated but ideally the previous 2 steps should have the students ready to write in their second language.
This process is expected to take 4-5 hours and comprises 3 formative assessments, later on the students will write a story independently for a summative assessment.
2) A story in 3 tweets
This can be done on or offline, on twitter or not but the idea remains the same. Students have 3 tweets to tell a story (140 characters if offline) and must compose a beginning, a middle and an ending to their story.
This should be helpful to students who are just starting the second language writing journey as it allows them to be very specific and concise.
3) Class story in tweets
or 
This exercise needs an online environment via a back-channel app such as todaysmeet or twitter. If you are using twitter please remember a hashtag, and check to see that it isn't being used elsewhere!
Working together each class member contributes 1 'tweet' to a class story. The teacher then uses storify for twitter or copy and paste for todaysmeet and other similar sites and then publish the results as a story.
I will add to this post as we try new things, feel free to share some of your idea's with me or let me know if you try any of these in class. I would love to know how it went!!
Ideally a tablet or computer should not be the focus of a lesson plan but rather an aid to the completion of a task. I, therefore, asked the teachers what topics they were planning on covering and the time-frame (in terms of lesson time) we had to cover the topic.
In collaboration with the teachers, and taking the content and time-frame into account here are some of the idea's we came up with:
1) Comic to written work
From
to App Smashing is the new thing! So using this as an idea step one will be to get the students to create a photo comic book. In this comic (which they are allowed to create in their first language) the students will have to act out a story and photograph the action. Then they add the dialogue in the form of speech bubbles and captions.
Once the dialogue is complete it will be translated into the second language using Google Translate (As pointed out by another teacher, it is not always advisable to translate whole sentences, rather use translation apps to translate words. Thanks, Nicole!) and everyday dictionaries. This should allow the students to relate new second language words to their first language context.
In step 2 the completed comic will then be published and used as the basis for a written dialogue:
Ben: "Hello!"
Fred: "Hello, how are you?"
During this part of the project the teachers will focus on using and correcting punctuation and grammar in the second language. They will discuss similarities and differences between punctuation and grammar in the first and second languages and the students will, hopefully, start to understand proper punctuation and grammar usage in the second language.
Once the dialogue is complete the student will have 2 pieces of work that are the same content in different formats.
Step 3 will use both of these in aiding a 'formal' piece of written work in the form of a descriptive essay. The comic will be used to aid the student in describing the scenes (using the pictures the students themselves created) and the dialogue will be fitted in at the appropriate places in the story. This can be done in first language and translated but ideally the previous 2 steps should have the students ready to write in their second language.
This process is expected to take 4-5 hours and comprises 3 formative assessments, later on the students will write a story independently for a summative assessment.
2) A story in 3 tweets
This can be done on or offline, on twitter or not but the idea remains the same. Students have 3 tweets to tell a story (140 characters if offline) and must compose a beginning, a middle and an ending to their story.
This should be helpful to students who are just starting the second language writing journey as it allows them to be very specific and concise.
3) Class story in tweets
or This exercise needs an online environment via a back-channel app such as todaysmeet or twitter. If you are using twitter please remember a hashtag, and check to see that it isn't being used elsewhere!
Working together each class member contributes 1 'tweet' to a class story. The teacher then uses storify for twitter or copy and paste for todaysmeet and other similar sites and then publish the results as a story.
I will add to this post as we try new things, feel free to share some of your idea's with me or let me know if you try any of these in class. I would love to know how it went!!
Monday, 21 April 2014
Getting Students going on a Tablet
Wow! it has been a while since I blogged.
At my school we have been running a BYOT (tablet) programme for two years. This involves both the Grade 6 (11-12 year old) and Grade 7 (12-13 year old) students.
I our first year we struggled to get the grade 6 students up to par with using the Tablets in class and so in January 2014 we implemented a Tablet licence for these students. The idea was to use Edmodo to introduce the students to the schools workflow solution, to introduce them to working on a tablet and to make sure they all had the required apps in order to use a tablet effectively at school.
To start the process we used a Google Doc to get input from all the Grade 6 teachers and create an outline to follow in order to ensure that we covered all our bases. At the end of this process we had 30 major items that every student needed to be aware of in order to use their tablet properly. These were then grouped into Modules or learning tasks.
Once we had the modules we needed to find a way for students to access them, without having tablets at school.
For this part I decided to run the licence via Edmodo, firstly because we use Edmodo at school and secondly because the students need to be comfortable using Edmodo to both receive tasks and to hand in completed work. The first step was to create a group that the students could join:
Part 1 on the licence covered the following 'modules':
Over the course of administering this process the main problems I had were:
Phase two of the licence start in May and I will do another post on how that goes. This part will cover:
At my school we have been running a BYOT (tablet) programme for two years. This involves both the Grade 6 (11-12 year old) and Grade 7 (12-13 year old) students.
I our first year we struggled to get the grade 6 students up to par with using the Tablets in class and so in January 2014 we implemented a Tablet licence for these students. The idea was to use Edmodo to introduce the students to the schools workflow solution, to introduce them to working on a tablet and to make sure they all had the required apps in order to use a tablet effectively at school.
To start the process we used a Google Doc to get input from all the Grade 6 teachers and create an outline to follow in order to ensure that we covered all our bases. At the end of this process we had 30 major items that every student needed to be aware of in order to use their tablet properly. These were then grouped into Modules or learning tasks.
 |
| 1. Create an outline document for your schools work flow |
Once we had the modules we needed to find a way for students to access them, without having tablets at school.
For this part I decided to run the licence via Edmodo, firstly because we use Edmodo at school and secondly because the students need to be comfortable using Edmodo to both receive tasks and to hand in completed work. The first step was to create a group that the students could join:
 |
| Create a group |
After that I created modules for each student to complete. The licence is self-paced and open to all Grade 6 students. I started by loading to Assignments (Modules) each week. The module below used commonsense Media's Digital Passport to introduce the students to sensible online behavior.
 |
| 3. Set assignments that cover your content |
Once a student finishes a module to my satisfaction they receive a badge to show that they have completed the specified task.
 |
| 4. Award your badges as work is completed |
In this case once a student had earned the first 9 badges they were allowed to bring a tablet to school. This signals the start of part 2 of the licence which will show students how to use their Tablet in class. The 'Whoo Hoo' badge signaled the specific students permission to bring a Tablet to school, get the key to their Tablet Locker and start using the Tablet in classes.
 |
| 5. Hand out the licence |
Part 1 on the licence covered the following 'modules':
- The schools Acceptable Use Policy.
- Digital Citizenship.
- Password Management (Security of and remembering their passwords)
- Email etiquette
- Email Setup (Labels and filters)
- Edmodo assignment turn in.
- Google Calendar.
- App/Play/Windows store account setup
- Social Media safety
- App readiness (in terms of getting all the recommenced apps for school)
- with keeping up with the administration of the modules (96 kids and 11 assignments so far, with 12 to go)
- keeping all the students on track on a self-paced project. The issueing of the first few 'licences' did help though.
- handing out the badges. As of now Edmodo has no way of automatically awarding a badge with a pass mark (Would love it if more people suggested this as a future feature for the Edmodo developers)
At the end of it all this licence has empowered the students in terms of knowing what is expected of them once they have a tablet at school. The teachers are more comfortable with the fact that students have tablets because they know that they are able to assign tasks and use the tablets in class knowing that the students are prepared for this sort of teaching.
Phase two of the licence start in May and I will do another post on how that goes. This part will cover:
- Setting up the tablet
- It's crashed, now what?
- Backing up and restoring the tablet and work on the tablet.
- Reading on the tablet (Kindle, iBooks and others. Also looking at the differences of the various formats, PDF, ePub etc)
- It’s safe! Safety and security of the Tablet. Including having a cover, using the school lockers and tracking the device.
- General classroom rules an the Tablet AUP.
Thursday, 14 November 2013
A year in review or 10 Things I learned this year
As usual, when a year draws to a close, people look back over the previous 12 or so months and reflect on opportunities or misses. I am looking back to record what I learned this year in terms of training, BYOD and staff and pupil development. I am starting to enjoy these '10...' posts so you can expect more:
1). Everyone learns at their own pace...
...and sometimes, as a trainer, we need to accept that. Along with this goes the provision that some people will not want to learn what we prescribe. This goes for adults and children. As teachers and trainers we need to 'hook' a person by showing the possibilities of a technology and not necessarily the end point. At school we call it a 'technological journey' that every staff member is on and we try to help them along their own path rather than a path we have chosen. As a teacher I believe that we need to do the same for our children. In my view this is the only way to create a lifelong learner, a child or adult who studies for the love of learning and not just for tests and exams.
2.) Technology can help us do this.
It allows a teacher the space to differentiate, set multiple projects on the same theme, or just give the children time to learn their own thing or in their own way. To this end I tried a very short version of 20% time after reading 10 Reasons To Try 20% Time In The Classroom and gave the students a project that was self directed and self paced but had the underlying premise of looking at the technology behind their favourite hobby, sport or passion.
3). Google knows everything but can't teach it!
It is up to the teacher to teach children how to research, analyse and interpret the things Google can tell them.
4).Google is awesome
After attending the GAFESummit in Cape Town (Here is my post on that: 10 things I will be taking from the za.gafesummit.com) I decided Google was awesome. Not for the content but for the technologies it drives or associates itself with, either through the 20% time they give their staff or from a passionate group of educators and developers around the world. There is a passion for education that is at the core of Google and that it shares with a large group of educators around the world.
Oh! and the Loon project, Google is awesome because of the Loon project!! (Project Loon)
5).Apple is awesome...
...and especially the South African Apple team at ThinkAhead who constantly strive to show the power of technology in the classroom. As a BYOTablet school we have had to lean on their knowledge all through the year. Best of all we have been able to teach them too, with neither side worried about ego's or point scoring.
6). Put them together and a classroom is awesome!
IMHO, my situation would not work without the combined resources of Google and Apple, both in terms of technology and cloud computing. With a growing Google Apps ecosystem on all tablets and the ease of use of the Apple devices our school has been able to push the limits of what students are capable of in terms of technology and learning. I no longer have to draw information from unwilling minds, the student is able to show their ideas and knowledge in so many forms that it is possible for every student to show their knowledge.
7). Creative Commons Search
I have written about this before but it is just so useful I put it in again!
8). Content Creation Apps
Along with many others I have moved away from content delivery apps and towards the apps that allow a student to create something of their own abd share it with someone else. Especially useful for this type of teaching and learning is the Book Creator App and I would like to thank +Dan Amos for the opportunity to be a part of the development and testing of the latest version of this app (and good luck with the Android launch!), it just gets better and better. Other useful apps include ExplainEverything, iFiles, Edmodo and Dropbox. Each of these have helped with our schools workflow solution. Speaking of which...
9). Workflow Solutions
every school must have one, especially in terms of effective assessment and learning. Also, every school needs to find on that suits their style and philosophy. Very often 'pre-packaged' solutions just don't cut it!
So...find a way that suits your school and don't delay because you are unsure. Rather be flexible, apologise for mistakes and accept feedback and criticism then act on it.
10). 10 things posts
I have really enjoyed this type of post, both as a writing style and for reading. I find the idea of a list to work through or a list to create allows me to pick and choose what I find valuable. Edudemic.com uses this style of blogging often and very effectively.
Lastly, Thank you to everyone who read my posts this year. Next year is a year of comments, so feel free to leave yours!
1). Everyone learns at their own pace...
...and sometimes, as a trainer, we need to accept that. Along with this goes the provision that some people will not want to learn what we prescribe. This goes for adults and children. As teachers and trainers we need to 'hook' a person by showing the possibilities of a technology and not necessarily the end point. At school we call it a 'technological journey' that every staff member is on and we try to help them along their own path rather than a path we have chosen. As a teacher I believe that we need to do the same for our children. In my view this is the only way to create a lifelong learner, a child or adult who studies for the love of learning and not just for tests and exams.
2.) Technology can help us do this.
It allows a teacher the space to differentiate, set multiple projects on the same theme, or just give the children time to learn their own thing or in their own way. To this end I tried a very short version of 20% time after reading 10 Reasons To Try 20% Time In The Classroom and gave the students a project that was self directed and self paced but had the underlying premise of looking at the technology behind their favourite hobby, sport or passion.
3). Google knows everything but can't teach it!
It is up to the teacher to teach children how to research, analyse and interpret the things Google can tell them.
4).Google is awesome
After attending the GAFESummit in Cape Town (Here is my post on that: 10 things I will be taking from the za.gafesummit.com) I decided Google was awesome. Not for the content but for the technologies it drives or associates itself with, either through the 20% time they give their staff or from a passionate group of educators and developers around the world. There is a passion for education that is at the core of Google and that it shares with a large group of educators around the world.
Oh! and the Loon project, Google is awesome because of the Loon project!! (Project Loon)
5).Apple is awesome...
...and especially the South African Apple team at ThinkAhead who constantly strive to show the power of technology in the classroom. As a BYOTablet school we have had to lean on their knowledge all through the year. Best of all we have been able to teach them too, with neither side worried about ego's or point scoring.
6). Put them together and a classroom is awesome!
IMHO, my situation would not work without the combined resources of Google and Apple, both in terms of technology and cloud computing. With a growing Google Apps ecosystem on all tablets and the ease of use of the Apple devices our school has been able to push the limits of what students are capable of in terms of technology and learning. I no longer have to draw information from unwilling minds, the student is able to show their ideas and knowledge in so many forms that it is possible for every student to show their knowledge.
7). Creative Commons Search
I have written about this before but it is just so useful I put it in again!
8). Content Creation Apps
Along with many others I have moved away from content delivery apps and towards the apps that allow a student to create something of their own abd share it with someone else. Especially useful for this type of teaching and learning is the Book Creator App and I would like to thank +Dan Amos for the opportunity to be a part of the development and testing of the latest version of this app (and good luck with the Android launch!), it just gets better and better. Other useful apps include ExplainEverything, iFiles, Edmodo and Dropbox. Each of these have helped with our schools workflow solution. Speaking of which...
9). Workflow Solutions
every school must have one, especially in terms of effective assessment and learning. Also, every school needs to find on that suits their style and philosophy. Very often 'pre-packaged' solutions just don't cut it!
So...find a way that suits your school and don't delay because you are unsure. Rather be flexible, apologise for mistakes and accept feedback and criticism then act on it.
10). 10 things posts
I have really enjoyed this type of post, both as a writing style and for reading. I find the idea of a list to work through or a list to create allows me to pick and choose what I find valuable. Edudemic.com uses this style of blogging often and very effectively.
Lastly, Thank you to everyone who read my posts this year. Next year is a year of comments, so feel free to leave yours!
Thursday, 3 October 2013
10 things I will be taking from the za.gafesummit.com
Parklands and Schoolnetsa invited the http://www.edtechteam.com/ to present the conference and the team blew us away with their knowledge and energy, considering many of them flew in from all over the world I am sure that energy was hard to find.
The sheer amount of learning made this conference, in my opinion, the best conference I have been to this year.
So what did I take away form the conference besides some new people to follow on twitter (@followmolly, @scubagirl812,
1) Amazing Video's
In every presentation there was a video to make you think! What it brought home was the power of a video used in the right place at the right time. As teacher we tend to see you tube as a time waster (and it can be, I just spent 10 minutes following recommended links) but to our students it allows entry to a world of knowledge.
2) Sheer Enthusiasm!
Thanks to @rushtonH for this, all creative commons resources all the time! This search engine along with the Google reference tool that can be switched on in Google Doc (Tools --> Research) are very powerful for everyone who is concerned about plagiarism, did anyone say Matric?
9) Customisation
What I was most reminded of during the conference is just how flexible Google is. It is, at heart, designed to try and make every individuals life easier. Tell it how you like to do things and it just does them. Even better, Google is starting to figure out things for you. The seamless integration across technologies and platforms is just brilliant.
10) The Demo Slam
Great staff development tool, each teacher presents an idea for 3 minutes. Best is it can even be used outside of 'tech' and just to blast several idea's at one sitting. I loved it and well done to @KShermanTweets for the outstanding win. Big applause by the partisan local crowd.
All in all this was a brilliant experience. What struck me most (even above the 10 things I took from the conference) was just how easy it is to customise Google for each user's needs. Every teacher, IT guy and 'other' at the conference could probably write a completely different but just as relevant and exciting '10 things' list. If you do please let me know about it, i would love to read it!
Tuesday, 2 July 2013
SchoolNet Blending the flipping classroom presentation
Blending the flipping classroom presentation for SchoolNetSA presentation 2013
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