teaching Scout

The hardest thing about blogging is getting back into it if you’ve been away for a while. So here is my attempt – but don’t get too excited, I’m not about to start making any great revelations.

Since I’ve been away I have completed my probationary year and am now a Registered Teacher. I think I’m officially called a teacher of Technological Education, but shorten that to Technical (woodwork/metalwork/ Graphic Communications/Product Design and Technology and some other stuff) and you’ve pretty much got it

Over the next while I hope to get back into blogging and share some ‘not so great’ revelations on my Probationary Year, ‘The Education System’ (lol), School Design and why Primary One worries me….

Honestly – would you on a day of your holiday – spend an evening packing your stuff, get up early the next day, get a ferry at 8o’clock in the morning drive for about 5 hours across Scotland just to do some CPD? Bearing in mind you’ve still got to get back home. Ian Stuart and Andy Wallis did. Are they insane? Nope – because there were teacher’s and educators from all over Scotland travelling for a few hours after a work to get to TeachMeetPerth. People joined the TeachMeet from even further afield through the Flashmeeting. Seriously I cannot recommend enough - if you do one piece of CPD in the coming year get yourself to a TeachMeet!

Why? It is full of enthusiatic, knowledgeable and practical teachers who share what works in the classroom. Based on experience, teachers have 7 minutes to share how they’ve been using Technology in the classroom. I have been priveledged to be at 2 TeachMeets and both times I have been bowled over at how I been made to feel part of a community of educators that love making things better for pupils. Getting involved in this has had a huge influence of how I have approached teaching. It not only provides me with a ton of ideas but allows me to reflect outwith my department.

So what did I learn. Firstly – I want to make it a long term target for myself to get 80-90% of pupil written work in a digital format. Why? Two reasons – from seeing Ian Stuart’s ease at which he organises, provides feedback and pupils collaborate on their handheld Q1’s – I want to do that. OneNote looks like a fantastic application – amazingly intuitive and easy to use. And also from Robert Jones’ recommendation: “where should we start the roll-out of 1-1?” and I want to be so ready that they couldn’t possibly choose anywhere else”. I don’t know how long it will take – but if I can and it’s practical I want to get rid of all unneccessary bits of paper both for me and the pupils.

The other person I thought was great was Nick Hood. He made a quick get-away afterwards and I really wish I had been able to speak to him. I admire the “no holds barred” way that he conducts himsself on the net – and I mean this in a positive way. He is refreshingly honest and humorous and his short presentation was cutting it all back to basics. You don’t need to go all high tech, just get a projector and a wireless mouse and there’s loads of potential. In his Authority everything is blocked and he gave a fantastic explanation of a teacher who refuses to give up and persists in finding effective ways of using the web2.0 tools that are out there.

Finally, a big heads up to Neil Winton, English teacher and blogger who organised the whole thing. His “7 tools in about 3 minutes” was a whirlwind tour of neat stuff that can be really useful in the classroom. In particular I loved Fleck, the website annotation tool. I can see loads of use for this in the design classroom. He also managed to book a pretty fantastic curry that allowed for some great chat.

So Islay Ian has a lot to live up to as he is proposing an Islay High School open day showcasing the unique things they are getting up to. In particular, I would love to see a school that has removed age and stage restrictions let alone a school with the lowest photocopying budget in the world* If you have one thing to do in June, get your ass self over to Islay High School, cos it looks like there might be another TeachMeet horizon!

*All I know is that the Design and Technology department managed to spend about £7 over the course of a year on photocopying. Eh, lets see someone beat that!

I have (literally) just introduced our class blog to my 1st years. We had a good look at Sandaig Otters to get a good feel of what our blog could maybe turn into….but of course we’ll see.

PHEW!!

For me, it was an exhilarating lesson and the class seemed to respond well. There is still a LOT to sort out with it and I’m hoping that a bit of class blogging coupled with lunchtimes on Thursdays we’ll get a largely pupil run scenario.

Unfortunately due to constraints put on me, NOTHING can be published without moderation although I am quite liking my status as ‘admin’ Although I am putting forward a large degree of trust as the pupils can all login under a common password/username (here’s hoping).

I wish our authority wasn’t so strict on blocking internet sites. I discovered that wikispaces and flickr are yet another on a long list that we can’t get access to

Wish us luck and put it in your feed-reader if you can.

Funny how education really is one of the most normal things in the world. Sometimes when you speak to teachers you get the impression that we should all be due some sort of royalty at the end of it. Over the past few weeks the normality of my job really has hit me. I’m not here to waltz into a classroom, produce some kind of fantastic all singing all dancing lesson that makes use of every technology under the sun and to be then congratulated by myself or others for my splendid efforts. Nope. I’ve realised that educating kids should be a largely normal process. I think the more that culture changes over the coming decades, where educators become used to the notion of simply trying new things and that change is just a natural process and shouldn’t be resisted, that there will be less people from the “I cannae dae that” camp. In the same respect, there will then be less kids from the “I cannae dae that” camp.

What I’ve learnt over the past couple of weeks is the truely humbling nature of my job. I’ve learnt that I thouroughly enjoy it! Often I am frustrated and really wish that I could manage that class better. Often, I find myself repeating discipline procedures and wondering if my actions are making a blind bit of difference to the kid who refuses to look at me when I’m talking to them A good few times I’ve thought despairingly “Oh God: This is it. Can I really do this for the rest of my life?”

But that is the point. It’s normal. And it is a reflection on the fact that education is as ordinary and essential as breathing. When I think of it this way, I feel grateful to be in a country where we have such an opportunity to make innovation  commonplace.

I hope that I can play my part!

I arrived in the nick of time as John Johnston was halfway through his presentation on scotedublogs. I thought it was a perfect introduction for the evening – an excellent insight.

 Terry Freedman showed us that if we want to contribute to the HUGE new “coming of age – an introduction to www” book, then head over to www.ictineducation.org. It is a print on demand project with profits going to a good cause. The first edition of this book was downloaded or read by 60,000 people. A big audience….?

Iain Stangers’ presentation really stood out. For me he showed us the COOLEST software around. dartfish allows you to edit and annote video really easily. You can do it, the kids can do it. You can create these ‘mediabooklets’ that the kids work on, annotating or editing the videoclip to their hearts content. In Technical Education, I had some immediate ideas… Iain talked about using it for internal assessment (kids can do voice over), peer assessment,  using it as record of achievment - he had the SQA approve this method of internal assessment. This would clearly be a good way of engaging those kids who hate writing out screeds of text . In the school I am in, the use of ICT in the classroom seems to be a key focus at the moment (eg HGIOS), I will defenitely be trying to persuade some people to get this used in the classrooms! I really enjoyed Iain’s presentation, although his software seemed to be playing up a bit, his enthusiasm and passion for what he was talking about, was very clear.

Next up, Ollie Bray. If I could some up Ollie’s point it was that really simple, small things can have the greatest impact on learners. I am sure he will put up his presentation on his blog if he hasn’t done already! Also if George W can use “the google” anyone can

David Gilmour talked about  replacing standard school websites with a weblog  and the effect on the parents. (in my opinion, surely as it is the parent who has the most effect on the child this was one of the most intsightful points of the evening) As David explained, the parents said: “we want to be involved in the school though we are really very busy. We will only get engaged if you can give me the information to get engaged in my kids class.” Weblogs anyone?

Out of the nanopresentations, Lee Carson made a fantastic point “You have a moral obligation to comment”. He was talking about his P7 class blog, and the simple need that the children had – to know that other people were interested in what they were doing. It struck me of the complete simplicity of all this “web2.0-ness”,  everyone, on all different levels and in all different ways, just want to be connected.

Dobee (doo be doo). These seemed cool. “Get those digital natives on board”

Nick Hood: Move over moodle and GET WITH THE WIKI! He went down the long road of using moodle and through his experience is encouraging us all to use wiki’s for collaborative learning. Will Glow stand up in comparison?

Andy Black. “I want to scare you to death” ummm – yup, he did! Andy was funny, enthusiatic, and had a clear message: “It’s not about the device, stupid”.

Alastair Thin gave an honest and interesting presentation about his “Martini media lectures” which was followed by Steve Beard who wanted to show us Second Life as an alternative learning environment.

And then it was over! I only looked at my watch once, when IslayIan said the bar was closed! I finally found out where AB is – sitting next to IslayIan I met Mr W, briefly, who gave me a ‘moo card’, very smart. I also saw John Johnston on the way out the door, though I’m sure not many people knew who I was

Hello to everyone who was there – it was a refreshing experience for someone like me who has so much to learn. I look forward to meeting and collaborating with you in the future.

Krysia’s dissertation

In the spirit of ’sharing’, here’s my dissertation ‘Sharing Good Practice: A focus on Collaborative Working’. Sounds fascinating? Well kinda, if you want to shoot me down – please don’t and just tell me it was very…’informative’.
When I was researching this area I found out a whole bunch of insightful things that I hope will give me  good footing when entering into teaching in August. Instead of writing an ‘abstract’ for you, here is some of the more salient points, in a much more informal manner than found in the PDF. I started off with the principle that ‘Working together is good. Working alone is (generally) not so good’. Yes, I know, kinda obvious.
If we are to work together for the better here is what I feel is vital:

• An approach is taken which focuses on the needs of the learner and teacher. To do this we (the teachers) need to be at the centre of decisions and NOT policy makers or traditional leaders

This of course needs a careful degree of facilitation to get us all working together….

• In my opinion this should be given in partnership with the Local Authority to start with who should figure out how much influence they should play in getting schools working together. It should be important that GROUND LEVEL LEADERS are used so as to make sure of the INCLUSION OF EVERY TEACHER. This is really vital, I got a clear opinion that there is a whole bunch of teachers who quite simply aren’t involved with others. If we are to change, then there is no point a select bunch of people thinking its fantastic. It should be important for us all to feel of value and included. I looked a lot into the idea of ‘flattening hierarchies’ and in the end figured that a bottom up approach is the best but I don’t think people will feel comfortable with a totally flat world.

Therefore

• The methods in which we work together to change and improve should cover as many bases as possible. If there is one that EVERYONE should focus on, it’s lesson observation – it offers us a place to keep any ‘debate’ focused within the realities of the classroom (pupils/ teacher at heart). Getting into each others classes on all levels, HT, PT, class teacher etc etc, not assessing each other but figuring out together what the best way of do things is.

But

• For us to feel comfortable doing this, we need the right climate. My favourite phrase is this ‘FAILING FORWARD’. At the moment I feel that education is in a bit of a straight jacket of do’s/don’t/target’s/ and measures (though probably less so than before). We don’t want to look stupid infront of other people and as a result even our blogs are sometimes too carefully considered for really cool innovation to happen. Sometimes it is better to think out loud – I mean we’re all in a constant state of change anyway so exposing others to our strengths/weaknesses should allow for greater confidence and willingness to move forward.

My research wasn’t really focused on blogging or all the fantastic web2.0 technologies open to us. Though, as usual I’ve figured out some opinions/questions that I think the blogging community should consider (or have you already?)
We’ve got the potential for real large scale change. Yeh? Well it’s not going to happen with a ‘community’. It’s going to happen with everyone. At the moment I’m getting (really good) community vibes, but everyone needs to be given the opportunity to embrace web2.0. Some of my research REALLY REALLY REALLY showed this wasn’t the case and it made me concerned.
But change is slow isn’t it? Of course, but I think the way to tackle it is to allow every teacher to web2.0 opportunities IN A WAY THAT IS RELEVANT TO THEM. Not everyone wants to express their opinion – (haha, I’m one to talk) – and these people need to be given opportunity to feel ‘safe’ in working with everyone else.
Also, I feel that blogging is so broad. People are talking about everything. But I feel that we should adopt common focus to make change for the better. It may just be me, but there is so many things and ideas going on I feel it could be a bit of an innovation overload (what a phrase). If we really focused on some certain areas and all chipped away at them, would that not be better?

I’m gonna stop there, I think I’ve covered enough for just now. There’s loads more I’d love to say and question but maybe later. If you read my dissertation then read the Literature Review/Results/ Recommendations as they’re the bits with (what I feel) is good info. Enjoy!