School 2.0 in SA

The education school at Wits will be hosting another public seminar. Download the invitation from here.

I am always looking for new ways to create backchannels or online meeting spaces. So this following little tool, Savor Chat,  quite intrigued me and I thought that we could try it out. I will leave the chat room open for now, just to see how it works.

Basically you can sign into the chat room with either your twitter username or your facebook e-mail address and password. You can also choose if you want your tweet/update to appear in yout twitter /Facebook home stream. You can access it on the Savor chat site or embed the chat into your blog/site using an iframe. It does however, have google ads on with links to chat rooms. This could be a calamity when using it with learners. The creators of the site are working on  a paid version where you can remove advertising and will be offered more advanced features.

Whenever someone post you get a direct message notefying you as well as a sound warning (if you have set it that way).

If you want to see how it works, come chat to me here: http://www.savorchat.com/chat/learn-with-maggie

It is that time of the year again and I am sure nails are being bitten, hair are standing on end (in the case of parents and teachers), candles are being burnt on both ends and nerve endings are fragile.

But don’t worry- focus and fly!!!!

Here is the exam timetable so that we can keep track of who is having nervous breakdowns!!!

2009 NCS Exam Timetable

CONCLUSION OF THE 2009 NSC EXAMINATION: 4 DECEMBER 2009

• Kindersite Project : Educationalists recommend the free Kindersite to introduce Young children to computers in safety, Research in to technology and children

  tags: education, games, school2.0

  • – post by acerview54

• No portfolios for learners

  “From next year, pupils across the country will do fewer projects, and teachers’ workloads will be reduced”

  tags: school2.0

• Bridge House School – Internet Acceptable Use Policy

  Maybe we could use this as a base AUP and build /change form it…???

  tags: aup, school2.0, policies

• Internet2 and School Libraries: The Time Is Now (More Than Ever)

  Does the word Internet2 conjure images of a mythical realm off-limits to the masses of web-surfing plebeians? A forbidding place where computer engineers and the academic research elite speak in esoteric computer programming dialects and move terabytes of data through big pipes at the speed of light? At Horace Mann Elementary School in West Allis, Wis., Internet2 is helping transform the school library into the heart of digitally enabled innovation and learning. So what is the real Internet2, and why does it matter to K-12 schools and libraries? James Werle and Louis Fox have the answers!

  tags: library2.0, school2.0

• Finding New Things to do with an IWB

  “I’m interested (read desperate) to see the revolutionary value adding aspects. I have an IWB, I love using my IWB, but I need to grasp the ideas and strategies that move people to describe it as a ‘revolution’ in learning. Show me an idea that is actually new!!!”

  tags: iwb, school2.0

  • – post by timsparacino

• Banning cellphones not the answer – The Teacher

  Steve uses a great metaphor for why we should not ban cellphones…

  tags: banning, cellphones, school2.0, mlearning

• Leaving digital footprints that count

  This wiki deals with the reasoning behind and the tools needed to manage your digital footprint

  tags: digitalfootprints, school2.0, wikis

• The great debate: is e-learning effective?

  Is e-learning really effective? Or is it a buzzword that promises much but deliver less? Trying to learn a language online has been likened to learning how to swim without entering the water. But more learning is likely to be delivered electronically in the future.

  tags: e-learning, debates, school2.0

• If you can’t use technology get out of teaching!

  A must read article for all teachers.

  tags: teaching, education, 21stcenturylearning, school2.0

  • – post by diigo_master
  • See this Review of the Teachers – post by diigo_master
  • The purpose should be creating the new information environment, one that’s at the core of our children’s ‘outside the classroom’ experience with technology. We have to bring digital, networked, abundant, overwhelming information into the classroom. The focus needs to be on the information and the learning not on the technology.

• Motion Chart of Internet Usage World Wide or fun with numbers

  tags: graphs, education, numbers, mathematics, school2.0, statistics

• Ebook: Netbooks in K-12: Thinking Big by Thinking Small

  Over the years, the question of how many computers per student or per classroom has emerged as a pivotal issue. Advocates for different perspectives agree that technology-enabled learning is important and the ideal is one-to-one computing and anytime, anywhere learning. In today’s economic environment, school districts must budget wisely and get the most out of each dollar invested. One way to address student computing and anywhere anytime access is with netbook PCs. This eBook will explore the issues and showcase districts that have implemented successful and cost-effective programs.

  tags: ebooks, edtech, school2.0, laptopinnitiative, netbooks

• The Teacher Tap: Professional Development Resources for Educators

  “The Teacher Tap is a free, professional development resource that helps educators and librarians address common questions about the use of technology in teaching and learning by providing easy access to practical, online resources and activities. “

  tags: school2.0, education, pd, professionaldevelopment, edtech

• Guidelines for Industry on Child Online Protection

  tags: policies, onlineprivacy, children, school2.0

• Guidelines for Policy Makers on Child Online Protection - Zunia.org

  In order to formulate a national strategy focusing on online child safety, policy makers need to consider a range of strategies.This document includes a number of key areas for consideration. These Guidelines have been prepared in the context of the Child Online Protection (COP) Initiative in order to establish the foundations for a safe and secure cyber world for future generations. They are meant to act as a blueprint which can be adapted and used in a way which is consistent with national or local customs and laws. Moreover, it will be appreciated that these guidelines address issues which might affect all children and young people under the age of 18 but each age group will have different needs.

  tags: policies, onlineprivacy, children, school2.0

• Digital footprints

  A report on how we view our digital footprints (form Pew)

  tags: AfricaIET09, digitalfootprints, school2.0

• My maths literacy research paper

  My paper on the agonies and successes of creating an informal online community of practice /learning ecology for mathematical literacy teachers in South Africa. It also explains the tools I used and how it impact(ed) on the community.

  tags: maggie, ict, edict, studies, research, school2.0, mathematics, teachers, ml

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

I read through Tom Barrett’s little newsletter that he compiles for his fellow teachers and was intrigued by the little tool that he introduced them to, called Write Rhymes. It helps to compile rhymes (duh) and is a very creative way to get your learners to write a poem. So I tried my hand at it and this is what I came up with……

Good morning last Friday
How did you get here?
I thought you were still far away
You sneaked up on me, that’s clear!

I still had so many things to do-
A whole month seemed so vast
But you in wisdom turned the clock
And now I am left aghast

So take me back to Monday first
So that I can try again
To pick up pieces of my life
That I lost – God knows when!

Very rudimentary and the list of rhyming words did not always inspire me, but it made me think. So this little tool get’s the thumbs up form me. Why don’t you give it a try and let me know (or post below) some rhymes???

The year 2009 is fast approaching its end and most young people are
pondering on what to do in 2010. For those who are thinking of tertiary education I suggest that you have a look at bursaries offered on the following sites:

• www.sasolbursaries.com
• www.absa.co.za
• www.hcifoundation.co.za
• www.funzalushaka.doe.gov.za (for teacher training)

There are also opportunities for new graduates. All major banks offer
graduate development programmes. For the Training Outside Public
Practice (TOPP) offered by Liberty Life you may contact
vikashi.chetty@liberty.co.za . The revenue service is looking to take in 200 BCom graduates in 2010. For more on this you may contact graduates@sars.gov.za

If you know of any other opportunities for our matrics leaving school at the end of this year, please add it as a comment.

Good luck- the future awaits!!

(Thanx @ceanlia for sending me this)

• Loads of Maths eBooks for download

  Wow, what a gem of a site where you can download great mathematics ebooks to enjoy

  tags: ebooks, library2.0, school2.0, mathematics

• If teens are confused by Twitter, what’s the right SocMed tool in school?

  tags: twitter, teens, school2.0, twitter4ed, socialmedia

• Top 100 schools in South Africa report pDF

  tags: schools, southafrica, school2.0

• Science: It’s A Girl Thing

  The Educational Equity Center (EEC) at the Academy for Educational Development (AED) is using social networking to connect with United States (US) parents and educators about how to foster girls’ interest in science and technology, and to communicate why that is important. Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), Science: It’s a Girl Thing! is an early childhood science programme offering web-based resources detailing science-based activities for parents and children to do together at home, with supplementary how-to videos and discussions available online.

  tags: science, girls, school2.0

• Mobile E Learning For Africa

  “A Danish – South African initiative offering Mobile solutions for Literacy Training and Skills Development.”

  tags: mobile, mobilelearning, education, AfricaIET09, cellphones, school2.0

• Thoughts on Setting up a Student Created Wiki

  This really brought it home: “as we already know, the technology itself does not develop the skill, nor is it the teacher; the technology is only a tool, and teachers must remain committed to the collaborative process if students are to fully engage and develop the skills necessary to work collaboratively with their peers”

  tags: wiki, school2.0, education, collaboration, teaching

• The Great IWB Debate – The Interactive Whiteboard Revolution

  Will be following this debate with interest seeing that I now have my very own mobile iwb!!! (and having great fun using it)

  tags: iwb, school2.0

• Blooms Taxonomy Tutorial FLASH

  This visual tutorial is really inspiring. Well done!

  tags: blooms, bloomstaxonomy, school2.0, library2.0

• ImageChef – Word Mosaic

  “Write a comment or poem in the shape of hearts or other symbols.
  Send a greeting or post to MySpace or your blog.”

  tags: wordle, visualization, mosaics, web2tools, tools, school2.0, images

• State of the Internet 2009: Pew Internet Project Findings and Implications for Libraries | Pew Internet & American Life Project

  “Nearly ten years’ worth of research conducted by The Pew Internet & American Life Project examines the growing role of technology in our lives, our changing expectations about how to find and use information, and the impact these changes will have on libraries and other institutions in the future.”

  tags: 2009, reports, PEW, school2.0, library2.0, education

• Education Week: Twitter Lessons in 140 Characters or Less

  A wonderful article about twitter in education

  tags: twitter, education, classroom, school2.0

  • Today’s students, she added, are going to need to have highly developed critical-thinking skills, be able to digest large amounts of information, and determine what’s important and what’s not. Those are the very kinds of skills they tend to use with Web 2.0 tools,

• What is SocialLearn ??

  tags: sociallearning, school2.0

• Time to change rules on textbooks

  tags: publishers, library2.0, textbooks, school2.0

• Kids get online protection

  This month, the UN’s International Telecommunications Union launched a blueprint for child online protection, drawn up jointly by welfare groups, regulators, law enforcement officials and the industry, that will be updated every year.

  tags: onlinesafety, school2.0, saschools

• Introduction to GIS

  Understanding what GIS is and what it can be used for. With a GIS application you can open digital maps on your computer, create new spatial information to add to a map, create printed maps customised to your needs and perform spatial analysis. In this worksheet we explore the basic concepts behind Geographical Information Systems.

  tags: gis, geography, school2.0

• Enhancing Child Safety and Online Technologies

  “”Many youth in the United States have fully integrated the Internet into their daily lives. For them, the Internet is a positive and powerful space for socializing, learning, and engaging in public life. Along with the positive aspects of Internet use come risks to safety, including the dangers of sexual solicitation, online harassment, and bullying, and exposure to problematic and illegal content. The Multi-State Working Group on Social Networking, comprising 50 state Attorneys General, asked this Task Force to determine the extent to which today’s technologies could help to address these online safety risks, with a primary focus on social network sites in the United States.” “

  tags: onlinesafety, saschools, school2.0

• Schools step up web-safety instruction

  tags: websafety, internetsafety, policies, school2.0, saschools

• LearnTrends 2009 -online conference

  The theme/focus this year is on Convergence in Workplace Learning. We will bring together people who look at different aspects of learning and knowledge work to understand better what’s going on in those areas and how we should be thinking about this holistically.

  As always, this conference is about getting together interesting people who bring a slightly different perspective and have meaningful conversation around innovation in workplace learning. We typically get more than a thousand people signed up and at least a hundred in each session.

  tags: conference, wshops, school2.0, learning, education, pd

• Lovely writing resource site

  tags: writing, english, school2.0

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Due to the incredible popularity of twitter globally, more guides are being written every day. I have had to update my teacher twitter learning object twice, due to the twitter interface changing. I also have not began to scratch the surface as far as handy twitter applications are concerned, but then I discovered this comprehensive guide to twitter from Makeuseof which always gives a down to earth perspective and look at tools and gadgets.

My current twitter tools that I am using are:

Hootsuite:

As I have various alter ego’s (@maggiev @schoollibrary @hogsback @mathslitteacher- The last 3 are collaborative), this web based tool is really very handy. You do not have to install a programme on your computer as it sits in your browser. You can keep track of all your personas and create separate streams which helps if you are following a great deal of interesting people. You can create a stream group by adding followers or hashtags. For instance, you can create a stream to follow the learners in your class. Another advantage is that you can keep track of your tweet stats with detailed graphs and stats (always very interesting from a maths point of view)

My Diigo auto- bookmarkmarklet to twitter

Where twitter is the mouth  of my online learning, Diigo is the heart and as it has an auto twitter tickbox, I can automatically post my bookmarks to twitter on the fly by just ticking the box. All you have to do is to install the diigo toolbar and click on bookmark. The rest is seamless. Very handy.

Twibes (www.twibes.com)

Is a grouping tool and comes in quite handy when you have meetings or workshops. Previously I swamped my poor following with workshop/meeting tweets. I am sure not all my social media and edtech followers are interested in mathematical literacy and the hassles we are having with assessment, so twibes makes it possible to create an interest group around a specific hashtag and use it as a seperate backchannel.

Backing up tweets (http://printyourtwitter.com/)

Tweets are only visible for a period of time and it is therefore very important to back it up/print it. I do this once a month and also back up my favourite tweople’s tweets! This makes for some great bedtime reading!

But let me introduce you to this great guide for a few more (very comprehensive) step by step pointers……..

The Complete Guide to Twitter

• MindMapSwitch

  tags: mindmapping

• Online university — free for all

  tags: university, online, education

• Facebook Apps for Education

  tags: facebook, education

• Government education ‘better’

  Thought about answering but then I would have had to stop laughing. But quite worrying as well if this is were we are at. Read through all the comments.

  tags: mathematics, education, assessment, localislekker, teachers, saschools

• Framework for a Safe Internet: Know the facts, understand the issues, shape the future | Safe Internet Alliance

  tags: education, internetsafety

• Interactive Mathematics – Learn math while you play with it!

  Great directory of tutorial textbook style lessons to point your learners to.

  tags: mathematics, math, school2.0, mathematicalliteracy, mathslit, ml123

• 100 Twitter Feeds To Make You a Better Teacher

  Great overview

  tags: Twitter, resources, lists

• Great stuff!!!! Librarians’ Internet Index

  This is a list of sites compiled by librarians to safe use internet sites. A great reference for school administrators, techies and teachers. It is a maintained directory of sorts and you can submit safe sites.

  tags: library2.0, filtering, school2.0, firewalls, reference, searchengines, education, search, library

• How To Create Shared Collaborative Google Maps

  Now you can get your learners to create a map!

  tags: education, howto, googlemaps, google, school2.0

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Last years matrics has never not known cellphones, TV, ipods, and all the mathingie-jigs of our 21st century world. So when Lanie send me this I had a really good chuckle!

If you are 30 or older you will think this is hilarious!!!!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking Twenty-five miles to school every morning…. Uphill…barefoot… BOTH ways Yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it! But now that… I’m over the ripe old age of thirty, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today…

You’ve got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia! And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don’t know how good you’ve got it! I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have The Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalogue!!

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter – with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take, like, a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

Child Protective Services didn’t care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

There were no MP3′ s or Napsters! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and shoplift it yourself! Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We’d play our favorite tape and “eject” it when finished and the tape would come undone. Cause – that’s how we rolled, dig?

We didn’t have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal, that’s it! And we didn’t have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn’t know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘Asteroids’. Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen…. forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel! NO REMOTES!!! There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I’m saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-bastards!

And we didn’t have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

That’s exactly what I’m talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoilt. You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in 1980 or before!