Teachers in my cluster will have now seen the article in our local newspaper promoting a Blog competition. Others mayhave followed travel blogs, and for some the word itself is foreign. Why should we as teachers be promoting it? How can we use it in our classrooms? Is it just another ICT fad?
Many of the PoLT (Principles of Learning and Teaching) surveys across the state have reported that the two things students hate the most are "oral presentations" and "journals". And yet many kids have MYSPACE accounts, are really into You tube and may already be Blogging. Podcasts can be the modern version of an "oral" and Blogging (keeping a web journal) is a journal.
Hhmm school site won't allow me access to some of the links I am after. Will finish this later at home.
To be continued ...................
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Back to school ..... but what to do !!!
Tuesday teachers go back to work and Wednesday the students arrive. But what do I do? I have no classes and I doubt any teacher is going to want me hanging around when they are busy getting started. I hope they take the time to do the most important thing - get to know their students. Making the connections and working on the relationships is so important . Primary schools tend to do this well, but secondaries !! Well ?? unfortunatley so many secondary teachers still think the most important thing is to set the rules and begin work, get stuck into "their subject". I intend to invite myself into a primary classroom to watch and learn how this is done in the upper primary level.
I have a collection of ideas and examples of activities teachers can use to get to know their students. I think during this coming week I will put them onto a WIKI to share and to allow any people who read my blog to add to , if they wish. A "wiki", hhmm, that makes me smile, a week ago I didn't even know what one was and now I can't wait to set one up !!. It goes to show that the philosophy of "just in time learning", OR "What's in it for me?" applies to adults as well as teenagers. If you are passionate, or interested in something or just "have to " know for a purpose, you WILL learn. We need to keep this in mind for our Middle Years students, especially year 9's.
At Templestowe College the Year 7 staff should be starting with a "Learning to Learn" unit devised by four Educators. Spending the first few lessons in all subjects getting to know the kids and then teaching them about how they learn best, establishing their preferred learning styles, discussing and learning about the sorts of foods to eat, how they affect the brain, the best environment for learning and beginning to talk about the Habits of MInd.
The Cluster ran numerous workshops and professional development sessions on the Habits of Mind in 2006. Daniel Gooding, Leading Schools Fund Eucator for Knox Secondary Learning Community, was a great help to us and his knowledge and assistance was appreciated. The College decided to implement the Habits into the school curriculum and culture, beginning with the Junior School and then continuing in 2008 into year 9 and 10. Staff need to be committed and make a conscientious effort to incorporate them into their units plans and daily lessons. It will be interesting to see how they go. I hope they remember I am available at any time for assistance.
I have a collection of ideas and examples of activities teachers can use to get to know their students. I think during this coming week I will put them onto a WIKI to share and to allow any people who read my blog to add to , if they wish. A "wiki", hhmm, that makes me smile, a week ago I didn't even know what one was and now I can't wait to set one up !!. It goes to show that the philosophy of "just in time learning", OR "What's in it for me?" applies to adults as well as teenagers. If you are passionate, or interested in something or just "have to " know for a purpose, you WILL learn. We need to keep this in mind for our Middle Years students, especially year 9's.
At Templestowe College the Year 7 staff should be starting with a "Learning to Learn" unit devised by four Educators. Spending the first few lessons in all subjects getting to know the kids and then teaching them about how they learn best, establishing their preferred learning styles, discussing and learning about the sorts of foods to eat, how they affect the brain, the best environment for learning and beginning to talk about the Habits of MInd.
The Cluster ran numerous workshops and professional development sessions on the Habits of Mind in 2006. Daniel Gooding, Leading Schools Fund Eucator for Knox Secondary Learning Community, was a great help to us and his knowledge and assistance was appreciated. The College decided to implement the Habits into the school curriculum and culture, beginning with the Junior School and then continuing in 2008 into year 9 and 10. Staff need to be committed and make a conscientious effort to incorporate them into their units plans and daily lessons. It will be interesting to see how they go. I hope they remember I am available at any time for assistance.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Check these out .....
It is amazing how appealing it is to write to "no-one" but know that "anyone" can read it ! It is quite addictive. I tend to become obsessive with things and suddenly it is with blogging.
I am so fortunate in my job to meet many amazing and inspiring teachers. I have the time to do the reading and the research and the networking that many teachers could only wish for. The Cluster Educators themselves are an incredibly exciting and generous group of people. I am a part of the Phase 2 Cluster group in the Eastern Region. We meet regularly ( although less in recent years due to budget cuts at the regional office) and everyone shares ideas, unit plans, rescources, whatever you need someone will most likely have, or know someone who does.
It is not only the Cluster Educators that inspire me, but educators in general. People such as Esther Weichart, Kim Blackmore, Gary Bass and many more who I will add to my posts later. Not only do I want to acknowldege each of them but to thank them for what they have contributed to education. ( I will add a link to each of these people when I seek their permission)
Other impressive people I have come across since I began blogging include
Joseph Papaleo - check out his presentation on how to use Google Earth that he presented at the K - 12 conference
Jo McLeay - excellent discussions and some great links on her open classroom site
The potential of blogging can be seen in this students blog , discovered from one of Jo's links
I am so fortunate in my job to meet many amazing and inspiring teachers. I have the time to do the reading and the research and the networking that many teachers could only wish for. The Cluster Educators themselves are an incredibly exciting and generous group of people. I am a part of the Phase 2 Cluster group in the Eastern Region. We meet regularly ( although less in recent years due to budget cuts at the regional office) and everyone shares ideas, unit plans, rescources, whatever you need someone will most likely have, or know someone who does.
It is not only the Cluster Educators that inspire me, but educators in general. People such as Esther Weichart, Kim Blackmore, Gary Bass and many more who I will add to my posts later. Not only do I want to acknowldege each of them but to thank them for what they have contributed to education. ( I will add a link to each of these people when I seek their permission)
Other impressive people I have come across since I began blogging include
Joseph Papaleo - check out his presentation on how to use Google Earth that he presented at the K - 12 conference
Jo McLeay - excellent discussions and some great links on her open classroom site
The potential of blogging can be seen in this students blog , discovered from one of Jo's links
What are Cluster Educators?
I have the very nice title of "Innovations and Excellence Educator". I have spoken at a number of conferences over the last two years particularly in the areas of Middle Years, and Differentiating Curriculum. Interestingly most of the attendees have been from the Independent system and have never heard of a "Cluster Educator". I effectively work for five schools to encourage and assist teachers to reflect on their teaching practices in order to provide innovative and engaging lessons. Even staff in my own schools have been known to comment that they don't know where I am or exactly what I do all the time. A friend suggested that I keep a Blog so that I can inform people of what I am doing, and share some of the great stuff happening in state education, and i thought it was a great idea. Particularly as the focus for my Cluster is to build and maintain a learning community through consistent and effective delivery of a Thinking Curriculum and the use of ICT.
A bit of background ......
The Victorian State government introduced the Innovations & Excellence initiative in 2003. It was phased in over three years and funding was supplied to groups of schools who joined together in "Clusters". By 2005 all Victorian schools were a part of a cluster, there are 247 in total. An Educator was appointed for each Cluster, usually someone who was removed from the classroom and given the full time role of developing educational programs that would improve student learning. Initially the project was aimed at the Middle Years, however, the importance of leading change in teaching practice and improving student engagement and student outcomes has resulted in its extension from P - 12.
The Initiative was to go over three years, so Phase 1 Clusters were effectively complete in 2006. They were extended for twelve months. At the end of 2006, the government announced the project would run for a further twelve months, with funding provided to meet Educator wages only. The project was extended to include P -12 with a preferred concentration on the areas of maths and science. So I have my job until the end of this year and then ?????????????
At Templestowe we refer to ourselves as the MYTIE Cluster ( Middle Years Templestowe Innovations and Excellence). My schools include Templestowe College,
Templestowe Valley Primary School, Templestowe Heights Primary School, Manningham Park Primary School and Bulleen Heights Special School. I work with a number of teams, from Management (which is a Principal or Assistant Principal from each school), a curriculum team, and then professional Learning teams within and across the schools. I run Professional Learning sessions, team-teach, faciliate joint projects, supply resources and ideas, encourage inter-school visits and do what I can to help teachers keep up to date. This year I will also be heavily involved in the administration of the Principles of Learning and Teaching (PoLT) across the cluster as well. I am very excited about that, but more about PoLT in another post.
So I hope you will join me occastionally and that you may find a few interesting things may be of use to you as well.
A bit of background ......
The Victorian State government introduced the Innovations & Excellence initiative in 2003. It was phased in over three years and funding was supplied to groups of schools who joined together in "Clusters". By 2005 all Victorian schools were a part of a cluster, there are 247 in total. An Educator was appointed for each Cluster, usually someone who was removed from the classroom and given the full time role of developing educational programs that would improve student learning. Initially the project was aimed at the Middle Years, however, the importance of leading change in teaching practice and improving student engagement and student outcomes has resulted in its extension from P - 12.
The Initiative was to go over three years, so Phase 1 Clusters were effectively complete in 2006. They were extended for twelve months. At the end of 2006, the government announced the project would run for a further twelve months, with funding provided to meet Educator wages only. The project was extended to include P -12 with a preferred concentration on the areas of maths and science. So I have my job until the end of this year and then ?????????????
At Templestowe we refer to ourselves as the MYTIE Cluster ( Middle Years Templestowe Innovations and Excellence). My schools include Templestowe College,
Templestowe Valley Primary School, Templestowe Heights Primary School, Manningham Park Primary School and Bulleen Heights Special School. I work with a number of teams, from Management (which is a Principal or Assistant Principal from each school), a curriculum team, and then professional Learning teams within and across the schools. I run Professional Learning sessions, team-teach, faciliate joint projects, supply resources and ideas, encourage inter-school visits and do what I can to help teachers keep up to date. This year I will also be heavily involved in the administration of the Principles of Learning and Teaching (PoLT) across the cluster as well. I am very excited about that, but more about PoLT in another post.
So I hope you will join me occastionally and that you may find a few interesting things may be of use to you as well.
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