Dust Echoes and M&Ms

Dust Echoes - a program we've already chosen to use in our WebQuest - must be on to a good thing!

Many of the stories have a more 'violent' images - use your understanding and relationship with your students before deciding whether to show the images. My mum is a teacher and we decided to use the Moon Man video in her class. We forwarned her students that some of the images were graphic and perhaps violent, and gave the students the option not to watch it. However, at the end of the video, her students said ' I dont' know what you're worried about - it was only a cartoon'. This may not always be the case though. She used her knowledge of her students to judge whether it is appropriate. We also linked the Dust Echoes story with another short video from ABC's Message Stick program called 'Before Galileo' which showed another interpretation of the Moon Man dreaming story.

There are plenty of teacher's resouces on the Dust Echoes websites that give a background to the stories, the applications for the classroom and a few activities that could be used in conjunction with each dreamtime story. These activities can be adapted into something more interactive, hands-on and creative ie. sequencing the story using interactive whiteboard, cutting up the story and having them to place the sentences in order.

Activity: Recreating story using Inspiration. Using the print screem button you are able to cut images from the video and place it into Inspiration. You can guide your students into a more consise visual retelling by restricting the number of images that can be portrayed.

Also look at MASH IT UP section of the Dust Echoes website - to retell the story in a personally created 1 minute version of the story. It is brilliant. Using images from the video, background sound and spoken text, students can retell the story in another form. Using an interactive website enables you to present the created stories to the whole class.

Excel - Maths with M&Ms

Note: Take care for student allergies! Other ideas of objects to use: Skittles, confetti, glitter stars etc

Graphs - visual presentation of data - be specific in what you ask students to do - ie. What kind of graph do you get them to use.

Activity: Create a graph representing 'What colour M&Ms are in your packet?'

Having little experience with Excel it was good to see some of the applications that it can be used for. Brilliant for maths lessons, data collection in investigation work and for research that is conducted over extended periods of time. It provides an opportunity for students to represent the data that they enter in a variety of ways such as in a pie graph, column graph or line graph just to name a few. Used in conjunction with more hand-on learning, programs like Excel give students the ability to present their learning in more diverse ways.

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Personal notes for Graph Design -

Highlight text in the spreadsheet to create a graph.

You are able to change the colour of each column to suit the way you wish to represent your data.

It is a great discussion starter about what are important aspects of a graph (labels, title, key etc)

Students can see different things represented in the same set of information. Group discussion allows other students to explore different ideas and avenues of thought around the same data set.

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Technology Design Briefs

Design Briefs

Coming up with a solution to a problem is not as easy as you think. As we grow older be become aware of key things to look out for when analysing a problem. For primary aged students, however, the investigation process has just begun, they have not developed a full understanding of the problem solving process and it is in the classroom that they have the opportunity to explore and practice these skills.

We analyse problems as we go, so as teachers, we need to demonstrate the steps to begin to incorporate this kind of thinking into students learning. These skills will develop over time, as a teacher we should aim to develop these skills over time.

As students language improves, so do their higher order thinking and problem solving skills.

Design Brief Problem for today: Design a frog that jumps!

Look for extensions in the activities to increase their thinking about the problem.

There is no wrong answer. No idea is a bad idea. There is only opportunity to experiment further and continually develop on their ideas. Continuous thinking, into continuous learning.

Whole class discussions will enable different ideas to be seen, analysed and evaluated. It is a great way to highlight that students will all have different ideas yet they all solve the problem at hand.

Quizzes and other activities

www.quia.com/web


Quizzes - see www.quia.com/quiz/2513812.html
Activities - see www.quia.com/hm/668170.html

These activities will engage students in their work, being both the seeker and distributer of knowledge. Focus on spelling, grammer and other literacy concepts can be highlighted and the games can be changed and edited to fix any errors that come along the way. Quizzes such as the Multiple Choice Quiz entice students to create questions from knowledge that they have found or know. They can be fun, informative, challenging, however you would like to see it being used in your classroom.

Students can email their friends, parents, other family members to use.

What we were shown was only a small amount that this website can offer. It will be fun to explore this site later on and think about just how much these ideas can be incorporated into the classroom.

Working with children in special schools, puzzle and activities that do not rely heavily on the written word would work really well. Connecting images with words, one-to-one correspondance with counting and other things like that. Ready made games may not focus on the skills that you are looking to teach and programs like quia.com allow teachers to personalise their learning tools to utilise the strengths of their students. It is definately something to come back to while on rounds next.

ePortfolios

ePortfolios

Focusing on ePortfolios and applying for jobs - presenting yourself in the most appropriate way to ensure that you are shortlisted for a position...

But first, Ms Publisher...

creating a brochure of a place you want to visit...

I remember working with Publisher in my Primary School years, and perhaps in the computer subjects in early High School. I think the different templates for all the different text and print types is wonderful.

ePortfolios - moving forward with technology - both a tool for presenting student achievement and your own achievements! What can you do to make you more employable! MSPublisher or MSPowerpoint are good bases for this kind of presentation - some free sites aid in this - Mahara for example.

Self Promotion

Self promotion seems to be the key. Not only do you have to write a brilliant job application and dress the part at the interview if you are lucky enough to be short-listed (here's hoping that they are plentiful!), we now need to look further and positively present our professional image to the world. I think this is a brilliant concept. It may take a little while to master the computer templave, but the possibilities that this can create for you is endless. Anything that will increase your positioning and enhance your employability is worthy of pursuing!

It will be intersting to go through our achievements to date and bea ble to see the connections that you can create toward the positions that we have worked so hard this year to get. Being older, we have so much to draw from our life experiences, information that you would love the people sitting on the interview pannel to know, but which do not necessarily fit into the timeframe of the interview...but how to make sure that they do take the time to look through the portfolio?

Thank you, Greg, for going over some important information about the interview and application process with us in the workshop. It will be something of a little stress for all of us as we come to the end of this year. I was fortunate enough to sit in the AEU presentation for applying and interviewing as well which went very much along the lines of what you spoke about. The presenter for the AEU highlighted a few home truths about getting shortlisted, indicating that your cover letter is one of the most important tools to getting shortlisted.

I love the analogy he had when describing the big pilies of applications that come through for any teaching position. He said, most of the applications are like apples and oranges. They all look and sound the same. What they are looking for are the bananas! The applications that stand out of the crowd and yell - HEY! LOOK AT ME!

So, my motto for the months to come...BE THE BANANA!