What’s happening?

Picture this :
  • Connor comments on Matt’s first blog post and gives him advice as an experienced  (6 months) blogger and wishing him ‘Good Luck’
  • A Year 3/4 class participate in a global project with schools in South Africa/NZ/USA/UK/Canada and Chile using a Wiki and Edmodo to share stories
  • Sue comments on Simon’s post with his published story, encouraging his writing
  • Mary posts to Edmodo publicising her new blog post (having returned to blogging after a lapse of a month or so) and responds to a homework tasks by sharing her response on-line
  • Teachers post comments on student blogs, praising, encouraging and suggesting
  • Robyn  and Mark trouble shoot  issues with saving and exporting Kodu projects for entering to Screen It competition by consulting the on-line help
  • Joe uses the chat feature on Skoodle (SuperClubsPlus) to get help from a classmate correcting his spelling words from home (he left the sheet at school)
  • A new blogger asks for help from classmates on Edmodo
  • A teacher posts on Edmodo reminding students to support a worthy cause they have been discussing
  • Brenden requests to use You-tube to look up  a movie how to create a bridge using Kodu (game making software)
  • Teachers sharing resources and ideas via a Yammer community
  • A student adds a page to his blog linking to his YouTube channel (created at home) with ‘How-To’ videos he has created.  (An opportunity here for discussion about Terms of Service that he is breaking)
  • A new season of Quad-blogging begins as the US school year opens
  • Students publish their thoughts about their current animation project on Edmodo
  • Staff share resources and ideas on a Yammer network
  • A teacher emails parents, praising student work, highlighting ways they can be involved, raising awareness of events and blog posts
  • A Year 3 student emails me on the weekend asking for his SuperclubsPlus log in details as he left them at school
  • Class teachers constantly posting to Twitter to advertise their new blog posts and connecting with other educators
  • A group of students working on a collaborative project decide to create a data chart to itemise their roles and responsibilities
  • An author responds to the draft writing of students that they have published on their blogs for feedback
  • The mother of a fresh blogger responds to her son’s writing
  • A new class blog connecting with a buddy class at a nearby school to promote commenting skills
  • A teacher from another school responds to a student’s post
  • Sarah uses Edmodo to ask her classmates for opinions as to the language to select for Year 7 next year
  • Susan, a student from another school introduces herself to Samara from our school as another Student blogging Challenge participant
  • Sue W, the organiser of the Student Blogging challenge comments on student blogs, welcoming them to the challenge.
Do you get the idea? A fortnight in our on-line world.  So it made me think ….  Each conversation can be considered in regard to Richard Olsen’s Model.

The purpose of this white paper is to use the Collective Knowledge Construction Model to identify strategies by which knowledge construction is facilitated when learning online. And, secondly to encourage teachers, school leaders and other stakeholders to reimagine the pedagogical, technical and contextual consequences that arise from teaching and learning in technology rich environments.

Collective Knowledge Construction

I find it helpful to refer to this and ponder where we are and where we might direct the learning so we continue to explore the possibilities created by our involvement in the online world.  Where to next?

 

Keeping in touch – Class Blogging

I work at a school where the teachers have taken to Class Blogging – they use their blogs as wonderful tools to communicate, connect and collaborate. I am only at school two days a week and so I could have the potential of feeling disconnected, isolated from the comings and goings occurring when I am not there. Nothing could be furtherer from the truth. All I need to do is check out the blogs and I can see what is happening.  Even if I was there full-time like most, in a busy staffroom, we often don’t get to hear all the news from the other classrooms, but blogging allows that news to be disseminated in a wonderful way.

Tonight, I browsed the Senior blogs, here and here, and was updated about today’s excursion to ACMI. I then saw a tweet from a Prep teacher and found that the nesting boxes the Preps made last term, now have a home and inhabitants! I also learned that the senior students had been helping their Prep buddies developing lessons for the peers.

I found out the Middle students have been conducting Sports clinics for their classmates.  I saw a new Junior class blog spreading it’s wings and asking questions, hoping to get parents involved in the class conversations.   I could keep going, but you have got the gist.

I also see

  • class groups commenting on other class blogs
  • parents commenting on the children’s learning
  • students commenting on class blogs
  • teachers affirming each other’s practise
  • a wonderful chronicle of the general happenings within the school
  • classes appreciating the potential of asking questions of a worldwide audience
  • students reflecting on their learning and sharing their thoughts

I am very happy with what I see, we have come a long way and keep on evolving in our purpose, methods and styles.  I wonder what it will look like in six months.