New Years Resolutions

National Learning Partnerships

This year, our school is receiving a large amount of funding through the National Learning Partnerships program, to improve outcomes for students and professional standards attained by the teachers.

Under the program, all the staff who participate receive relief from face-to-face teaching for four periods. The four periods are split so that two periods are spent working on the Quality Teaching model and the other two on improving student outcomes. Each staff member has had an interview with the Deputy Principal who then works out how the individual learning goals can be allocated between the two initiatives.

I'm quite excited by the program as it is flexible enough for me to pursue my own goals over the course of the year. I believe that those goals are in keeping with the aim of the program. From the students point of view the aim of NLP's is to improve literacy, numeracy and engagement in the classroom. From the Quality Teaching model I will be improving my own understanding of the pedagogy as well as improving other teachers understanding of the resources available to them that will assist them in their goals as well.

Goals

So, what would I like to achieve this year?

All the work last year on Personal Learning Networks and Web2.0 resources really impressed me on the potential audience that blogs and blogging provides. I feel that this may be the hook necessary to engage students in improving their literacy skills as they communicate their understanding of their studies to a much bigger audience than just their teacher.

Goal 1. Get some students using blogs as a their learning journal.

The amount of useful tools on the Internet is amazing and there are some wonderful applications that are so much more interesting and satisfying to use than the usual MS app suite. I've already had some interest from other staff after demonstrating various gadgets and hope to share more of that with some of my colleagues

Goal 2: Help staff and students become proficient users and creators within the various Web2.0 tools available

I am getting an interactive whiteboard in my classroom and whilst I am familiar with the software suite that comes with it , I haven't fully explored the potential that an IWB offers a mathematics classroom. I want to make sure that it becomes an essential component as opposed to a useful gimmick.

Goal 3: Become a proficient user and creator of IWB materials relevant to mathematics

I have a senior mathematics class this year and am hoping that I can maintain interest in the subject (through my achievement in the above goals). My experience in the past is that the students get a little disheartened with the amount of work involved and give up, either changing to an easier mathematics course or giving up the subject altogether. I am attending one of the extension classes so I can observe my Head Teacher in action and also brush up on some maths that I just haven't used on a regular basis for several years.

Goal 4: Reduce the normal attrition experienced by our senior maths classes by maintaining interest and understanding in the subject through the use of technology and active engagement.

Getting Started

I've already signed up a fellow teacher who is exploring youtube and wanting to learn a little more. I'll post a notice in my staff common room to see if I can drum up a little more interest.

I'm also a member of our ICT and PBS (positive behaviour for success) committees and will be able to offer some solutions to problems or opportunities that arise in those forums.

I'm hoping to adapt the 23things program offered a few years ago by the Virtual Services Task Group (SJPL & SJSU staff), who modified The Learning 2.0 program designed by Helene Blowers, Technology Director, Public Library of Charlotte & Mecklenburg County. I've read through most of it and think it has a lot to offer anyone who takes it up. I know that I will benefit from actually doing it as I am still only a little way into my own learning journey.

So wish me luck and, as always, please feel free to send suggestions or offer corrections

Presenting Blogs and PLN's to my school

Okay.
The school year is over, the kids are on their way home and all our staff have got two days of professional development before the holidays.

I'm trying to encourage the use of blogging as an educational strategy for our students in the New Year and am presenting my case for the use of Blogs and PLN's to the staff in a couple of sessions tomorrow.

I owe a huge debt to the members of my PLN as, over the last few months, they have greatly contributed to my understanding of Personal Learning Networks, have asked me several pertinent questions and made some wonderful suggestions abut how to go about integrating these technologies into my school's culture. Thank you so much to Susan, Chris, Vahid, Julia, Scott, Jim, Sara, Kate and Linn. I am still amazed at how wide afield my network is spread and the different cultures that it is already influenced by.

I apologize in advance for any suggestions that haven't been put into the programme for tomorrow but I am hoping that next year will see many of the staff and students continue to develop their understanding and I will be able to make use of the many suggestions that have been offered.

I'm pushing ahead with blogging as an entry point to PLN's as I believe that text is probably the most generic and applicable medium that will apply to the participants tomorrow. Other formats may be more useful to individuals and Key Learning Areas but I am hoping that I will be able to work with smaller groups in the New Year and assist them to find the tools relevant for their own PLN's.

My plan is this:

• I am going to start with the Powerpoint presentation as it says what I want it to say and I can leave it as a resource on Slideshare for people to come back to if they want to.
• Having run through the presentation, I will model the process of setting up a blog on the interactive white board at the front of the room. Hopefully, I'll be able to take everyone through setting up their own blog and then publishing their first post.
• The modelled blog will become a clearing house for all the blogs that the school population creates. So individuals can return to the site and find links to new blogs that may pique their interest.
• I'm going to use EduBlogs, although I will leave the choice of platform up to individuals. Being a school based resource, I have to try and protect the students from adult content where possible.
• I've created a Symbaloo page to provide a series of links that I hope may prove useful.

I would like to think that this will provide an opportunity for the school population to find out a bit more about each other and discover common interests that fall outside the typical domain of a 'school'. I also hope it will set many on the same road to developing professional contacts with people outside the school and our immediate local area.

Why teach PLN's?

I'm Teaching but they don't seem to be Learning

I've been trying to work out why the PLENK course peaked my interest in the first place and I think I've come up with an answer.

I started teaching because of my experience at Camp Chipinaw in NY. I found that I got a great deal from working with kids who were able to make huge developments in their self efficacy through positive experiences in quite challenging environments. I then spent about 10 years following a career path involved in experiential education. I only entered mainstream education when, having arrived in Australia, I found that the outdoor recreation industry here is more seasonal than in the UK (go figure!!). I trained as a PE teacher and then, when it became apparent that there are too many of those in NSW, I retrained as a Maths teacher and, in the process, returned to subjects I pursued rather unsuccessfully in Years 11 and 12. (A case of those who can do, those that can't... !).

So I don't feel particularly successful as a Maths teacher. I love the idea of teaching and I've had successes in terms of "light-bulb" moments, but not many in my current field. I can get by and I can teach the content, but I don't seem to be able to get the students into a state of "flow" (by which I think I'm referring to Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development)

Paddling the River PLENK

I'd not really thought about it in this way before but the ideas were flowing on Friday night and this was one that popped up. When I'm in a particular mood (relaxed, pressures off for the day), I sometimes find that what I am thinking or writing about continually triggers fresh ideas or insights. I'll start by jotting down a few ideas and then an hour later realise that I've filled out several pages of notes. Up till now I've enjoyed these moments of productivity but not really considered the vehicle by which I can disseminate them and receive feedback and criticism. My PLN is the most obvious mechanism in which to do this.

What I enjoy about PLENK is the feeling that I'm involved in a highly productive network of learners and experts. Some of the content is way over my head, but it's not hard to find things out and catch up. It is also very empowering to be able to contribute to discussions. Even if my input is not very ground-breaking (or even helpful), it can generate feedback and further discussion and so help expand this gradual unfolding of knowledge.

In terms of flow, the river analogy has already been used several times in the various discussions and web posts. But I'm a paddler at heart and so will string it along a bit further. Engaging in this course does feel like I'm sat on the side of a river watching a lot of information drift past. Every so often I jump in and float along with the current by joining conversations and making comments on people's posts. Every so often I'll get swept into an eddie where I'll decide to hop back on the bank again or wait until someone throws a metaphorical rock into the pool and the conversation sweeps off on a new wave.

I still feel, very much, the novice paddler. I stay close to the shore, not yet brave enough to head into deeper waters and paddle with the pro's. The fear of capsizing by posting a discussion topic or blog post that tries to chart new territory that has already been charted and finished by others! I know that my fear in this regard is unfounded. Throughout the course, the support for newbies has always come across as whole-hearted. I know there will be people around to put me back in my boat and help me figure things out, point me in the right direction.

The classroom as a component of a Personal Learning Network

As a teacher, I love the idea of my students being exposed to a supportive learning environment in which the emphasis is on them to contribute and improve each other's understanding of the course. I want the physical classroom to become a part of my students personal learning network, as opposed to it being the only place where they learn Mathematics. Of course they learn maths in hundreds of different places, but they don't make the connection between what they do in "real life" and what they do in the classroom.

I want the lesson to continue outside the classroom and I see PLN's as a method of enabling that. The important element being that the network is explicitly about the students interactions with maths and maths ideas as they travel through their day. The more those interactions are published by the students and then read by their peers, the more noticeable they will become to everyone in the class. I've introduced Edmodo to my classes and we'll see how they respond to it to the stimulus questions I've posed on it.

But to make the most of the opportunity, I really need to be able to teach them how to build their own PLN's. To stop relying on the educational structures that have been imposed on them since primary school. To be brave.

My view of education doesn't fit the current model. It's never really worked for me, neither as a student or as a teacher. Experiential education had a major impact on the direction my life and career took and inspired me to be a teacher. But my classroom isn't based on experience and it is, quite frankly, boring. I believe that teaching students to develop their own personal learning networks, and engage with conversations outside of the classroom is closer to the idea behind the one-to-one laptop programs appearing in schools then the more traditional methods of education. But I can see that implementing this will require a fair bit of work and, worryingly, a departure from the traditional curriculum. A risky move really given the students whose futures I am experimenting with.