Moderating comments and writing the first post:
Archive for April, 2008Just when I had the CPD presentation all worked out I received an email from edublogs! It turns out they’re making lots of changes. Their sign up page is changing from this …
to this …..
…. and apparently there’s lots more changes on the horizon. As well as having a fancy powerpoint presentation for my first attempt at providing CPD (along with a printed handout), I also managed to produce something on google docs. I was really chuffed at keeping up with the new technologies – but it seems that what I’ve produced is already out of date :) In a previous post I mentioned that I was to be involved in some local CPD courses about ‘blogging with classes’. It turns out that some of the teachers in my own school are coming along. Mrs N is one of those teachers and she is also going to be my stage partner next session. She gave me me this advice: “Can you keep it simple … because if I’m going to be expected to blog with the P 7’s, I need ’step by step’ advice. I’m glad it’s someone I know organising the cpd session because it means that I can ask lots of questions if I get lost.” I’ve been on ICT courses like that …… minutes into it I wanted to say “No – Rewind!” Well, this one is for Mrs N …. I hope it’s OK for John too He invited me to join the Open Source CPD wiki. I’m providing 3 two hour after school CPD courses. Here’s what I’ve come up with so far. Let me know what you think
On Thursday of this week Primary 7V represented Carronshore P.S. at the annual Ict Fair in Carronvale House, Larbert. Twelve children volunteered to attend the after school event. There were 5 girl volunteers and 7 boys. They all had a super time. The boys took great pleasure in describing how we use web 2.0 tools in all our learning. They may not have contributed as much to their individual blogs as the girls did during the 3 month study, but it was apparent that afternoon just how much they valued the type of learning taking place. They spoke confidently about:
……. and loads more They were keen to be the cameramen for the event, too, as can be seen below! It’s only a draft …. and I condensed 3500 words into this short post so probably didn’t include the important bits either The steps in the research involved investigating the useful features and barriers when using blogs and wikis and other emerging social software in a supportive online environment. Progress was then monitored. Motivation and formal and informal learning was evaluated. Section 1 The range and depth of topics - The blog posts were grouped into five different categories and a coding framework was devised. The five categories were:
Table 1
The posts covered a wide range of topics and in order to find the most popular, the invitational, experiential and reflective posts were scrutinised. The decision was made not to include the transient and informative posts in the investigation, as it was apparent during the initial gathering of information that the subject matter included in these posts consisted mainly of shallow content. Once the popular topics had been identified, it was noticed that particular themes were recurring in a number of different children’s blogs. Recurrent themes included:
The fact that these themes were recurring led to further examination. There is evidence that one pupil would write a reflective post and, rather than leave a comment, the children tended to replicate the introduction of the post, then personalise it with their own viewpoint.
Section 2 In this section, a narrower field of focus is established. It provides a descriptive account and analysis of the complex issues involved in the unfolding events. Three topics were analysed:
Online Identities Jackie referred to the children’s use of WeeMees. It was apparent that the children had great fun designing these characters for their blogs. In an informal discussion with Courtney, she explained how important it was for her to find strategies to improve her spelling in her new online environment. She had been identified as having difficulties with spelling, but stated: ‘I don’t really care about my spelling in a jotter because only me and the teacher sees it, but when I write on my blog, I don’t want a showing up when the likes of Nadine from the AllStars reads my stuff. She’s really good at spelling.’ When Miss L (a visiting student teacher) expressed a desire to set up a blog, the children were keen to help her to create an online identity by showing her the various themes on offer, and by helping her create a blog avatar. They also helped her to settle in to her new ‘home’ by leaving comments such as Rebecca’s: ‘HEY Miss Law congrats on getting your new blog im sure youll luv it !!!it is a bit complicated at first .Jaydean also says heyah !! well al luv having u in the class’ Early on in the study, I had noted in my online journal that two of the boys had been very excited after having received a comment from a boy in an Inverness school telling them about his football blog. When we followed the link, it was difficult to understand the posts on the blog because they consisted mainly of large black squares accompanied by a very short sentence. We later discovered that the black squares contained video clips of football games. The host video site is blocked by our school authority and the boys were very disappointed that they were unable to enter into any resulting debate. It was suggested that they could join in at home, but the consensus was that they had wanted to take part in school as a group. There were a number of occasions, however, when boys did add comments and posts from home. A comment left by Russell led to a discussion about the relationship between the online and offline environments. Russell commented on Miss Law’s blog: ‘YOU WILL BE PERFECTLY ABLE TO TEACH ANY YEAR BECAUSE AFTER TEACHING ALL OF 7V I THINK EVERYONE AGREES WITH ME BY SAYING YOU ARE A FANTASTIC TEACHER. ’ The Online / Offline Environment When the comment was noticed on Miss Law’s blog, a reflective post was added to my online journal. Russell would not have felt it appropriate to say something like that in the class, and the comment was not mentioned in class. During a class discussion about the subject, the children were asked if they thought that the blogs had impacted on their own offline relationships with their peers. Typical examples of the children’s responses are cited here:
A further example of an instance when the online / offline environment interconnected was when blog posts and wiki writing considered worthy of note was shared during class time. This tended to happen as a result of children coming in to class and announcing that they had posted / written something that they wanted to share with an audience. Resulting Impact on Teaching and Learning The desire to share what they had written with their classmates impacted on the delivery of the curriculum. Stories the children had written were shared via the interactive whiteboard. These showings resulted in class discussions about what makes a good story, directing the children’s attention to nice use of descriptive words, etc. Other ways in which the blogs and wikis directly influenced teaching and learning came about after the sharing of blog posts in class. For example:
The evidence shows that the posts and comments on the children’s individual blogs and the stories written on their wikis did indeed change the offline context of the classroom. The curriculum changed to one that was more ‘child led’ Condensed draft Conclusion and Implication sections to follow ……. The Edublogger post about using RSS appeared recently and it got me thinking about how I used to track the blogposts of my previous class bloggers. These blogs were set up with the help of David Gilmour from East Lothian Council. I had no knowledge of RSS (hadn’t even heard of it!), but I soon discovered that it was possible to track the children’s new blog posts by visiting certain East Lothian blogs. The sidebar would show information about the latest ‘edubuzz’ posts … just like the example below. Latest eduBuzz Posts Happily, I’ve now discovered how to use ‘Google Reader’ and today I found that Stuart – 4th from the top on the list above – from last year’s P7 class decided to put on a new blogpost (10 months since his last one!). You can read his post here: ‘Sorry, not been in touch much because couldn’t find a computer to get on. LHS is the best high school ever people talk about getting your head getting flushed down the lavvy isn’t even true.The work isn’t too hard and you get 2 go up the street 4 u lunch and get anything you want up there. Me and Marc were in a talent show but him and Iona never won and I never won so boohoo. High school is really great but some subjects like french, english/language, R.M.E, H.F.T (writing part) are all a little boring. P.E is brilliant but if you pick it 4 2 nd year it isn’t always physical sometimes it can be writing, Tech is excellent too but same again it’s not always practical work some is writing. High school isn’t scary but it is FUN. You barely even get lost because after a few weeks you know your way round but I will admit sometimes it will just slip your mind where your going. And you’ll need 2 get use 2 not skiving out class saying yuo need the toilet only sometimes if you are really bursting or if you have got a toilet pass which lets you go to the loo any time you can only get one if you have a medical problem. And you don’t get golden time up here. HUB cards are used to buy food at the hub but if you lose it you need 2 go 2 the front office and ask 4 a temperary card until they order a new one. Mine broke at first then I got a new one and I lost that one. I am absolutely tired so am going 2 ma bed cause it’s 5 in the morning and am at a sleepover so catch you later.’ I really appreciate Stuart’s post …. the incentive for writing the post is obviously to give a message to the present P7 class that they shouldn’t fear moving on to High School. I’ll make a point of sharing the post with the intended audience as soon as we return to school! Meanwhile - what is Feedburner?? ….. and what is twitter about?? I came across this video via John (I’m not sure why some people’s delicious entries end up in my ‘google reader’ – but I’m glad they do!). It’s a pity I won’t be able to show it in school because youtube is blocked. I’ve never fully understood copyright but I was a bit concerned that some children were getting pictures from google images for their blogs. I tried to explain about copyright, but the children were indignant that if it was on the internet anyway, then anyone could freely use it. Since then, however, little ‘copyright’ messages have been appearing on some of their stories on their wikis. For an example, click on this icon If someone writes a story at home on their wiki, they’re usually keen for it to be shared in school. We often find some time to do this on the whiteboard (it’s also a great way to instigate discussions about what makes a great piece of writing ….. sometimes we’ll use ‘2 stars and a wish’ to peer assess the writing. The children will often voluntarily go back and edit their stories as a result of these conversations). The story in the link above is an imaginary tale involving lots of people in the class. This inspired some more children to write imaginatively about their friends, too. One particular story, however, was very similar in content to the original. This led to discussions about just how much of someone else’s work you should be allowed to ‘borrow’ from. One of the useful things about a wiki is that it’s possible to look at the history of edits made. I receive emails whenever a wiki is edited, and it made me smile when I saw the changes made to the original story above. As she went on to finish and edit her story, she made some changes to her ‘copyright’ message. You can follow how the story progresses here After we had explained yet again sophie said that she was dreaming of what it would be like to draw pictures of famous people and so she ended up drawing the queen. We spent a little more time with the queen and then ran to the final picture which was the one i drew. Copyright! The story was continued at a later date: I checked my watch to find it was almost midnight yet none of us felt tired at all! “Guys,” I said, ” Its almost midnight!” “Wow!” they all replied including our new-found, famous friends. Just then one of the city clocks struck midnight and the castle from DisneyWorld appeared with Cinderella ,and Johnny Depp with the balloon, at the front of it looking for her glass slipper. At the other side of us Nina’s elephant and African sunst appeared. Everywhere around us was covered with the pictures we drew copyright! ……. And Finally: Nina wailed for the second time, “Oh no! This time we really are locked in and we don’t know who will help us!” Just then Miss Law came running to the door with a key to let us all out. “I am back and with the key!” she shouted as she turned the key in the lock. We all smiled as the door opened and we walked out of the art room. “That was some adventure!” Anna commented. “What was?” Miss Law asked, “You can’t have had a big adventure when you have only been in there for 10 minutes!” We were all absolutley speachless once we found out time had hardly changed but i managed to say with a wink, “You’d be surprised Miss Law. You’d be surprised!” THE END! COPYRIGHT! She should be really proud of her great story. I think she’s learned lots about the importance of copyright …… and she’s sending a very clear message out to others, too :) |
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