DOLORE SIT AMET ERAT TE BLANDIT DIUS ALISED VELI WISI ERAT DOLRE SIT ENIM ERAT ELIT
ISSUE 3
VOLUME 1
2011
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ALISED VELI DOLORE SIT ET ERAT TE BLANDIT DIISI TE WISI ERAT DOLRE SIT ENIM ERAT ELIT ................. 2
VELI WISI ERAT DE SIT ERA ENIM ERAT ELITDOLORE SIT AMET ERAT TE BNDIT DIUS ALISED PLURIOS ......... 2
Mentone E-learning
TEACHING IDEAS FOR USING TECHNOLOGY IN THE CLASSROOM
The online professional development issue. This issue is all about ways that you can connect with other teachers and find information for your professional learning.
Curation Online There are lots of sites online that are free to use and allow you to curate and store content to share with others. You can choose a topic of interest to you and essentially create your own page filling it with things that you have found. All you need to do is sign up with an email address, install a bookmarklet (which you simply drag to your favourites bar) and then start curating. The most powerful thing about this is the ability to connect with others who may share similar topics. I use Scoop It to store my information but another excellent site is Paper.li. Once you have begun you can add your twitter account to the site so that you
can broadcast your topics. Others then follow you and share their ideas too. You have complete editorial control and can connect to others who share suggestions with you on topics of interest. You then receive updates which show you what else you might be interested in and you can rescoop things that other users have posted or take the suggestions and scoop them. It is a great way to gather all of your reading on a particular topic together in one place and to link it to your learning and the learning of others. Constructivist thinking at its best.
http://www.scoop.it/ http://paper.li/
Storing your reading If you are doing some serious professional reading there are several resources which will help you. One of these is Issuu which allows you to create a shelf of documents which others have uploaded on topics of interest to you. It is a free site and you can search through for items of interest and then click to store them on your shelf. Another one is Evernote which allows you to ‘clip’ articles that you find online and read them at your leisure. You can also clip emails, notes and images. There are apps for phones and i-Pads on both of these sites. http://www.evernote.com/ http://issuu.com/
Using Twitter to develop your PLN
E-L EARNING F OR T EACHERS http://
Twitter is an excellent way to connect with like-minded individu-
elearningforteach-
als. There is a great teacher presence on Twitter who regularly
ers.wikispaces.com/
share ideas.
While microblogging sites such as Twitter may seem a bit trivial and even time wasting, they are a valuable way to connect with others who share your interests. You can tweet up to 140 characters and share hyperlinks with your followers, and there are numerous apps out there so that you can stay updated. The best reason for teachers to use them is their ability to use hashtags (#) which delineate particular topics. You can then
Search through particular sessions after their initial topics and find items that contact via Twitter. Many others have teachers have also share with the there are several examfound that Twitter group. You can help them ples of teachers who can set up lists have put out calls for find information. and groups, in A request tweeted authors or experts in the same way for assistance particular fields to as many does not often go online social ‘meet’ their class online unanswered. You sites, and engage in dialogue about your topic. Many teachers have found Twitter to be valuable in class as well, there are several examples of teachers who have put out calls for authors or experts in particular fields to ‘meet’ their class online, some even arranged Skype
may find that you already know of several people using Twitter and that is a good start for you. Mentone Grammar now have their own Twitter feed through which they can pass on information to parents and the school community. https://twitter.com/
The wikispaces site is for your ideas and tips on all things e-learning. It is a good place to ask questions and get some advice. There are many ‘how to’ guides on using technology for teaching. Join in the discussion. It meets some of your professional learning requirements for VIT. http:// elearningforteachers.wikispaces.com/
Live Binders- http://www.livebinders.com/ Is a way to collect information in an online ‘binder’ which can then be embedded and shared with others if you wish. You can collaborate with others in the creation of a binder. A group of teachers might set up a topic about teaching in their subject area for example.
Share your ideas: It would be great to have teachers sharing some of their experiences with e-learning in this newsletter. If you would like to write a short overview or would like to be interviewed for the newsletter please contact me lrl@mentonegrammar.net and I will include you in the next newsletter. I aim to get one of these out per term for your reference. I hope you have enjoyed this issue. Louise Robinson-Lay