Flying With Your Flock - #edchatnz

By D. Dibenski (images.fws.gov ([1])) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

I love language. That's one of the reasons I tweet.  I love the crafting that goes into the "pithy epithet" of 140 characters.

I love collective nouns.  A school of fish. A pride of lions. A herd of cats. A bowl of nuts.

I love being part of a collective noun.  A thought that came from Danielle Myburgh at the start of the conference was the challenge of being "the lone nut": the person not afraid to take risks, to go against the crowd, to make a change for the positive, to sing in the silences and dance in the stillness.

A lot of twiducators seem to feel like lone nuts in their schools.  They are fired up about the learning through Twitter, and the power of using other digital technologies for connection and collaboration. They want to find out more about modern learning environments, digital literacy, blogging, gaming and coding.  And sometimes - maybe more than sometimes - they want to share and no one wants to listen.

More than once I've listened to educators who feel that frustration.  It might be good to stand out from the crowd, but being an outlier is a lonely thing.

So opportunities like #edchatnz are great for us. It truly is a place where we swim with the Twitter stream instead of feeling like we are battling against the rapids.

And we like the opportunity to feel that collective togetherness by being in the bowl - in the flock of Twitter birds.  Some of the birds are sharing sky space like the lovely folk of the Hobsonville Point schools, who opened their wings and shared their nests. (Apologies for the mashed metaphors, but I am enjoying myself).

For a weekend we are no longer the lonely nut or the ugly duckling; we've found our flock and we can't stop the singing in our heads.

Replying to Reid...the #edchatnz Blogging Meme

If you get included in the blogging meme: copy/paste the questions and instructions into your own blog then fill out your own answers. Share on twitter tagging 5 friends.

1. How did you attend the #Edchatnz Conference? (Face 2 Face, followed online or didn’t)

It was a MUST attend for me. I'm one of the early #edchatnz crowd – and well, the “queen” it would appear – so one must make an effort! I love @MissDtheTeacher and what she has done to BITS and wouldn’t have missed it.

I told my team, leapt in the car after a meeting on Thursday afternoon, and drove the three hours to Auckland where my lovely tweep friend @CaroBush was hosting “the girls”. We went to #Educafe with @EmmaWinder25 and @andrewcowie and had the most marvellous think tank time…but I digress; that’s another post.

Next morning it was on the road to HPSS with @CaroBush, @digitallearnin and @annagerrit – and I think we were first there!



2. How many others attended from your school or organisation?

Just me.



3. How many #Edchatnz challenges did you complete?

Hmmm – certainly #selfies, #grelfies, #melfies and #twofies.

Also assisted @digitallearnin with the dance challenge in @andrewcowie’s digital literacy breakout.  She held the camera while I yelled at everyone, “Get up! Dance! It’s a challenge! DO IT!”



4. Who are 3 people that you connected with and what did you learn from them?

@boonman who is a well-known advertising face (had to ask him if he really was himself) but did his best work on our Twitter video. Funny guy! Smarter looking in real life. (He he.)
@AKeenReader who reminded me that we all have an influence on each other and it’s so important to make those connections and have that support.
@mattynicholl whose whole face lights up when he greets someone.

But I want to say EVERYONE!  I really get pleasure from meeting all the tweeps I talk to online, reconnecting with people I now regard as friends, new tweeps I didn’t already know and anyone who shares my passion for learning and sharing. So I could just add my “following” list!



5. What session are you gutted that you missed?

I would have liked to see @geomouldy in action, @nanogirl, and @rosmaceachern, who was talking about being a learning coach in this different school environment.



6. Who is one person that you would like to have taken to Edchatnz and what key thing would they have learned?

I can’t choose one. The people who should go might not be ready to go.  The teachers at school who would love to go but have small children or Saturday sport commitments and put their kids first.  The people who don’t get the whole connected, collaborative, online environment and being a global citizen.

I’d love people to see what an amazing network is forming through Twitter: my staffroom of choice, where hierarchies don’t exist, people share the same vision for learning and get each other.



6. Is there a person you didn't get to meet/chat with (F2F/online) that you wished you had? Why?

Yes – some names that constantly pop up on my feed like @DanceWellNZ, @nanogirl and the Ngatea lot who I promised @Neil_NPS I would look for.

I love putting the faces to the names. @nanogirl has been an inspiration in science and with her handling of the media.

I have to say though, that I met a huge bunch of tweeps! Yay! Lots of #grelfies and #huggingandshrieking to prove it.



7. What is the next book you are going to read and why?

I need to finish “Boy Writers” by Ralph Fletcher, which is inspirational and down to earth. He is a father of boys and a teacher of writing; Gail Loane recommended the book to me.

Next will be the #edubookchatnz choice, “Key Competencies for the Future” by Rosemary Hipkins et al.



8. What is one thing you plan to do to continue the Education Revolution you learnt about at #EdchatNZ?

Lots of things were reinforced.  I think that not being worried about being the lone nut is the most important thing. We aren't lone nuts and I'm already spreading the good salt.  The NZ Curriculum document is a good one, and I need to keep reminding folk what it says.

I'll continue to look at gaming with Minecraft and coding.



9. Will you take a risk and hand your students a blank canvas?

I try to now. My NAPP inquiry was about boys and writing and I am fascinated by the “feminisation” of education; some say it doesn’t exist. I think it does. One thing is less teacher talk, more discovery.



Who do I tag with this meme:

@CaroBush
@digitallearnin
@annagerrit
@LaSampsonater
@Belchick1

So What's So Cool About Coding?

So I've jumped in...I'm a learner too.  I've started an elective class in our arts and culture timeslot in a Friday, and I'm doing code.org, where we work through projects.  At Educamp Auckland two Saturdays ago, Lesley Sampson aka @LaSampsonator decided to brave the "smackdown" and suggest we start a teachers' club.  Obviously other teachers are feeling like me.

Last night, very timely, the #aussieED chat was on coding; what a full and rigorous discussion! One of the best chats for resource sharing I've been part of, and a HUGE number of resources to go through:

I've now completed my first two exercises in code.org, and feel chuffed that I've both made the time and completed the exercises.  They aren't that easy. I'm obviously not as logical or spatially skilled as I'd like;  I can see the benefit for my students for improving both problem solving skills, algebraic thinking, angles, estimation and following a logical sequence.  Maybe it's not a good idea to do this late at night...

My first two classes with the group of Tech Wizards have started well.  The boys - yes, all boys - are right into it and I'm nearly redundant.  So far they are working on Tynker.com which has been successful because I can set up a class, give the students individual passwords, then check out their work on a collective gallery page. I think we'll move on quickly, and there are one or two who want to move into more complex sites which I need to check out.

It's also a great opportunity to watch kids learn and think about aspects like letting them find out about the info.  So we're experimenting with shared Google docs, forms and self help videos.

Click on the picture to go to the video!

A mention in a tweet brought a collaboration with Craig Kemp aka @mrkempnz in Singapore. Because we are doing similar things with similar groups, we thought the kids could communicate through a doc or form.  So far so good.

I'll post again when we are further along!

#educamptt How to Spend a Saturday Learning - Here, There, Anywhere!

While I didn't drive up to Educamp Tai Tokerau, I WAS there!

It was a fantastic experience sharing and contributing to the smackdown, and facilitating two workshops with the amazing Monika Kern (@BeLchick).

Spur of the moment stuff: I sat amongst the washing at home (well, almost) and talked about Coding and Minecraft with groups of teachers. Had a momentary panic about not having prepared resources but in the end, went with the flow. Being a talking head was enough.

What an amazing experience! No special outfit, no travelling for hours to Northland from here, no accommodation costs. And I managed to do some chores in between.(Well, the bed got made.)

But here I still am...storifying and blogging.  Sometimes you just have days like that!

It's All About Connecting - #connectedrotorua

We want these meetings to meet needs and wants. Twitter was suggested at the last meeting, so Twitter it was! (And I don't need to be asked twice.)

I think it's the MOST important arena for teachers to build their personal learning networks.  I've said it before - here's my post on being Attwicted to Learning.

It's harder to convince teachers of this however.  in spite of this, a dozen keen folk came out to find out why this is so.

Knowing Alex Le Long had presented on Twitter at the NZATE conference in the holidays, I thought we would spread the love and get her to share her presentation.  Thanks Alex! it was very informal, with questions and clarifications as we went along.  Two new tweeps joined up and others enthused that they would start using it more.

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Q5oTIOrh8v5MOm4mNW6quFi9GDmvm2wyiWiKzW20D34/edit#slide=id.p

We moved on to the topic of Blogging. as the discussion went that way, I talked about protocols and security:

• Don't forget that your school owns intellectual property completed in its name - so by inference - even student blogs.
• That means you need some identification and some pastoral control.
• Use the school name in some form in the URL so that they are easily found. we use "mokoia-int"
• Blogger settings allow you as teacher or administrator to both be an author and moderate either posts or comments or both. Suggest you get in there!
• Use first names, not surnames in titles and URLs and never identify a student with an individual portrait photo.
• Decide on the purpose of the blog.  Will it be to publish beautiful teacher-edited work, or is it rather evidence of learning? The latter is more real and helps with parent understanding about where their learner is at. Say this in the blog description which appears under the title.
• Use the word verification; there are unfortunately, too many spammers out there!
• Advertise! Use twitter to tell the world about the blog post. Get your network to RT (retweet). Your young blogger will need readers and commenters!

Marnel talked about her Kidblogs.  She teaches new entrants and Year 1.  Even young students can post with a teacher's help.  And parents love being able to share their child's learning at home.

Her children participate in Kidsedchatnz too, for which she is one of seven teacher facilitators. Make sure your children have real places to read and write, with real just in time audiences! 

Thanks everyone for another great evening of learning and sharing.  Next time - Friday 5 September, we'll discuss eportfolios, so bring your ideas, your questions - and a friend!

Connected Rotorua Twitter Handles:

@mrs_hyde    @1MvdS    @ariaporo22   @lynmartin  @suewintersnz  @NeedhamVicki  @nobiek59   @JakBBB