Reflecting on the thought that he feels rushed has made me think about the first three weeks of this term for my class. Just how much are they being rushed too? In an effort to slow the classroom morning rush we have introduced a ten minute ‘homeroom’ time from 8.30 to 8.40 am. In theory this is a wonderful moment to connect, think, reflect and plan for the day or the week ahead. In practice I am finding myself rushing to remind them to post lunch-orders, to find their diaries, to prepare for the first lesson and more. If only I could have thirty minutes ‘homeroom’ time then perhaps my ideas of deep breathing or even classroom yoga could come into play. I reflect that I must find time for this in the ten minutes I have.

The first three weeks also seemed to have rushed past. I know that already we are behind in our English program. Since lessons which on paper take only 45 minutes have taken longer, not to mention discussions about the novel we are reading. I am not actually worried about this in English though, since I know that it is the learning that counts not the finished product. I reflect that I must find time for them to enjoy the process even if we have no product.

In Mathematics however it is a different story. We have this week finished a ‘Place Value’ unit and we must move on. My daily formative assessments using our mini whiteboards tell me I that not every student understands all that I want them too. I know that many of them need more time to truly understand this vital topic. Yet if we allow those students to spend another week exploring ‘Place Value’ in the classroom what will those who are ready to move on do? How can I split my maths program to suit two or even three mini groups?  Or perhaps more importantly what will we do with the next topic. I know that in Mathematics learning is incremental, by that I mean it is vital for students to understand what they learn one year in order to build on that learning the next. Yet the curriculum requires us to fit in many topics in a year. To cover many different areas and many different stands. I reflect that I must move on for if I don’t we will almost certainly miss something needed next year. And this worries me.

So what can I do about this need to rush? The need to fit in the learning, to rush through the topics, to rush through the day? I really don’t know. It seems to me a factor of the lives we lead. And although I take time out to slow down, to reflect to plan and to spend time with my family on the weekends, my son still feels rushed. Perhaps the answer is to wake him thirty minutes earlier so that our morning routines are not as rushed. Whether he would agree with this plan though remains to be seen!

Since then TeachMeet Sydney has grown to such as point that this term alone we have several TeachMeets in the planning stage, each one being held in a different part of Sydney. SO whether you live in the East, West or Hills area you can get to one and meet other like-minded educators. Other teachers who want to network, meet, talk and grow. Other teachers who are prepared to share best practice, share ideas and share resources. Other teachers who want to break down the walls of their classrooms and learn together. And not only that TeachMeets are also planned this term for Melbourne and Brisbane too.

As part of the growth of TeachMeets in Australia a new TeachMeet Australia website has also been born. One which eventually hopes to hold the details of all future meetings. One which hopefully will allow the TM Sydney wiki to develop into more of a resource centre.

But firstly we have a world record to break and we need you and your colleagues to achieve it. On March 2nd from 5.00pm to 8.00pm we will be attempting to hold a TeachMeet with more than 350 participants. To be held at the Australian Technology Park, a two minute walk from Redfern station, this TeachMeet promises to be a meeting like no other. View this google doc to see how over 140 teachers from all types of schools and all curriculum areas have already joined us, can you come too? There will be seven minute and two minutes presentations.There will be a sandpit area for brainstorming sessions. There will be teachers from all curriculum areas and all educational setting presenting and networking. There will be beer available to purchase!

The question is? If you teach in Sydney can you afford to miss it? After all it is free. It is after school and it is a Friday night. So please visit the TeachMeet wiki to sign up for TMSydney World Record and help spread the word at your school by downloading and printing this poster ‘savethedate-1′ too.

Yes its back to school time here in Australia, week one is already over and the term is almost up and running at full steam. I love the new year, a fresh start for some, a new class for most, new ideas, fresh faces, eager learners. Yet for me this year is one of many changes and many similarities. For this year after six years on year 5 I have moved to teach year 6. I have many new things, including a new room, new computer and new grade buddies. What I don’t have are new students, as half of my class I taught last year and the other half I co-taught with Pru. So I already know them well.

So just what does this mean for me as a teacher and a learner? I have been thinking about the positives and negatives of this move. On the positive side I already know their names, their personalities, their learning styles and more. I know who to worry about and who to watch over. I already know who loves Maths and who needs help in English. I know about their friendship issues and their families. I understand what motivates them and what challenges them. All wonderful positives which have certainly ensured a smooth start to year 6.

On the negative side I have a new program to write, new topics to delve into and a new curriculum to get my head around. As well as new grade buddies to get to know and learn to work with. Yet are those really negatives? Yes I will miss Pru, I already do. Yet our friendship built over many years of shared experiences will not die and our classrooms are just around the corner from each other. Yes I need to write new programs and learn new curriculum matters. Yet I love to learn, I love new challenges and I never sit still anyway. Yes I need to get to know my two new grade buddies. Yet they are great teachers too and I know I will learn much from them too.

Negatives? Not me. I’m a glass half full kind of person anyway, so I am looking forward to the challenges, the ups and downs the pluses and minuses and everything that will go to make 2012 a great year of learning both for me and my students.

Watch this space!

Before term starts though I will be presenting at another school, to staff interested in learning about using edmodo and blogs in their classrooms. I am calling my presentation ‘Connecting your Classroom‘ and I will share my ideas and links here for anyone who is interested.

It appears that I am not alone in thinking and planning about how best to assist teachers to connect their classrooms to the world, as this week I have read several other blog posts saying just what I wanted to say on the subject. So much so, that much of the work I was planning to do for my presentation has been done for me. A big thank you to my PLN, you have helped to make my holiday longer and my job easier. Great minds think alike!

I will start by recommending the following magazine ‘A teacher’s guide to edmodo and student blogging‘ I created this using a new program  called Themeefy. In the magazine I have included links and details, which should answer most teachers queries on the how and why of using blogs and edmodo with students. In it I have included videos, posts and a podcast with both primary and secondary teachers.

Kathleen Morris is an experienced teacher and bloggers from Victoria, she blogs at Integrating Technology in the Primary School, I consider her blog as a must read for all primary teachers. She writes here about Setting up Student Blogs , this fabulous post contains all the information a teacher needs, to help them get started with classroom and student blogging. Of particular note is her advice on spending time teaching students how to write quality comments as well as all about creative commons, copyright, internet safety and netiquette.

I have long been wondering how to persuade more teachers of the value of reading blogs themselves, part of my presentation is on the educational and social value of connecting and learning from other teachers through the reading of their blogs. Edna Sackson, a Teaching and Learning Co-ordinator from an International Baccalaureate PYP school in Melbourne, Australia, has written here her Top ten steps to get teachers into blogs.

Finally this educational wiki has been created by award winning American teacher Mrs Yollis, she started it up as a resource for all teachers who are considering setting up a class blog. She writes ‘Having the classroom blog is like having Open House all year long. Students share what they are learning and then return to comment. Parents have regular opportunities to participate in the learning through commenting. I agree wholeheartedly with her point of view. I will be blogging for the third year with my class this year and I cannot wait to get started again.

As part of my presentation and workshop we will be viewing a prezi. I have included it here as a reference point.

What I just cannot completely stop though is learning, I think my urge to improve, to learn and to challenge myself is ingrained. So although I am trying really hard not to learn about new programs or lesson ideas or classroom management tips. I am still learning through listening. Everyday I wheel out my bike, climb aboard and ride the streets of my suburb while listening to an audio book or podcast. As I do so, I have also been exploring exercise apps. So far I have trialled CycleMeter, Cycle Watch, JogLog and RunKeeper. Watching my distance and times improve is an added bonus too.

So far I have listened to

Out of Our Minds: Learning to Be Creative

• by Ken Robinson
• Narrated by John Lee

and

Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School

• by John J. Medina
• Narrated by John J. Medina

Both of these books have been interesting and challenging and gave me food for thought, while confirming my own educational philosophy. I can heartily recommend them both to anyone interested in the future of education.

I leave tomorrow for a family holiday, where I will have no internet connection and no opportunity to lurk on twitter, to check out the odd blog post or classroom tip. I will however still be learning while listening, even though I may have to walk rather than cycle. So if you too know that to remain sane next year you need an enforced break. Why not discover the world of audible and audio books or if you prefer the world of i-tunes and free podcasts.

The first category I have played a part in is Best Student Blog. I am both excited and thrilled that four of our students from year5rc have been nominated. Nominated by their peers, families and friends from around the globe in this category. I am excited for them, not because they might win but as they like so many others from our class have taken to blogging with gusto. In year 5 blogging is optional, virtually no school time is given to it. We even ask parents to become the administrators. So although I can claim to have had a part in these nominations, their success is not because of me. Yes, I read their posts and occasionally I comment but really each of these eleven year old girls is blogging because she wants to. Not because it has been set for homework, not because a teacher has made them. Just because reading and writing for and with a world wide audience interests them. These students have extended the length of their school day with meaningful posts and authentic writing.

SO I present to you

• Angie:  http://angie1234.edublogs.org/ you can vote for her here
  

• Dawso: http://dawsosblog.edublogs.org/ you can vote for her here

• Esha: http://thisandthat.edublogs.org/ you can vote for her here

• Tess: http://greenzebra.edublogs.org/ you can vote for her here

These are students who are all eleven yeas old and have been blogging since April of this year. They are on the world stage now, representing Year 5rc and all of their classmates who are also student bloggers but who didn’t make the short lists. Please take the time and check out their blogs, they would all love new visitors and then please vote for one of them.

The second category I have played my part in is with TeachMeet Sydney. Little did I dream back in April of this year when I held the first Sydney TeachMeet in my classroom that it could have grow so much. Not I hasten to add, was it driven by me but because I have become part of a network, a team who believe that self-driven teacher professional development is the way to go. I am again excited and thrilled to announce that our TeachMeet Sydney wiki has been nominated in two categories.

Best educational use of a wiki and Best open PD or webinair.

Again this is not because I expect us to win but as TeachMeet Sydney grows, TeachMeet Melbourne and TeachMeet Brisbane have also started. A TeachMeet Wagga Wagga is planned for next year as well as an attempt to break the TeachMeet world record. Look out for more details about that as well as our brand new TeachMeet website soon!

From little things big things grow.

Flipping Professional Development – New ways of teacher learning.

I will attempt here to summarise what I spoke about.

Who am I?

I am a year 5 teacher who believes in collaborating and team teaching whenever I can. I think that primary school is a time for making memories and it is what students do with those memories that will stand the test of time. I aim to create a classroom where group work is valued, where creativity is fostered and where students construct their own learning. I do not believe that I am the sage in the stage, the boss of the room and I refuse to set out my classroom in rows. I believe in the power of class and student blogging and in students teaching students, using the example of Mr Avery’s Student made Maths movies‘ wiki. My students create an online digital presence and learn cyber safety in authentic and meaningful ways.

Old ways and new ways of learning

I used to think teacher professional development took place in dusty halls on the first or last day of term, I now know that my professional development can be anytime any place, through my use of Twitter and my PLN.

What did I learn – Working smarter not harder

Since this talk was given to a primary and secondary school my aim was to whet their appetites. So in this section I attempted to give an impression of the myriad of sites I have discovered, the blogs I have read, the tools I have used and the conferences/podcasts I have listened to. I also tried to show how using these sites and tools had improved my life as a teacher and not simply added extra work to it. How using tools such as edmodo and scratch can engage and empower students and help me to work smarter not harder.

So how can you connect and learn?

Again my intention was to show all the different ways teachers can connect with and learn from other educators. I tried to include visual, auditory as well as more traditional ways of learning such as reading blogs. Again my intention was to whet their appetites.

Why bother?

We live in a rapidly changing world. The students we teach today will graduate into a world of work completely different to the one we see today. Research out of the UK tells us that 60% of our students will work in jobs that haven’t even been created yet. And that what the world needs is solvers of problems and divergent thinkers. With seven billion people on this planet we need young people to be creative, flexible and adaptable. With the introduction of smart phones, which are in my opinion ending up in the hands of younger and younger students. We also need to develop our own positive digital footprints so that we can model appropriate online behaviour to our students and guide them as they learn to take responsibility for their online presence.

The fifteen minute rule

I live by the fifteen minute rule when it comes to my learning. Take fifteen minutes a few times a week, to read something new, listen to something new or connect to someone new and before you know you will have learned something new. Take baby steps, do not feel so overwhelmed that you end up doing nothing. Do not rest on your laurels and think teaching in the way you have always done, will do anymore. Get out of your comfort zone and improve your life as a teacher and your student’s lives too. Even during the holidays fifteen minutes can be found once or twice a week. So that next term when you arrive back in this hall, you will not think that teacher professional development is something that is done for you. You will be on your way to developing your PLN and changing your life, just like I have.

This week we posed the following question on our year5rc blog. If you were the teacher what would you change?

The comments we have received make for amusing and interesting reading and for me are a great reminder of what is important and meaningful in the life of 10 and 11 year old students. So just what would they add to the day if they were the teacher?

• I would add more drama and art. A common theme and mentioned by many students, unfortunately for them drama is only timetabled once a fortnight and art once a week.
• Talk Time (Where the teacher talks to her students and asks all about how life is going and all that sort of stuff and they can talk about worries). I love this one and it is a definite reminder that sometimes we just need to slow down and chat. With our overstuffed day and busy curriculum that can often seem an impossibility.
• I would add TV review lessons where we get to watch something on TV and we have to write a review on it and say what was good and bad about it. An interesting possibility perhaps? I wonder if she had an educational program in mind though?
• If I were a teacher I would decorate the class room a different thing each month. For example one month it would be at the beach with sand. Or one month it would be a water park. Not sure about this one.
• We should have more mufti days and more sport and less of written maths and more of interacting mathematics! Proof that they are loving our current maths project where we are making maths movies to display our learning. if only every maths lesson could be like this.

And what would they take away? No surprises here.

• I would take away some of the homework because it takes up time for family friends and extra activities.
• I don’t like having NAPLAN and the ICAS tests which I don’t know why are so necessary.
• I would take away some maths and replace it with other subjects.
• I would also change that instead of laptops we have ipads so we can take the home and get them in year 5 and have them for your whole life but use them at school from grades 5-12. I wonder if ipads will be what they will be using in year 12? Somehow I doubt it.
  

But perhaps the quote of them all is the following:

If I was in charge of what was going on I wouldn’t of allowed Mrs Thomas to get Appendicitis. That was the disappointment of my year!

I agree! Losing my buddy for six weeks made my life both difficult and stressful. Proof indeed that two heads have been better than one and that team teaching has been one of the most rewarding aspect of life in year 5 for me this year.

I Can Do That

Or how I came out of my comfort zone and changed my life – And if I can so can you.

I used to think that professional development for teachers was something that was given to me. I would sit up near the back of the hall on our mandatory staff development days and listen to various ‘gurus’ talk at me. I was the one who was doodling or writing lists, or day-dreaming about all the work that was waiting for me in my classroom. I was the one flicking through the provided power-point screen shots, counting them down to the end. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to learn it was just that the topics didn’t always grab my attention or seem relevant to my needs.

Then two years ago I went to a conference and discovered the world of Twitter for teachers. I came home and told my husband that I needed an i-phone and I needed it now as I was joining Twitter. I thought, I can do that and I did.

As I got into Twitter I discovered that teachers were writing blogs and that in these blogs they were sharing ideas, reflecting on their learning, asking for advice and passing on their learning. I thought, I can do that and I did and this blog was born.

I discovered also that classes were blogging, so at the beginning of term I said to my co-teacher Pru “we need to have a class blog” and we thought, we can do that and we did. So year5rc was born. We use this space to connect with students around the globe, reflect on our learning and share our work.

Then our students started to badger us for their own blogs and we thought, we can do that and we did. This year we have thirty students blogging, just for fun, not because we make them and not because it is homework. They use these spaces to reflect on their learning, to share ideas and learning and to decorate with widgets, after all they are girls.

Meanwhile I was learning about all these amazing websites and I wondered how I could share my knowledge with my staff? I had heard about a concept called techie brekkies being run in new Zealand. I thought, I can do that and Techie Brekkie was born.

I then discovered that if I put a proposal into a conference, that was accepted, I could go to the conference for free. I thought, I can do that. And I did. As a result I have listened to Gary Stager, Alan November, Jeff Utecht, Chris Betcher, Stephen Heppell and more. I have also attended workshops and as a result, shared my learning with my staff back at school.

So I now see myself as a networked teacher. Yet I did not do this alone. I did it with the help of my Personal Learning Network on Twitter.

What did this require of me? I needed to let go of the past, take risks and get out of my comfort zone. I have had to see myself as a continuous learner, even when that learning is hard and I felt unsupported. I have had to realise that the concept of TeachMeet is bigger than me and I needed to work in a team, so as to get it off the ground. I have learned to work with others from around the world. And above all I have had to hang on tight and have fun, on the ride of my life.

Why am I telling you this? Well I want my students to take risks and leave their comfort zone. I want then to view themselves as continuous learners. I want them to realise that when they work as part of a group, it for the good of the group, not their own personal ambitions.  I want them to learn to work with others from around the world.

And above all I want them to hang on tight, have fun a go for the ride that is year 5.

Firstly a school parent, who is a qualified art teacher, looking to get back into the work force; came in to give my class an two art lessons. We planned the lesson together  using the Sidney Nolan’s series on Ned Kelly as inspiration. As a classroom teacher I am by the very nature of my profession, a generalist. I work hard to keep up to date in my knowledge and understanding of all the core curriculum areas, including Visual Arts. It was though a fabulous opportunity for my students to experience a ‘professional’ series of art lessons. 

The second ‘lesson’ was a new experience for us all. Australian educator Adrian Bruce joined us for a ‘performance poetry’ lesson via Skype. At 11.00 am on the prearranged day we rang Adrian at his office in country New South Wales. After a quick visual tour of his office and a glimpse of his axolotls, we got down to work. Adrian firstly led my class through a tour of some of the finer points of the free program audacity. The students played around with recording their voices and adjusting the tone so that they sounded like chipmunks or monsters. We then used one of his halloween poetry scaffolds and we explored how to add spooky sounds from his sound file collection. Since we are in the middle of a unit of work studying ‘Australian Bush Ballads’ though, Adrian was also kind enough to give them access to his soundsnap account.  In it they spent a busy twenty minutes downloading various bush sound files, such as whips cracking, trees rustling, animal noises and more. Finally Adrian showed them how to import these sounds so as to produce an audio file. They each worked to create their own creative content which incorporated both a voice recording and sound effects. Proving that it is possible for children to emulate professional quality audio books using free software and only one lesson.

Although I had a basic knowledge of audacity and this was helpful to me as I was the one problem solving on the go, I also managed to learn heaps of new tricks and ideas from Adrian. Tips I know I will incorporate into my English program in the future as well. To prove they had mastered audacity my class followed up his session, with one with the other year 5 class, in which they taught them everything Adrian had taught them. They are still completing their MP3 recordings but soon we will be able to listen to each others performances of famous Australian poems such as Mulga Bill’s Bicycle complete with added sound effects. When they are complete we will of course share them to the world and our community, using our class and student blogs.

Both these lessons were fabulous. If you have a parent who is a specialist teacher and who offers their expertise then of  course you should grab the opportunity and welcome them into your classroom. With the advent of Skype though the opportunities are endless. My class have called New Zealand several times, as well as the education office at the Ballarat Goldfields. From Australia it can be difficult although not impossible to Skype other classrooms in America, as we discovered last year with our call to Wisconsin, when we spoke to our pen-pals. This school in Melbourne has also learned enormous amounts from Raj and his Indian students. All over the country schools are taking up the opportunities of bringing in experts that Skype can offer you.

Having a teacher join us though was new and interesting experience for us all. So if you need a touch of expertise in your classroom. If you want the opportunity to learn alongside your students why not use Skype and invite an expert such as Adrian Bruce into your classroom?