Mel+2010

2010 is th​e year for eLearning!media type="custom" key="5663811" align="right"
Hi my name is Melissa Julian and I'm the eLearning leader for our school. This year is going to be an exciting (yet huge) learning journey for both myself and all of the teachers at our school. This Wiki webpage is like my eLearning diary. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I am enjoying taking part in all of this learning! Thanks, Mel

Here's a link to my class wiki for 2010 media type="custom" key="6414465" media type="custom" key="6232383" align="right"

And here's a link to my professional wiki media type="custom" key="6836211" Term 3 Thursday September 9th (week 8) Thursday September 23rd (week 10)
 * eLearning days for the rest of the year

Term 4 Thursday October 21st (week 2) Thursday November 4th (week 4) Thursday November 18th (week 6) Thursday December 2nd (week 8) Thursday December 16th (week 10) || media type="custom" key="7864499"

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__**9th December 2010:**__ media type="custom" key="7787561" __**5th December 2010:**__ A new application added to wikispaces - a widget which shows all of the wikis you're linked to. Very cool! include component="wikiList" wikiListType="member" limit="10" __**2nd December 2010:**__ Time to reflect on how eLearning has evolved for me during 2010. media type="custom" key="7714051"

__**24th November 2010:**__ __**Storybird.com**__ **-** __**Collaborative Storytelling in the Classroom - embeddable**__ __**Technology in the Classroom - Links to great tools to use**__ __**17th November 2010:**__ Thanks David for finding AudioBoo. The almost-equivalent to Vocaroo but without the 6month time limits. You need a login but that's no problem, I've just set an account up for my class - they can use the same account and just remember to include their name when recording and include their name in the title of the audio file. Yay, am so happy!!

media type="custom" key="7558163" __**31st October 2010:**__ Just discovered [|www.xtranormal.com] and want to see if it's a suitable tool to use in the classroom. Here's my test movie.

Actually it's __**NOT**__ suitable. There's inappropriate options and wording which isn't at all child-friendly. If only I could find the child-friendly version of this!??!

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__**8th October 2010:**__ I'm presenting at the ULearn10 Conference in Christchurch during the school holidays. Here's the presentation.

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__**24th September 2010:**__

Just discovered Animoto so have had a play...but I'm not very impressed because it seems that you have to pay to go-pro to get the cool effects. What a shame. media type="custom" key="7000223"

__**23rd September 2010:**__

media type="custom" key="6985191" __**1st September 2010:**__ Running a Wiki workshop with staff - how to embedd your photo slideshow from Photobucket into your Wiki media type="custom" key="6811941"

__**13th August 2010**__ I'm testing how to embed a PowerPoint slideshow into a wiki. Tracey O wants to use this tool to present her .ppt

media type="custom" key="6699797" __**12th August 2010**__

media type="custom" key="6693251" Testing a few ideas.... One of the classes I worked with today wanted to learn about the 'eLearning experts' idea (and PhotoStory3). I took down the wall display in my classroom and went through the whole concept with the children in D'arcy's class. Their reactions were really positive and they seemed motivated to try the concept in their class. We discussed how the idea of experts creates collaborative problem-solving within the class and leads children towards independence with eLearning tools. Another positive factor to the whole eLearning experts concept is that it takes the pressure off the teacher as they are no longer the holder of the knowledge. The knowledge is distributed amongst the children and it is the children's job (with the teacher as facilitator) to on-teach other children. As I've said many times, this is very powerful stuff! I'm going to trial using the experts concept in another curriculum area over the next couple of weeks too. media type="custom" key="6629371" media type="custom" key="6629367" Having a play with Glogster....
 * __31st July 2010__**
 * || Alphabetical Order ||
 * River Rhyme Game ||  ||
 * __29th July 2010__**
 * __2nd July 2010__**

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I've had the **eLearning Experts** wall working in my classroom for approx 6 weeks now and what a HUGE IMPACT this has had on my classroom management in regards to eLearning. Infact, as I reflect on the impact this has had on children's independence, I would say that the 'Wall of Experts' has been the most effective thing I have done this year! The children are becoming independent - they don't need to rely on the teacher to help them. This wall has the different things / tools we use in the classroom for eLearning such as;
 * __16th June 2010__**
 * Our wiki
 * Login the computers
 * Digital cameras
 * Sound/volume
 * Wordshark
 * Success criteria of what to do if you're stuck
 * and many more

We began the process of turning the students into EXPERTS by selecting 'Login the computers' experts. All children have their own individual login and passwords and by having an expert on hand for the children to get help from, the dependence on the teacher was greatly reduced. Everytime we recognised a child as having expert knowledge they became an expert and their photo was placed on our 'Wall of Experts' by the particular thing they are good at. Here are some photos of what the Experts wall looks like in our class, plus some 'experts in action'!


 * media type="custom" key="6391877" ||= **Here are the templates for creating a**
 * Wall Of Experts**
 * display in your classroom.**

Feel free to use these templates in your classroom. I would love your feedback too! Just click on the 'discussions' tab above and email me.



||

__**10th June 2010**__ Today has been a busy day for eLearning! David is here at school and is busy doing practical demonstrations in classrooms. I spent the morning block in two classes.

9:30am - Room 3. Firstly I worked with three students to introduce their class digital camera and how to use it. Only one of the children had ever used a digital camera before. After demonstrating the basic use of their camera the children then taught two other children. I was really impressed at how well the children explained their new knowledge of the camera. The main things they learnt were; hanging the camera on lanyard around their neck, turning it on/off, holding it with two hands, where the shutter button is, how to play back and see the photos they had taken etc.

Testing Wordle embed option media type="custom" key="6169799" width="334" height="295"
 * __19th May 2010__**

Today I tested a new way of capturing student's voice by using Vocaroo. This is a great online tool for recording audio and I am planning on using it in the classroom on Monday by getting some children to record themselves reading a chosen reading book. This audio vocaroo file will then be saved onto our class wiki and used for a range of things. We can use the audio as a listening post, evidence of reading fluency, peers can assess and share their thoughts about the reading (by using the discussions tab at the top of the wiki page). As well as using the audio files for these reasons, the children can share their reading with their families at home too. Very cool!
 * __28th April 2010:__**


 * ~ Date ||~ Book Title ||~ Recording ||~ Name ||
 * 28th April 2010 || Random bloke talking as an example || media type="custom" key="5989543" || Mr Bloke ||


 * __11 March 2010__**: Very busy day today with all of these great online eLearning tools that David has been showing me. Have you ever used Jing before? Well it is an excellent tool if you want to create tutorials. This tool allows you to capture the screen on your laptop/PC as a video image and record your voice as you explain an idea or how to use something on your laptop/PC. I'll have a go at creating a Jing screen capture and embed it here next Friday (19th March).

As well as that, I have been learning about how to use Fotobabble as a tool for literacy. It is VERY user friendly and will be great to use with my junior class. However there is one issue with this tool. When a fotobabble recording has been embedded into my wiki page, it plays the audio as soon as you arrive on the webpage...rather than the user having to press play. This will be an issue if I embed more than one fotobabble item on each webpage. I will have a think about ways around this issue. Maybe separate webpages within our class wiki for each child? Maybe fotobabble isn't the tool I need? I'll let you know.

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Also today we had a Google Sketchup workshop with the Digikids during lunchtime. These children are in training to become experts of a wide range of eLearning tools and ICT equipments so as to support our school community.

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After lunch we had a workshop with Room 15T. They have just returned from their Marae camp and have a huge amount of digital photos. David introduced some eLearning tools they might like to use so as to integrate their photos and oral language development through the use of PhotoStory3 and fotobabble.

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There has been a really cool shift in the interest about eLearning tools and ideas amongst the staff here at Westmere School. Great stuff!


 * 01 March 2010:** I have been focusing on getting my classroom Wiki up and running lately. The children in my class (Room 14) are super excited about featuring on the Wiki and are using the language of Wiki, website, YouTube and projector regularly in the classroom. Here is the link to our Wiki - please take a look - thanks.

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We have recently received FOUR sparkly new laptops in the classroom which is great. At the moment we are using the computers in a non-structured type of way (online reading activities during reading time, online numeracy actvities during numeracy etc) while the children become familiar with navigating, logging in, general and independent use of the laptops. Our next learning step is to integrate the computers into classroom learning where there is a roster system and the children have a project to do.

As well as this, tomorrow the children will record their before views of 'Caring for Pets' using VoiceThread. This eLearning tool will be great to use now and again in 4-5 weeks to compare their new knowledge.

Busy times huh!?!


 * __15th February 2010__:** I spent some time after school with one of our teachers Vanessa. Her classroom has had one of the new short-throw data projectors installed and we went through the basics of using it. I showed her how to use the projector as a tool to model brainstorming in Kidspiration, using Kidpix to demonstrate gathering data for statistics (grouping/classifying, tally marks etc) and to use online based video to supplement classroom learning (using YouTube). There a couple of photos embedded below.

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In my own classroom today I tried something new too. One of the children brought in some cicada skins which were perfect for using in our pencil sketching art unit. We took a close up photo of the cicada skin and projected it up onto the screen so we could see all of the fine details of the skin. The children compared the view of the cicada on the screen against what they could see in the little cicada skin they held. We could see little hairs on the outside skin only in the close up photo. The artwork the children (who are 5 years old) produced was excellent! They captured so much more of the small details in the cicada skin compared to what would usually be drawn / sketched. I will take some photos tomorrow of the evidence.

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 * __11th February 2010__:** Today I created the wiki (with David's help) and spent a couple of hours recruiting the Digikids for Westmere School. There is so much interest in our Digikids club. There have been more than 80 applicants - we only need approximately 20 Digikids!

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7/3/10 - Wordle - I'm just seeing if this widget will work...can I get a Wordle word cloud embedded into this Wiki?

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