Our Last Master Classes

The first day of our last master classes flew by in a blur as we discussed, analysed, shared, planned and collaborated. What an amazing amount of work we managed to get through by this process. We are all so much on the same wavelength and yet are looking at a diverse variety of research pathways in our e-Fellowships. Sadly due to health issues our mentors Vince and Michael were unable to spend the day with us, but Vince managed to spend part of the morning with us and Michael was with us through Skype and following the Google doc we were creating as we worked.

Alongside the discussion there was a sharing of practical knowledge happening as members of the group asked ‘how do you…?’ and were shown how. This natural flow on of skill sharing is one of the benefits of meeting as a group alongside the extensive professional dialogue that occurs both in and outside the Core offices environment.

Tuesday was another power packed day! We worked on creating a plan for the future and ways in which we can work collaboratively. Joel helped me with setting up my own website – watch this space – and I will be working on getting that up and running soon.

The list of planned projects I have set myself for the next 1 – 2 years is almost overwhelming in its range and load, but at the same time after arriving in Christchurch feeling sad about the end of the fellowship I have come away knowing that it is only the beginning and that we are all committed to continuing and growing as teachers within the fellowship and will be supporting each others future endeavours.

This is the stated group theme that evolved from our time workshopping together:

‘Collectively the 2010 e-Fellowship is developing new teaching practice and utilising current technology to develop student interaction and learning of the wider world through collaborative projects with other schools using real-time video conferencing platforms, and developing a new culture of independent self-directed learning using newly developed e-resources, both within the school environment and in the wider world.’

Dr Sugata Mitra

As we spent time revisiting Dr Sugata Mitra’s Hole in the Wall project during our time together in e-Fellow Master Classes, I could not help but reflect on how there are elements of his work in the way we approach some things in ECE. 

For example, when I make available a new IT component (e.g. software, peripheral etc) I tend to not give instruction but adopt a ‘wait and see’ approach. I have always found that through exploration the children discover far more about the programme and uses for the peripherals than I could ever have done exploring on my own. They work both individually and collaboratively and regularly astonish me with the discoveries they can make. Examples of this are – when we were shown by the children how to take photos on our Digital Microscope with a button on the front of the unit that we hadn’t found as teachers; the amazing elements there are in Garage Band that even with going to courses and exploring this software I hadn’t yet found; the list goes on and on. 

We need to relax and let children explore with the equipment we give them – we allow this to happen in other contexts, but so often I hear teachers say that they haven’t let the children use something in relation to ICT’s yet because they themselves don’t know how to. To that I say let the children play and then let them teach you how to use it. This will reinforce the learning that has happened for them, empower them as learning leaders and free your time up to do some of the other myriad of demands that all teachers have placed on their time. 

When I was first exposed to a computer it was a small group of 4 year olds who taught me how to use it. They taught me to try something and if it didn’t work try something else. They taught me I couldn’t break it, and through what they taught me then, I have become the confident explorer of ICT’s that I am today. A classic example of who leads who? Who was the teacher? Who gained the most from this process?

Hairy Maclary from Donaldson's Dairy

I want to share the creation of Lena’s animation and retelling of ‘Hairy Maclary from Donaldson’s Dairy’. Lena decided she wanted to animate this story, one of her favourites, so we discussed how we would be able to do it.  She decided that she would draw the various characters in the story and then film them. This self -set drawing task took Lena two days to complete and then another day to film her movie. 

On the fourth day we recorded the voice over and then she was able to share her accomplishment with the other children at mat time. As usual I burnt the movie into a CD so that Lena could share her work with her extended family, at home.

 Lena's Movie

I spent part of my time at Ulearn this year exploring the use of Ipads/Ipods in education and plan to make this part of our equipment for the children to interact with next year. Since attending the related breakouts at Ulearn I have spent some time thinking about how to apply what I learnt, and have since discovered through my own exploration, into my teaching practice with our children. One thing I have come up with is to create a folder of all the movies the children are making and having it available for the children to use. I am also going to do this on the Imac the children work on.

My rationale for this is that any time the movies are played on, or through, my laptop there is instantly a large audience of very interested children. There is something about the animations that totally engages the children’s interest and enthusiasm. I am still pondering on why this is. Is it that they have observed the creation of the movies; is it that they see a lot of ‘cartoon’ type television; is it something about the simplicity of the animated stories; is it the fact they have been created by someone they know? I plan to explore this further and see what I can discover.

Some of the ICT's our children use

I have been thinking that I should share some of the ICT’s the children at our Kindergarten are interacting with. We have worked hard over the years to fund raise and purchase a relevant and effective range of equipment for the children to use.  Every item we have has only been purchased after much forethought and discussion to its relevancy.

 

We have two Apple computers for the children to use, an Emac running OS10.4 because it supports the classic environment that we need to run some of our software. The other computer is an Imac running OS10.6 that we use for a multitude of purposes with the children including a Digital Blue microscope, Bamboo Touch tablet, an Akai Professional Keyboard and a variety of software including Kidpix and Comic Life. 

 The children have several digital cameras available for them to use and they download their photos and create learning stories using Comic Life for their portfolios. 

 

We have a lot of peer tutoring supporting this as the ‘experts’ help those still learning. When the Imac is connected to the internet the children have several favourite sites they like to visit like lego.com and Disney.com, amongst others.

 

For group work we have a projector and visualiser with a ceiling mounted screen we can pull down. The visualiser is invaluable to use for sharing photos, small books, using as a microscope and looking closer at small objects. We also use our laptops with the projector to share movies we have made with the children, research on the internet, etc.

At Ulearn I purchased, for the Kindergarten, some 'Logi-Blocks', a set that helps develop an understanding of circuits. The children on exploring these have quickly grasped the way that they work and the meaning of the symbols that are on the blocks.  There is a robot that links to these blocks and I  plan to introduce this soon.  I am looking forward to seeing how they work with this extension, building on their understanding of robotics in another format, rather than just the Lego version. 

For the past few weeks we have been very busy at Greenhithe Kindergarten getting ready for our major fundraiser for the year - The Great Greenhithe Garden Tour, on  the 14th November - this this be the 17th year for our annual garden tour. It is thanks to the generosity of our local gardeners in opening their gardens to the public for one day a year in support of the Kindergarten that we have been able to provide these fabulous resources for our children to explore and learn with.

Isla at work

During the last week of last term I had the opportunity to film Isla creating her animation. She was so focused and intent on her work and despite it being a very wet and noisy day she retained that focus throughout her animation project.

And this is the movie she created:

Ulearn10

For the fifth year in a row, I was fortunate enough to attend Ulearn, the conference held in Christchurch annually, that informs and inspires teachers, during the October term break.

I started the week with e-Fellow Master Classes. Monday we shared our journeys so far, with each other, as we shared the presentations we had created for conference delegates later in the week. We gave and received feedback to help make our presentations even more effective.

On Tuesday we had the first e-Fellow ‘group session’ working together with e-Fellows from the past 8 years alongside a team from the Galileo Network who are based in Canada. It was wonderful to meet and share stories with previous e-Fellows and to be part of an inspirational group of teachers. One of the highlights for me was to talk with Carol Marks from Selwyn Kindergarten in Tauranga. Carol was the last Early Childhood e-Fellow in 2006 and I was so impressed by her presentation at Ulearn that year, that I had decided to be an e-Fellow myself one day there and then! Here I am 4 years later following that dream.

And onto the conference itself, three days full of inspiring keynotes and wonderful breakouts combining to create a mass of information to process, interaction with great teachers from all sectors and all seen this year from the perspective of being part of an amazing group of e-Fellow as we bounced our thoughts, ideas and passions off each other. And, we even managed to fit in a late night visit to the Christchurch Art Gallery to see the Ron Meuk exhibition; sculptures that made us all feel emotional in some way or another.

 Lee Crockett from Canada, spoke about the ‘Digital Generation’ and how that brains of children today are wired differently – they are ‘neuroplastic brains’ – as they are changing physically and digitally as their eyes process information 60,000 times faster than text. The digital learners prefer to process pictures, sound and video before text and his catch phrase was “It’s not about hardware, it’s about headware.” We need to be teaching ‘just in case, not just in time’ as we have in the past as the children of today and tomorrow need higher order thinking skills to cope with the world they will be working in.

Steve Wheeler from the U.K., also talked about the trend in education moving from just in case to just in time and he feels it needs to move to just for me – more personalised learning for the future (Te Whariki kept ringing in my ears at this point). He discussed personalised learning and how we can make it interactive and interpersonal.  He also discussed Digital Wisdom and how we need to show children what the dangers are and then they will avoid them – a different scenario from a break out I attended presented by Brett Lee from Australia, who has set himself up as a teenage girl on chat rooms to catch paedophiles online, to arrest.

Lane Clark from Canada, discussed what she calls ‘Learning Smarts’ and how we need to check each stage of the way that children have taken on board the learning and rechecking to see where the learning they have achieved takes them next on their learning journeys. As I sat in her Keynote I could not help but reflect that much of what she was saying is the way we work in ECE, as we follow and build on children’s interests, and follow those interests down some amazing paths.

The final keynote was very entertaining and given by Stephen Heppell who stated we should not be discussing 21^st Century learning we should be calling it 3^rd Millennium teaching. You can see and listen to this presentation here.

As well as the keynotes I learnt about using IPod Touch and/or Ipads in the teaching environment, enviro-ethical teaching and the availability of open source material on the web, the power of reflection by children using video and even gave an interview for Edtalks (a scary moment) alongside presenting the research I have done so far in my e-Fellowship.

My mind has fizzed and buzzed ever since and I would like to thank Core Education, and especially Vince and Michael, for the opportunity to again attend Ulearn, the professional learning at this conference has to be the best anywhere as we learn from fellow teachers and leading international educators in the beautiful, if still slightly shaky, city of Christchurch. Thank you also to the other e-Fellows who are the most amazing and inspirational teachers, and whenever we get together I come away feeling so privileged to be included in this group. They are also so much fun to be with as we all have the same sense of fun alongside the passion to be the best educators we can for the children we work with.  I really do not want this journey to end!

Rethinking

When I started my eFellowship I had the preconception that I would be exploring the extension of literacy skills with children through using animation.  Well, I am coming more and more to the conclusion that although there are some literacy skills being developed, there is far more happening than that. There is so much creativity and planning happening it is blowing me away. And the way in which children learn through observation of their peers is being strongly demonstrated.

On Friday (17th September) I decided to just set up the camera and lap top, in front of my newly created green screen, and see what happened. I had said to the children at mat time that anyone who wanted to try it out could. Toby immediately came up to me with a handful of small cars and said he was ready to start. I showed him how he needed to look at the screen to see where the cars were and showed him the key to push on the keyboard to take his photos. I stood back and watched as he carefully placed the cars and then proceeded to create his animation independently. He knew exactly how far to move his models between shots and worked with confidence and demonstrating an understanding of the entire process. When he said he was finished, and after I exported his animation to Imovie,  I asked him if he wanted to narrate his story or just find some sound effects. He opted for the sound effects and once these and his titles were completed I burned his movie to a CD to take home.

Toby's Movie

As soon as Toby had finished Lola stepped forward and said she was ready to have a go. I had seen Lola watching the other children who have made animations, as they worked, and she just got straight into things with our model fairies and quickly completed her animation. I was very impressed by the animation she created and the way she worked - I felt she had a concept in mind before she began and worked to create it as she worked so quickly and confidently.  By the time she had finished it was the end of the session and we agreed she would complete her movie today. When I asked her this morning if she was ready to complete her movie she was keen to start, but really wasn't very interested in the process to finish the movie. I could see that for her the creation of the animation was what engaged her interest and she was not really interested in the other elements whereas the other children have been engaged by the entire process. She decided just to add some music and was very happy with the finished movie when we had added the music.  I wonder if she had been able to complete her project in one session, or without a weekend between, she may have been more engaged in the process. It will be interesting to revisit the entire process with her, in one session, to see if it makes a difference.

 

Lola's Movie

 

ICT Supporting Learning

At our Kindergarten we use our computers to extend children's learning on an almost daily basis through (just a few examples) -

• sourcing information on the internet that we cannot find in our book libraries 
• watching You Tube clips to further extend our learning (e.g. insect metamorphosis etc) 
• exploring small things through our digital microscope or with our visualiser and projector
• revisiting events through slideshows and movies
• creating documentation for portfolios using digital cameras and Comic Life software

The list could go on and on.  As an aside I also often get children to record things as they are happening for me with the cameras and we have several fantastic photographers amongst them.  On excursions out of Kindergarten we always choose several 'official photographers' as having the 'child's view' of where we are visiting gives us a different perspective and helps in our understanding of the learning that has taken place.  Our children love being able to take photographs of their achievements at Kindergarten and then creating their own learning stories to add to their portfolios using Comic Life software, which is very user friendly.  (To download a free trial of Comic Life go here.)

I have recently recorded two examples of children using ICT to extend and support learning.  Firstly we have a group of budding architects who spend part of their time with us, every day, creating some stunning and amazing buildings.  To extend on this interest, the children and I used Google Images to find photographs of some wonderful and exciting buildings from around the world.  Since printing out, laminating and binding the photographs into a book, the children have been using this resource tool as a stimuli to create even more wonderful buildings. They choose buildings from the images to try and recreate or to recreate elements they can see to enhance their creations.  Here is a slide show of some of their wonderful buildings.

Another example is what happened after a recent concert the children attended at our local school.  The Polkadots invited our children to the concert and on their return to Kindergarten I created a slide show of the photographs I had taken of them and the performers.  I put my lap top onto the table the children were working on, with the slide show running, and the depth of detail in the drawings was amazing (I felt). The discussion happening as they worked was pretty amazing too as they used the slide show as a prompt to sharing their thoughts and ideas about what they had experienced during the performance.