source

I was one of the many who took the opportunity to upgrade recently to FF3 for the Mac. Is anyone else finding blog and wiki dashboards are well and truly screwed up, as well as my Bloglines showing no entries at all? But they look ok in Safari …?

this is very cool!
Great for the classroom or cluster. Simple drag and drop interface

Stixy helps users organize their world on flexible, shareable Web-based bulletin boards called Stixyboards. Unlike most personal productivity or project management software, Stixy doesn’t dictate how users should organize their information. Users can create tasks, appointments, files, photos, notes, and bookmarks on their Stixyboards, organized in whatever way makes sense to them. Then they can share Stixyboards with friends, family, and colleagues.

STIXY

I had a message from Jedd yesterday morning asking if we would be able to set up a Skype chat with the group he was working with in Malaysia because there was a Teacher Expo happening and they were wanting to see Skype video in action.
What a chain of events that set off ….

I chose two of our Y6 children to come in and do this for us. A quick, VERY quick tour of skype - chat and video - and they were off talking to the children about how old they were, checking time zones, writing and crafting questions for each other … It was really interesting to see how quickly the kids took over the learning and I was redundant!
* using the text function in skype to chat with each other if the communication was difficult or the language barrier was causing problems. This was instigated by the kids as a solution!
* our kids learn spanish and at one point they were comparing the spanish, english and malay words and phrases.
* sharing files adn photos as well as websites. I have two monitors so the video call was on one and my firefox and skype chat open on the other. Check out the photo below …

* discussing the preparations for the Queen of Malaysia (?) who was going to visit. We even got to see her in her pink outfit.

* the kids organised with parents to come in after school to pick them up as they wanted to stay on after three o’clock. The session didn’t finish until after 4pm and began about 1pm. They were engrossed the whole time and learned heaps!

I also bought in other children and staff to watch at different times and this was learning for everyone. A very cool afternoon!! Thanks Jedd!

check out the entry on our new school blog

A comment from Rachel Boyd on my post yesterday prompted the thought ….

Remember that in aggregators like Bloglines you can share and see what other people are reading and looking at. On the right hand side of this blog is a section called “Spaces and Places” and one of the links in there is “My Bloglines”.
If you click on the link it will take you to a list of all the blogs that I subscribe to…

In my presentation for the Time4Online Conference (linked in an earlier post) I talked about this and other features of aggregators. I find some of the most interesting things I come across in this way - just browsing through other people links or commenters.

Jane has tagged me because Miguel would like to know …

List the top 5 to 10 things that you do almost every day that help you to be successful. They can be anything at all, but they have to be things that you do at least 4 or 5 times every week. Anything less than that may be a hobby that helps you out, but we are after the real day in and day out habits that help you to be successful.
Source: Around the Corner v2 - MGuhlin.net, Ed Tech Journeys’ Guest Blogger, Sylvia Martinez (GenYES Blog) writing on this meme by Thea Westra, Simply Successful Secrets

I am never sure if this sort of thing is the blogging equivalent of a chain letter or something interesting to reflect upon. I do find interesting things in what other people respond though so here goes.
What do I do to manage my day successfully? In no particular order ….

1. Laugh!
I laugh a lot. Some people find this disconcerting, but I can usually find the lighter side of most things. I have read somewhere that children laugh many, many times each day. Most adults need to re-find this skill. Life is too short to be serious all the time.
I also think that laughter is infectious and is certainly part of any place I want to work or learn in. I laugh at home a lot and rather wicked senses of humour is something both our children have inherited from their parents.

2. Having a good Diary ….
I use iCal on my laptop and have a Palm Treo 650 that I sync every couple of days with my computer. I could never remember all the things I need to be doing without this electronic support system. I also have a notebook for all the notes, ideas, etc that I need to keep. I stick in business cards, notes, and other things as well and find one spiral bound book does me a year.
I also use voice recording software on my phone to ‘jot down’ the things that flash through the grey matter (soon to be forgotten!) as I am heading to or from school in the car.

3. Listen more than I talk
Some people who know me may debate this one …. more of a goal than a strategy? (lol)
One of the things from PLOT PD that really resonates with me is the difference between listening to listen and listening to talk. I hope I am doing a lot more listening to listen ….
This is especially important for me at the moment as I am relatively new to my school and need to find out how things REALLY work. I like to ask lots of questions and probe peoples thinking ….

4. Family and Friends
… after all these people are the reason it is all worthwhile. I try hard not to make principalship a lifestyle choice and keep it as my job. But I suppose the reason any of us are good at what we do is commitment and passion for the role.
Having said that I do make sure I spend time with Jane and our children each day. They keep me grounded and Jane always is able to provide me insights or ideas about things I may be mulling over from a completely different perspective.
There is nothing better than family, good friends, good wine and good food!

5. A big whiteboard in my Office
I have to have the big picture and am a ‘model’ person. I like to figure out how the pieces look all together before I pull them apart for planning etc. I use a whiteboard in my Office to draw diagrams etc and write notes to help this.

6. Listening to music
I always have music playing in my office and use it to match what I am doing …. To keep focused, motivate, etc. My tastes are pretty eclectic so i can usually find something in the nearly 30GB I have on my laptop.

7. Connecting with people
My bloglines is my homepage on my laptop, we have a wireless network at home, Skype and iChat are login items …. there are numerous ways I connect with people virtually.
I also like to bounce ideas around with people face-to-face and value opportunities to find what others think and why about any particular issue. Collective wisdom is greater than mine alone.

So … tag - Jedd Bartlett, Derek Wenmoth, Graeme Wegner, Paul Wilkinson

I have just been listening to an item on the radio news about how shocking it is that it has been found that seven hundred and something convicted pedaphiles have been found with myspace sites in the ‘States.
For me this raises two main issues:
1. What percentage of sites are from pedaphiles then? The numbers would say it is acually remarkably safe wouldn’t it? How does this compare with driving in a car? I would guess that you statistically have more chance of being injured in a car accident than randomly stumbling across a space run by a pedaphile in MySpace??
2. Isn’t this arguement akin to saying it is terrible that a convicted drunk driver now owns a car?

This sort of arguement and flawed logic does nothing to inform the issue. There is nothing inherently good or bad about any technologies … it is what people do with them that makes there USE good or bad. These are moral and ethical issue not technological ones.

Delicious, the social tagging site is one of my key resources.
One of the great things you can do with it is include people in ‘Your Network’. This is where you can ’subscribe’ to the tagging of other people.

If you click on the Your Network below your main header:

you will get to see all the people you have added to your network or who have added you to theirs.
To add people to your network you simply type their account name into the box shown below and click ADD - very simple

I then get to see ALL the things that the people in my ‘network’ have tagged, how they have tagged them etc. It is a great way to tap into the thinking and learning of like-minded people.
Adding them to your Del.icio.us account is simply a matter of clicking on the SAVE THIS option next to the title of the entry; or clicking to follow the link and going through the usual process.

This is a relatively new tool to Del.icio.us and one that I am only just starting to use but it is very useful.
Give it a go with your account …..

Thanks to Derek Wenmoth for the heads up on this great article about the use/s of wikis in education.
It outlines things about pedagogy, information about different wiki hosts, how-to information and more. This is well worth reading.

I have been having a real look into wikis over the last month or so and are convinced they will be one of THE tools of the future in our classrooms. Wikis, blogs and pod/vid casting I see as the ‘must have’, or really ‘must do’ applications. It is incredible how quickly the kids in our school have taken to podcasting and the quality of the results.
The great thing about both blogging and wikis is they don’t need any special equipment, or even particularly flash computers. Just a browser and decent internet access.
I have even started my own wiki that I am using to organise my thinking around school change, learning and teaching, etc. Feel free to have a look and add your own ideas, resources or anything else. Remembering it is only a week or so ‘old’ and I am still transferring in information from the multitude of sources I have things scattered in so it is still pretty sparse.