Verona's Blog

In previous posts I have outlined the process that we are undertaking to create change in readiness for ICON. This will be the platform for the Shared internet for Catholic Schools.
We have agreed that an area for Change within our school, in which we can test this process is through collaboration. A brief outline is below.

WE ARE REQUESTING YOUR THOUGHTS AND FEEDBACK

Opportunity for change
Aim: To develop a whole school approach to vertical and horizontal collaboration within and beyond the school.

Solution– What form it will take?

Professional learning around the notion of collaboration.

What will it look like?
• Develop a shared understanding of collaboration – vertical and horizontal
• Gather evidence of current collaborative practice in the classroom/across the school

• Establish prior knowledge
• Teachers reflecting on current practice within the school
• Expert lead professional learning for all staff
• Utilise teacher expertise – modelling forms of collaboration
• Consistent and clear goals planned for and set by teachers and students
• Negotiate tasks to match goals across the school
• Reflection on trials and evidence

What do you think of our objective to ensure that there is Professional Learning around collaborative learning from P – 6 at St Lukes?
What is your reaction?
What makes you say that?
Have we considered everything?
Have we missed something?

This is our Vision for building Collaboration to strengthen our Teaching and Learning. We invite your response and welcome feedback. This follows on from our illustration that symbolised what collaboration means to us.

http://voicethread.com/share/2518288/

Vision

You will see:
-purposeful local and global partnerships
-a supportive community working side by side
-a clearly articulated purpose
-positive relationships that energise and motivate
-confident leadership

Our Staff is in a pilot program to upgrade schools to a new Ultranet Platform. It is the ICON trial plan and we are preparing for the Journey.
After discussion about what our shared vision for the future of Teaching and Learning would be, we were then asked to use symbols and pictures to show what it it looked like.

For us Collaboration is about the students learning from each other, the community and the world. It is about bringing the global community into our classrooms and reaching out to others.
It is about utilising the best tools from the past, eg. music, art, books, while embracing internet resources and tools, deep thinking and multiple intelligences, to enhance learning.
It is about offering a rich education through inquiry learning, to create a sustainable future.
We underpin our teaching and learning with strong gospel values, while working in partnership with parents and the wider community.

Our illustration was completed in 5 minutes but we hope that it conveys the basis of our Vision.

What is your reaction?
What is your vision of the Future of Education?

There are so many amazing resources out there to be shared and used for personal and student blogging.
Select the tool for the specific purpose. there are many to choose from.

My favourites are:
1. Voicethread This allows you to upload student photos and have the student record personal learning reflections. It also allows visitors to your blog to comment, reply or ask a question. It is a great interactive tool.
2. Kizoa Like many of the great slideshow tools this one allows you to add comments, music and special effects.
3. Picture trail is another photo sharing tool that allows for extra special effects including rotating cubes and special borders.
4. ToonDoo is a fabulous cartoon creating tool. The students are able to use special backgrounds, select images or draw their own and include their own text. We used it to show what the students had learnt about the life-cycle of insects.
5. Audiboo is a very simple tool that allows you to record student voices from ipods, ipads or PC. We used it to share our songs created using garage band.
6. Wordle is a simple tool used to create word clouds. It is a great way to present key words from an inquiry unit of work, a particular text or topic of interest.
7. Youtube is fantastic to share student learning. It is a great way to preserve the experience of a guest speaker. Once embedding into your blog it can be referred back to and commented on, to develop deeper thinking. We also enjoy recording our news reports to share learning.
8. Glogster is a poster making tool. It allows you to share photos, write questions, embed videos, add special labels and effects. A great tool to display learning as an interactive digital poster.
9. Storybird is a wonderful tool that allows you to write your own book. It is collaborative so 2 students or 2 classes can take turns to write the book. We used it to write the story of our learning journey about designing and creating a healthy meal to share.
10. Skype has endless possibilities in the classroom. We skype other classes in our school. We skyped our blogging buddies in Canada to learn about ice-hockey. We skyped a reading tutor in USA to discover new insects. We skyped a class in Manilla to learn about their favourite toys but found out they had created a class robot which lead our inquiry learning on a new journey to create our own robots.

The variety of web 2.0 tools is endless and their scope for use in the classroom is only limited by your own imagination and willingness to jump in and explore!

A – Authentic audience
B – Broadening horizons, outlooks and perspectives
C – Collaborating, connecting, comments, cross curricular, critical thinking
D – Distance learning, discerning Digital citizens
E – Engaging enthusiastic students with an Electronic agenda
F – Focussed teaching with very Focussed students
G – Global citizens learning within a global network of gigantic proportions
H – Hats on for every colour of thinking while blogging

I – Interactive with instant feedback to maintain interest
J – Judging the relevant information to share
K – Knowledge shared across the continents
L – Learning communities to support each other both Locally and Globally
M – Multi mediums shared with multiple learning abilities to Motivate many
N – Now! Information is instant to nurture deeper thinking
O – Opinions shared openly while offering Ownership for posts and comments
P – Promotes participation by whole school community to present current state of mind and personal ideas
Q – Questions welcomed and encouraged by bloggers and audience – Quad blogging to build deeper relationships
R – Risk taking to reveal reflections on learning and to build relevant relationships
S – Shared learning within a safe social network
T – Thinking critically while using technology and a variety of contemporary tools
U – Understanding others unique perspectives
V – Voice for all students
W – World wide web to enable students to walk with the world wide audience
X – Xtranormal and many other extraordinary tools to express expertise and experiences
Y – Yelling out your discoveries to the world
Z – Zoos, museums, galleries and many other excursions reflected on while presenting discoveries to global community

21st century education is so much richer than web 2.0 tools. The new technologies are transforming our education system however, not only are we developing students into savvy digital citizens, we are now making that learning even more meaningful by inspiring compassionate learners who take action that makes a difference in the community.

As a teacher I am always trying to nurture a love of learning and as a school we have set our goal this year to “take action that matters.”

As journey through an inquiry learning unit we are endeavoring to answer a big rich question. Our unit topic this term has been Healthy food. The through line for our learning is on design and creativity, so our goal was to have the students design and create a healthy recipe. If you follow our class blog http://juniorsblackburn.edublogs.org/ you will have seen the many rich excursions, guest speakers and master chefs that we have experienced over the past few weeks.

So it came time to answer the big question, “How can we design and create a healthy meal to share?”

The students had already cooked for their families and we are using their new recipes to make our own cook book, so it was decided that we would cook for some other members of the community. After much discussion it was agreed that we would cook a healthy lunch for the local senior citizens.

We sent out invitations, designed posters for advertising and planned a menu. Our guest list grew steadily and is now up to 34!

With the 2 other junior classes we are each preparing a course. My class will make soup for entree and the other classes will make salad sandwiches and fruit salad. The students have made all the decorations for the hall, including their fruit and vegetable photography and art work, as well as decorative posters that proclaim healthy eating messages.

We are very excited about this project and hope that the community building and sharing will inspire our students throughout their lives to take action that matters.

So often now in the world of blogging we are all hoping to make those connections with overseas classes or teachers. It is well established how powerful the learning can be, through these collaborations. Sometimes we need to pull on the reins and take at a look at the importance of building or strengthening the local relationships, in our community.
We are currently swept up in the enthusiasm of our students as they discover the benefits of healthy eating. It is always wonderful to be able to inspire our students with our own knowledge on how certain foods affect our bodies and the joys of creating new recipes to share.
But I was reminded yesterday of how important it is to tap into the knowledge of the experts who sell the fresh food at our local market.
We planned our trip to the market carefully, wording up the butcher, baker, grocer and fishmonger. They were all a little apprehensive at first, but then happily agreed to share their knowledge with 60 young, eager customers.
The butcher was extremely funny and delighted the students with meaty facts, pig’s tails and kidneys.
The Asian grocer was very keen to share his cooking expertise and the delicacies of Asian herbs and vegetables.
We even shared the loaves and fishes, as the baker handed out bread rolls to our endless line of hungry mouths while the fishmonger produced a free tasting platter for all to share.
We were grateful for the time and energy that all our local shopkeepers gave, to totally inspire our young students. These connections are what make our vibrant friendly communities great places to live.
Sometimes we don’t see the value in what is right under our noses. We are looking to collaborate across the seas, when it is just as important to make those face to face connections, with those closest to us, to help build healthy relationships in our local community.

We are on a Production journey! This is my favourite time of the year. I love the creativity that evolves with a school production. I love the singing, the dancing, the script writing, preparing costumes, props and backgrounds. I love the enthusiasm of the students and the hype from the parents. Most of all I love discovering the hidden talents that so many of our students possess.
I have been lucky enough to be a part of the audition panel for our senior students. Over the last two lunchtimes they have sung, danced, recited and entertained us. Many of the students always shine and it is wonderful that they continue to share their talents but 3 or 4 students walked in and blew us away.
One of the students, who does not read so well, had us captivated as he told a sensational story. He was loud. He was animated and he had us all on the edge of our seats.
Another young girl who is bright but very quiet opened her mouth to sing and we all gasped. “Who knew that she had a voice like an angel.”
Many students performed to a very high standard, all hoping for some kind of role, to share their hidden talents in our school production.
Now we have the challenge of finding the perfect role that will fit each student just right and to encourage them to continue to shine, not just for our production but for the rest of their lives!

Inquiry Learning is a fabulous platform for setting out rich questions, recording student wonderings and making fantastic discoveries. We then use these new discoveries to take some action in the community that will make a difference.
We came to the conclusion that insects and minibeasts have a huge positive impact on our environment, so the students set about making recordings to spread the news. Here is a sample of some more awesome song writing and recordings using Garage Band and AudioBoo.
Take note of the very important message that these students have!
Ryans Bee song (mp3)
Riley saves the spiders (mp3)

 A week in the life of a teacher is always hectic with planning, preparations, meetings and connecting with students in engaging and significant ways.

Sometimes things just happen that aren’t planned, but can excite and stimulate the learning in ways we could never have imagined.

I begin each Monday morning with a modelled recount of my weekends events. It always includes the comings and goings of my 3 teenagers, 6 sisters and extended family and friends. Tomorrows recount will be on the life changing events of the past 10 days.

Thursday  18- Ted Bailleau visits our school for a Press conference to make election announcement about extra funding for education. He pops into our classroom and delights the students with questions and stories. The school is on 3 Tv networks.

Friday 19- Everyone is on a high from the Politicians visit and TV coverage. Planning is out the window and reflections and recounts are on the agenda. Students learn about Wind Power as they run around the school with their newly made windmills, that work like a treat.

Saturday 20- Last minute present buying for hosts in France. Cooking, cleaning and preparing Bon Voyage party for my daughter. My youngest sister Laura is very pregnant and ready for the imminent birth of her firstborn.

Sunday 21- My husband plays his 2nd game of Veterans cricket and pulls a hamstring. he is now in doubt for Mt Bogong climb next weekend. I continue to work on end of year reports.

Monday 22- Summer has arrived, early heatwave. I attend my youngest sons Year 7 concert. My young boy is fast becoming a man.

Tuesday 23- Staff plan together for next years review and Inquiry topics. Heatwave continues as does report writing.

Wednesday 24- Husband visits physio and hopes sporting days are not over. He is given the go ahead for Mountain climb. Packing for France continues, as does studying for exams for both sons, still waiting for news from Laura and Report Writing is completed.

Thursday 25- Awake to the sound of the phone ringing. It’s Laura. I have a new niece. Both Mum and Baby are well. It was a natural straight forward birth. Which is unusual in my family. There are tears of Joy all round.  Maleah, my daughter, has a piano and singing exam followed by an awards ceremony at school where she receives two academic awards. Sometimes I wish I wasn’t working full time. I forfeit a hospital visit in the evening to attend Maleah’s netball semi-final.

Friday 26- Colin packs for Mt Bogong, takes Maleah out for Father daughter farewell breakfast, then they meet baby Lucia in the hospital. My student Laura is so excited that I have a sister Laura that she encourages other students to make cards. They all agree I have to go and buy a teddy bear as they rate teddies highly as favourite first toys. I love Inquiry learning. Finish work, dash to shops, take Declan to basketball in thunderstorm, meet my Mum, pick up cousins, drive in terrential rain to City Hospital. Cuddles for baby Lucia, Laura and Lex.

Saturday 27- Drive at 8am to junior cricket-Yay it’s a wash out. Head to a polling booth to vote in our State election. Back home for last minute packing for Maleah. The knots in my throat and chest are growing. She is so excited and I must be strong too. Colin has just called from a hut on Mt Bogong. He almost made it to the top. He was ecstatic. I am relieved. With my Mum, 2 sons and Maleah we drive to the Airport. Check in is smooth and we give a hug that must last till Christmas and the New Year. We both cry but they are more happy tears. My chest is so tight I could burst. This is a tough day. Time for a Champagne with my best friend.

Sunday 28- Fr. Staunton, our beautiful Parish Priest retires. We farewell him at a special Mass and celebration. More tears. Maleah is still flying but would almost be in Paris. Colin is on his way home, nursing very sore legs but a strong sense of achievement.

I am glad to be at this point!

I wonder what will the next 10 days bring.