Teaching with video

Khan academy was one of the concepts mentioned at Rogalandskonferansen this year.  It has been some time since I last was in and saw what they were doing.  This TED speech has really inspired me to learn more about the concepts of teaching using video.  Something I have been doing for a number of years now but nowhere near the caliber of Khan Academy.

 

http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf

My new PLN

After hearing Svend Andreas horgen at rogalandskonferansen this week I have decided that it’s about time to get my blog up and running again. This time I will be using posterous as it is said that it can automatically post on twitter and Facebook and that I can send a post from an ordinary email. Sounds all too good to be true, but if it works hey I want too use it. Posterous might just be the answer for teachers at my school to get them interested in blogging. I might even get my principal to start. When it’s simple and convenient, then people will use it. No hassle, no time wasting. That’s what I want.

Videoconferance

Yesterday I visited Dalane upper secondary school in Eigersund, a small Town south of Stavanger. We were 5 members of a pilot team trying to find out good ways to use videoconference equippment in education. Our county is in the forefront when it comes to purchasing this relatively expensive gear. Our studies show that 17 of the counties 28 schools own vidconf equippment. The big question is how do we use it effectively. Most schools presently use vidconf for meetings with the central government in the county or between schools, but there is very little pedagogical use. Our school uses vidconf on a regular basis for evening courses where adult students come to school and follow a course sent via vidkonf from another school in the county. This works relatively smoothly however many of the students experience the ‘fly on the wall’ syndrom where they are just observers and not really participating in classroom discusions.

This was the first time our pilot group had met together ‘in real life’. Up to yesterday we had only met via vidconf. So it was good to shake hands properly and share lunch together instead of seperately. We had some good discusions about the use og vidconf in the classroom. There are of course many challenges one of which is the timetable. Trying to make a good timetable for ones school is hard enough let alone making a timetable that encompasses many schools so that they can have ‘english’ via vidconf. at the same time. We realized that maybe this wasn’t the way to go. Maybe we should set up ‘meets’ or webinars that the different schools could subscribe to. One of the schools could host the webinar and those schools that wanted to follow could do so if an when it suited them. These webinars would of course be recorded so that they could be followed asynchronous when time allowed. In this way we could utilize teachers that were spesialists in a given subject or subject area and allow them to ‘reach’ many other students. By sharing their courses they would reduce their preparation and greatly enhance and inspire the students.

In order to achieve this we will have to train teachers and course them in the use of vidconf giving them instruction on how to engage the learner ‘on the other end’. No easy feat. However avoiding the ‘fly on the wall’ is imperative for the learners total learning experience. This is partly technical with the placement of cameras, flat screens etc. But preparation and dry runs are also necessary until the teacher is comfortable with this way of teaching. It must come across as naturally as possible. In this TV age we are all used to the reporter looking straight at us through the cameralens. A teacher must also concentrate on those on the other end. The student in the classroom get the atmosphere just by being there. This is harder to create when one is also on the receiving end of a camera stream. Good audio and use of real time data sharing (eg Go to meeting) are also essential for the whole experience.

This is the reason this pilot group has been established. Not that we have all the answers, but because we have some years of experience behind us in the use of vidconf. Now we just have to bring it to the masses.

Removing the clutter

I discovered a great tool today helping to remove the clutter from webpages.  Often when reading long texts and blogs there is so much clutter that distracts from the article.  Also when reading for a long period of time small skriftsizes and different fonts make my eyes sore and tired.  Readability is the answer.  Just make your choices, then drag the link into your browsers bookmarks and its ready to use – extracting (and enlarging) the text and making it easier to read.  Try it – you’ll love it.

Skolen i digital utvikling 2009 – dag2

Skolelederkonferansen – Lillestrøm 12.-13. november

Tanja Byron – Safer children in a digital world

Byron Review – has worked in child mental health

Unlike the UK, Norway is very good at talking to children both about sex and alcohol.

• The Byron review – 6 months og hard work
• Refers to the shooting in Finland – “The Youtube killer”
• What the child brings to the technology and not what the technology brings to the child
• no one talks to children – not policy makers, politicians, law enforcement, parents etc
• Radius of play has shrunk compared with 20 years ago.
• Children are over protected – physically – pushing children to take risks online.
• Parents over-react and want to stop the internett. stop their children from meeting all the pedofiles on the net. – The press reacts and blows these issues out of proportions

We need to talk with the digital natives – adults are the immigrants

Kids know what a road is and what a car is from an early age – but we as parents don’t let them go near to a road until we have taught them about safety.

• The government shouldn’t be able to tell us what we can and can’t do.
• ISP can only block infomation that is illegally defined by the government
• The climat is one of fear and not empowerment
• As a parent we can filter the internet until our children are able to navigate the digital media

In UK  there is a strong lobby agianst adult content.  A complete ban is not effective.

Children worry more about bullying on the net – than predators.  Its easy to say “you’re an arsehole” digitaly than face to face.

Think – click campaign…a comedy campaign on TV directed to adults

• Techology must be so integrated that the children don’t realise they are using it
• nettvett – what is a vulnerable child offline vs online

digital literacy – help people understandwhat they do with technology – faster nett

A little less conversation and a little more action

Skolen i digital utvikling 2009 – dag1

Skolelederkonferansen – Lillestrøm 12.-13. november

Statsråd – Kristin Halvorsen: “IKT, innovasjon og kvalitet

• Digital dømmekraft – kunnskaper, ferdigheter
• teknologien er kommet langt, men datamaskinen er kun verktøyet
• Kompetanse er hvordan det skal brukes – forstår, dømmes, refereres til kilder
• Finner spilleregler – digital mobbing – vranglære
• Kritisk holdning til informasjon på nettet
• Nett og sosialmedia er områder som ungdom beherske mer enn voksne – liten forsprang
• twitter – kreve en del tid – må forkortes alt til 140 tegn
• Kildekritikk, personvern er en viktig del av digital kompetanse
• Senter for IKT i utdanning er snart klar – hovedsenter i Trømsø
• Læreren må fremdeles være sjefen i klasserommet, selv om det skal brukes digitalverktøy
• Stort behov for kompetanse innen for dette området – Senteret skal jobbe med bl.a. dette.

Mobbing

• Selv om norsk skole er stedet elevene trives best i europa
• 5% av elever opplever mobbing hver uke
• Dårlig utgangspunkt for læring
• Må passe på digitalemedia

ITUs kreativitetspris – utdeling

Vinneren er Byåsen vgs i Trondheim som laget kort animasjonsfilmer som vises på trikken i bybanen. “Elever på banen” – www.eleverpbanen.com

Test of posterous.com

This is a test of posterous.com.  Just to see if it works.  If it does, then it's a great way to update a blogg.

Time for a dust off

We’ve all heard of a spring clean – well now it’s time for an autumn dusting.  This autumn I have commenced a new course with the University of Stavanger (Norway) studying the use of ICT (Web 2.0 in particular) in the classroom. One of our first assignments is to create a blog.  I have had this blog for some time now – however (largely due to lack of time) I have let this blog gather too much dust!  So now it’s time to clean it up and again share my thoughts (generaly short ones) with those who take the time to read my humble blog.

I must sat that as a teacher of ICT I find this course very relevant to my work – and it will be exciting to find out new ways to use and enhance the use of computers in the 21st century classrom.

Just Jing it!!

I have used Camtasia (a wonderful live screen capture progam from Techsmith) for many years now. While visiting BETT earlier this year I had a chance to meet some of the staff from Techsmith and saw a preview of their latest creation – Jing. A small (and totaly free) package that is available for both the Mac and PC enabling up to 5 minuttes of screencapture video or screen shots (still). These short film clips can then be uploaded to Techsmiths own server (Screencast) where they can be embeded or downloaded from. Screencast is also free (2 GB and 2GB monthly bandwidth) and can be upgraded to a Pro account.

I tried out Jing and it works! While not being able to edit the videoclips (like in big brother Camtasia) it is really easy to set up and run. The upload to Screencast also went without a hitch and the small videofiles were able to be embeded in It’s Learning with ease. My students can now see small screenshots or a powerpoint presentasjon with commentary direct from their LMS. Because it is free means that also my students can create their own films explaining their choices in an essay or showing how they added a profile in Facebook. The uses are numerous. Why not give it a try? – just Jing it.

PS Camtasia for the Mac is on its way and Techsmith plan to release it in May 2009

iPhone

I have recently bought an iPhone and am now trying out the WordPress iPhone application. This just goes to show that progress often comes in small packages (steps). Now I will theorerically be able to blog from anywhere (so long as I have an internet connection that is). Ahh the marvels of modern science.