2010 Highlight: Students promote Guided Inquiry

The highlight of this year's work was when two students from one of the classes at my school, and whom had been using Guided Inquiry for research, came with me and presented their experience and articulated their learning path from information to deep knowledge in front of Teacher Librarians from around the State. They proved that this process really works and is relevant to today's students. They had worked on a class wiki for sharing and they also discussed how useful this tool had been.
I have placed footage and description on my library blog at www.bacirc.edublogs.org

Bridging the Divide: Online K-12 Conference begins

Guided Inquiry presentation 'gets the ball rolling'

Last term I organised and assisted in the implementation of an 8 week integrated Guided Inquiry unit of work with four Year 7 Humanities classes and their teachers.

We are currently having two Professional Development days and this morning I headed up a presentation of our AGQTP/AIS funded Guided Inquiry action research project. I briefly introduced the theory of Guided Inquiry and a brief overview including photographic illustrations and screen dumps from wiki pages. I also showed the analysis of reflection sheets the students completed during the project and how their knowledge and Information Literacy skills had grown.
This was followed by a teacher speaking of her experience and then three students, who had come in just for the presentation (in fulll uniform), spoke of their perspective and showed some of their work. Another teacher finished off by speaking of her experience of being a 'facilitator' rather than a 'fount of all knowledge' and how this had changed her perspective of her role as a teacher. She also told of the many areas of application she could see for Guided Inquiry.
The response from staff was extremely positive and planning has begun in a number of faculties to change pedagogy for aspects of topics next year - oh dear it will be a busy one for me!

Reading activity for those "too cool for school"

We had a great 'Book Week' in the library last week. I took the idea suggested by a colleague from another school and set up a room for classes to come and have an experience of "Speed Dating with a Difference". [This followed on from last year's "Library Lover's Day" (Feb 14) when we 'wrapped and ribboned' many 'good reads' and students took them home to read and review.

The English teachers were keen for the experience this year and booked a total of 18 lesson times in the library for classes ranging from Years 5 to 10.

We had tables set with tablecloths, flowers, 'candles' (battery operated of course) and a centrepiece of a basket of appropriate books of various genres for each age group.

After a brief introduction to set the scene students were given four minutes to 'date a book' before giving it a rating and recording its title and author for future reference should they want to go on another date! They 'dated' five books in total within the lesson.

Even the students the teachers thought might be a bit "cool for school" and not want to take part, did enjoy the activity and the teachers want to repeat this type of activity occasionally to encourage borrowing and wide reading. A large number of students came back to borrow the books they had 'met'.

The HSC 'Game' - Do they want to play; how can we help them?

Last night Dr Michael Carr-Gregg spoke to our parents and students about facing the challenge of the HSC years at school. He discussed, using reseach findings, how the brain functions and what it needs for optimum performance when it comes to study and retention.
Should we let our students listen to music and chew gum while they study?.... Yes!!!
Listen to the talk here - excuse the writing - it is linked!

http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=Hzs6Qd6bz24v

Recognising the signs - reducing student risk

Just came from hearing Dr Michael Carr-Gregg speak to our staff about the teachers role in picking up the signs of teen depression. Very serious statistics about the state of the Ygeneration and he said we shouldn't even 'go there' when it comes to the Z generation! Again I took notes with my 'Smart Pen' and can share them plus audio - of course I asked permission to capture the session.

http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=Gjx1Fq1wC1DD

ICTs in the Classroom - a revolution?

Mal Lee spoke at the Blue Mountains ACE group yesterday on the revolution that is really not happening yet in Australia. 'Normalisation' of technoloigy has not happened yet in our schools. He said that the technology is not as important as the expert using the tool - the TEACHER - we have all heard that before... and he went on to say that most teachers just replicate the old technology with the new. He spoke of nine critical variables and finally took questions where his views on current government initiatives, the secret of the success in the UK, and educational outcomes from additional use of technology. Again, here is a link to an audio plus my untidy notes!
http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=mjCPclr2mNKv

I will start again - now that I have worked out what I am doing with my new Pen files! I am only making available the files with audio - not the pages of messy notes.
Here is the link to Will Richardson's second session on Connected/connective Writing
http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=jwGQvDLd1RpK


Here is his third session on using live streamed TV in the classroom setting.
http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=wWmB0qhNtxLj

New beginnings happen every day!

Today I went to the Network Literacy Conference hosted by Syba Signs and was totally inspired by Will Richardson! For the first time it really clicked that to 'blog' did not necessarily mean that I was totally Narcisistic but rather that I wanted to learn and share in community. I took my newest purchase with me - a Livescribe pen - and took notes while I recorded audio of the sessions. Now I am able to access the notes at any point and listen to the surrounding 'talk' as well. I now can share the notes and audio through this forum - NOW I wish I had written at a slower speed and more neatly.... Next time! Also I didn't hit record so audio is only connected to bottom part of the first page. Click on the text after that to skip to the section you want to hear as well as read.

Session 2
http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=cRqZ8vcWrlxR

Session 3
http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=dvXghVPR6bt0

I am still a little confused about free access to conferences - but in this case, as I know Will was videostreaming the talks to the open web, I think acess to my messy notes and audio of his talks is OK. [Also... never sit next to a person with a cough if using a Livescribe!]

Guided Inquiry And Wikis

Sept 08
The assessment policy is finally finished ... I have been far too busy to 'blog'!
The new challenge is to finish off some research into the use of Guided Inquiry as a learning process with a group of Year 7 students.
We are more than half way through the process and so no conclusions have been reached except to say that it was obvious from the start that students love to select their own area of interest for study purposes - mix that with new technologies that include social interaction and we are onto a winner.

Online Workgroup

3 March: Last weekend I initiated my first online workgroup. As the chair of the Middle School(7-10) Assessment Committee set up to draft a new assessment policy, I was finding it hard to find meeting times suitable to all members. I decided to set up a Yahoo Group with links to readings followed by a proforma of policy on which all members were asked to jot down suggestions for all to view and comment.
None of the other committee members had ever belonged to an online group before and were pleased to find it was easy to join and some have already contributed to the files.
As this is a four week task I decided against setting up a Wiki and this Yahoo Group space is proving adequate for our needs. I have yet to set up a 'chat' which will also be a new experience for all other members.
A big thanks to Lyn Hay who gave me my first experience in online communities and workgroups in my CSU coursework. Translating study experience into the workplace is very exciting.

ASLA Day at the State Library

Sunday 24 February
Yesterday I thought I would come home sure of exactly where I was going in my Research plan but I am still in the 'confused' state of not knowing if I really want to do action research on how teachers manage and use Guided Inquiry or if I would rather look at the use of specific Web 2.0 tools and how their use improves attitude and success in learning with teenagers.
The latter idea 'grabs' me more but I am actually working through Guided Inquiry with a team of four teachers next term anyway. Surely the project would be too huge to amalgamate both?!
(This Action Research is a project undertaken with collaborative assistance by a community of teacher librarians: CAR-TL.)

Life-Long Learning

I hope to use this space to record my journey as I learn, share and research my experiences in the use of ICTs to enrich and extend the learning and knowledge development of students and their teachers.
This goes hand in hand with assisting students and teachers to follow the Information Search Process in developing a 'Guided Inquiry' approach on their journey of assimilating information into knowledge.