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Slideshare

Slideshare

This is a great service where you can access online presentations on a whole range of topics. The one below on Critical Thinking is just one example of the many professional learning opportunities. Using multimedia presentations which often come with voice as well as imagery and embedded links provides an excellent assault on the senses!
 

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Learning Technologies and School for the Future

Learning Technologies and School for the Future

This excellent brochure from the UK British Council for School Environments provides an easy to read outline of the future for schools, not just in the UK , but in every country in the world. The pamphlet is a record of the first BCSE lecture from Rachel Jones from the company Steljes (Smart Board Distributors)
 

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Wisdom

Living Wisdom

The 2nd education paradigm provides learners and educators with the capability to move the end point of learning from knowing to understanding but with understanding comes the capability to be innovative and creative and this innovation and creativity can be applied for good or for evil. If we are to teach for understanding then we have a moral duty to teach/encourage wisdom as a an outcome of the application of potential innovation and creative thoughts and actions.

This paper serves as a very good primer for developing an understanding of what wisdom is and how it can be encouraged.

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21st C Skills for 21stC learners: Literacy in a  Digital Age

21st C Skills for 21stC learners: Literacy in a  Digital Age

"A report from the 21st Century Literacy Summit (2002) contends that "the explosive growth of technology in every aspect of society offers us a unique opportunity to engage our citizens in economic and civic life" (p. 4). The report further states that to take advantage of this opportunity, we must continually acquire and develop new knowledge and skills. Summit participants noted, "Information and communication technologies are raising the bar on the competencies needed to succeed in the 21st century, and they are compelling us to revisit many of our assumptions and beliefs".

The sheer magnitude of human knowledge, world globalization, and the accelerating rate of change due to technology necessitates a shift in our children's education—from plateaus of knowing to continuous cycles of learning. Therefore, policymakers and educators alike must define 21st century skills, highlighting the relationship of those skills to conventional academic standards. As they do so, they must also recognize the need for multiple assessments to measure these skills within the context of academic standards, evaluating their application to today's technological, global society."

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A Global Imperative: 21st C Literacy Summit

A Global Imperative: 21st C Literacy Summit

"A profound shift is taking place in the way people communicate and express themselves. Fueled by media that increasingly are crafted for a global audience, pervasive access to goods and services from ever more distant locales, access to networks and communication services that span the planet, and generational ties between youth that transcend borders, a new concept of language — and what it means to be literate — is evolving.

This report eloquently presents where literacy is heading in the 21stC.

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8 Things that really do make a difference in schools

Teachers Make a Difference
What is the Research Evidence

There are so many initiatives, ideas, philosophies and passing fads that proponents will tell you "will revolutionise your school and dramatically improve student learning" but what really does make a difference. In this excellent piece of research John Hattie from Auckland University in New Zealand has distilled the evidence from over 50 000 studies (yes 50 000!), on the effects of those initiatives to see what really does push out the boundaries of teaching to deliver improved learning results. The answers will surprise you and the effect size will also surprise you.

All teachers and all school leaders must read this work.

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A new Paradigm for a new Generation

Educating the NET Generation

This is the reading for the month. An excellent online book which is available as a free download from this site. Although written from a tertiary perspective the principles apply to all levels of education and the content is very insightful. There are 15 chapters so I suggest each PD team read a chapter and then take turns having 2 groups per week do a presentation on that chapter to the whole staff. Allow about 40 minutes for discussion on each chapter so keep the presentations short(ish).

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The Future of High Schools

Bill Gates has an opinion on most things and here is his opinion on schools today and why he is not too keen on them. Quite insightful really

Harnessing Technology

In the UK they are designing a very ICT rich future for their schools which they hope will transform learning and what schools could be.

Teaching as Performance

Is knowledge about performance or is it an object? Should we be worried about the intellectual property associated with  knowledge?

WebLogs and the "Middle Space" for Learning

Why hasn't e-content and e-content systems transformed higher education? What has been missing and what can we do about it?

Portfolios to Webfolios and Beyond .  .

Portfolios are useful but they are often just stuff! What can be done to transform them into learning and teaching environments?

Creation of a Learning Landscape

What is the purpose of an e-portfolio? Start here and work your way forward and some interesting solutions start to become apparent.

A Diamond in the Rough

Education headlines tout e-content as the future of all education but is this the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Where is all this going and what can we expect?

The Creative Commons

Copyright poppycock! That is the general interpretation that teachers have applied to the (c) symbol and although there has not been a great deal of guilt associated with this, here is the future of guilt free use of other people work!

Free Online Image Libraries

We are currently using "Google Image" searches to get the images we need for our online coursework etc. and feeling a little but guilty about it, but now we have "fat free; guilt free" online images in abundance.

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The Questioning Toolkit

Questioning Skills

This is an excellent collection of ppt slides dealing with questioning. The subject is science but this is very good for all teachers at all levels.

Classroom Questioning

Why do we use questioning in the classroom? What does the research say about questioning? How do we structure the cognitive level of questioning?  Excellent article

Inquiry Based Leaning

Using the Internet to Promote Inquiry Based Learning

This paper promotes a structured approach to Inquiry Learning via an 8-step intuitive process.

Centre for Inquiry-Based Learning 

Although centred on teaching science this is an excellent paper investigating the inquiry learning process.

Understanding & Teaching Thinking Skills

The Brain, Technology & Education

In this interview with Robert Sylwester the discussion focuses on the development of the brain and its capacity to interact  with the technologies that we are exposing them to. Excellent.

Building Learning Power

This article highlights an excellent approach to an integrated approach to using thinking in the classroom. More on this can be found at  www.buildinglearningpower.co.uk/

Learner Centred Strategies

Visible Knowledge Project

Learner centred teaching focuses on what the student brings to the table but how do teachers use this to create learner centred environments

Learner Centred Psychological Principles

Good models of teaching and learning with technology (GMOTT) take into consideration a set of practices that support the effective integration of technology into the curriculum.

Providing professional Development for Effective Technology Use

How can schools deliver the required level of PD for staff when it comes to technology skill development and application of these skills in the classroom?

Practice Evident in Good Models of Teaching with Technology

What contributes to the effective integration of technology into the classroom?

Web Quest create opportunities for teachers to create online resources for students in a structured and well managed manner. This paper addresses the different types of tasks/questioning stances that the teacher can make use of.

A revision of Blooms taxonomy through the 1990's  provided teachers with considerable improvements. What were these improvements and what are their implications?

Inquiry based Learning is one way to encourage "deep understanding". How can we overcome to major problem identified on p2 of this excellent article?

The Courage to be Constructivist

Increasing global focus on "high stakes assessment" means that teachers are sacrificing their own philosophical beliefs about teaching and in the process losing interest in their profession. How can we "assess for learning" as opposed "assess for status"?

Teaching and Learning is often thought of a single endeavour but it is in fact two distinct activities; teaching AND learning. What is our current understanding of "learning"?

How do Lerner Centred Strategies apply to Middle Schools? What differentiates them from what is done in high schools?

Applying Learner Centred Practices to High Schools

How do Lerner Centred Strategies apply to High Schools? What differentiates them from what is done in middle schools?

Information Technology & the Curriculum

This paper addresses the role of ICT in the tertiary sector. What are three "connections" between what this paper is describing and your school?

What is different about how ICT's should be used and the introductory statement by Thomas Edison? Arte you sure?

A Questioning Toolkit

Jamie McKenzie presents here a toolkit for effective questioning but how practical is this toolkit for the classroom? Which of the question types promote understanding? Does any one type do this better than any other and why/why not?

A Checklist for Effective Questioning

Here are 12 questions you need to ask about how you ask questions in your classroom. Good questioning promotes quality thinking but you may need to talk to the thinking skills group to assess just what good thinking is! Good thinking??

An Introduction to Inquiry Based Learning

This introduction provides an introduction to Inquiry based learning and sets the scene for more in-depth readings that will follow. What are the classroom management changes required to transform a classroom into one with an inquiry learning focus?

Inquiry based Learning is about setting good questions and this reading provides a simple framework that teachers can use immediately to start building an inquiry approach. What is the relationship between questioning and the inquiry learning model?

Teaching Thinking Skills (extrinsic)

This introduction to thinking skills from North Western Education labs provides a framework for teaching thinking skills to students extrinsically (make it obvious). Which of these two reading makes the best case and why?

Teaching Thinking Skills (intrinsic)

This paper takes the intrinsic approach by infusing thinking skills into curriculum delivery. The paper follows the work of Swartz, Perkins and Parks and look at embedding thinking intrinsically (not obvious) in the curriculum. Which of these two reading makes the best case and why?

Learner Centred Psychological Principles

This paper presents 14 principles for introducing a learner centred teaching model in the classroom. These principles are divided into four classes. Which class of principles do you feel affects your classrooms the most and can you justify your decision?

Learner Centred Syllabi

Many schools are talking about creating learning communities. But what is a learning community and are these just buzz words for "classroom"? The principle here is to focus on the learning process rather than the content. Does this mean content is now irrelevant?

Enhancing Learning with ICT

This paper was released earlier this year and provides a clinical look at whether ICT benefits the education process as much as the evangelists say it does or are some of the shortcomings due to how the ICT's are applied to classroom practices?

e-Learning & the Attention Economy

We have everything we need to move into the second education paradigm except the attention of the children we are doing this for.  The attention crisis; is this another job for technology or do we need to be a bit more creative?