Tech Talk Tuesdays: Crowdsourcing Tools for Student Engagement

When: Tuesday April 30th 4-5pm, Melbourne Australia time. See timeanddate for your timezone and day.

About this session: Last Tuesday we looked at google document as a tool for engaging students. Participants also shared the names of tools that they had experienced. This second session in this series will enable participants to share their favourite tools and step us through them. We will then use  our collective intelligence and experience to brainstorm how these can be successfully used for learning.

Come along and if possible bring along a favourite tool, share it with us and push innovation further. Where possible the tool will be stepped through and a collective document created to capture our knowledge.

Here is thelink to the recording of this session. Alternatively, you can view the recording on youtube. Thanks to Chris Smith (@shamblesguru) who has recorded the webinar in this fashion.

Tech Talk Tuesdays: Tools for Student Engagement

When: Tuesday, April 23rd 4-5pm Melbourne Australia time (gmt+10). Please note that we are now out of daylight saving time. Check the time and date here for your time zone. About this session:- Anne Mirtschin will lead a discussion on engaging students with technology. Discussion may centre around the following:-

• is engagement in learning important?
• what impact does it have on learning
• how do we know when students are engaged – how does it look, feel and sound?
• Sharing tools that participants have found to work
• Looking at google apps, starting with google document and how it can be used for collaborative learning, sharing, engagement etc. This has been one of my favourite tools.

If you cannot make this session, it would be much appreciated if you could add your answers to the above questions. Hope to see you with us. Here is the link to the recording of this session.

Tech Talk Tuesdays: Using iPads to EnhanceTeaching and Learning

When: Tuesday 16th, 4-5 pm October Melbourne Australia time (gmt+11)

About this session: Joe Dale, from the Isle of Wight, UK, will be our guest presenter. Joe has been brought out to Australia several times this year to work with educationalists in the area of technology and mobility in teaching languages.  He will share, virtually, his experience and knowledge in using iPads to enhance teaching and learning. Joe is a UK Independent modern foreign languages and technology consultant and is host of the TES MFL forum and MFL portal manager for the OU’s Vital programme.

Please join us and share in the conversations. Click on  this link to listen to the recording. In this session, Joe shared the changing nature of learning, lots of resources, links, apps, thinking etc. Thanks Joe for getting up at 6am to share with us.

What questions do you have?

e-Ignite in Review

This was a trial session held in eT@lking last Wednesday evening, where five presenters were asked to bring 20 slides and speak to each slide for 20 seconds. See this post for more details on the schedule and presenters.

Highlights

1. fast paced
2. variety of topics and presenters
3. positive feedback from everyone – participants and presenters
4. A google document was set up for feedback, contact details and questions further to the presentation.

Challenges:

1. 20 seconds is not long! Getting used to speak to each slide concisely
2. A couple of blank slides showed up. Despite me being able to see all slides, all other participants could not see two of them at all.
3. the number of slides and size of files – slides with a lot of images used up bandwidth, which meant some did not display or took too long to load for some participants. Note: resize and compress images
4. getting slides in early enough for the organiser to pre load and ensure  they have loaded into the room sufficiently as participants come in.
5. multi-tasking:- need someone to moderate, keep the program flowing, another to just be in charge of the timer and someone to be onto the chat watching out for questions, problems etc.
6. challenging to be both a moderator and a presenter
7. if question time is allowed, four speakers may be the maximum
8. technical difficulties prevented Penny Bentley from sharing her presentation. This will be held soon.

Below is Tania’s great presentation on  What’s good on facebook for educators and regular teachers

Ness’ valuable presentation on Voicethread

Thanks to all our wonderful presenters. It appears that this might be a regular event on a monthly or bi-monthly basis. Would you be prepared to present?

eT@lking: e-Ignite

Note: A big thank you to our fabulous presenters for their willingness and expert approach to presenting. There was a great range of topics and experiences were freely shared. Technical issues and time prevented Penny from presenting. But, she will share her presentation in eT@lking soon.

This week witnesses the launch “Connected Educator”  month, an initiative of the USA. The Australia Series is proud to continue to connect educators across the nation and beyond to the globe as part of their weekly webinars. This week also sees a pilot trial of e-Ignite take place with many connected educators sharing.

Ignite is a fast-paced geek event started by Brady Forrest (Technology Evangelist for O’Reilly Media) and Bre Pettis (of Makerbot.com, formerly of MAKE Magazine). The first Ignite took place in Seattle in 2006, and since then the event has become an international phenomenon, with gatherings in Helsinki, Paris, New York and many other locations. We’re proud to be bringing the format to the Australia Series on a virtual basis – e-Ignite.

Speakers will use 20 slides, rotated automatically with each slide shown for 20 seconds, giving each speaker 5-6 minutes of fame to share their passions and interests and ignite an interest in those who listen to their presentations. ISTE Ignite was brought to the ISTE conference in 2012. The sessions were extremely popular.

Please join us in this exciting venture and support those who are willing to be amongst the first to do so.

When: Wednesday 1st August, 8-9pm gmt+10 Melbourne, Australia time

Our e-Ignite presenters for this first session are:-

• Carole McCulloch  - Connecting echampions/eleaders
  
• Ness Crouch - Voicethread
• Tania Sheko - What’s good on Facebook for Educators and Regular Teachers?
• Penny Bentley - Connecting Learning
• Shin Gog-s: Connecting with students through social networking tools – facebook and skype

Please join us and support this pilot trial! Here is the link to the recording.

Tech Talk Tuesdays: Using iPad apps for effective learning

 

When: Tuesday May 22nd, 4-5pm, Melbourne, Australia time (gmt+10)

About the session: Jenny Ashby will be leading a discussion about the  use of iPad apps for effective learning. She will share some of her favourite apps and discuss ways in which we can learn more about their use in the classroom. Come along with your questions and share your resources and ideas.

About our presenter: Jenny is a pioneering and leading expert in all things mac, ipad and ipod. She has presented overseas on numerous occasions and her advice is in high demand! Jenny is an ICT specialist, teacher coach, forever learning, forever teaching, early years literacy teacher and currently teaches in Bendigo, Australia.

Here is the link to the recording

Tech Talk Tuesdays and eT@lking – this week’s webinars

Tech Talk Tuesdays:- Google Sketchup
When: Tuesday, October 25th, 4-5pm, Melbourne Australia time (gmt+10)

About this sesion: Join us for another great session with Marc Grossman from the UK. This time Marc will walk us through some of the wonderful features and applications of google sketchup that allow for creativity and design in the classroom.

His last session on Scratch was a great ‘hit’! So don’t miss this session. Marc added files for Scractch here from our last session.

About Marc: Marc is a teaching assistant at two primary schools in London. After working in the IT industry for almost 20 years he moved into supporting children with their learning, He loves helping children with their numeracy, literacy and ICT. He also spends part of of his time supporting teachers too showing them new aspects of ICT such as Scratch and SketchUp.

Here is the link to the recording

eT@lking: Sharing Digital Media (part 2)
When:- Wed, Oct 26th from 8 to 9 pm Melbourne, Australia (gmt+11 during daylight saving.

About this session:  Following on from the success of Chris Smith’s first session for eT@lking several weeks ago, we continue on with part 2 of Sharing Digital Media using Social Networks and if time permits torrenting.

About the presenter:  Chris (@shamblesgu) is well known internationally on the presenter circuit, especially in Asia. His website alone attracts more than 10,000 hits per day. Chris describes himself as a Digital Nomad Evangelist and TEDxBKK presenter. See his presentation

Please join us! Here is the link to the recording

eT@lking: Top Trending Online Tools in review

Tonight, participants listed the 5 tools that they are increasingly using. We did not actually get to compile the  10 trending tools as hoped, but it was so interesting listening to the tools that others use, why they use them and how they use them. Here is a screen shot of the whiteboard showing the list.

Participants took it in turns to choose one of the tools and get the person who added it to the board to speak to the tool. The tools chosen for further discussion were:-

1. evernote
2. mightybell
3. simplenote app
4. spicynodes
5. rockmelt
6. webspiration
7. posterous
8. showme app

Which of these do you know? How  and why have you used them? Which would you add to the list.

Coach Carol shared this link for  the top 100 tools for learning 2011 as a comment on the blog post.

Here is the link to the recording.

Tech Talk Tuesdays and eT@lking: This week’s online webinars

Tech Talk Tuesdays:  Open House

When: Tuesday, October 11th 4o5pm Melbourne, Australia time (gmt+11 as we have now entered daylight saving, this session will be one hour earlier than our last session time)

About this session: This session will be an open, unconference style session where you can come with ideas and experiences to share, or questions to have solved or discussed or any matter relating to teaching, learning and education in general. Hope to see you there!

Here is the link to listen to the recording

eT@Lking: Keeing the Conversations/Experiences continuing with Mightybell

When: Wednesday, October 12th 8 – 9pm, Melbourne Australia time (we have started daylight saving so please check with a world clock, if you are in a different time zone)

About the session:- Mightybell is a new web based service, created by one of the co-founders of  Ning based on the idea that “success comes from thinking big, but acting incrementally,” and so this platform allows you to create and share an “experience.” An experience is an organized series of step-by-step “actions” users can follow. This makes it a powerful social media tool.

In this session, Carole McCulloch will share how Mighybell is being used after the successful ePortfolio MOOC and will demonstrate how to create your own mightybell experience.

Other online webinars available in Australian time zone friendly slots will also be shared. Please join us in the conversations.

Here is the link to join the session

5 computers, 1 laptop, 1 netbook, 4 headsets later and finally … Tech Talk Tuesdays webinar

Just to vent my frustration and show how annoying technology can be at times, I shall write this post.  I like to logon 30 mins before Tech Talk Tuesdays webinar starting time, upload any presentation and proforma slides, check my audio and take time to then welcome participants prior to commencement time.

However, as soon as I entered the computer lab, it was obvious that an supervised group of students or highly disengaged students had been in there prior to the closing bell. There were five or so coloured, carefully folded paper rockets littering the floor, chairs were all askew. After quickly tidying up, I settled at the desktop that I usually use for online webinars. The audio on this  computer always works and there is rarely a need to tweak the settings – until this afternoon! Here were my challenges:-

1. first the computer was so  slow loading up
2. the speakers worked but not the mic
3. the ppt presentation failed to load
4. my laptop no longer works with blackboard collaborate, so I could not revert to this.

Solution:

1. try a different headset, run through the audio setup wizard, failed again.
2. Plugged the headset into the back ports.
3. Tried a third headset to no avail.
4. Logged on to a borrowed netbook, still no mic working. Getting quite frantic now so another three computers were logged onto. Still no luck with the mic or with logging on.
5. A small number of people were in the virtual room waiting patiently and  punctually for TTT to start. I text chatted furiously while trying a fifth computer, which finally worked.
6. Fortunately, my school colleague Britt Gow entered the virtual room and she kindly started the webinar and continued moderating until I finally was settled (10 mins after starting time). Thanks Britt! Much appreciated.

What I have learned!

1. Over the last few years, technology can be your best friend, but sometimes your worst enemy.
2. Do not panic! Keep trying and persevering. Change headsets, ports, computers etc until one works.
3. No-one is irreplaceable!
4. Make the other participants moderators and let them sort out the session, until I can get in appropriately. It is surprising what others can do when they can support each other.
5. If the worst comes to the worst, suspend the session and re-schedule for next week. It is all free, so there should be no complaints except for the inconvenience.

Clearing up my scattered mess at the end of the session, meant the room was then neat and tidy for tomorrow’s classes. And….. we had a fantastic webinar where everyone shared tools and conversations. A post is to follow!

What has been your most frustrating moment with technology? What did you do? What were the outcomes?