The yeast to activate learning

Jabiz Raisdana, AKA @intrepidteacher, shared an interesting post a few days ago, which he entitled Singing Hearts, in which he wrote about how a group of eighth graders in Missouri connected with his 3 year old daughter in Qatar. Like many stories of connections made across time zones, cultures, and age groups this one involved [...]

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Random facts I learned from Flickr today

They may be random, but I’m still learning. Flickr is fun to browse, but more and more, I’m discovering Flickr to be an interesting way to learn. The photos take me into places I’ve never been, to things I normally wouldn’t see, often providing interesting background information. Here are a few random things I learned from Flickr photos [...]

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Don’t bag Facebook

  Photo courtesy of phillipsandwich on Flickr This is for all the people who think (and write) that young people use Facebook to waste their time with pointless dialogue, flaunt themselves inappropriately, engage in banal chat about drinking or bully others online. Here’s a thread started by my 16 year old son who loves classical [...]

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Can we see the process in the end product?

Last Saturday my sister (art teacher) and I finally saw the exhibition of work which was the culmination of The Indoor Laneway project. My last post explains the project. The exhibition space is quite large and the ideas behind the exhibit well thought out. The adolescent bedroom and laneway leading to the main screen showcasing students’ [...]

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Art students collaborate – Indoor Laneway Project

Sometimes things happen in schools. Days and lessons go by and pile up but occasionally an exciting kind of learning takes place. Marie Salinger, art teacher and Director of Learning Enhancement at Whitefriars College (my school), has been a catalyst for this kind of learning. Marie has taken the plunge with her Year 11 Studio [...]

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Where the wild things are

 Where the wild things are by Maurice Sendak has been a picture book favourite for children and adults since 1963. The book is about the wild adventure of a boy named Max who is sent to his room without his supper by his mother as punishment for misbehaving. Max wears a distinctive wolf costume during [...]

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Great quotes about learning and change – Flickr group

Yes, another post about Flickr. This time, I’ve discovered the Group Great quotes about learning and change. The image/quote above has been added by canesinthecup. If you look at the rest of canesinthecup’s photostream, you’ll find more quotable quotes, such as this one:  This Schopenhauer quote is a favourite of mine and was added by colemama: Darren [...]

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Why do you write? What gets you flying?

As I’ve mentioned already, Paul C. writes regular posts on a wealth of topics in his blog, Quoteflections. His GPS brings together bloggers from around the world on a topic a month. This month, Ken Allan is the host and gets to set the topic. Paul explains: As GPS (Green Pen Society) host this month, [...]

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What do you say to a student who says your reading blog updates are spam?

What do you say to a student who says your reading blog updates are spam? And what do you say when more than one student sends you an email like this one Could you please stop spamming me. You are cluttering my inbox and inhibiting me from working. Now, there are several things bugging me [...]

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How far will an author go?

How far will an author go to fuel a readership? Will he go as far as to don a soft-toy unicorn head to get people to read his book? Well, John Green will and has. He and his brother, Hank, have created an internet video gameshow which he explains here: Okay, so here’s how this works. [...]

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