More than just knowing stuff! » VITTA

1:1 – A pedagogical view

helenotway — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 11:39:42 +0000

This year the VITTA conference was back at the Flemington Racecourse. A beautiful venue which for me is synonymous with VITTA, so it was nice to be back. I presented on the Tuesday on 1:1 Learning Environments – A pedagogical view. It was a quite a good size crowd and lots of familiar faces in the audience, including Jill, Mark, Anne,and Glenn. With so much current interest in 1:1 laptop programs, it was clear that many schools were heading down that path in 2010. Some schools were choosing to do this, whilst were being caught up in the Digital Revolution and really felt they didn’t have a choice.

We are lucky at my college that we have made it our choice, and we offer a 1:1 Laptop Program in Years 7 and 8. Year 8s will continue with the program from this year, whilst our 2010 intake of Year 7s will begin next year. It is certainly an exciting time ahead, and we have learnt much in our journey.

Key for us, besides making sure the nuts and bolts of the program were right, was making sure the learning designs were well explored. We are still moving forward in this area and believe that the technology is not just a new way of doing the “same ol’, same ol’”.

“My goal in life is to find ways in which children can use technology as a constructive medium to do things that they could not do before; to do things at a level of complexity that was not previously accessible to children”
Prof. Seymour Papert 1998

We are having our Year 7 Info night this Wednesday, so look forward to getting some feedback from our community.

Learning in a Networked World

helenotway — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 11:06:59 +0000

Earlier this year I wrote a couple of posts about developing a PLN (Professional Learning Network), and just last week I presented at the VITTA Conference about ‘The Power of the online PLN’. It was very much a reflection of how I had developed my own network over the year as a direct result of me needing to learn more about new technologies and online tools for learning, for my role as an Ultranet Coach.

The talk I gave highlighted four key tools that got me connected -

Now I am moving into a new role, that of Assistant Principal for a new college (currently undergoing a name change) with a focus on ICT and Student Learning for the 21st Century. With this in mind I am planning on developing learning programs that exploit networking tools and new technologies.

Our students are widely connected in their own lives and would benefit from having similar networks cultivated for their learning to become richer and more meaningful.

Only last week a colleague, Stony River, sent me a link to a great video called “The Networked Student”. I think it is great video that will help me promote this style of learning to my staff, students and parents.

Looking back…

helenotway — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 11:30:02 +0000

Whilst looking through some resources on the ePotential, I came across a video that was made about my classroom (as well as others). It was shot in 2006 and this was the last year I taught at Essendon Nth Primary School. Renee Hoareau, Executive Officer from VITTA was on the production team.

Find more videos like this on Classroom 2.0