24 Learning: October 2008

24 Learning

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Following on from ULearn08

I've just been reading some of the things I picked up at ULearn.

The Periodoc Table of Videos is a brilliant set of youtube videos from the University of Nottingham. Click on each element and you get a short video explaining the element. Just great.

Tutpup is another site worth checking out. This is basic maths facts and spelling where you login and compete against others from around the world. It is a bit like Mathletics and Spellodrome except it is free. That always attracts me. :)

I have also been playing with Marvin. This looks like it could be quite fun. The thing I really want out of any of these animation software programs is the ability to create characters. I haven't yet found one that will easily allow that. Marvin is pretty cool though and pretty easy to use. It has a few bugs that annoy me. I couldn't get it to export the sound with the animation when I created a video.

Another cool looking gizmo that I think we will buy is this mp3 recorder. It has a built in rechargeable battery and you can listen to what you have recorded on the unit before you save it to your computer to manipulate in audacity or upload to a podcast.



Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach was one of the keynote speakers at ULearn08. She very generously makes all of her resources available for free on her wiki here. There are a whole lot of great resources here worth looking at.




Robomind is a great looking online intro to programming. I'd really like to get some lego robot kits but this might be a good starting point.







Another great resource gathered at ULearn was the Interface Magazine.

Friday, October 10, 2008

ULearn08

I've been at Ulearn08 this week and it has been a great time. Tiring but enthusing. Three standouts for me.

Tony Ryan - This man is an absolute legend. What a delight to listen to him. It is so good to be reminded about the importance of being transformational in our teaching. This wasn't a presentation of "how to teach" rather a challenge about "how to be". It was worth the conference fee (not that I paid it personally mind you) just to hear him speak. He talked about teachers needing to be Energisers, Ethicists, Entrepreneurs and Environmentalists. Great to be reminded that teaching is a mirror. Your attitude is reflected back to you. I know this is true when I feel frustrated and that is reflected back at me from the children. I hadn't really thought about the opposite being true that when I am on top of it that gets reflected back in improved attitude from the children. So many challenges in this presentation that I will be mulling it over for awhile.

Webspiration - This is a beta test of an online version of the classic brainstorming software. It just looks brilliant. I sat and created a brainstorm and then collaborated with someone else all within the time of half a keynote speech (woops did I confess to that). If this remains free and online I don't see how they will keep selling the full product? Maybe the full version offers extra features. I'm sure it will. Very nice to see this online though. It is better than some of the alternatives I have played with like bubbl.us or mindmeister.

Finally. I am so proud of the children from LT4 who came and presented some of the things they have been learning. They were just great and I was very proud of them. If you happened to be in the session... Thank you. Some of the things we showcased are available here.