Reflection on 3 Years of TMPO

Facilitators of The Manaiakalani Programme Outreach (TMPO) met today to reflect on the 3 years of being in the programme. Our Tairāwhiti cluster started with TMPO in 2018. 

Themes emerging from the facilitators reflections...

• leadership
• personal reflections - we must blog ourselves
• if its good at the top - its good at the bottom
• TMPO - delivery of online learning - theory move to reality
• blogging is the change agent - Lenva - Secondary schools
• sell the why of blogging - to teachers and kids

Looking ahead:

• scale not stretch
• What tree will we plant? | He aha te rākau hei whakatō mā tāua?
• how will we know that Cybersmart is being implemented across the school?

Parliamentary Bills:

we had 2 provocations today to discuss and 

My reflections of the 3 years in a nutshell...

Partnerships with Whānau

As we return to school in this post-lockdown period we have an opportunity to reflect and learn from our experiences.

The Education Hub has been active in collecting parent, teacher and student voice. 

The Education Hub's webinar of "Lessons form Lockdown: Engaging in true partnership with Māori and Pasifika families" is a succinct article about what can be done on the way forward. 

In our cluster many schools reported anecdotally that they felt that they had formed closer relationships with whānau. They reported that whānau were active in their children's learning at home and even sat in on class Google Meets. Many of the junior teachers I worked with had parents emailing photos of their children learning at home. 

On return to school parents were messaging schools with gratitude for the work they saw teachers and schools doing. They appreciated the high level of communication through daily Meets, online assemblies and emails. They expressed thanks for the care and attention the teachers gave to the learning tasks and how accessible it was on class Google sites. 

So how can schools learn from this and continue to forge relationships to continue on from the good work done in lockdown? How can they build on what worked and collectively work on what is good for students, whānau and schools?

Reflecting on the Magic

At the end of a very long period of work from January to this week, the Manaiakalani facilitators met online this week to reflect and share our perspectives on the power of the Manaiakalani kaupapa through the pandemic.

After working with teachers closely during lockdown so they could deliver distance learning, this time of reflection is important so we can see what worked well and harness that as we return to classrooms. 

Here are my reflections on my experience.

DFI Day #8 - Computational Thinking

Another full day of Learn Create Share.
Computational Thinking is such an interesting area and the resources that are available are amazing.
In the past DFI's I have explored Lightbot and Flappy Bird (which was highly addictive!). So today I thought I better get stuck in and try Scratch Jnr.

I am in 7 junior classes this year so I would like to open the world of coding to them and as they all have iPads this is the ideal place to start. I like the way you can test the code and adjust as you go - is that called debugging? I managed to add my face to the girl character which will be fun for learners. Next bit of leanring for me will be to add sound bytes to characters rather than having words popping up.

I can see me exploring this further and probably losing a few hours in doing so. All in the name of "work". And...we are having our 2 young grandsons for the holidays - this could be a saviour on a cold, wet winter's day.

Here is a screen recording of my first project...

Gamefroot was another fun thing we did and used the Mihi Maker. Last time I used this it didn't work that well. And it is still not embedding correctly so I fall off the end of the world part way through even thought the preview went well.

Learning More in DFI

As DFI continues I realise what a great opportunity this is for further leanring.

Each week the "Connecting with Manaiakalani" slot explores the kaupapa of the programme and I always deepen my understanding of it from these sessions. So much of the visible, connecting and sharing sections have taken on a different meaning following Lockdown. 

I found that when we were designing sites and spending time on our own sites that the teachers had so much more understanding of why we use sites and what should be included on them. This is because of their experience in Lockdown and the steep learning curve it threw them into as they designed distance learning programmes and used sites to deliver the learning programme. 

When creating sites we were able to spend lots of time on the actual content and how best to  make it visible. In earlier DFI I have found that many teachers need lots of time just coming to grips with setting up the site, adding new pages, and creating links. This minimised their time in getting content online. 

I have certainly used the time to tidy up the Cybersmart pages on the many class sites I populate. I wanted to ensure the content was clearly dated and titled so the most recent lesson showed at the top of the page. 

Here is one example of the result on Room 4 @ St Mary's. 

I Love Google Drawings and Slides!

DFI day #3 "Create" day was about Slides and Drawing. I was in 7th heaven!

Visual Mihi

Above is my visual mihi created in Google Drawings. I could do exactly the same in Google Slides as well. The menu and toolbars are almost exactly the same which means students get used to menu items and icons in these apps.

Vicki, a Manaiakalani Facilitator in Otaki took us through a slide deck about Google Drawing. There are lots of links throughout to give more information and examples of use. I loved looking at the templates again and refreshed myself about making a flow chart.

We worked with Gerhard on Google Slides and had time to explore student's creations. There is no "death by Powerpoint" here!

I had the privilege to lead a small digital bubble group to create in Google Slides. My resources is available here. 

DFI Day #9 Revision

There's that fabulous word - Ubiquity. If you look it up in the dictionary it says: the fact of appearing everywhere or of being very common. An example of this is that we talk about smart phone being ubiquitous. So what does it mean with devices in schools? 

Ax3
Anytime
Anywhere
Any pace

and from Anyone

Did you notice that any place has now become any pace? 

Any pace. Learning needs to be accessible to all learners across the spectrum of learning abilities. This is why we push Google Sites as they offer this. Teachers need to take the glass ceiling off learning.

The question was asked in this session of DFI - What will you be taking forward into the 'new era' of schooling? I really want to emphasise the importance of any pace.

Why do we have learners sitting around in class waiting for instructions or waiting for the teacher to hand out the learning. A Google Site can deliver instructions and all resources needed for learning efficiently and effectively. If all this is accessible for learners then teachers can then teach!

The learners can access the learning and work at their own pace. If they need to review material or instructions these should be visible on the site. If they work quickly and can be accelerated then the site can provide this. This provides learning for all learners across that wide spectrum of abilities.

Will we Embrace Distance Learning in a post-Covid-19 World?

I am reading an article about embracing distance learning by Jeb Bush in between Google Meets. Sometimes I feel like the meat in the Meet sandwich! (I could make a meme for that but I have to get to the next Meet...soon.)

I wonder lots about what will happen when we return to school.
I wonder if we will go back to "business as usual"?
I wonder what we can ditch in this golden opportunity to change.
Because if ever there has been an opportunity to change, it is now.

Jeb's 4 bullet points on what we should do now really struck me as a comprehensive place to start in the post-Covid-19 world. 

• Every district should make available a device and WiFi so every child can participate in online learning. The digital divide must be closed.
• Every district should practice and plan for distance-learning days every year. Distance learning isn’t just for pandemics; it’s also for times when schools would otherwise be closed — whether for snow, hurricanes or other emergency events.
• Every district should make sure teachers and other instructional professionals understand how to use distance-learning tools effectively.
• Every district must plan to virtually serve students with special needs, nonnative English learners and others who require more attention. This will be challenging. First steps should involve conducting an audit to identify which services can be delivered online, and then narrow the list of services that require unique solutions. Districtwide solutions should be considered, such as using a reading specialist to virtually support dyslexic students across the entire district, without being constrained to an assigned school.

1. Yes - we must close the digital divide. The Manaiakalani Education Trust has been front leaders in doing this. Learn from their model. It can be done.

2. Yes - distance learning isn't just for when close schools because of a pandemic. Even though this is an American article some NZ schools do have snow days, some schools are closed for emergencies. So we should learn from 2020 and always be prepared for this.

3. And yes - we should make sure teachers are digitally fluent. that is what The Manaiakalani Programme sets out to do with the Digital Fluency Intensives. Which by the way, are being delivered online right now. So that can be achieved as well.

4. But what about the last bullet point? Have we been able to virtually serve students with special needs? Many teachers I have contact with in this period has agonised over student sin their classes and how they are managing at home but they have not had any helpful guidance. Can we do an audit as suggested? The Manaiakalani Programme have a wealth of people to draw this information from and from a range of contexts, schools, geographical areas and across all demographics. I trust the way The Manaiakalani Programme researches and gathers data, so I would trust them and their findings for this particular point. 

Let's not go back to school and return to what we were doing before. Let's chuck out those awful worksheets. Let's look at our timetables again. Let's look at the way students were empowered and could design their daily timetable. Let's look at how engaged and motivated they were in things that interested them. Let's ask the students what worked for them and why.

Teachers have made huge inroads in delivering distance learning for their students by using the affordances of digital technologies. And they themselves have upped their digital fluency in doing so. 

So we need to harness what has happened and make our classrooms great again! (There's another meme in there too)

Distance Learning: It's about more than access

What has been your most profound change in lockdown? What are you most proud of? What do you regret?

I have worked with many teachers during the lockdown supporting them to deliver online learning and have been impressed by the adaptability of some teachers. Some teachers who had functional class sites transitioned quickly into the distance learning space picking up quickly on using Google Meets to connect with their class or groups. Some teachers had a very steep learning curve but they got there and were very proud of what they could do in a very short time. They were ready for April 15th when term 2 started.

As we moved through the weeks there was a whole lot of  'expert' advice coming from all directions. It was overwhelming. Teachers needed to be very secure in their belief in themselves, that they knew their students well, knew the curriculum and knew what the learners needed next.

A lot of the teachers I talked to were very conscious that 'hauora' was the number one consideration. They knew some learners and their parents were anxious for a variety of reasons. So they knew that by making regular contact and communications this would support those at home. And they did it with style and grace. Daily videos were created with the unique style and personality of the teacher shining through.

Ann Milne in her work about culturally sustaining pedagogies posted this on her blog recently and it struck me as good set of questions for teachers to reflect on.

Engage whānau. Engage learners. Let's ask them how online learning and distance learning was for them. Let's rethink what we do and make the changes while we have this opportunity to do so.

from Colouring in your VIRTUAL White Spaces - Ann Milne

DFI #9 - Computational Thinking

Today is day #8 of DFI.

Computational Thinking is such fun. Often when thinking about technology people think straight away 'computers'. And when the term computational thinking comes up the same - computers. Well that is not so.  If you are new to all of this then take a look at CS Unplugged. This resource does not need devices. Today Kerry took us through a comprehensive introduction to the New Digital Technology Curriculum - Computational thinking.

I used the Mihi Maker on Gamefroot. It works well online and plays well there too. But embedding this is problematic when embedding, hence my one finishes after the marae. Use your right arrow to make me move in the game.

Looking Forward to School

What is school going to be like when we all go back.? 

Can we go back to “business as usual". 

What can we learn from this disruption?

Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano's blog post really got me thinking about when we go "back" to school. Silvia says we should look "forward" - not in the sense of something happy to look forward to but to go forward in terms of teaching practice.

Her image of a bubble that she created in 2009. It actually looks like so many schools today.

from Langwitches blog 

The challenge for all of us going back to school is to make the most of this disruption and change. This is the best chance we have to make change.

So what would you get rid of? On my list are...

• round robin reading
• individual tasks
• worksheets
• iPads only used for games/distributed practise
• looooong drawn out teacher instructions (use your site!)
• glass ceilings on learning 

And hey - if you don't know what change is needed - ask the kids!

DFI Week 6 - Sites & Enabling Access

DFI continued online this week with the theme of enabling access with Google Sites. We explored many sites and evaluated them in terms of visual appeal and user experience. These sites were from across the clusters and provided a range of levels for us to look at.

Then we explored the sites we have made ourselves and provided feedback for each other. We used this exploration and feedback to work on our sites and develop them more. A large chunk of the day was for participants to work on their own site. Having this uninterrupted time is significant for time-poor teachers and allows for focused working time.

I loved exploring and seeing the use design elements that make a site visually appealing.  I love sites that use art from the students and photos as design elements. Here are 2 examples...
Room 8 Wesley Intermediate - home page with a photo as a header
Te Ana Ako (Waikowhai School 2018) - photos used a buttons

We worked in our regional groups connecting on Google Meet which enabled teachers to share their screen to trouble shoot. We covered a range of issues including using Incognito Window to test sites, publishing settings so everyone can view the site, changing sharing properties of Drive folders, creating buttons on one Google Drawing and downloading as a PNG...to mention a few.

The theory behind Just-in-time learning (JIT) has been played out dramatically since the lockdown was announced. Even in days like DFI with a set agenda and times, there are times where we are working in groups and this allow for some of that JIT learning to happen. The immediacy of connecting in a Google Meet means that participants can present their screen in Google Meet and we can deal with their particular issues and queries efficiently and to completion. This reduces frustration and learning is in short bursts without distraction.

I have enjoyed seeing the growth in confidence and capability of the teachers in DFI so far. The sites I viewed by our participants from Tairāwhiti today are coming together nicely. While many teachers instinctively use design elements well, they have worked really hard on making everything accessible today. This all bodes well in this lockdown and means that learners and their whānau can access sites and see everything on the site.

The Public Voices We Hear

Every day I listen to the Prime Minster's Press conference.

Each day starts with an update from Dr Ashley Bloomfield - the  Director-General of Health.  He explains things in layman's terms and is easy to understand. Apart from a break over Easter he has spoken to the nation and kept us informed. He engenders confidence and I am happy to have someone like him at the helm. He even put himself onto social media to answer questions from the public. He has become a household name.

The Prime Minster is equally easy to understand and her empathy for people comes thorough strongly. She is showing true leadership.

So where is the Education voice in all this?

Am I missing something here? Am I not looking in the right place?

We had one day with the Minister of Education last week updating what was being done in the education arena.

We always talk about parents being the biggest stakeholders in their children's education - so who is speaking to them?

I know that the Secretary of Education, Iona Holsted is communicating with Principals via email.  There is also information available here on the official MoE site. But I think a more human touch would build public confidence and ally the many fears people have.

But where was the public voice of Education today on the first day of term 2?
Where was the Secretary of Education or the Minister to talk to parents about their new role today?
Where is the message for the teachers and the extra care and attention they are taking in this uncharted territory of delivering remote learning?

In their absence I hope that Principals and BoT's are picking up the ball and working on communicating and reassuring people of the steps that are being taken to try to carry education on through this trying time.

The Minister did have a Q&A session live on Facebook tonight. But what happens if you are not a FB user? Or you do use FB but don't "like" the Minister?

I think being out in the public domain today would have been critical to making connections with the public, to be reassuring and to build confidence.

Are you ready? Remote Learning here we come!

In the two days we had before schools closing down St Mary's decided to go ahead with their scheduled staff meeting. And as some teachers had selected to work from home, a Google Meet was set up so they could join in. What a great opportunity to practise the coming reality of delivering #remotelearning when school resumes on 15th April.
With the announcement on Monday of the lockdown it made the theme of this staff meeting very relevant. Helen, the Principal, talked about the expectation in their school for how they are using sites to amplify and turbocharge learning. Most classes in this school already had sites set up. SOme had just started using them this year and some teachers have used them since joinung the cluster 2 years ago.
In the past week we had been discussing with school show they will deliver online learning using the Manaiakalani "Limit the Links" doc as the guideline. St Mary's set to last week and ensured every class had a class site and that all content was visible. Their class sites and blogs are all linked on the school site here.
During the week the year 4-6 classes practised using Google Meet to familiarise the student with this Google App. It also gave the teachers an opportunity to set up protocols with their learners for connecting online in a video conference.
So are they ready? Yes indeed. Combine this with effective practice, Digital Fluency Intensive participation, online support from facilitators of The Manaiakalani Programme and a strong collegiality, they sure are ready.

St Mary's staff meeting before lockdown 25th March

Helen, Principal of St Mary's Catholic Primary School - Gisborne

History in the Making

Do you feel like history is being written right before our eyes? I do. Everyday there is a significant development in every way. And while I am deeply ensconced in isolation and working at supporting teachers to deliver online learning, I am staying in touch with (official) sources of information.
My 3 go to's are...

• COVID-19 NZ Government site
• The Prime Minister's daily press conference 
• The Spinoff's COVID-19 page

So how is history written? I think we can write history. We don't need historians or academics to do it for us. And yes, I think they will publish books on this pandemic and the responses will be analysed ad infinitum, but I reckon we can write history just as well as them.

How? By documenting and curating our experiences and understandings we can write history.

Teachers are in a position that we have never been in before. We are having to deliver learning online - uncharted waters for everyone.

We need to write and write and write as this new reality unfolds. I entreated a group of teachers at a staff meeting last week to document what happens over the next 4 or more weeks. The group I was with all have professional learning blogs and this is the ideal platform for them to write, reflect and amplify their experience.

I have been motivated to write this blog post by another blogger - Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano aka:  Langwitches. Her blog post We are in the Midst of Making History really got me thinking about history and not leaving it to the academics to write. Her blog post has many questions that will prompt thinking. Let's get this down for posterity and chronicle our growth as educators, because I predict that out of this disruption will come change. 

So get writing...and be kind.

Blogging Tips: Labels

Labels for blogs are a must. They are effectively the index to your blog just as the blog archive is the table of contents.
Labels for student blogs should be curriculum areas such as reading, writing, maths, art, inquiry, technology, computational thinking etc. These labels should be added to the first blog post by the Blog Admin so that they are already listed for students to choose form. 
Students tend to put in all the main ideas in their labels and this defeats the purpose of labels which is to group blogs and make the posts searchable. 
At this week's DFI Kerry shared with us Blogging Tips: Labels and the gem in this was the table for labels for professional blogs.

STP1	Te Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership
STP2	Professional Learning
STP3	Professional Relationships
STP4	Learning-focused Culture
STP5	Design for Learning
STP6	Teaching

These are from the Standards for the Teaching Profession

Remote Learning is here

What a week this has been!
The announcement on Monday that we were going into a nation-wide lock down at midnight on Wednesday sent many into a spin.

There was panic buying nation-wide and widespread anxiety from parents about their children's educational future if they miss 4 weeks of school - which is actually 2 weeks because there are 2 weeks of holidays in the 4 week. But who knows if it will only be 4 weeks. It could be longer and we need to prepare for it to be longer.

Our Manaiakalani team were onto it a week before this announcement and delivered a doc title "Limit the Links" to all our schools.

We were preparing all that week before the Level 4 announcement was made. We connected with Principals to ensure they had read the "Limit the Links" doc and shared it to staff and that they realised what a lockdown could mean for their school.

Schools were closed effectively on Monday and teachers were to be at school preparing and teaching remotely. We supported schools on Tuesday and Wednesday face to face as much as we could. Most of the support I provided was about using Google Hangout Meet with learners. Lots of the sites just  needed a bit of tweaking in the schools I supported.

Our Manaiakalani Schools are well poised to deliver #remotelearning. Some schools could tick most items off the list immediately and in particular having a school site with links to class sites and blogs.
Take a look at some of the local schools and their set up for this...

• St Mary's Catholic Primary School - Gisborne
• Ormond School
• Campion College - Courses page

This means there is one portal to all sites and blogs in the school. Whānau only need to Google their child's school and can get to the leanring that their child can do remotely easily.

Click here to view all the schools in our local cluster.

DFI Day #2 Tairāwhiti Cohort

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy?

Lenva presented the "Connecting with Manaiakalani" section today. I was riveted to her presentation. Even though we are immersed in the kaupapa of the Manaiakalani Programme, whenever I listen to one of the team talk about Learn Create Share I alway deepen my understanding of another facet/portion of our mahi.
The part that got me thinking more deeply was about amplifying teaching practice as giving and getting. I have just written 2 blog posts about this part of our term 1 staff meeting. I will go back to these posts and make sure that I have expressed with clarity amplification of effective practice.

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

Workflow and being efficient is hard to nail. Just when you think you have it sussed up pops another challenge - like screen recording in Quicktime. Today's Share | Tohatoha section was to be in a Hangout and record the conversation in 3's. One team recorded theirs but there was no sound. I had helped set up Quicktime for this group but forgot to check that the microphone was set to the internal mic before they started. Grrr!!! Sorry about that team!  It goes to show that practising with the tools and testing is necessary prior to any event.

What did I learn that could be used with my learners?  

Being able to record your screen is a critical skill to nail to make rewindable material for our learners.
Quicktime is something that I don't use frequently. I use Screencastify with learners in the classroom on Chromebooks and to make tutorials for teachers as the mp4 is automatically saved to Drive and can be shared from there.

Google Keep voice recording on a mobile phone is a fabulous addition to my toolkit.
For today's session I focused on voice recording in my phone app and was pleased that I had done so as there was a question from one of the participants today about using it for Te Reo Māori. This is a great way to record voice, download the mp3 from Keep on a laptop, save in Drive so it can then be inserted as audio into Google Slides. This feature would be so handy for inserting instructions into slides in my Cybersmart lessons. It would function like audio clips in Explain Everything where each slide can now have an instruction inserted for learners to rewind if they forget what to do. I need ot create a workflow diagram for this and share to the group.

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow in my personal life?

Keep is such a great tool to have. It integrates with Google Apps so well. I use it lots on my phone. In my personal life I use Keep to save recipes! If I am disciplined as I use it and apply labels it is an efficient file of stuff that I like but don't get around to cooking. I really need to teach my retired husband how to use it. Now there's a challenge!

Why Blogs?

This question comes up all the time in our work as facilitators with The Manaiakalani Programme.

So why do we choose Blogger as the platform for Share | Tohatoha? 

Many years ago I visited Pt England School and saw the way blogging was used with learners. On return to my school I got stuck in and get students blogging. We followed a lot of the guidelines on Edublogs and joined in with their challenges. We also joined Quad Blogging and interacted with schools in USA and UK. It was fun especially when we had a competition to see who could get visitors to their blog form different countries and who could get the most visitors.

I read the Langwitches blog by Silvia Tolisano and she is a strong advocate of blogging. Not just blogging by learners but she advocates for teachers to blog FOR their students.

My main reason for learners to blog is the way a whole bunch of skills come together such as writing skills, reading skills, metacognition skills and reflection skills to name a few.

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/PCpNZhaoK8tUZDcoDByLkW-650-80.jpeg

Sharing by blogging is core to what we do in The Manaiakalani Programme. We have systems and processes to develop blogging with teachers and students and are able to provision this legally, systematically, and securely under the GSuite owned by each school's BoT so they can share with purpose.

So why should we blog?  I firmly believe that blogging gives the quietest learners a voice, a place to document their learning and to connect with others.

Amplifying our Practise - Giving to others

Continuing on from my previous post about getting from others - here is the second part about giving to others.

When you learn, teach. When you get, give - Maya Angelou

So my question is - how do you give to others? And for that matter - how do I give to others?

Lots of share in our own settings with colleagues. I know that once we became a Google Domain at my previous job that we were able to create and file and share easily. We did not have to re-invent the wheel and that made us really efficient in the admin side of our job which hopefully, left us time and energy for the real part of the job - teaching! Because we all understood each other and knew the context of your teaching we also had the confidence to share with each other. So sharing is easy in our own settings.

Sharing outside our own settings is enabled by the ubiquitousness of digital technologies. We have platforms that we can share and once we are active on these platforms we can get from others. 

Locally we have a Facebook group to share stuff that we find useful. Join us and share the good stuff you have. We also have a Google + community for out Tairāwhiti cluster to share good stuff.

Are you on Twitter? If you are pop your Twitter handle in the comments so I can follow you. You can find me on Twitter @GigagalGizzy.

Is there anything holding you back from sharing which could include documenting your learning? I sense a real lack of confidence and purpose in teachers when talking to them about sharing on a professional learning blog. This could be for many reasons including  a lack of time or technology. Self-confidence can also be a limiting factor and/or worrying about bragging, judgement, or not feeling worthy enough etc. If we lived in USA we would probably be shouting it from the rooftops - or form the laptop screen. IS this a cultural thing? Or is it something else? I need to ask teachers directly instead of making assumptions.   

My job as a facilitator is about giving to others. And yes - I get paid for it, but I believe the work of The Manaiakalani Programme Outreach has meant that more teachers have access to quality PLD in digital fluency that will mean better outcomes for the learners in our local schools. Apart for that I am able to immerse myself in my technology and use Chromebooks and iPads with learners all day, every day. 

Amplifying our Practice - Getting from others

As we plan for our term 1 staff meetings with a Learn | Ako focus, I am reflecting on offerings from  other educators on the WWW as they amplify their practice.

We live in a digital landscape which makes sharing and requesting very easy. With digital resources we can share and help each other.

When you learn, teach. When you get, give - Maya Angelou

There is a plethora of sites with digital offerings right across the curriculum spectrum. Buy oh! how do you sift through offerings such as "50 of the Best Chrome Extensions for Teachers". I really don't have time to sift through these.

I do like lists like this on in a Sheet from Eric Curts where you can use the control + F  function to search the Sheet and get to what you want.

Locally we have a Facebook group to share stuff that we find useful. Join us and share the good stuff you have. We also have a Google + community for out Tairāwhiti cluster to share good stuff.

I have a long list of educators around the world that I glean all kinds of information from. This ranges from global education issues to specific Google sites that provide information about Google Apps. I subscribe to their blogs, follow them on Twitter and listen to podcasts and ma thankful for the material they provide for us all to use. Who do you follow or subscribe to?

Once you tame your twitter feed this is a a place to go to. Hashtags help sort the material. List of edu #hashtags are available as a place to start. I use TweetDeck to help organise Twitter Feeds. I would be lost with out this.

Once we discover a source of material we then need to Cybersmart and use our critical thinking and literacies to determine whether the material is useful, reliable and/or applicable to our context.

One found you will then need a curation tool so you can find it when you need it. I use Google Keep, OneTab Chrome extension, Toby Mini Chrome extension and Bookmarks in Chrome mainly.

In our term 1 staff meetings we have been exploring Manaiakalani Class on Air episodes. If you want to see real teachers in action in real classrooms then this is the pace for you to go. The teachers document an extended plan which allows you to get inside their head and see how they have planned and reflected on lessons they teach and video for us to watch and learn from. This Sheet lists all episodes. Hint: use the tabs at the bottom to explore categories and cntrl+F to find specific search terms. This shared resource really does amplify teaching practice.