Testing Notaland.com
I’m thinking of using Notaland.com in my Year 11 History class this semester. It lets you put together scrap-book like pages, where you can add videos from YouTube or pictures from Flickr and lots of other things. You can also leave comment on people’s pages.
My thoughts are that my students could create a page for each week of the semester to summarise what they have learnt. They can find relevant videos etc and I can comment on their pages each week, as well as get them to comment on their classmates pages. A different and much more interactive way of ‘taking notes’ and keeping summaries that might help with end of term assessment.
This is a page I put together for tomorrow’s lesson as a way of presenting to them and showing them to application. I’m not known for my graphic design skills 
Let me know what you think of the ideas and if you’ve used this application before. Thanks!
P.S – Hmm, it seems that the embedding code is not working for the moment so here is a screen shot of what my page looks like – and here is the link to the actual page: http://notaland.com/jessmcculloch/26192
Just Chat To Us
At the Learning 2.00 Conference a couple of weeks ago, one of the best sessions I went to was one that Jabiz (@intrepidteacher) set up with some of the kids who were helping out as part of the ‘Geek Squad.’ Of course the conference was about education and what is best for our kids, so Jabiz thought we should ask some of the kids themselves.
Here are some notes on what we asked them and what they answered:
When asked if they would or do put more effort into blog posts because they have a global audience they said they would and that blogging is a way of communicating to everyone.
There was a great conversation about exams and their relevance. The kids were saying that they wanted an overall grade about how they progressed – not final exams. They didn’t feel that this showed what they could really do.
“There has to be a point in me learning it
When am I going to need this in life?”
We asked how do you know that the information you find on the internet is correct? – well, that’s where teachers will come in. Teachers having blogs will help a lot. The kids were saying that they need to know how to search and need to know the real life applications. These students were saying how they make sure they comparing resources – as it is much easier to get more information from several resources
Some advice from the kids on how to encourage kids to engage with technology outside of class -
Film making and blogging are good places to start.
How would you like to be assessed? –
This was my favourite part of the conversation. Being as into technology as we are, all us teachers were expecting something like ‘get us to make movies’ or ‘get us to blog’ or anything like that. But no, the kids came up with the most simple answer that really does make a lot of sense:
“Just have a chat to us.”
We said “Oh you mean like IM?”
“No, just face to face. Just have a chat to us to see what we know.”
Who’ve thought?! They just want us to talk to them!
Having real conversations as assessment tasks – how on earth do you assess this?! Jabiz had a great idea – record a converation with the students, then get them to edit the conversation and hand in an ‘audio essay’ for their final record of learning and assessment for a unit. Great idea!
I really appreciated having a chat to these kids. They had a lot to tell us – not that there weren’t things we didn’t already know about what many kids thought, but it was great to be reminded of those perspectives in the middle of a conference about education. After all, the kids are what we are all about.
The tweets I was sending out during this session (in reverse chronological order!):
kids: in class if there is something you want to hear – you will listen
kids: class need to be relaxed – silence invites talking!
kids: class need to be relaxed – silence invites talking!
kids: exams not real – you write your answers then it’s given to someone who doesn’t know you
kids emphasising the point that there has to be a point to what they are learning! imagine that!
assesing kids via f2f conversation or with IM
kids saying that real conversation would be great assessment task
@israelgreg if something is not effective then is it really innovative?
damn – typing too quickly! interactiVe
kids: the biggest thing you can do is make it interactice
kids: do something that is interactive – anyone got any questions for 3 international kids about techn in classrooms?
kids: most boring lessons are when you are told to read pages and do questions – make it interactice
kids: sending private messages through games – something that accessible at home
kids: making class more interactive with games please!
this session is asking kids about what really does engage them…
question to 3 kids about how overwhelmed they feel – talk about homework timetables
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