Netbook teachers' Hui July 7th 2011Feedback - via Form / F2F- Having Sarah coming in each week to work with some students and especially with setting up all the individual blogs.
- Using presentations as a reading sequencing activity.
- Blogging at last. The students are so happy to have their own blogs and are becoming much more independent about using them.
- Current events blogging. Each Monday, students go to stuff.co.nz, choose an article, read it and write it up with a picture. Nearly every student achieved this this week. Yay!
- The students that I wouldn't have expected to be 'experts' developing into experts, and the way they are so happy to help others - especially students having difficulty with the technology. Quite humbling really. Much more patient than I am often.
- The children are blogging independently. I just need to tell them the Title and Label...if that! (Once I have checked it of course!)
- class site for weekly tasks and LOs etc for groups (rdg, writing, maths)
- The children's confidence is improving.
- Most of them are writing more.
- It is good to be able to see where they are and to insert more or add more to what has been written.
- Being able to correct spelling errors straight away is another plus.
- Currently using Presentations for our Technology project and the kids are getting very good at inserting images, changing fonts etc, creating drawings, inserting text boxes, and in general progressing independently through the process.
- The class site has become an integral part of our class culture. The kids login and find what they will be doing and when. Resources, tasks, links etc are all there in the one stop shop. It is so easy for them now and for me and my planning and transitions.
- Blogging: As we are working through the topic project the kids are becoming more confident with independent blogging of photo's and movies. All I have been required to do is a quick check of spelling and grammer, and the kids do the rest.
- Organisation of files into collections. It took one veeeeery long session to sort out the class and have no unfiled doc's, but now we have done this it just requires 2 minutes a week for those that forget. Most kids are organising as they go.
- Sarah's support is great. Allows me to account for all that conferencing of writing I just don't have time for. Lucky kids having two teachers. Great for finishing off work.
- photobucket.com is brilliant for having one central place to store and share photo's and movies for the kids. At the end of a session, day, week, I upload photo's for the kids and then link album through our class site. It's all there for the kids to search and copy, save or screenshot for their blogs, presentations. For movies we use the embedded code which works fine. (only downside is the movies take forever to upload if you try and do to many at once)
From F2F discussion at meeting
- Students suddenly 'got it' this week, finally after all this time - posts going up fast - understanding is a lot better.
- Students are posting more regularly on both their class blog and the individual blogs.
- Higher engagement level - getting faster at the basics so they can move on.
- Getting a higher level of engagement in the high school.
- Peer editing and conferencing is much easier and seems to be making the teachers workload a little easier.
- Student independence is slowly growing in the fact that they are not having to discuss with the teacher as much as they have google at their fingertips.
- Enables the students to catch up in their own time as the work is saved for future reference.
- Doing exam catch up on the netbooks in Social Studies ie students who were away on exam day accessing the questions online afterwards and doing them digitally.
- Google Presentations are enabling students in inquiry to share their learning.
- Photobucket is handy to use in the class for sharing photos with the students.
- Blogger going well with the individual students.
- More use of sharing documents to do shared editing on work. Students seem to enjoy working on one document together when working in small groups.
- Students enjoy using ‘Maths Whizz’ in the maths rotation and seeing how they are going when teacher shares their tabular outputs.
- Using Sites in the class has made the class programme work more effectively and organised.
- Being able to give the students the opportunity to use online resources that motivate them. Using online resources to make lessons more motivating.
- Simulations online are working well eg electronics in science.
- BBC bitesize.
- Use of more interactive sites.
- Brighter students are keeping others up to date.
- Using Google Forms during a maths programme, as a follow up session.
- Using the Teacher Dashboard when conferencing during writing.
- When a reliever is in the room the teacher is able to share the work with the students so they can get on with the work rather than the reliever having to work out what they are supposed to be doing.
- Extremely quick to do e-AsTTle on their netbooks. TIP: make sure that the students click on the test that is available ‘now’ as AsTTle will let them do a non-available test and the mark will be false.
- easTTle - writing task - can it be done on the netbooks? - does the spelling and grammar help make it easier or harder for them?
- Issues may arise when moderation happens and some are on paper and some are online. General consensus was that we should be doing it online
- Using Google Forms to do a Pre and Post test allows you to work out if the students are achieving.
- Monitoring a few of my students and keeping them on the right site at the right time.
- Not getting the time to get through every piece of work that children want to submit to the blog :(
- Sometimes find it overwhelming to monitor and mark all students' work on Google Docs. Need to monitor reading and Inquiry tasks more frequently.
- homework using netbooks
- Getting the pictures with the written text to be shared with me. Only the text shares sometimes
- At times the children have trouble getting on to their net books and staying on
- The kids are blinging their browser toolbars appearance and it seems to be affecting the performance of the browser. I have had to reset these.
- New students. What to do with them for 2 weeks until they get their netbook. I feel slightly bad for them sitting there staring at the other kids they don't know playing on these cool machines.
- Kids are getting a bit care free with their netbooks and not treating them with the care they need. They pick them up anywhere, balance them on their spine, swing them around in their bag's. Doesn't seem to sink in when you talk about the correct way either.
- Space, storage Our netbook cupboards are not accesible enough, too tall for most kids and due to lack of space, too cramped. I'm yet to find a routine/system that works well ALL the time.
- Young boys messing with the netbook interface. The first time they did this it meant they were struggling to navigate netbook successfully. Took 10mins of teacher time to set it right as they couldn't remember what they had actually done. Subsequent lads who've messed around have caused all sorts of mischief to their netbook and has meant a re-image. I'm glad they're being "clever" but it's frustrating.
- I would love to be able to access our school server on the kids netbooks to make uploading files from 'students room' easier. I am thinking the iMovies we make from hyperstudio. It would be easier than pushing seven kids at a time through the iMacs.
From F2F discussion at meeting
- New students coming to class and struggling with the whole concept of the computer, etc.
- Putting resources up on Google Docs from commercial resources is very time consuming and frustrating. Formatting into Google Docs tends to be tedious from other programmes ie: Publisher.
- Need up to date versions of Office so work can be exported as a format to be uploaded.
- Students being too casual with the netbooks in the way the students are handling them. Noted: this is in the Kawa of Care document for insurance that was given and signed off by the Principals, so ask to see this so the students can see what are the rules for moving around the school with their netbooks.
- During practical sessions - readings need notes taken but they have no pen!
- Students taking mice from the class desk tops.
- The keypads pop up on the netbooks. Students starting to tamper with netbooks (physically)
- Blinging the browser tool bars are affecting the performance of the browser.
How I have problem solved- Making all the students responsible for monitoring each other and feeling free to tell me if anyone is on the wrong place.
- collaboration with colleagues and/or students - discussions
- Constant talking to the other teachers about issue's, ideas etc... Makes a big difference having the support. Also trial and error.
From F2F discussion at meeting
- Alt + tab - you can scroll through what programmes are open.
- F11 hides and shows full screen.
What I would like help with- Can I upload a student google presentation to a blog? If not, is there any way I can format one so I can upload it?
- Finding ways to encourage children not to play games while they are meant to be completing a learning task.
- literacy help - e.g. to conference and add value e.g. with vocab ideas, scaffolding etc
Netbook Teachers Mid year surveyThanks to the 15 (out of 24+ teachers!) who have taken the time to complete this survey MUCH appreciated Please complete it today if you haven't got there yet Emerging Trends - from the 15 responses- increased engagement and motivation
- quicker to settle to work
- better access to online activities
- Face to face feedback is the most effective, but there are advantages for online comments in some instances.
Student Survey FeedbackColleen has collated data to share with us:The data from the paragraph responses is not included, only the data that is able to be graphed easily.... Written responses qualifying response above, summary: - Easier to type and find information, to spell check and find words
- Harder to type and can get distracted by other things on the netbook
Subjects in which they found using netbooks most helpful
Writing 195
Maths 56
Inquiry/SS/Sc 40
Reading 33
Literacy/Eng 20
Other 70 Educamp AucklandEpsom Girls Grammar: Saturday 6th August, 10am - 3pm, Map Free Bar CampFor the true geeks at heart ie not just a teacher event July 16th, Botany Downs College
Google Sketchup Pro LicensesAvailable free to NZ schools if anyone interested
Creative CommonsAre we talking to our children about mixing, remixing, downloading etc?
Have you ever wondered how to download and share digital content legally? How do you let people know that you want them to reuse your own work? Creative Commons licences can help you do both. We'll show you how. To find out more about Creative Commons in New Zealand visit us at http://creativecommons.org.nz
This video by Creative Commons Aotearoa New Zealand, with support from InternetNZ, is available under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 New Zealand licence. A project of the Royal Society of New Zealand. Produced by Mohawk Media.
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