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Inspired by the popular campus game Humans vs. Zombies, join @Jessifer and @allistelling for an epic zombiefied experiment in Twitter literacy, gamification, collaboration, and emergent learning. Part flash-mob. Part Hunger-Games. Part Twitter-pocalypse. Part digital feeding frenzy. Part micro-MOOC. Part giant game of Twitter tag. Band together your most trusted Twitter allies to defend against a virtual Zombie horde. Collect canned goods, store water, watch your hashtags, and sleep with one eye open. THE RULES TO JOIN THE GAME: Register on this page. Commit to posting at least 10 tweets per day. THEN, TO PLAY: 1. A ZOMBIE can #bite (to attack) once every 30 minutes. A bite will turn a HUMAN to a ZOMBIE in exactly five minutes. A #bite can only be sent to a player who has been active on Twitter in the last five mins. 2. A HUMAN can #dodge (protect yourself) once per hour and #swipe (protect someone else) once per hour. 3. When you are bitten, you have five mins to reply to the ZOMBIE with #dodge or have another player reply to you and the zombie with #swipe. A turned HUMAN must update the Twitter vs. Zombies Scoreboard by changing his/her status to ZOMBIE. 4. The rules are emergent. There will be challenges, amendments, and rule adaptations as suggested by the community and implemented by administrators. Keep your eyes on the blog and #TvsZ for updates. Anatomy of an action tweet: [@name(s)] [body of tweet with action tag #bite, #dodge, or #swipe playfully inserted] [game tag: #TvsZ] Example of a bite/dodge: @DigiWriMo attacks: "@moocmooc I want to #bite your lovely flesh. #TvsZ @moocmooc dodges: "@DigiWriMo No you don't. I have not used #dodge in an hour. #TvsZ Example of a bite/swipe: @DigiWriMo attacks: "@moocmooc What's that lump on your neck? Is that some kind of #bite? #TvsZ @Jessifer defends: "@DigiWriMo @moocmooc I #swipe your hungry beak. [pets @moocmooc] #TvsZ The game is beta, and we will be crowd-sourcing the rules as it's played.

A fun maths angles game where you must find the attacking ninja at the correct degrees before he attacks you. There are three levels of difficulty. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/maths

1. OWNERSHIP is key. For this project, the students were not listening to me on why Twain was or was not a racist, they were showing me and the rest of class what they thought. They were invested in winning their argument. They knew that their work was going to determine if he was guilty or not. Although I gave the assignment, the students were in charge the rest of the way. It was their project and they wanted to do it win. When students feel they own what they are doing, they will work harder. When the audience is larger, they want to impress everyone. These are not crazy ideas, they are the results of owning the work they are doing. OWNERSHIP is a major factor in the value of PBL. 2. CREATIVITY is the another major part of the PBL and is closely linked with OWNERSHIP. Students were allowed to be creative in their work as a lawyer or witness. Witnesses needed to stay within character, but could add their own elements on the witness stand. Allowing the students to create gives them a bigger sense of OWNERSHIP. 3. Another part of the PBL is the COLLABORATION. Students were working with each other trying to decide the best plan of attack. Witnesses would meet with their lawyers and discuss how the questions they were going to ask and how they should dress. The Jury worked on group projects researching the previous public opinions on Twain and his writing. Students were sharing ideas freely with one another. I had three sections of American Lit at the time, so I had three trails running. Lawyers would help others in the other classes and trash talk the opposing lawyers as well. It was all in good fun, but the collaboration had students working hard with one another to accomplish this goal. 4. Depending on how you set up your project, CRITICAL THINKING, is also an important part of PBL. With my Twain Trail, students needed to think about both sides of the argument. Students needed to prepare their witnesses for potential cross-examination questions. They needed to

"AVG Rescue CD is basically a portable version of AVG Anti-Virus supplied through Linux distribution which can be used as a bootable CD or bootable USB flash drive suitable for recovering MS Windows and Linux operating systems (FAT32 and NTFS file systems) from virus and spyware attack. AVG Rescue CD administration toolset also includes a Windows Registry editor, a TestDisk utility for recovering deleted files and lost partitions, a file browser for navigating folders, and a Ping tool for basic network diagnostics. How does AVG rescue CD work? Simply download to any CD or USB stick and insert into damaged computer like a recovery disk. Upon booting, the free AVG software will automatically mount all hard drives of the computer and scan them for viruses and malware, while automatically restoring a safe network connection. Download AVG Rescue Free now onto any CD or DVD or USB flash drive. They promise free support and service for paid license holders of any AVG product."

Free resource explaining the September 11 terrorist attacks on America to kids.

5 minute video summarizing the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York City.

"Math Time Attack! has Flashcards, Quiz and Test modes to help learn and recall multiplication, division, addition and subtraction with an emphasis on speed and accuracy."

A great video and games based English as an additional language learning site aimed at teenagers and above. http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/English+As+An+Additional+Language

"Name-calling, hair pulling or cyberbullying: About a tenth of adolescents across the globe have been the victim of psychological or physical violence from classmates at least once in their lives. A new study carried out by researchers at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) has shown that victims and their perpetrators both suffer as a result of these attacks: They are more inclined to consume alcohol and tobacco, are more likely to complain of psychosomatic problems and their chances of having problems with their social environment increase, too. In the scientific journal "Children and Youth Services Review", the researchers plead for prevention programmes to place more emphasis on cohesion within the classroom."

"My teenage years were brilliant, and one of the reasons for this is that I was involved in so many active clubs and hobbies. I was an army cadet, I did karate and I even tried hockey and acting for a short while. The Extra-Curricular Activities (ECAs) I did as a kid shaped my character more than my lessons in school. I can say that with conviction. In my ECAs, I made new and lasting friendships and learnt cool skills (such as how to start a fire with potassium permanganate, and how to disarm an attacker with a pistol)."

Einstein is often quoted as having said "If I have an hour to solve a problem and my life depended on the solution, I would spend the first 55 minutes determining the proper question to ask, for once I know the proper question, I could solve the problem in less than five minutes." Clearly Einstein understood how to attack puzzling problems. As teachers we face a host of puzzles on a daily basis. Every student we teach, thanks to their idiosyncrasies presents a unique puzzle. The interactions between students further complicates things. Our goals for our learners, their learning needs, the demands of the curriculum, pressures from beyond the classroom all result in puzzles for us to manage and to solve.

I am wanting to take a slightly different approach to this weeks post. The past week has seen the latest round of PISA results and the media has had a field day. Headlines have routinely attacked students, educators and education systems in equal measure. The Canberra Times reported that "Australian school scores plummet on world stage", the Sydney Morning Herald led with "Alarm bells': Australian students record worst result in global tests" and The Weekend Australian went with "PISA global educational rankings: Schools fail on maths, science". 

He said what?!

Not learning algebra means you have shut the door on many careers. Sure you can lead a good life without it, but you have limited yourself. Math phobics are always looking for a reason to justify/validate their choice to avoid math. Trying to make math seem irrelevant to life is a common approach. Imagine saying learning English is overrated - many get by just fine without writing or reading much of anything in their daily lives. In fact, why do we need any education?

It's an interesting article. The writer followed it up in his blog extending similar treatment to ALL subjects. It's more a treatise in how curriculum design and the current state of the system has failed society, rather than an attack on disciplines specifically. He actually has a STEM background, mind you.