Group items tagged

A blog by Deborah Stewart about her preschool and their daily activities. There are also lots of different ideas and resources on her blog (ideas for different activities along with lots of other resources). Very inspiring and interesting blog; definitely gives me lots of inspiration for things to do in my room!

this is a great blog about creative and fun ways to teach children in early childhood. I found it very interesting and it has some very relevant content for pre-service teachers hoping to work in the early childhood field. Take a look I hope you find it helpful.

Here you will find resources, teaching ideas, curriculum and inspiration related to Early Childhood education. This is a fantastic blog and a great example of early learning in action.

A Swedish academic writes an open letter raising some concerns about the SAMR model. A common model for understanding what ICT can be used for. Mentioned briefly in the week 3 learning path.

Article describing games and virtual worlds and their application to learning and teaching.

A description of the 1st one-to-one laptop program in the world (at a Melbourne-based private school). The important aspect of this is the purpose behind this program and how that differs from what has happened since. Arguably, how computers and computing devices are being used in schools has radically decreased even though the capability of the technology has radically increased.

I found this article really interesting after an experience in two year seven classes a few weeks ago. I was asked to help two grade 7 classes for the first 2 periods for three weeks. In that time, I wandered around quietly paying particular attention to what the students were actually doing on their laptops. I noticed on many occasions, several of the children were actually entertaining themselves by just "pottering" around on their laptop, even while the teacher was explicitly teaching. I was really curious to know how much the majority of students were actually learning. The class environment was relatively quiet compared to schooling in my day (in the '70's and '80's) but I had the thought, if laptop programs are NOT successful, we have a big problem that may not be confirmed for a decade or so. The other thing I found interesting is that the majority of the year 7's had done extremely poorly on their ICT exams.... interesting...

This is aimed at kids with dyslexia but I don't think it would matter either way. There are some creative and fun ways to learn sight words.

This is an awesome and fun way for children to learn sight words. It's always great when we can make school fun!

Brilliant! I was just doing an observation in prep yesterday, will be sure to pass this on!

Video of young learners giving instructions to a bee-bot to play snakes and ladders while practicing their numeracy skills.

Hi David, This looks like something new and fun but is it? Is this technology replacing, enhancing or transforming learning? Also there are only 8 children in the video in a real prep class there would be 20 plus and they would not be as calm and well mannered when taking turns. Seems like fun for a small group all the same.

I have followed Miss Jacob for a while on facebook and find lot's of resources from different websites in this one location. It is great for ideas for younger children without having to look at lot's of different websites.

One for the HPE folk.  A Victorian PE teacher who labels himself "The PE Geek".

He does discuss other reasons why ICTs should be used in classes, but unfortunately doesn't give enough practical examples. The gamification he talks about most specifically is a dance game on the wii. Now of course the students are taking part in a game, but their bodies are moving just like they would be if they were dancing without the use of the game, so it is definitely physical. Using these types of games in your teaching shouldn't outweigh the the students taking part in physical activity or sports and training, but it should supplement it. I think using ICTs in HPE will help to improve motivation and interest in students who are uninterested in sport, which is a big focus that teachers face, particularly with junior high school girls. Using these games to get them interested is better than forcing them to take part in an activity where they aren't going to put in much effort anyway. ICTs are also immensely beneficial to students studying PE in senior, as a lot more of the focus is on technique and improvement, so using videos to view performance and receive feedback is great for these students. Especially the apps and programs you can get nowadays that let you pause and rewind video, play in slow motion, and draw on the screen (to check if your body is creating the right angles in the movement etc). In primary they wouldn't be so concerned with technique improvement like this, but ICTs can be used to expose students to sports that they wouldn't normally see or experience. Primary students could research and create their own games and sports using the internet and computers. (It is harder for me to think about the primary context, because I haven't had much to do with it). I am sure there are many ways ICTs can be incorporated in the Primary HPE setting, you just need to think outside the box.

Oops, I think I got PE Geek confused with a PE blog I was reading recently. After looking at the actual link, this PE geek offers so much more! It is actually great, the apps he talks about are great for primary and secondary.

interactive games for children in the classroom