domenica 31 dicembre 2017

HAPPY NEW YEAR !!



Hoping that the coming year  2018 may


be smart and bring  peace 

 everywhere!!


venerdì 29 dicembre 2017

Digital Summit December 2017 (2)

Day 5  19th  December 2017


Sarah  Thomas - How to learn from  a world of  educators

Sarah Thomas explained how  social networks like Twitter made her learn about  ideas and technology and she started to work together with  other  educators to enhance  learning and teaching by using  modern  technology.
In order to know more about the network and her PLN  you should check these  links :

 http://www.edumatch.org/books     you can  download free ebooks from the web site : they provide  examples of  what educators are sharing.  
http://www.theedsquad.org/

What hashtags to follows :

#Ditchbook
 #Futureready
 #CUE
 #ISTE18
 #EDUMATCH

Here are the replies of some educators to her  engaging conference: check the flipgrid 
More events were held online , I am going to write more in the next days.

Day 6  20th  December 2017

Plan Smarter , not  Harder with Edu-protocols  by   John Corippo

Day 7  21st  December 2017

How to make   Learning  a  Game


Day 8  22nd   December  2017
Chrome Book: Crash course : what you need

Day 9  23rd  December   2017
What schools can learn from Start-up  culture

mercoledì 27 dicembre 2017

Digital Summit December 2017 (1)

December 2017- free events on line

The Digital Summit took place this  December. It was an international and free online event for educators.  Nine  events which will disappear  by the end of this month.


Day 1    15th  December

Where  Pedagogy and Technology collide-  Tanya and Holly

"Kids learn  better from each other  "

Key ideas expressed in the video conference

- Use Hyperdocs
- Incorporate technology in existing  projects
- Use Seesaw as a digital portfolio tool




https://flipgrid.com/a04fd0

from the two presenters the book they published this year  " The Google -Infused- Classroom"
Google Infused Classroom link to the book online

Day 2   16th  December  2017

The Science of  Happiness  - A  conference with  Kim Strobel  

Key ideas  expressed in the conference

  1. Teachers need to take control of their own well-being   
  2. Happiness can  bring more productivity 
  3. Play and Laughter need to be incorporated into the classroom and workplace 

How we can love  life : this will help us  as educators and  people who live  their  lives  in a positive way.
Follow these  tips
  • take time to play
  • find things to be grateful
Link to her website and blog :https://www.kimstrobel.com/



https://flipgrid.com/6dae97

Day 3  17th  December 2017

BRAIN FRIENLY  LEARNING THAT WORKS
Presentation by  Pooja Agarwal

Retrieval practice” is a learning strategy where we focus on getting information out. Through the act of retrieval, or calling information to mind, our memory for that information is strengthened and forgetting is less likely to occur. Retrieval practice is a powerful tool for improving learning without more technology, money, or class time.

An interesting approach that can help  teachers and learners: I will  have to search online and  check how it works.

links online :
https://www.retrievalpractice.org/download

http://www.youtube.com/retrievalpracticeorg

https://flipgrid.com/817c94


Day 4  18th December 2018

 

How in the Google Did You Do That?!?


Presentation  by  Eric Curts

https://flipgrid.com/245b1a

Google Slides, Google Sheets and Google Drawings can be used by educators to engage  students while they are collaborating and communicating.

Eric Courts shares his presentations and ideas in an interesting website :
http://www.controlaltachieve.com/


My suggestion is  just follow one of his webinars and you will learn more about Google and its apps.

Eric has a Twitter account and he shares his interesting ideas  online :

martedì 26 dicembre 2017

Teaching History and the Holocaust

While surfing online  last year I came across this interesting  website   Facing History: I learnt about  the best ways to teach about Tolerance and also the Holocaust.

Educators can find  interesting materials online, documents and also webinars  which can help them develop lessons about these topics.





Starting from January 2018  educators can find interesting webinars online- they are free and teachers can have access to the slides and  documents :

 https://www.facinghistory.org/professional-development/upcoming-webinars


The first  webinar will be about the Holocaust  Memorial Day:

I am looking forward to these interesting webinars which will help me develop materials about  these events and people who  survived the Holocaust and have something to tell us about it.

 A lesson for Life. We should never forget what happened in the past and we should think about what is happening also today.


domenica 24 dicembre 2017

Flipped Learning and Wikis

Vance Stevens is  teacher of English and great supporter of  teachers who work with new technologies. He shares his  slides online and  runs interesting  events for  CPD. He is one of the teachers  who is also involved in EVO sessions in January and February every year.

He has been working for years  and works online by choosing  wikis and also sharing  his  interesting  virtual meetings  in wikis and in his groups on social media. 

He presented this  conference in November 2017 and provided some examples of what  he means by using  wikis  while choosing  Flipped Learning.  

Here is the link to his  wiki:

http://vancesclass.pbworks.com/w/page/92112765/FrontPage

Vance uses wikis  with his classes  and also for  professional development.

All the documents and slides he   shares  are excellent documents worth reading and learning about.

This is the recording  about his speech in the conference :




You can find this interesting document online which we shared with us regarding  online professional development:




venerdì 22 dicembre 2017

Seasonal Greetings

Wishing you all the best for the coming New Year and a Merry 

Christmas





The cold days have arrived and we are  getting ready to celebrate this  season .   Winter has  arrived with its cold and freezing  days........

A new year is  coming and  we are going to leave  the old one behind.  Let's hope this Christmas is
full of  great  and peaceful  events.






I wish you all the best  for these  holidays!!

Technology and good teachers


Teaching  well  is important for achieving good  results. Students   can learn in different  ways- sometimes also the best teachers can have some difficulties . What  really matters is  a good  teacher who knows how to use  technology and can cope with different  learning  situations and find good ideas and materials for learners.  Technlogy is  a tool which can help us: we  do need to be able to analyze and focus on what we want to achieve.



I agree with what has been  said in this post found on Twitter





The last years  have been spent on helping Italian teachers to better their skills but innovation is not the use of  nice  smart whiteboards with  internet  access, innovation implies re-thinking our way of working and also integrating  technology in our  learning paths.

Blogging : a course for Teachers


Great  news:  Learning about   BLOGGING - A New  Course starting in January




I did some webinars about blogging  some years  ago.  I started using  Blogger and also Edublogs for my  online  activities as I felt I should  try to work in a different  way.

I am looking forward to learning more  in the next weeks.  I would like to share this great  opportunity for  learning about   blogging with students.  I have just  started a blog where I post some activities but  I have not  used  it as a class blog.
I hope I will be able to learn about better ways for blogging.  

Meanwhile I will check some  more tips and ideas for blogging in ELT.  I have read and learnt  a lot about new ways of teaching and working online :



For more information about the course  starting on 15th January  check the blog online

https://www.theedublogger.com/2017/12/14/better-blogging-with-students-2018-new-supported-course/

Resources for ELT

https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/article/blogging-elt

http://esol.britishcouncil.org/content/teachers/staff-room/teaching-articles/blogging-elt

http://eltlearningjourneys.com/

giovedì 7 dicembre 2017

Christmas trees and activities for my learners

Arbol Navidad 03

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/85/Arbol_Navidad_03.gif
Public Domain

The origins of Christmas  trees can be found in the past and also in Europe we have a lot of traditions.

The  main traditions  come from Germany but it was with  Queen Victoria  that  the Christmas tree  became a tradition in most British families.
I found this useful page about the history describing  this   tradition :

http://www.history.com/topics/christmas/history-of-christmas-trees

For my  blog created  this year for my  English  language  learners I am going to use  this short video  which will be  given as  listening  activity and  homework to my students:


Since I am teaching in a school of  Art I would like my students  to search  paintings and pictures  about  this  tradition  online.
They could use  the images they have found to describe them and speak about  them.

Here are some nice  paintings which could be described by my  first  year  students:


Christmas-Time, The Blodgett Family MET DT7582

Eastman Johnson [CC0], via Wikimedia Commons


William James Glackens - Christmas Shoppers

By William James Glackens [Public domain or Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons


Carl Larsson Christmas Morning 1894

Carl Larsson [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

The language structures  will be related to descriptions of places and  people. I expect them to tell me  what's happening in the pictures and paintings and I would like  my students to focus on adjectives that might describe what  people might think and how they are feeling. 

It might be interesting to check which images they like and why and how   they chose them.

sabato 2 dicembre 2017

Twitter : a source of images for speaking activities

         More and more I use  Twitter to find resources and images for my lessons.
         It is great for pictures and for descriptions.  I must confess that I am learning  a  lot online
         thanks to people.
         We can learn more about  other countries and  get back into the past.







White Boards online

Today we can have many free whiteboards online to work in a collaborative way.
Teachers and learners can work together and  share ideas, materials and more.

Here are some tools which I might start using.

Stoodle : see this interesting post online   https://blogs.umass.edu/onlinetools/community-centered-tools/stoodle/




https://awwapp.com/

This is  a web White board which is  free. Check this post online 

http://tammyworcester.com/aww-a-web-whiteboard/



Link to free interactive online resources http://www.teachhub.com/free-interactive-whiteboard-resources

venerdì 1 dicembre 2017

Professional Development online December 2017



Just two weeks before this  free event starts. I was online last year and loved learning from famous educators.







Looking forward to this  free event! Thanks a lot!