London Monopoly Challenge 2011

Craig Charteris, head at Trinity Lower School in Aldwicle, came up with an idea for a Monopoly-style, techno-challenge around London after watching an episode of the Gadget Show one weekend. I was minding my own business but was run over by Craig’s ideas bandwagon. This collision of creativity and chaos has resulted in the Northants BLT Monopoly Challenge 2011.

The Northants BLT Monopoly Challenge is designed for teachers and pupils to explore the opportunities offered by mobile and internet technologies to enhance learning before, during and after an educational visit. It should hopefully demonstrate both the scope and limitations of using a range of technologies in such contexts.

Every out-of-school visit is traditionally founded upon a pre-visit to a destination to assess the potential risks and gather the worksheets to keep the pupils occupied during the visit proper. Re-imagineering the concept of the ‘pre-visit’ is also a goal of the BLT Monopoly Challenge. A pre-visit could perhaps be more a practical CPD or action research opportunity combined with a chance to put ourselves in the pupils’ shoes and experience a trip from their viewpoint. Then perhaps we would be more inclined to remove the worksheets from the itinerary and explore what technologies might  be used instead to capture, collaborate broadcast and celebrate learning on and from a school trip.

The pre-visit is taking place next Friday. Let’s see how many worksheets we can avoid making…

Communicate.06 Conference

Scottish CILT’s 2006 Communicate.06 Conference was an exciting day of technology and teaching. One hundred foreign languages teachers and advisors came to build on their use of technology – whether to make links with partner schools, to inject new forms of creativity into the classroom, or to learn a new skill such as making a blog.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself, presenting my keynote live from a blog instead of using PowerPoint. I created the posts in draft beforehand and chose which to publish in turn. Perish the thought – I actually had to think during my presentation It was a great way of modelling the versatility of blogging as a tool.

I’ll find it hard to present any other way now. I love the idea of people being able to comment straight on to your presentation slides posts, either at the time or later. It allows a conversation to start and continue after the conference is over.

Actually the most striking thing for me is the fact that the conference is not over. The Saturday session was just the beginning of the support that will see many projects spring to life and be supported by the workshop leaders over the next few months. So often good ideas heard at a conference drain away in the reality of a classroom full of students on the following Monday morning, like water being poured into sand.

However, the MFLE is a platform for folks to receive support and ask questions to ensure that the projects get off the ground and flourish. Furthermore all the proceedings were podcast so people who were not there in person can also take part in this ongoing unconference. Ewan McIntosh, who did a brilliant job organising and presenting, has written about the conference from his perspective.

I also got to meet John Johnston of Sandaig Otters fame. He demonstrated that welcome combination of the down-to-earth and inspiring when chatting to folks about blogging and podcasting. Lynne from Tobermory was cool in the blogging session as well. David Muir whose blog I have enjoyed reading over the last months was also there and won a fiver for a blurry photo

Three Musketeers

Colwick Park

I had a very interesting morning with Charlie, one of the students with whom I regularly work. He walked me through the intricacies of bluetooth on my new phone, beaming a photo that he took with his phone’s camera to mine. He was a good teacher! We then sent it to my Flickr account and it was automatically posted to this blog. The photo forms part of our River Trent project that we are putting together. The photo shows a view over Colwick Lake which is situated near Nottingham’s racecourse.

A pear!

I’ve just taken delivery of my new mobile phone. I wanted a new phone so I could use Flickr’s email to blog function. The above pear, painted by my good wife, was the first experiment. It is way too easy to take photos and then have them posted to a blog. One of my students is going to explain the bluetooth options tomorrow. I can imagine being out with students on a visit somewhere, everyone taking photos of the event with their phones and beaming them to teacher’s phone for upload to a blog that has been created for the occasion. (Saves them money that way!) That really would be a consensual learning process!