Monika’s Professional Portfolio

I stumbled across this video in my travels, which describes the education system in China and how SMART boards can be used to change learning from memorisation to actually learning life skills.

There was a problem with embedding the video, so the direct link is below for you to click (from teacher tube)

http://www.teachertube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=2087ba24609b14f2dc4f

I like how it asks the children what they think, and even presents some disadvantages with using the SMART boards, like shadows and bandwidth issues when accessing the internet.

The comparison of two complete opposites can help compare the past to the future, and even some aspects of the traditional Chinese classroom are evident in Modern day Australian classrooms. Hopefully teachers will begin to recognise that traditional methods aren’t really preparing the kids for life and begin to change their ways.

I found this interesting clip on youtube today, similar to what was shown in one of our lectures this semester based around the idea of children as ‘digital learners’

It raises a few good discussion points..

• Two and a half million kids use social networking sites- Children communicate so much more with each other these days compared to when we went to school. It’s a shame it is not outdoor communication involving physical activity, but children sit at home on their computers for extended periods of time.
• Children are fluent in new literacies- instant messenger, blogging and texting. It is important that children gain the ability to determine which literacy is appropriate in different contexts, for example when creating a narrative a child cannot write ‘Then she said, “C u l8r, lol”‘
• Kids have shorter attention spans- It’s something I haven’t really thought about but when I think about teaching experiences, it is so true. It can be incredibly difficult to keep children focused on a task when it is not interesting or engaging. Could this be linked to children

This video links the same ideas to teachers today.

• I like the point raised that teachers today may have limited autonomy, opportunity and resources, but their possibilities are unlimited.
• Instilling curiousity and exciting learners has never really come into my mind about teaching, and often all that I have seen is the same units of work and lessons being repeatedly taught with no new approaches being taken. How often do teachers ask the students what they want to learn about before creating a unit of work?
• ‘Teachers today embrace change’ I find that age seems to be a differentiating factor between embracing and opposing change, often those who have been teaching for many years and are stuck into their routines will be reluctant to change, though the students and resources surrounding them are totally different to how they used to be.

What are your thoughts on these clips?

It’s funny how a few years ago, the internet was simply used for information searching and maybe having a live chat with a friend over a messenger service. Today, networking giants Myspace and Facebook have completely changed the way that we spend our time online.

I must admit that I used to spend time during high school and the start of uni on Myspace, allowing me to chat, listen to music and share/view photos with friends. My profile was very pretty in pink and it became a hobby learning html code to be able to update it without using a pre made layout. I had no randoms adding me because my profile was private and my full name was needed to be able to add me.

At the start of my 3rd year of uni, began the Facebook revolution. It’s amazing how it has become so big in such a short period of time, and now boasts more users than Myspace.

I have found these days, Facebook has become part of regular conversation. For example ‘Oh yeah, I saw he posted that in his status update’ ‘Did you hear so and so broke up? It came up on my news feed’ ‘I posted my photos from the weekend and tagged you in them’.

Is this necessarily a good thing, that Facebook seems to be consuming our lives? That we can be in tune with the lives of others without even speaking to them? How many of you will log into your computer and check facebook before your email? Though it is so easy for me to keep in touch with anyone I know these days, even people from my childhood, today I unfortunately had my facebook window open before my theology essay file.

If you have good self control, it is an awesome thing to play around with in your spare time. But if you are a procrastinator.. beware!

So, this semester we have had to take on an IT unit because it wasn’t covered within our last three and a half years of study. I was not looking forward to it in the beginning, as I am pretty computer savvy already and am generally the one people go to for advice regarding computers.

As the weeks progress, I am finding out many things which I did not know, in particular with using Mac computers. At Holy Cross where I have been doing alot of casual teaching, they all use Macs with their smartboards. I could generally get on the internet and use comic life but that was about it, but through our workshops I am learning so many new ways to use them which I will be able to pass onto the kids someday.

I hope to update you with the new things I learn throughout the semester and I can use this as a log to come back to someday.