U.K. Mulls Blogging, Tweeting, Podcasting in Primary School Curriculum

Blogging, tweeting, and podcasting are all good and fun, but what about including them in the school curriculum? Folks in the U.K. are considering an overhaul of their elementary school curriculum—and a draft proposal requires kids to master these Web technologies, reports the Guardian.

The proposed curriculum—which would also give teachers more freedom to decide what students concentrate on in classes—marks the biggest change to the U.K.’s primary school education in a decade, and “strips away hundreds of specifications about the scientific, geographical and historical knowledge pupils must accumulate before they are 11,” the Guardian says. more » » »

Teaching Twitter could become a class act

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British school students may soon be learning about William Shakespeare and Ashton Kutcher.

British schoolchildren may soon be studying the tweets of Ashton Kutcher along with the sonnets of Shakespeare.

A leaked Government report due to be released shortly, recommends that British primary school teachers be given much more flexibility in deciding what lessons to teach.

And while it emphasises the continued necessity of teaching traditional subjects such as spelling, history and arithmetic, it also recommends that students be taught about online media and instructed about web-based skills including how to use a spell checker.

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How Teachers Can Get More Respect, Part 1

Most teachers feel that their profession does not get the respect it deserves. In 2000 a survey of teachers conducted by Scholastic reported that 79% felt that respect for the profession is a problem in teacher retention. I don’t think much has changed since 2000.

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LBJ & Gene Simmons of Kiss? (Ten Teachers Who Made a Mark in Another Field)

Everyone is concerned about the number of teachers leaving the profession. These ten individuals left teaching and went on to achieve greatness in their chosen fields. For some, you might think it possible that they would have done still more good remaining in the classroom. For others (#1, #9) most would agree that it’s just as well that students learned from someone else.

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Impatience with Bad Teaching

I am sick to death of all the people who come here and say they’re going to make this school better but nothing happens. It’s a disgrace.”

That’s what a young woman said to me the other day as I sat with her in her art class.

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Patnership Lists Geography as a Critical 21st Century skill

[Via mywonderfulworld]

A report from the Partnership for 21st Century Skills addresses the need for new competencies among American students, highlighting geography and geographic themes such as global awareness, social and cross-cultural skills, and civic literacy. The Partnership proposes a solution with (surprise, surprise) educational reform.

Songs for teaching

http://songsforteaching.com/

"The Definitive Source for Educational Music"

2 fruits and 5 vegetables - Kids only

http://www.gofor2and5.com.au/article.aspx?c=7&a=136&n=1

This website outlines the benefits of fruit and vegetables, suggests ways of increasing fruit and vegetable intake and provides easy recipes. The Kids Only section provides activities designated lower primary, middle primary, and upper primary.

Multimedia / Video Tools

From data projectors and digital video to interactive whiteboards, educators today have a wide array of multimedia presentation tools at their disposal to enhance visual instruction--allowing them to share ideas, information, charts, images, animations, audio, and video more effectively.

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Typing Games

http://www.freetypinggame.net/play.asp

A collection of interactive free online typing games for beginner touch typists.

Food time line

Via Gary Price's Resourceshelf:

The Food Timeline <http://www.foodtimeline.org/>

Ever wonder what foods the Vikings ate when they set off to explore the new world? How Thomas Jefferson made his ice cream?

What the pioneers cooked along the Oregon Trail? Who invented the potato chip,and why?

Welcome to the Food Timeline! Food history presents a fascinating buffet of popular lore and contradictory facts. Some people will tell you it's impossible to express this topic in exact timeline format. They are correct. Most foods we eat are not invented; they evolve.

This site is the work of Lynne Olver, "(a) reference librarian with apassion for food history."

There is a section of this site that covers Historic Food Prices. Seems like somebody always wants to know what a gallon of milk cost Back In The Day <http://digbig.com/4xfxq>(PDF; 2.2 MB; scroll downto page 31). Some data from other countries can be found here as well.

BugWise

http://www.bugwise.net.au/

The BugWise program has been designed by the Australian Museum Online to enable schools and other groups to get involved in ecological research. Here you will find out what invertebrates are, what they do, their incredible diversity and why they are vitally important to a healthy planet. The Invertebrate Guide provides a fact page with image of each insect.

ABS brings data to life in the classroom

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has launched a new set of web pages designed for use by both teachers and students. Developed by the Education Services unit within the ABS, these new pages aim to assist educators to bring data and statistics to life in the classroom. The pages offer a range of learning resources, including classroom activities, games, professional development materials and specially selected ABS publications.

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sites for new teachers

Over 125 sites, categorized and briefly described. http://tinyurl.com/zp4ee

Using test scores to evaluate teachers

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2007-02-13-effective-teachers_x.htm?csp=N009

Comment from Biglearning:
Please show me a profession where beating people over the head with threats of dire penalties for someone else's work, while taking away their autonomy, has led to sustained performance improvements. No, it doesn't matter - I still wouldn't wish it on our teachers. Even the bad ones.

Design a Satellite

http://www.eduweb.com/portfolio/designsatellite

Primary students studying communication technologies will be enamoured with this interactive website. With the assistance of the animated inhabitants of Littleton, students can design a TV satellite, incorporating the necessary parameters to be able to relay signals to space.

Lesson plans and resources

I have updated the following pages of lesson plans and resources for teachers.


Books like Unfortunate events
Thinking skills
Books about refugees to Australia
Values books
Reading comprehension
Books with a rugby league theme
Computers & ICTs
Thinking hats picture books
Geography
Books about self-control
Picture books for P.E.
Weather

Enterprising Australians

Enterprising Australians provides free DVDs, teaching resources and support for schools in Victoria and Queensland.

As part of Enterprise Learning in the 21st Century they are providing free resources that are mapped to ELS for Victoria and Queensland in domains of English, Maths, Humanities-Economics, Civics & Citizenship and ICT.

The resources incorporate a unit of work, DVDs, worksheets and online support.

For more information please visit www.enterprising.com.au or call 03 9473-3688

Art and life in Africa

http://www.uiowa.edu/%7Eafricart/teachers/lessons/index.html
This site contains a database of 47 lesson plans created by the Art and Life in Africa Project Teachers' Forum related to Art, French, Music, Science, Social Studies/World Culture. A selection graded 'Elementary' are suitable for primary school.

Embracing Technology in the Classroom: One Professor's Story

By Chris Procello

Laurel Amtower, professor of English and comparative literature, was becoming concerned about how to reach her students. Each semester her classes became larger, and, correspondingly, students were banking on their anonymity. Class attendance had become more sporadic and a good portion of her students sat in the back of her classes, not engaged. Assigned papers were seen as hurdles where students saw no connection between what they were being asked to do and what skills they are supposed to gain as a result of the class.

Read on ...