This is something I must explore more deeply. It sounds like a fabulous engaging way of teaching, but I would need to explore much further to see what sorts of learning activities could be undertaken. Obviously we could tick the box on collaboration and teamwork, also independent thinking. Depending on the game there could be elements of creativity, especially if students are encouraged to adjust things to suit themselves. I read an article in the VIT i-teach flyer (I can’t really call it a newsletter) that discussed machinima use in classrooms as used in Golden Square Secondary College and taught by ACMI. I will investigate this further.
This could be a new wip.(like I need one!) This blog here has some very interesting things to say about this. The ACMI link is here. This is a very good reason to visit the new Game On exhibition at ACMI too, hmm, research.
I’ve just finished creating a few more intel tools for the classroom to use with my year 12 English class. There is a new assessment area that allows you to create and print rubrics based on your individual needs and to learn about assessment strategies and use rubrics already created.
I created a visual ranking tool for the year 12s doing Area of Study three, using language to persuade. The issue we’re discussing is dredging so I created this tool with a set of reasons for why we shouldn’t dredge Port Phillip bay. Students then have to rank them in order of importance and add short notes explaining their reasoning. They can then check their reasoning against the other groups and are given a correlation score.
I have also created a Showing Evidence tool for the same issue. Students need to provide evidence for the claim that we should not dredge the bay and then justify their reasons for choosing that particular evidence. This assists them in writing their analysis, as they can evaluate the arguments used and then print out their own arguments and those of the rest of the class.
Students are doing a Point of View piece about a current issue, they were encouraged to do this on the dredging issue, but we also wanted them to do their best and so we thought we should let them choose an issue. It will be interesting to see how many choose the issue that they’re analysing as this will give them a much greater understanding of the issue and should help their analysis to reach the necessary depth. We have very little time on this so students will have to be independent. I wish the VCE year was longer!
The new Smartboard files for educators are available in beta and I uploaded them to try in my classroom. They are flash animation files that are easily customisable so that you can create quizzes, question activities and match up games in your class. We used them for revision of persuasive language techniques and they were incredibly easy to create. I plan on sharing them around the department so that I can get a feel for how easy they are for everyone to use. So far, though, I really like these as it took me much longer before to create these types of lesson activities and they did not have the polished look that these ones do.
Well, that really was an interesting and exciting thing to do. After the training session I promised myself that I would practice a few times in the room so that I could get familiar with the way everything worked. I really love optimists!
Anyway, I did practice for about half an hour before the room went live and I uploaded everything (twice!) and eventually it went to the right place. As people started to arrive I began to be nervous, especially as Wendy was so kindly giving me a big rap. I was so grateful to have Alan as moderator to fill in the gaps as I think I talked a million miles an hour through the presentation and I was left with a bit more discussion time than I wanted. It was amazing to see the potential of this form of conference as people were able to interact by placing ticks, crosses, thumbs up or down, or by raising their hands. Participants could also type messages in a message box, or raise their hands to ask for permission to speak, it was the best behaved class I’ve ever had!
I did not get to use all of the functionality of the tool, which was unfortunate, I would have liked to have built in more interactivity. They have break out rooms where groups of participants can go to work on things and then reconvene in the main room and there are more whiteboard functions than I used with my simple PowerPoint. I would definitely recommend having a look at their website as this could be the way of conferences in the future. Here is the url http://www.elluminate.com/ check it out.
Thanks so much Alan, Wendy and Janice for the opportunity, it was much appreciated 
