Friday, December 7, 2012

Why We Want Santa Microsoft for our classroom


Our school has established partnerships with students across the globe this year – pen-pals in a different part of the province, or connections with students in a different country far, far away. Students are learning about others’ cultures, communities, traditions and lifestyles. They are observing that their classrooms do not have restricting walls – the world is their classroom.

We cannot do this without technology. Microsoft technology would help us gear our school for the powerful learning that could take place through these global connections. It would always feel like Christmas then. Our students are worth it. Santa Microsoft, please visit us!


Saturday, October 27, 2012

'Digital Storytelling' presentation at ECOO

It was a great opportunity to be able to present at ECOO 2012 - the conference that takes educators into the dreamy land of technology, surprising them with the applicability of those dreams in the classroom.

At the bottom of this post is the link to my presentation on Digital Storytelling. The discussion around the slides was related to how storytelling and technology are two of the things that our students are really good at. Combining the two gives rise to the powerful process of 'Digital Storytelling'. The fun part was sharing examples of students' digital work with other educators.

Presentation description:

Students are full of stories - some retold in their words and some brand new coming from their own lives or imagination. With the digital world upon us, it is not only fun to turn these stories into a reality but also very easy to showcase and broadcast them. Using some simple audio and video software available in all Ontario schools, learn how to make audio and visual digital stories that primary and junior students can create themselves to share with the world.