Comicssss

After taking some time to look at and create different comics, I can see how useful they can be as a classroom tool. I think a lot of students would love these as a learning activity, as it gives them the freedom to present learning in a really individualized, entertaining way. It would also work as a great way to encourage less creative students to have a go at interpreting material in a different way, especially using things like the ComicLife website that doesn't rely on the amazing artistic ability of hand-drawn comics. For more info on the educational benefits of comics, check out http://comiclife.com/education
I used a far better free program to create my comic; a free iPad app called Comics Head Lite.

 I think the trick with using comics in the classroom would be keeping students on track, as the entertaining topic of comics can be a pretty distracting one... My preparation for this lecture may or may not have turned into an hour of reading Calvin and Hobbes comics...

A story about Multimedia stories...

Hmmm. Multimedia stories. That's a topic.
I'm not super convinced how much I like them as a teaching resource, purely because of the effort to outcome ratio. If there were some decent ready-made examples online that could be quickly applied to a class then that would be helpful, and I can see the benefit of getting older students to make PowerPoint presentations and similar projects themselves... But I really can't see myself using this specific task of making a PowerPoint to use in a year 1 class, because I like kids to be far more hands-on and individually involves....
Can see the point of them, but admittedly not a massive fan...

Oh my blog!

Blogging about blogs. Yep. This is happening.

I must say I've been enjoying this process far more than I was expecting, and have found it surprisingly easy to get this whole thing going. I can definitely see the appeal for people starting up blogs for bigger audiences, or for use in a classroom. I've been mentored by a number of teachers that have a class blog for parents to have a better insight into classroom happening, and I can definitely see myself doing the same when I have my own class!
I like the idea of students having the opportunity to share their best work online for others to read, something a bit special!

Podcast Queen!

So, it turns out that making a podcast is wayyy easier and more automated than I thought! I knew the basic beginning of just recording a voice but wasn't sure what avenue to take when it actually came to uploading it in a public, downloadable sharing site such as iTunes. We managed to get most of a group podcast completed in less than half an hour, I was pretty impressed!!
Until next time, enjoy this photo of my puppy. She got heat stress earlier in the week so now each morning starts with a nice splashy play in a tub :)