Exploratree

Got an invitation today to try out their new exploratree website. . . . . . they write . . . .

Exploratree website

You're invited to an early preview of our new, free web resource which can be used for downloading, using and making interactive thinking guides. Thinking guides can be useful for supporting independent and group research projects with frameworks for thinking, planning and enquiry. The website is currently in beta version for testing and we'd really welcome your feedback. Go to Exploratree website...

MORE cool websites!

You know this blog could very quickly become a repository for cool websites that I come across that I want to be able to use at home and in school! I really hope not. I cam across a few quite cool sites today that I am going to try and use in some shape or form over the next while with some of my classes.

Bubbl.us is a site where you can do some online brainstorming and mindmapping

Community walk is an interesting mapping application that allows people to plot journeys . . . I a thinking of trying to develop a journey to school type thing . . . .

Weebly is a rather nice and easy to use web design and web authiring online programme - its really good for beginners who want to set up their very own site . . . .

I came across this cool site application!

Star in Your Own JibJab! It's Free!I came across this rather cool site the other day and made a little video - with many apologies to my good friend - who I hope does not mind, too much!

2 great websites sitting on this wall

I thought I should try to share a few cool web sites with readers out there - a few sites I have been looking at recently and find interesting. Let me know what you think?

1. Scratch is a really cool new site from MIT for kids to be creative and leave their projects online for otheres to see. They say

Scratch is a new programming language that makes it easy to create your own interactive stories, animations, games, music, and art -- and share your creations on the web.
Scratch is designed to help young people (ages 8 and up) develop 21st century learning skills. As they create Scratch projects, young people learn important mathematical and computational ideas, while also gaining a deeper understanding of the process of design.

2. Motionbox is a nice, freindly and easy way to share video with others online. Similiar but different to YouTube - check it out!

More as I find them!

Rain = Global Warming

Lets face it, every time that we get a slightly odd weather phenomenon, the talk is about Global Warming and how this has caused our world to change upside down. Climate change is doing it all. Bad, bad climate change. When did climate change become bad? And since when was ALL climate change caused by us chuffing a load of carbon into the air. Now I am not quite in with George W on this one - whenever you have bad asthma like I have, you think that it is a pretty good thing if people reduce the amount of chemicals that they pump into the air . . . . . but - how far does this go to change climate.

The climate of NI has always been changing. People alive today can remember worse winters than what we get now (like 1969 or 1947) , they can remember summers where it rained every day, they can remember floods that took weeks for the water to reduce, they can remember droughts that descimated fields, they can remember years where the snow lasted from Dec until June and the river lagan and parts of Belfast lough were frozen over for months (1952). All global wamring? Or could it have been the cyclical pattern of climate - sometimes it is getting warmer and sometimes it is getting colder.

Even in NI there is huge amounts of evidence of climate change in past times. 8,000 years ago when Ireland was still attached via a landbridge to England and the rest fo Europe - the climate was different. the Ice age was probably also a bit on the cold side. Yet, before that tropical rainforests (with temps above 40 degrees and MORE rainfall than we get now) led to the production of peat and coal deposits. AND, it gets more complicated when you try to explain the huge limestone deposits without explaining soem form of climate change. The climate has been changing in NI for a long time and it will continue to change for a long time. The big question is . . . . . . . do we help speed up climate change and make it more unpredictable?

D-Day, 2007

Ever since I was a boy I have been fascinated with war. I once toyed with the idea of going into the RAF when I was 16 but found out that I was colour blind and that meant I couldn't have been a Tornado pilot. From the age of 12 until I was 18 our family holiday used to consist pulling a trailer tent down England and into France for 3 -4 weeks. They were great times and I remember especially my first visit to some of the sites in Normandy that were left over from the Normandy invasion on D-Day, 6th June, 1944. I was in awe. I stood in the craters at Pont du Hoc, I marched up and down the perfectedly straight rows of gravestones at the military cemetaries in Bayeaux and Omaha beach. Since then, I have been back a further 3 times. This summer I took my own kids along for the first time. We visited everything we could along the beaches, every gun turret and museum and memorial. I tried to get the idea behind war and what had happened here to my kids as we walked round the sites. However, I suppose that like me it will take films like 'Saving Private Ryan' before they can fully understand what happened and how the brave men were able to march from the Calvados coast to Berlin in just over 330 days. Band of Brothers re-emphasised the sacrifice and Major Dick Winters has been a hero of mine for a while now and I was glad to be able to finally read his own war memoirs recently. His leadership and integrity through something like this asks questions. How would I have handled the same pressure? What would I have been doing in the war? Visiting historic living museumes like this are not just for the old and the remembering . . . the battles that were fought in the hedgerows of Normandy are what allow us freedom today. I value the stories. I value the memories, even though they are not mine. Hopefully in about 20 years, my kids will be doing what I did and dragging their kids all round the same sites . . . . . . .

It's been a while . . .

I have neglected my blog! The monthst from March to present have just been too hectic and I have not had the opportunity to keep this up to date with my thoughts and ideas as I go. I decided to take the whole month of July off to unwind and recharge the batteries. It has been a good summer - even though the weather has been pretty rubbish - we went to France for a few weeks and got pretty good weather. We visited the Normandy beaches (my fourth time), stayed a while in Brittany and then stopped in Disneyland Paris on the way home. Altogether a pretty good time. I will maybe write up a few posts about some aspects of this later. However, I want to maybe end this revisit to my site with a warning. In June, I was just about hanging together when some people kept saying to me about how great teacher's holidays are and how we should get real jobs etc. I came to the point that the next person to say that to me really was going to be spitting teeth. Last year I think I worked harder that I ever have. I went to bed very late and got up very early to fit in all the things I wanted to do. It was stressful and looking back now, probably too stressful and I am going to try very hard to make sure that my stress levels odo not reach the same point as they did this year. So seriously, if you really want to annoy me . . . tell me about teachers get big long summer holidays . . because you know what, I work really hard the rest of the year to deserve them and if I didnt get a month off every July I know I would burn out in no time. Roll on July 2008! Already starting to plan the holiday!

I am a film maker!

This week I launched a cool Film competition in my school that will hopefully lead to a Film Festival and celebration of the talents of the people in my school some time in May. To help the launch process - I actually put together 2 films myself to show the kids the type of thing they could do. I tried to mix up the presentation types a bit - using photos, video images, stuff I had got from the net and stuff that I had shot on a video camera myself.

I have put the first Launch film onto YouTube - you can see it on this page

The second film is one that I produced about 2 years ago as part of our part and contribution for the Make Pverty History Campaign. My colleague Mike Bennett came up with the idea of getting the school to make a visual representation of Africa in the playground - my job was to take the picture . . . . but I thought I mught also document the process with my video camera too . . . and I am glad that I did . . . . . . have a look at our Make Poverty History Campaign video here. I must admit that I am pretty proud that the video was featured on the Northern Ireland MPH web site and the picture that I took was used in some of the publicity for the campaign as well.

I am really only starting to discover the many uses and delights of YouTube recently - though I am well impressed and certainly I do intend to be putting a few more of my films on in the near future.

Ps - More details about the competition can be found on my web site

Those pesky French . . . .

Aaaargh. Super Saturday in the Six Nations. Ireland, France and England can all win the championship. Ireland do the business in Rome. They give the Italians a lesson in how to run tries in. 51 points on the board. They leave France with 24 points of a score difference needed. Its a big job. Scotland vs France in Paris. Scotland, so narrowly beaten by the Irish last week. Can they do the same to France as they did to Ireland. em . . no. Try in the last seconds. Was it over? Ref says yes. Game and 27 points to France. Ireland second. Six Nations to France. Disaster. The last game in the season is Wales vs England. Its just kicked off and for once in my life (well, maybe twice) I want England to win. By about 60 points. It used to be 'anyone but England' but after 2 years of jammy victories in the six nations and I have got to say 'anyone but France'. Swing Low, sweet chariot . . . . . . oh the words are sticking in my throat!

A Global Warning...

Found this really thoight provoking film all about global warming!

What makes a good educational website?

I have been writing an article recently about 24/7 learning and why I think more teachers need to develop their own websites so that students can keep continuing their learning out of school. One of the most interesting things that I have found as I researched the article is that it is really difficult to actually find good, useful advice about what actually makes a good educational website. People are very quick to tell you what is NOT good in a web site and what does not work but there is precious little information about what should be appearing on youre site. That is the sort of article that I feel that I should be writing but I am finding it very difficult as I am not sure that I am expert enough to be able to know. I am a geography teacher who dabbles. I dont know much about web design, i cant speak HTML or SQL or .net, I could't even tell you how to put a web counter onto your page.

My view is that the internet is here to help communication. Yet, sometimes the communication between teacher and student is not as it should be. The internet should allow more communication, advice and online learning nut is it? Students are more technically enabled. They use YouTube, MySpace, Bebo and other social networking sites as places to meet and share social information - how can we encourage these communities of learners to engage in learning rather than socially? Is it the content of our courses, our sites, our teaching that is letting us down or is it the way that we attempt to communicate?

How to be interesting?

A guy called Russell Davies has been writing some good stuff about how we can actuallu be interesting people. You can check out the full article here

There are 10 simple steps that help you and me to become more rounded people. Though I especially like

4. Every week, read a magazine you’ve never read before

Interesting people are interested in all sorts of things. That means they explore all kinds of worlds, they go places they wouldn’t expect to like and work out what’s good and interesting there. An easy way to do this is with magazines. Specialist magazines let you explore the solar system of human activities from your armchair. Try it, it’s fantastic

Periodic Table of Visual methods

Came across this amazing site tonight - it lists many of the different visualisation methods that are used to present information - only this is in a slighly different format and classification.

Click here to check out the site in full

20070103-BBC Newsnight-Migration Watch - report

This is a brilliant short film that looks at whether migration is worth it into the UK.

Geography, how much do you care?

This video will make you think . . . . its about time that people took the subject of Geography a bit more seriously, dont you think?

The new Headteacher is . . . . .

. . . NOT a teacher! Disturbing reports on the BBC News site over the weekend with reports that perhaps education is to go the way of the health service. Instead of the more experienced teachers in our schools to run things, we are going to be getting some help from the private, management sector. What joy! Number crunchers and business-brained boffins coming into schools to tell us how to manage. And, lets note the marvellous success of what they have done in the health service. What a model of leadership that has been! Costs up. Morale down. Doctors and nurses needed to be imported from the developing world to make sure that there is enough staff. Yes, what we need right now in education is professional managers taking over the reigns in schools. After all, these schools are a drain on resources and society and it is about time that they started turning a profit. The Government can be a load of muppets sometimes.

Quick mail BEFORE email? (by missle)

I was fascinated this week by a story in Bill Bryson's most recent book about how in 1959 the US trialled a new postal delivery system - the guided missle. The History of the US Postal Service describes it like this,

On June 8, 1959, in a move a postal official heralded as "of historic significance to the peoples of the entire world," the Navy submarine U.S.S. Barbero fired a guided missile carrying 3,000 letters at the Naval Auxiliary Air Station in Mayport, Florida. "Before man reaches the moon," the official was quoted as saying, "mail will be delivered within hours from New York to California, to Britain, to India or Australia by guided missiles."

Yes, you did read that right. Somebody actually thought that we could use missles to deliver our post. Now I am not the most technically minded but the idea of my mail whizzing over my head before it lands at the local post office in a cloud of smoke is an interesting image. For one thing, I am pretty glad I don't live next door - things might get a little interesting. Also, how would the price of stamps increase? 3,000 letters 'posted' using a 20 million dollar piece of technology - thats $6,666 per letter. And to think that someone else thought of a way to deliver these same pieces of mail free, instantly and right into our homes.

Now, if you did not like the person you were mailing - I suppose this brings a whole new meaning to how you can use 'hate mail'!

Leadership is . . . .

Over the last year I have been considering various aspects of school leadership. My final thoughts on this are needed to be sorted and presented in a short 2 minute presentation about what I have learnt about leadership. I thought - 10 minutes would sort this out easy. Oh, how wrong I was!

In 2006, I have started to read business books for the first time and have found remarkable similarities between the qualities and issues in leading and developing a business as in leading, developing and improving a school.

I met Andy Hargreaves at a conference in Boston during the summer and in his most recent book he promotes the idea not just of strategic (planned) leadership but also sustainable leadership - a leadership that prevents burnout or innovation fatigue as I like to call it.

I suppose I have always seen myself as a manager first and leader second. But, the more I think about things, I realsie that I am moving towards being a leader first and a manager second. I have always been proud of my organisational skills - but what use are these if I dont have an innovative way for these to go.

So I continue to think and pnder this question - what is leadership? or more interestingly 'What does good leadership look like?' I hope I am getting closer to an answer! Is motivation enough? Is energy enough? Is creativity enough? Is valuing the indivdual enough? Is creating incentives enough? Amswers on a postcard to me at . . . . . .