Linda's Meta-learning Journal

5/22/2004

Training this year

This is my list of training this year for LA1.2

Formal training attended:

A one day overview of ELS & FLS

A lecture on Collaborative Working Practices

A twilight on Literacy and Preferred Learning Styles

An INSET day on Positive Handling

A twilight on Behaviour Management

2 hr course on behaviour strategies for use in after-school environments.

Devolopmental Dyspraxia (lecture)

Problems of short term memory transfer/processing (lecture)

Training on “Telling into Writing”project.

workshop on Children on the Autistic Spectrum.

Dyslexia friendly schools lecture

supported reading course at beacon school

Health and safety for swimming course

supported writing course at beacon school

3d display in the classroom -one day course

Team Teach training day

PAL training day

And training that I have been involved in giving:

a four hour training programme for other SSAs to learn to provide the Better Reading Partners scheme.

retraining of SSAs in the administration of the school reading scheme. This involved a two hour workshop on how to use the scheme in combination with ‘real books’ to provide a varied learning experience tailored to the individual child.

Healthy Schools cluster meetings to share best practice

Posted at 7:46:04 pm by lmhartley
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5/21/2004

More about play/delight

I found this on on- line learning environmentson Vix MA site and thought it was an interesting view on how Firstclass works for on-line learning. I'm surprised that it is used by notschool as it does not seem to me to be very user-friendly. I find it a bit dull to be honest, not playfull at all.

Some one was saying today that their ideal would be a community that offerred a variety of formats so that you could choose. People could see the messages in their home mail boxes, use wikis and blogs, web sites, all manner of ways of accessing the conversations. I am having real trouble wondering what that would be like in practice. I like the idea of it but I wonder how productive that varied sort of environment would be. Would it still feel like a community? I am not sure. How does all this relate to play and delight? Well it seems to relate more to the lack of it on FC if I'm honest. Unless of course you count the 'delight' of watching pillars of the CU posting about their prowess at playing computer games that depict the bloody and violent deaths of innocent penguins! :-)

Ah well, I'll be on holiday this time next week and that should indeed be delightful. I can hardly wait. :-)

Posted at 8:59:40 pm by lmhartley
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Friday Night

So here I am on a Friday night and the most interesting thing I can think of to do is work. I can't even go for a walk as it is pouring with rain. I have done my initial pdp but I can't say I'm very pleased with it. Never mind it is done!

Now to do a list of all my learning in the workplace over the last year. The courses are easy, it's the informal stuff that is harder. The informal stuff of course far outweighs the courses I've attended. At least since October there has been my Learning Journal and I suppose I'd better trawl through my blog as well as I'm sure there is stuff in here too. Still it is just a list for LA1. LA2 though is where the certificates, evaluations, reflections etc. start to come into it.

I'm going to try to get both more or less finished this weekend. Then I'll start looking for some literature refs and quotes from FC etc. to go into the final stitching.

I need to get as much as I can done this week so that I can go away at half term and not work at all. Well, I suppose the Student Reps F2F meeting at Ultralab might count as work but it is only one day.

Posted at 8:23:51 pm by lmhartley
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5/19/2004

Playfull learning?

Just been reading some interesting stuff about play on Dr Ian Terrell's blog There are a whole raft of entries about various aspects of play and IT. It has occurred to me that part of the problem with Firstclass is that it is not an environment that encourages playfulness. As it was primarily designed as a business tool it has a basically utilitarian approach. JellyOS (our previous community software) on the other hand was much more obviously trying to be "delightful", despite its considerable drawbacks. I have been commited to the idea of 'learning through play' for many years and I still think that some of the most profound learning experiences can be achieved during play.
The question remains how to define this thing "play."
Ian Terrell's definition is here
Do you agree with this definition?

Posted at 8:58:28 pm by lmhartley
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5/18/2004

My ILP

So here is my ILP
Learning Activities:
Learning Activity 1
I will develop a PDP for the coming year, to include a short section looking at both the PDP process and the lack of support for such processes in my workplace.
I will produce a list of workplace learning both formal and informal that I have undertaken since June 2003.
Completion Date: 22/5/04
Learning Activity 2
Identify significant learning from my list of workplace learning activities. For the workplace learning identified, I will collect evidence of learning & add this to my learning portfolio. This will include evaluations, certificates, reflections from my learning journal, mind maps etc. I will identify 3- 5 of these significant events to reflect and focus on in the stitching section.
Completion Date: 23/5/04
Learning Activity 3
The "Stitching Together" in the form of a report.
Using the reflective processes developed in term 2 I will analyse and evaluate my learning. I will provide detailed reflections and evaluations of the significant learning activities detailed above. I will then analyse and report on, what I have learned, why this learning is worthwhile in my context, what I do differently now or in the future as a result of these activities. I will show what difference my learning has made.
I will use these evaluations to make a PDP with SMART targets for the coming year.
Phew, finally got there!
Seen and agreed by my LF:-)

Posted at 5:35:08 pm by lmhartley
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5/12/2004

Japanese kites

I saw these fish kites as I walked home along the canal tow path today & thought what fun they are:

Here's a link to explain the reason for the kites
As First class is going to be down tonight and I am tired I'm going to log on to Ultrastudents chat now & see if anyone's around.

Posted at 8:42:48 pm by lmhartley
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5/8/2004

Showing people how to add a photo

I have just put some instructions in my FC homepages on how to put a photo into your blog.

This is a picture of the sea shore in my village that I took this afternoon when I was out for a walk. It was unusually quiet and all I could hear were a few birds and the bleating of the sheep that have been put out to graze on the salt marshes.

Posted at 8:27:18 pm by lmhartley
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5/7/2004

PDP still causing problems

I AM STUCK as usual early in a module :(
I thought I had this sorted out until I started to try and fit what I'd done into Greta's template. It's the sections in the AE tool all over again. Nothing relates to what I actually have. It all hinges on the existance of some sort of PDP prior to the start of the degree. Of course I have nothing like that so it feels like the whole module is based on a false premise. And as for doing some sort of cost/benefit analysis on the outcomes of this imaginary plan- words fail me!
What happens if I don't use the template?
What then? Can I just write briefly about not having a PDP? Then list the training & informal learning opportunities. Does that work? Will that meet the Learning outcomes?
Maybe I'll feel better about it all tomorrow. I am feeling a bit low anyway as I have had a tummy bug so perhaps I need to wait till I feel more energetic.

Posted at 8:12:14 pm by lmhartley
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5/5/2004

new guest book

Mo e-mailed me to point out that my guest book is no longer active. I suspect it has reached the limit for comments as it has 30 in it now. So this is my new one.

Posted at 9:23:33 pm by lmhartley
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4/29/2004

More on Module 3

I had a phone conf with my new LF tonight. I think my plan from yesterday might be OK. I just need to be careful not to lift LA1 entirely from my Report 1. It occurred to me that the way to avoid this would be to use the areas I identified for research as a starting point rather than my strengths and weaknesses.
So, for example,
the area might have been to investigate behaviour management techniques, I could then narrow it down to the Team teach approach, use the mindmap of the training day & the jelly discussion as artifacts, pick out a significant thing that was learned, reflect on it, and evaluate the impact on my workplace and my own practice.
improve my knowledge base: finding out how to use the ecologger, writing some teacher friendly instuctions, using it with groups, reflect, evaluate
researching the copyright -free artwork and putting together the resources etc for the Telling to Writing Project, reflecting on how I found it, why it matters to have great pictures, using the evaluation sheets with the kids, the impact on the literacy lessons and the quality of work produced. What have I learned from doing this?
Display was an area I identified so I could use the 3d display course, What, if anything, did I learn that day? I have a myriad of pictures of the day & I can use my Land use display to show me using a technique I learned there not working and explore why.
That's all for now and I must be getting to like being off-line as I am again away for the weekend - hope everyone has as nice a time as I intend to:)

Posted at 10:49:57 pm by lmhartley
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