Don’t believe the hype

Thanks to Tim Kong for putting me on to Gartner’s hype cycle: a quick way to capture the way we move through periods of infatuation, with particular reference to technology. Any Principal grappling with their ICT budget will recognise this! I’m not sure how useful it actually is, other than describing a pattern that people already […]

Rethinking education: New video from Mike Wesch

I’m a bit of a fan of Professor Wesch. I like the way he captures some of the big picture ideas that sit at the point where technology and anthropology meet. In his most recent video (a conversation starter produced for an EDUCAUSE book, The Tower and the Cloud: Higher Education in the Age of Cloud […]

Teachers’ views on technology: snapshots from the frontlines

This is a neat selection of videos that explores the way different technologies are being integrated into teaching and learning. The New York Times asked teachers to submit videos that explored how technology had changed the way they teach… The overwhelming themes that emerge are: Trust the students – be prepared to work with them. […]

5 ways to make the most of online meetings (for newbies)

I took part in a professional learning session with CORE this morning via Elluminate. Great fun and very interesting (lots of clever heads in the virtual room) – but it highlighted a few thoughts for me that might be worth sharing, if you are to make the most of online meet-ups: 1. Get there early: […]

Tips for Skyping with the kids: they’re not performing monkeys

This morning, I was part of a Skype session between grandparents in the UK and two children under six in New Zealand. This was not the first time we had undertaken this type of conversation – but each time it often takes more organising than a school play. We want everyone to be able to […]

Wave goodbye…

We were big adopters of Google Wave at work, even in its BETA version. We thrilled at the excitement of synchronised editing from different places in the country. We were intrigued by the action replay of what we had composed. We found it a great way to live blog from conferences, creating back channels that […]

Hands up for invisible tech

Steve Braunias, a keynote speaker, gently mocked the inoffensive little pun in the title of the NZ English teachers’ conference last week – but we WERE ‘enthusENG’, and for many of us, the focus was elearning. Workshops ranged from using Digistore for planning to exploiting creative affordances for presentational tools to support the teaching of […]

A dead blog

This blog is no more! He has ceased to be! ‘E’s expired and gone to meet ‘is maker! ‘E’s a stiff! Bereft of life, ‘e rests in peace! If you hadn’t added this last post ‘e’d be pushing up the daisies! ‘Is metabolic processes are now ‘istory! ‘E’s off the twig! ‘E’s kicked the bucket, […]