Teaching Multimodal Literacy with Inanimate Alice

Inanimate Alice is an interactive multimodal digital novel told from the perspective of Alice the main character. This transliteracy fiction story tells the story of Alice from the age of 8 years old. She gets into all sorts of interesting and often dangerous situations as they travel the world wherever her fathers work takes them. In each episode Alice is a few years older and the writing style, the games she creates, and her artwork develop accordingly. Alice is highly imaginative, and a developing game designer whose games are incorporated into the story. The reader interacts with the story on each ‘page’ in different ways and experiences a combination of text, sound, music, images and game play. The entire story is planned to be told over 10 episodes, the first was released in 2005 and there have since been another three episodes with Episode 5 been released on the 1st December 2014. The series is written and directed by Kate Pullinger and produced by Ian Harper.

Inanimate Alice has been used as an exemplar of a digital storytelling and has been widely recognised as an example of transmedia storytelling. Considering the multimodal world of internet and gaming there are not many good examples of this type of literacy and schools have been slow to recognise the value of using and teaching multimodal literacies. For some ideas check out the learning experience of my students and myself on our wiki. This is a record of an entire unit I taught based on Inanimate Alice to my Year 6 class (http://inanimatealice-aperspective.wikispaces.com). The fun part about ‘reading’ Inanimate Alice is that afterwards students can use what they have learnt to create their own episodes of Inanimate Alice, and even have them posted on the official website.

Inanimate Alice is an exciting and engaging story that has captured the imaginations of every class I have shared it with, and the teaching and learning possibilities are very broad. Not only that but the website is packed with extra student resources and teaching support materials, like the ‘Starter Activities Booklet’, the ‘Teachers Education Pack’, and links to the curriculum. One of my favourite resources is ‘Alice’s School Report’ which is a set of narratives in a graphic novel style of Alice’s adventures in other countries.

In The Classroom: this video shows an example of how a teacher is using Inanimate Alice in the classroom. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0SZ0uSwIDKk

Interview with Kate: my Year 8 students loved Inanimate Alice so much they arranged a Skype interview with Kate Pullinger. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eliJOj0-jlA

The Website: on the 1st December 2014 Inanimate Alice Episode 5 will be released on the website. The website will also be getting a whole new look plus some extra features like a gallery of student created content and a developers journal. http://www.inanimatealice.com

This is your chance to dive into transliteracy with all the support and scaffolding you could possibly need as a teacher. It will provide you with so many opportunities to explore the multimodal literacies of our 21st century. They are relevant and I promise you they are fun and engaging. Give your students a chance to meet Alice and go on an adventure.

Inanimate Alice Episode 5 Trailer

EduCampNZ Christchurch 2014 #educampchch

I love going to EduCamps as for me they showcase what I believe a model life-long learner teacher is. These amazing teachers take a Saturday morning of their own time to share and learn from each other, to connect and collaborate. So not only was this #educampchch a wonderful learning experience but also a great chance to meet those teachers whose passion for teaching learning is an inspiration.

Below is a copy of the Smackdown slides and they were all fanatasic, but some of my favourites where:
* Kahoot (Slide 6): which allows you to run a quiz, you do however need either a connected device per student or per group.
* The Five Sentence Challenge (Slide 10): which is an online writing challenge for emergent writers.

* Coding for Teachers (Slide 18): a community of teacher learning to code together.

Smackdown Slides

I presented some of my favourite free coding sites and apps for different primary school levels.

There was also a lively Twitter backchat and sharing happening which you can view below.
Twitter Feed
  #educampchch Tweets

The Hour of Code

I am committing to have my students participate in the Hour of Code -- would you like to join me? Here's more info about the Hour of Code:

Computer science is foundational for all students today, yet 90% of students haven’t been exposed to this subject at school. Last December, Code.org launched the Hour of Code, a challenge for students to spend one hour trying out computer programming. This year, Khan Academy, Code.org, and many other organizations are offering a bunch of new ways for students to participate in the Hour of Code!

Start planning your students' Hour of Code!

What is the Hour of Code?
The Hour of Code is an hour-long introduction to computer programming designed to demystify code and show students that everyone can learn the basics. For example, Khan Academy has crafted several custom-made tutorials for your students that require no prior experience:

Hour of Drawing with Code: Students will learn to program using JavaScript, one of the world's most popular programming languages via two great options:

• Drag-and-drop: block-based coding for younger students with less typing skills and students on tablet devices (ages 8+).
• Typing: keyboard-based coding for older students (ages 10+).

Hour of Webpages: Students will learn to make their own webpages using the basics of HTML and CSS (ages 10+).

Hour of Databases: Students will learn the fundamentals of databases using SQL to create tables, insert data into them, and do basic querying (ages 12+).

Last year, 15 million students tried computer programming for at least one hour during Computer Science Education Week on Khan Academy and other platforms.

This year, our goal is to reach 100 million students.

Let’s join Microsoft, Google, Apple, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, Malala, and millions of others around the world to make history. Start planning your Hour of Code today!

Why Don't Students Like School?

The title of this book first drew me to it, as we have all experienced the frustration of not being able to get through to a child. However this book focuses on why student's don't enjoy school because they are not succeeding in their learning, which makes sense as I have never met a child who does not relish the satisfaction of achieving or discovering something new.

Cognitive scientist and author, Daniel Willingham says that people are curious, but not naturally good thinkers.That unless the cognitive conditions are right we will avoid thinking, sounds true for me at least! As teachers we need to understand the science of thinking and reconsider how we encourage students to think in response. The better students think, the more they will learn and the more likely they will enjoy it.

Willingham encourages us not to dismiss the value of knowledge, even in a Google society. That despite all our efforts to teach critical thinking, without an extensive and deep factual knowledge students will struggle to problem solve, to think critically or abstractly. Background factual knowledge is vital and should precede skill, and skill should be taught in context. An example he mentions that I have experienced often in the past is starting a unit with an attention grabber. For example a few years back I started a science unit with the famous 'coke and mentos' experiment. It was a hit of course but what did my students really learn? Not much that day although they were excited and perhaps engaged to being the unit. However, what if I had spent the time developing their knowledge of liquids, gases, and surface tension first, then done the experiment later? Would they have been more likely to think and perhaps come to more informed hypotheses of the experiment? I believe so.

Some of the cognitive principles Willingham discussed are:

How memory works

We need to give meaning to the knowledge for it to be remembered.

Mnemonics are not the devil's work, they are actually excellent memory tools.

Humans are wired to storytelling, so use story structure to teach lessons.

What's the truth about visual, auditory, and kinetics learners?

Its seems there is little truth in this old belief, sure it helps to approach any learning in multiple styles, but that's true for all learners. Students learn by learning meaning.

What's the truth about Multiple Intelligence's?

Surprisingly for me having used multiple intelligence's for many years, cognitive science shows there is no evidence for multiple intelligence's. Maths needs to be taught mathematically, and counting leaves for 'nature smart Johnny' will not help him learn maths better. However multiple intelligence's can still be used successfully with content and to change thinking; just not individuals

Praise effort not ability 

It took me many years and more practise to develop the habit of this one but it is worth reiterating. Cognitive science does confirm that praising effort or the process (not ability) is highly effective in motivating students to learn and develop a positive attitude towards learning. However praise must always be sincere, kids can tell! We need to teach our students that hard work increases intelligence and failure is the road to success.

These are just some of the surprising new things I learnt from reading "Why Don't Students Like School?" and it has certainly challenged some of my past pedagogical practices. It is well worth the read, and I'll leave you with one last major lesson (repeated through this book) that cognitive science has revealed. Practice, practice, practice! Practice makes room in working memory, which allows deeper thinking to take place. When deeper thinking is happening students are more challenged, confident, and hopefully liking school and their own learning journey.

Why We Should Teach Mindfulness Meditation to Children?

I started practising and studying mindfulness and meditation early this year as a way of dealing with my own troubled stated of mind. It fast became an anchor, a place of peace, a place that allowed me to overcome emotional pains and automatic reactions. I also grew to love and value my meditation times; I wished I’d learnt this as a child. As a teacher I recognise a valuable life skill which I plan to gift to many children in the future.

Meditation is a strategy that can play an important role in every classroom, for cognitive focus and emotion control. Learning to quieten and focus their minds, children improve their abilities to pay attention, be better communicators, make better decisions, improve behaviour, and be compassionate.

Some studies of mindfulness programs in schools have found that regular practice improves student self-control and increases their classroom participation, respect for others, self-acceptance, happiness, and optimism. Even a few minutes meditation a day can make a difference; just taking a few deep breaths deactivates our fight or flight response (our sympathetic nervous system) and engages our parasympathetic nervous system which is our resting mode. As a teacher I have noticed that most of children’s problems in and outside the classroom derive from making instant judgements and not being able to notice the reality of a situation, and some of us never grow (or learn to) out of this.

• Mindfulness meditation can improve concentration and benefit students’ learning.
• Mindfulness meditation can lead to increased mental clarity, cognitive reasoning by increasing the thickness of the cerebral and prefrontal cortex the areas of the brain responsible for attention, sensory processing and complex cognitive skills.
• Mindfulness meditation has been show to decrease activity in the anterior cingulate which controls thinking and emotions.
• Mindfulness meditation can assist us in developing self-acceptance by teaching us how to deal with our minds continuous negative self-chatter and be more connected to our own bodies.
• Mindfulness meditation can build compassion and reduce bullying.

So perhaps the Dalai Lama had a point when he said, “If every 8 year old in the world is taught meditation, we will eliminate violence from the world within one generation.”  I would love to test this theory, but even if it didn't, I believe meditation has the power to make children better students and better human beings.

Teachers Don't Own Their Own Content!

Last night I attended a presentation on Creative Commons in Education presented by Creative Commons NZ  and hosted by the Christchurch Connected Educators’ Network. To learn more about the background and basics of Creative Commons read Rob Clarke’s post “Knowledge Creation, Sharing and Creative Commons in Education.”  It is an interesting subject and one all teachers and schools need to understand. Copyright and Creative Commons is a major part of digital citizenship, and our students need to know how to avoid ‘stealing’ the work of others as well as protecting and perhaps even more important sharing their own creative works. However the point that created the most discussion and interest was the fact that teachers don't own their own content!

Did you know that New Zealand teachers don’t own or have copyright to resources they create! It is a grey area but essentially it means anything educational you create while employed, even on weekends is not yours. This is a worry for those of us who create and sell educational resources. According to the Creative Commons in Schools website, “The 1994 Copyright Act grants first ownership to employers, which in the case of New Zealand schools is the Board of Trustees (BoT).” Although some of us find this shocking, it is not a conspiracy, but an old legal default of policy that has never been changed. This is another reason why you as educators need to be aware of copyright issues, take charge of the contracts you sign, and take action to change policies at your school.

Why Open Education Matters from Blink Tower on Vimeo.

We all want to have a fair playing field and luckily the government is on your side. The New Zealand Government Open Access and Licensing framework (NZGOAL), advocates the use of Creative Commons licensing and encourages Boards of Trustees to take NZGOAL into account in their copyright policies. The solution is to adopt clear and transparent policies to allow schools and teachers to share and reuse content. The benefits are: teachers will not need to ask permission to use resources, they and the school can legally keep and reuse resources, plus the teacher who created the work can receive credit when their work is reused. Of course this doesn’t cover educational resources or books teachers may be creating in their own time, but the answer is to be upfront and talk about these issues with your Boards of Trustees. Preferably get any conditions included into your contract.

To learn more about Creative Commons in Schools and how to pass a Creative Commons Policy change at your school visit Creative Commons in Schools for more detail, including a policy template developed by Albany Senior High School which you can use.

It is an interesting barrel of worms, and here are some other things for you to consider.
- Who owns the content of your personal teaching / reflective blog?
- Students work is all automatically copyright, should they also agree to a Creative Commons sharing policy?

By Shaun Wood, teacher and consultant at www.Mindcraft.co.nz

Twitter:             @mrwoodnz

Blog:               http://mindcraftlearning.blogspot.com

Facebook:     https://www.facebook.com/mindcraftelearning

A Literacy Comprehension Approach To Maths Problem Solving

From my own experience and that of many other teachers I have worked with, I have found students struggle with word-based mathematical problem solving and mathematical literacy. 
Sound familiar?

Many teachers have found their students struggle with word-based mathematical problem solving as Reilly, et al., (2009) showed in their study. However they also showed that using a Reciprocal Teaching approach to address mathematical literacy provided an increased evidence based understanding of word-based problem solving by the students. 

Reciprocal Maths (based on the Reciprocal Reading system) first described by Palincsar and Brown (1984) is an instructional strategy designed to improve comprehension of mathematical problem solving through the use of reading strategies, with the further aim of increasing student independence. 

This highly effective approached uses the stages of: connecting, predicting, clarifying, visualising, questioning, solving, summarising, and reflecting. Strongly linked to literacy, students support each other in co-operative groups but work individually and record their though processes, working out, and reflections.

Using role cards similar to those used in Reciprocal Reading, students work through problems together and record their work individually but share their results and strategies, allowing the group members to support and learn from each other. This process like Reciprocal Reading should be teacher led, and over time as students become proficient with the process they will be able to work in groups independent of the teacher. Students using this method do work through problems at a slower pace but you will find they have a deeper understanding of the problem and strategies they used and be able to discuss their working out process with more clarity.

Below is an example of how students would use Reciprocal Maths to solve a word-based problem.

Write the problem out here: Jake baked 115 muffins, which was 17 more muffins than Jill. How many muffins did Jill bake?

CONNECT •      What past maths problems does this remind you of? This reminds me of a problem that was in last week’s test. •      How did you solve a similar problem last time? I found all the numbers and minus them. •      What strategies did you use to work out a similar problem? I used subtraction.

PREDICT •      What do you think this problem is asking you to do? I think the problem is asking me to subtract Jill’s muffins from Jake’s muffins. •      What operations do you think will be needed? Subtraction •      What different ways do you think could solve this problem? Reversing the operation might also work or I draw a number line.

CLARIFY •      What is the problem asking us to do? It is asking us to find out how many muffins Jill baked. •      Are there any words or ideas you are not sure of? No. •      What information is AND isn’t needed to solve this problem? IS:  Jake 115,  Jill 17 more, how many            ISN’T: all the other words •      What operations are AND aren’t needed? ARE: subtraction     AREN’T: addition

VISUALISE •      What pictures can you make in your head about this problem? I imagine Jake with 115 muffins in lines of 5 in front of him. Next to him I imagine Jill with the same. Then I imagine a wicked teacher destroying 17 of Jill’s muffins with a laser gun one at a time. •      Draw a picture, diagram, table or any other visual way to show this problem and its solution.

QUESTION •      What questions do you have about this problem? None •      Are there any tricky parts to this problem? The word ‘more’ makes it sound like you should add the numbers. •      What do we need to do first? Then what? First we must take 115. Then we must split 17 into 15 + 2 because 15 is easier to take away from 115 than 17. Lastly we should minus the 2.

SOLVE •      Solve the problem and show all your workings out and thinking. 115 – 17 = 115 – (15 + 2) =      115 – 15 = 100      100 – 2 = 98 •      Re-read the problem and judge how reasonable your solution is. I think my solution is reasonable because if Jill has 98 muffins, it means that Jake has more muffins.

SUMMARISE •      What strategies did you use to solve this problem? I use subtraction and place value partitioning. •      Give reasons to justify why you think your solution is correct? If I add 17 to 98 I get 115 which means Jake has 17 more muffins than Jill.

REFLECT •      What worked well? Underlining words that seemed important in the problem helped me choose the right operation. The visualising helped me figure out I needed to split the 17 into 15 and 2. •      How would you change your solving strategy next time? I would use the same strategy but I would try another one as well to see if it also works. •      What could the group improve on next time? We could encourage each other by saying what each person did well. •      How well did you contribute to the group work out of 10? 8 because I could have helped Mary when I finished early.

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Reciprocal-Maths-Pack-British-US-Spelling-1496178 

Retelling a story aids comprehension and develops an understanding of the structure of narratives. It is always better to ask students to retell a story orally before any writing. Speaking the words out loud allows most people to clarify their own understanding, whatever the subject. It gives us some mental space to sort and adjust our recall and understanding within a given framework. During retelling students are naturally using their reading strategies and writing scaffolds to visualise, question, summerise and order all the parts into a cohesive whole that brings a deeper understanding. From that point it makes the writing process much clearer for the student, as they already have a map in their head. I like to do oral storytelling with my students before they do any of their own writing; sometime before brainstorming, sometimes after, and sometimes both. 

This Five Finger Retell strategy is a simple way to scaffold your students thinking as they practice oral or written retelling. It's a free download here.

Language is the bridge that connects us. Without language we cannot communicate and get our true meaning across to other people. In today's international world where we connect in education, business and play across many countries, being understood has become even more important. Being understood brings us closer to peace, kindness and success in our lives. Often we are not even understood by people who speak our own language! This quote by Nelson Mandela, a man who brought peace with his words, inspires me as a language teacher to make a small difference in the world through helping others be better understood.

 

"Without language, one cannot talk to people and understand them; one cannot share their hopes and aspirations, grasp their history, appreciate their poetry, or savour their songs." Nelson Mandela.

English Elearning: online English learning for primary, intermediate, and secondary school age learners.

https://www.facebook.com/English-Elearning

http://englishelearning.asia/blog

Photo by MsSaraKelly, modified with text.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/mssarakelly/9424997560/

Modern Learning Practices in a Connected World #cenz14

Modern learning practices are not necessarily the learning practices we see in schools today. I believe this is due to lack of teacher self-development but also because school systems via school leaders, via Ministry of Education dictate teachers daily lives. What we should teach, how we should teach it, how long we should teach it for, then they measure and assess the teachers and students contsantly, not giving the trust and freedom to allow teachers and students to disrupt old learning practices.

However I hope things are changing; today I took part in a webinar which is part of the Connected Educator Month. It featured some well known guest speakers like Stephen Heppell, Derek Wenmoth, and Janelle Riki who discussed modern learning practices in education, and what they might look like for future-focused organisations.

Modern learning practices are about students leading their own learning, creating their own PLN's, creating their own communities, connecting with their own mentors, and making real differences in their own worlds. It is about self-determined learning, reciprocal learning, collaborative learning, and cultural learning. Modern learning practices should be disrupting traditional learning practices.

This webinar certainly has planted a seed, a challenge; how can we change the mind set of students, teachers, leaders, and community?

Watch The Recording
http://connectededucator.org.nz/calendar/archives/

Read The Shared Notes Document
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Q835d7hfa_AtVBD5QTWcl9r_iew4ex1RmnJanUDnKG8/edit

Connected Educator Month website
http://connectededucator.org.nz

Events
http://connectededucator.org.nz/events/2014-10-01/

Educamp Minecraft

Today the first Educamp Minecraft was held in Rotorua. As a long time proponent of Minecraft as a teaching and learning tool, I was lucky to be asked to present via Skype from Christchurch and managed to participate via Twitter. You can review the tweets below if you missed out on the conference.
#educampminecraft Tweets

Below is the slide I talked about, and here is a link to all the other wonderful presenters. Thank you to all, I learnt so much from you all.

I have also shared my teaching experience with Minecraft last year at a TeachMeetNZ virtual unconference. You can read my blog post and watch the recorded video about it by clicking the link below.
TeachMeetNZ - Minecraft as a Teaching and Learning Tool - See more at: http://mindcraftlearning.blogspot.co.nz/2013/11/teachmeetnz-minecraft-as-teaching-and.html#sthash.yMdehT6d.dpuf