Assignment One

Okay an aspect has been chosen - e-learning in the early school years (namely year 1 and 2). Tentatively titled: E-learning in the first year of school - enrichment or entertainment.'

I'd like to look at how e-learning can assist in building children's literacy and numeracy skills. Ideally I love the children using the computer within the classroom and the two computers I have hum away all day with all the children getting at least 30-40 minutes each a week working individually on numeracy and literacy activities. I always worry about avoiding "playing" and try to aim for "learning" or "practising new skills". Not always easy to achieve!

Some key words searched are : computer assisted learning, e-learning, early childhood, literacy and technology... and more to try. Many thanks to Kirsty and her helpful library search notes. If only I had known in my earlier papers about logging into the library and search multiple databases!

I've thought about some definitions I'll need to include ie literacy, e-learning, computer assisted learning, multi-literacies... I'm sure this list will be added to. The main problem has been finding articles and readings specifically related to the first two years of primary school - there is a lot of information on older children (8 years and upward), and early childhood, but not much in the middle.

The search continues!

PDF Conversion

After finding some interesting articles tonight, I also taught myself how to convert them to a PDF and embed them in my blog. Unfortunately as it was about to embed the PDF file I noticed some small print as I waited for it to load... basically if it's not yours, you can't use it without permission! Woops! Delete! That was the second thing I learned (or was reminded of) tonight. Timely really as plagarism needs to be taken into account - another reason I dislike children cutting and pasting from the web for their own reports!

Lesson learned!

Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education

Something I plan to watch when my nearest and dearest is not trying to watch a James Bond movie - looked interesting without the audio, so looking forward to hearing what he has to say. Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

Web 2.0 Is the Future of Education

View more presentations from SteveHargadon.

Diigo and Endnote

Am also pleased to report that as well as a blog, I am the new, proud (or perplexed) user of a Diigo Library, which even links back to this blog! I have to say, a great way to keep a list of all those websites, google scholar searches and links. Very easy to use so far, and comes with its own tool bar.

I also today learned how to use EndNote 3.0 - how have I done other University papers and not made use of this! The hours of trying to type a reference list is over. The only tricky part is choosing whether things are journal articles, edited books, etc and where to put the information so it's correct!

Campbell Reading

Am a little bemused by the reading by Nola Campbell (2004) "The Vintage Years of e-learning in New Zealand Schools." While it is an interesting history of e-learning, it appears to have an emphasis on e-mail and electronic communication and how schools could use this in their classrooms. It does however demonstrate though, that with the use of the term e-learning by Nola in 2004, how advanced she was in the use of computers and internet within the realm of education.

I was lucky enough to work with Nola in 1999, 2000 in the University of Waikato Professional Studies Department and remember talking to her then about 'online learning'.

I did like the idea that the introduction of email and the internet did (and still does) give children an opportunity to be part of a global community and Campbell also comments that "a teacher who was prepared to fill the role of the facilitator and was not afraid of change would find [electronic mail] a powerful tool." This links back to the EDPROFST 714 discussion started by Pomate regarding "No man is an island" and the need for teachers to work alongside or learn from students, rather than direct the learning (Westerland, 2010).

From this article, I think a further investigation and clarification into what e-learning is (in general and to me) is in order.

To begin!

Okay so its been a few days since I began my blogging experience and I see I have a follower! Hi!

Due to work commitments (long term planning!) I haven't even began to get my head around where I am at and where I need to be so tonight is the night. First job, to read the assignment one requirements and to choose an aspect...

One of my lunchtime "duties" is to run a ICT club for approximately 25 year one and two children. My plan is to get them doing a variety of tasks using a range of technology so they can then go back and be the "classroom experts". I guess this comes back to the "No school is an island" thread - some of these children will be more capable than their teachers. I embrace the fact that these little 5, 6 and 7 year olds are confident in trying something new with no fear of the delete key!

Over the year we will be covering digital stories, photography, and creating our own video/news item. We will also be setting up a learning cave so that everyone else can see what we've been learning.

Now to find out if that is an aspect !!

Welcome!

Come with me on my E-Learning journey... I have no idea what I am doing so be prepared for a wobbly ride!

This is my first blog, hang in here with me as a learn how to post, add other information and keep up with all those University readings :)

Should be fun!