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Revisiting the Digital Footprint message

Today, I delivered a presentation to our Year 11 students about how they conduct themselves in online spaces, to ensure their safety and to cultivate a positive digital footprint. I delivered a similar presentation to this same cohort in May last year, and I thought I might be flogging a dead horse. I was wrong.

They listened intently, asked serious and thoughtful questions, and even provided examples themselves of people who had had reputations damaged due to poor understanding of the magnification of information shared in social networks today. I thought I’d fall short with information and have to fill time, but I was struggling to get through what I wanted to cover.

One of the things I wanted to cover was Facebook’s places feature. My guess would be that the majority of them weren’t using it, and had no idea that their friends could check them into locations unless they disabled the feature in their privacy settings. I used the following lifehacker video to demonstrate what they needed to do in Facebook to opt out of the feature. It helped me too. I lead a very transparent life, but I don’t want to use the places feature and I don’t want to be checked into places by friends in my network. It’s not a straightforward process. You have to find the customise button and find the page where the settings need changing. The lifehacker video explained it very clearly and I followed those instructions to meet my requirements. The students watched it intently, and it’s my guess a number of them will be looking at their privacy settings tonight.

It was nice to receive words of thanks and a round of applause at the end of the session. It’s made it very clear to me that these messages need repeating and reinforcement in our teaching practices.

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Toorak Continuous Professional Learning Seminar

I work at Toorak College, an all girls’ school in Mt.Eliza. One of the initiatives being driven here at the moment is the growth of a professional learning network for both the teachers within our school, and those further afield.

Continuous Professional Learning is an online network for our teachers (powered by Ning), and other teachers who are keen to join and share their insights about issues related to our profession. Coupled with this is a series of seminar workshops that will be run at Toorak College throughout the year. The first of these sessions is being run by yours truly (that would be me!).  Toorak College is an hour from central Melbourne, and we are hoping to provide educators from the South Eastern suburbs with professional learning opportunities closer to home. If you are a teacher from Melbourne, and know some teachers who would benefit from the workshop I am offering, please direct them to the site and download the flyer.

Sounds like a bit of an ad really, doesn’t it? It’s a departure from what I usually post about, but it is an exciting development at my school and I am hopeful that anyone who chooses to attend my workshop will leave with more knowledge than they started with! Hopefully they’ll have some strategies for their own personal learning and how they make it happen in their classrooms.

If you want to explore the CPL community, join the site and share your ideas. We’d welcome your presence. : )

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Digital trends to watch

Steve Rubel and David Armano put together this presentation that they then shared on Slideshare. It’s designed for business, but if you look at it with your education hat on, you will see there are lessons here for how we approach the use of mobile devices and tablets, how we support the thought leaders who are trying to make change happen, and how we use social tools and transmedia to make connections with our parent and wider teacher communities.

Looking outside the education sphere and listening to how business is responding to the way the world works now, is one way to further your understanding of digital media. We send our students out into that world of work; listening to what it thinks is important is a way to help us prepare them for what they will face when they get there.

 

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School’s out Friday

I saw “I’m reading a book” tweeted by Kim Yeomans yesterday and thought it would make the perfect School’s out Friday post. I sent it to a teacher who was looking for a way to motivate her Exploring English class today and she used it with them. They loved it, and recognised Julian Smith from some of the other 59 videos he has posted to YouTube. My son watched it with me last night and asked if it was a Top 40 song! It’s certainly got appeal.

Just for an extra treat, being the end of the first week back and all, I thought I’d share another video with you. This one was sent to me by my good friend Tania Sheko, and it’s the latest improveverywhere mission. This time it’s an ice skater in New York’s Bryant Park. I walked through Bryant Park last year as they were dismantling this ice rink for the season. It’s a lovely park situated behind the New York Public Library if you ever get the opportunity to visit.

Ahhh…..the end of a busy week. A week that saw our students embrace their new library space, something I’ll try to post about over the weekend. A week that saw my son start high school, a week that saw a new stage of life for him, and me too. All up, exhausting. Time for bed.

Enjoy the weekend ahead. Relax, and drink a glass or two of the good stuff. We all need it. ( I do, anyway!)   🙂

 

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When Twitter comes into its own…

Unfortunately, an impending disaster is sometimes the impetus for naysayers to see the worth of a service like Twitter.

The hashtag being used on Twitter to track the tweets referring to Tropical Cyclone Yasi is #tcyasi. I’ve been following this hashtag today, and as the cyclone gets closer to the east coast of Far North Queensland, I am receiving more pertinent information there than what I am getting from news organisations like Channel 7 and their very sensationalist Today Tonight program. I, like many others on Twitter, was horrified to see Today Tonight using a countdown clock in the top right hand corner of the screen as they broadcast their program tonight. This is a potentially devastating climactic event, not the Olympic games.

Yes, sometimes you have to put up with some inappropriate language and some irrelevant tweets, but following a hashtag to find out  what people are sharing about something like Tropical Cyclone Yasi is one of the most effective ways I know of keeping up to date with what is really happening from a citizen journalist perspective, and from a traditional news media perspective, as evidenced from the ABC_NewsRadio tweet above.

Right now #tcyasi is a trending twitter hastag worldwide. This gives you some indication as to the number of tweets on the twitter timeline using this hashtag. I’ll be following tonight and in the coming days. You should too. As much as I hate to see something as devastating as this convert people to the benefits of a service like Twitter, it’s more likely to be the catalyst for adoption than any attempts Twitter users can make to convince people of its worth.

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School’s out Friday

I was watching our television news tonight, and was amazed to see this footage of Ambam, a bachelor Western Lowland gorilla at Port Lympne Wild Animal Park in Kent, England who apparently loves to walk around like this. My first reaction was to wonder if it was a man dressed in a very lifelike gorilla suit, and it brought to mind a prank delivered by Australian comedians Hamish and Andy. Take a look at their very funny effort at the Werribee Open Range Zoo.

The kids are back at school next week, just as the hot weather arrives. I’m guessing our air conditioned library just might be the destination of choice on their first day back next year!

If you’re in Melbourne, stay cool this weekend. Chill out, literally!

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Creating a Library for the future

Well, that’s what we hope we’ve done. Created a Library for the future, that is.

When we started planning Toorak College’s new Norman Carson Library, we knew this would be a space that had to meet the needs of a school population into a future that will see a physical collection change as society becomes increasingly comfortable with digital storage and usage. The space needed to be flexible and able to accomodate our book collection, but we didn’t want the books to be the predominant feature. We realise that fiction will be with us for some time, but our non fiction collection we see as a shrinking collection. We needed to find a way to make it inviting, but able to be transformed with changing times.  You get one shot to get things right. Our students return next week, and we can’t wait to see their reaction to the space. It will be their usage of the spaces that will let us know if we’ve hit the mark. I thought I’d share some pictures here to demonstrate the thinking behind the design.

The non fiction shelving in our large learning commons space. We wanted to utilise the wall as much as possible so that we could hopefully accomodate two classes in this space. We will have to see if it is possible once our furniture arrives.There are three break out rooms at the back of the learning commons space. We see these as small group work spaces, meeting spaces and private study areas. Each room has it’s own LCD TV to be used for presentations by students and staff. A divider separates two rooms so that we can create a larger space for a small class if necessary.

Room divider

This is the large conference/work/relax space at the front of the learning commons area. This room has a large divider (see below) that can provide us with a large room for Year level presentations. It has a projector and very large screen for this purpose. (see below) We aim to provide flexible furnishings in this space that can allow for it to be transformed for different purposes. This vista of this space is simply beautiful. It looks out to our Edna Walling designed gardens and historic Hamilton Building.

High pitched ceilings give the library a feeling of additional space, and louvre windows will help with the release of heat when the air conditioning is not being used.

Here is the circulation desk, opposite the entrance, with the library workroom behind. It divides the two spaces of the library and allows for visibility to the learning commons space and the reading and multimedia spaces.

The library workroom is centrally located, with windows all around giving visibility to all areas.

This is our Multimedia room, that will be fitted out with Mac desktops. It adjoins our fiction/reading spaces.

This is our Fiction collection, looking out to our reading space. We are going to replace a standing double bay with wall shelving to help us maximise space.

Our reading space. We intend to make this an L Shaped space, once we have the wall shelving in place.

Opening doors at the rear of the reading space open to this deck, making this an indoor/outdoor reading space. The tree behind has had its canopy trimmed since this photo was taken, and it looks even more picturesque.

This tiered room, for chillin’ out and relaxing, or for presentations to groups, adjoins our fiction/reading space. It’s my favourite room, and has a very high ceiling giving it an interesting acoustic quality.

It is so exciting having the opportunity to help plan and realise a new learning space for students. Like I said, the proof of its effectiveness will lie with student usage. Seeing their reaction to this space when they return next Monday will be something to savour I’m sure. There are floorboxes with data and power dotted throughout the space for our power needs (we are a laptop school), and we will have netbooks and iPads available for student use when their own devices are not with them.

Our next step is furniture, and this is exciting too. February will see the first installment with more to come in a second stage. Flip tables are being used, as are ottamans, colourful chairs and what we are calling a snake lounge, and that will be the signature piece of the Library space.

Hopefully this will be a space that will meet our students needs well into the future. We wanted it to be welcoming, and it certainly has a homely feel when you enter it. It has been enthusiastically embraced by staff, and I expect to see the same reaction from our students, maybe an even more effusive one. I’ll let you know how it’s received.

 

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Google Teacher Academy Sydney application

This is my application video for the Google Teacher Academy being held in Sydney in April 2011. I originally had another idea, but it involved a humorous jab at Steve Jobs and the Apple Distinguished Educator’s program, and with the recent news about Steve standing down as CEO of Apple due to ill health, I thought it would be in poor form. So, this is what I came up with instead.

I have no idea if it’s got any chance of helping me gain a guernsey to what I’m sure will be an outstanding day, but it was fun putting it together anyway. It was filmed in our brand new school library at Toorak College, and you’ll notice the lack of furniture in the background shots. Steve, a colleague from school, helped me with the filming, and we shared a few laughs as I made attempts to get my part down in one take. Hence the out-take at the end of the video! The click sound was added to Freesound by TicTacShutUp and is licensed under a Creative Commons Sampling Plus 1.0 License.

Chris Betcher, Tania Sheko and Phil Hogg are a few of the many teachers who have created really interesting videos in the hope of becoming a Google Certified Teacher. Take a look at their efforts. It’s the first time Google have offered this outside of the United States, and they are seeking applicants from a variety of nations – and applicants with international teaching experience. There are only 50 places – a fierce competition is no doubt unfolding amongst all those applications Google are receiving. I’ve just scraped in in terms of my application, as it closes on January 27th. Successful applicants will hear the good news towards the end of February.

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School’s out Friday

Improveverywhere have posted their 2011 No Pants Subway ride, an event that has grown in size and stature over the last 10 years, and saw participation from people in 50 cities globally this year. I loved the view of Union Square at the end of this video. It brought back happy memories of my time in New York last year, when Union Square was the closest Subway station as I made my way to the many magnificent sights that make up that wonderful city. In fact, it was exactly this date last year that my plane landed at JFK airport in New York. I’d love to make a return visit one day – sooner rather than later I’d hope. Who knows? Sometimes the things you wish for do come true!

In the meantime, I’ve been unbelievably busy this week back at work getting the new library at my school organised for the school year. We took possession of the building on Monday, and I’ve been there every day, except for Tuesday when my time was punctuated with a bout of Gastroenteristis! Just what I needed- NOT! Today was huge. All of the books were stacked on the new shelving and everything, office supplies, digital equipment, the small amount of furnishings we are bringing over with us, were placed in the building. We had specialist removalists helping thank goodness, or there’s no way I’d be typing this now. In fact, it’s pretty surprising I’m doing this at all, because I am thoroughly exhausted. Time for bed methinks.

I’ll see if I can get a post happening where I include some pics of the building. In the meantime, here’s my favourite space at the moment.

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Reinventing our Library space – what did we do?

Tomorrow, I return to work. It’s an early start for me, and that’s because the new library that has been under construction is completed. It’s very exciting and something I have alluded to over the last year. Our library, and the staff who work in it, have been located in temporary accommodation for the past twelve months so we are very much looking forward to moving into a spacious environment where we can realise some initiatives we have planned for the 2011 school year. I haven’t written a post outlining the process we underwent planning this construction, and I thought it might be useful for anyone facing either remodeling or building from the ground up.

Our original brief was to remodel an existing building, but the eventual outcome was the demolition of our old library, and the construction of a new building on the same site. We had very little time in the planning stages to come up with a design, but after working in a library that had functional issues, I was already convinced of the changes we needed to implement to make for a more functional space that would meet the needs of our learners, and the people who work in the building.

Our old library had already seen a change in usage as a result of changing seating options. Over a two year period we invested funds into couches and cushions, and we strategically placed them in and around traditional table and chair configurations. What we saw was an almost gravitational pull towards the new seating options. Classes that were booked in would float to those spaces rather than the traditional areas. At recess and lunch breaks those spaces were fully occupied with students working on their laptops, reading and talking. We also had become more flexible about eating arrangements. I know this will not suit many, but we allowed our students to eat in the library, provided they were respectful and cleaned up after themselves. I have always struggled with break periods like lunchtime, and restricting student use of the library until they have finished lunch. For many students, the library is a refuge, the one space in the school that is always supervised and can provide them with a place to belong. Those kids need the library, and eating lunch by yourself can be a very solitary pursuit. At least in the library they are in a group atmosphere. I think it helps them. I’m not sure how we will approach eating in this new space. My feeling is that we will be very precious about it to start with, and probably will ask students to eat before they come in, but I feel we will need to gauge this and see how our ‘refuge’ students react.

We had always struggled with poor design that meant our workroom was located well away from the main traffic areas. It led to a dislocation of staff and an inability for some staff to see when times were busy and more hands were needed on deck. We made sure in our new design that our workroom was centrally located with visibility to all parts of the library. The reality of any library is that we are service providers in our school; students and staff needs come before all else, and we need to be responsive.

I’ve included a floorplan of the new library below. I used an online program called Floorplanner to help me insert furniture, and I used Jing for the annotations. The furniture is not necessarily as it will appear in the new space and there may well not be all of it either. It will very much depend on what the space looks like when we walk into it! The picture below was my thinking based on what we envisaged might be possible. We have tried to put most of our non-fiction shelving along a wall, so that it doesn’t compromise what could be a learning space, but we have found that we will have to have some shelving spreading  into a learning space. The ‘snake lounge’ as I’ve called it, is actually a very large piece of furniture that will be the defining piece of the large library space. I can’t wait until it’s installed- it’s going to be a stand out piece. It won’t be in until mid Feb at this stage. I’m excited about the portable IWBs that we will have in the space (there will be three of them) because we intend to allow student use of these. I’m interested to see what use they make of them.

Right throughout the flooring are floorboxes containing data and power for students to power up devices. This was a crucial part of the design process- there are not many desktop computers- they exist only in the multimedia lab. Our students bring their own laptops to school and we provide netbooks (and iPads as of this year) for student use within the library if their device is not working.We are a wireless networked environment, but we have factored data points for cabled connection into the floorboxes for moments when the wireless may be down.

Another exciting addition is the presentation space. It’s a room off the fiction/reading /relaxation space that has  three rows of tiered seating – a reverse amphitheatre type arrangement. All of the tiers have power outlets within them, so that our students can lounge there and plug their devices in when necessary. We envisage teachers will book this space for presentations and will be using one of the portable IWBs that can be rolled in to allow students to hook up their computers.

The conference room at the front of the very large learning commons type space is exciting too. It has doors that can be remotely closed making it a self contained space. It will have a data projector and very large screen installed for presentations. If your school is anything like mine, you will know how hard it can be to facilitate large groups like a year level for a presentation. We think this room is going to see a lot of traffic, and we are planning flexible seating arrangements so that it can be reconfigured to meet changing needs quickly.

We will be sharing the space with our IT Department and this will be located in the back of the building. Both the library and IT department welcome this. We work very closely together facilitating technology needs of our students, and a closer physical working arrangement is going to be an added bonus.

We won’t have all of our furniture installed from the start of the school year. It will be a partial fit out to start with but we envisage the place to be totally functional from May. It’s going to be a bit messy and very busy for the start of the year, but it’s going to be exciting too. I’ll post some pictures of the completed building in the coming days.

Our Library- close to end of construction

Busy days ahead!