So I got fired up about learning Javascript and then I had to do some very practical stuff in HTML/CSS that took way longer than I thought it would with considerable troubleshooting. So that's been parked. Even as a teacher, when I do stuff I'm learning about learning. Like the fact that when I originally … Continue reading Learning but not yet
Week 12. The TV in our household has been quiet for most of the Covid-19 period. This isn't unusual, since I grew up in South Africa, we only got TV when I was 9, and it was a little black and white thing to boot, so the habit never caught on. Since my son is … Continue reading Don’t try this at home!
Tomorrow marks 74 days since we saw our students face-to-face. Since we had the luxury of physical indoor and outdoor spaces. A library. Fields to play in. Classrooms. We're at the point of the year now where we've started talking about assessments and report cards and student led conferences. Where there are fewer days left … Continue reading How long will it take to rethink online learning?
This blog post is brought to you in-between too much stuff to do with online learning but as an absolute PLEA to Microsoft Education with their wonderful but exasperating Teams product to do some more heavy lifting to get Teams for Education into a shape and form that will get us through the next few … Continue reading Teamin’ up
Six weeks done and we enter our virtual online Spring Break. And my social media both professional and personal is awash with questions from people about school closure and online learning from a teacher/librarian/tech/personal point of view. It's the long tail, the tsunami hitting land after the earthquake at sea. And I know that's just … Continue reading First the earthquake and then the tsunami
As we enter week 4 of online learning (and week 5 for me of the supporting and setup) a few musings on the process. I chose today's title because a lot of what we do is like trying to drive a car in reverse over a long distance for a long time with only a … Continue reading Objects in the mirror
By now the nCOV potential pandemic is world news and international schools over China are in (full) preparation mode on how to continue teaching and learning via online modalities. As part of my preparation, I'm planning to blog daily. Because it's not about the tech. It's about mental and psychological preparation to sit this out, … Continue reading Preparing for closure – don’t make it about Tech
One of the hidden advantages of learning Chinese is that I often catch myself pretending to learn and it gives me an acute insight and experience into the nature of real vs. faux learning. I'm doing a lot of "busy" work today on trying to get my document together for my ISTE certification (faux learning) … Continue reading Pretending to learn
One of the fun things about the FOEN19 (Future of Education Now) was meeting up with two librarians who I greatly admire and in-between sessions geeking out with them. One of the great things (and possibly why I like them so much) is that they're both keen students of Chinese, the three of us are … Continue reading A little on learning Chinese
One regularly hears phrases bandied around schools such as "Every teacher is a language teacher"; or "Every class should start with 10 minutes of reading" and you'd be hard pressed to find a teacher who doesn't agree in theory, that reading is a good thing. But then there is the "reality" of supposed too little … Continue reading Content plus
Informative Flights - Musings of a Teacher Librarian 