Today was the day for two training sessions.

Firstly, I ran ‘Digital Storytelling" workshop, sharing the online platforms of Voicethread, Teachertube, and Slideshare.

I always enjoy running these session because I find teachers bring just as much to a session as I do. We began a voicethread… My first really proper one and it is oh so basic but I am hoping that others whole attended the session will be adding there thoughts about it. The cough at the beginning of my talk is not me but an attendee who shall remain nameless.

Cliotech was good enough to allow me to share some of the input from her slideshare .

Second up was Stop motion animation. Some folk from this morning stayed into the afternoon. We played around with webcams for a while and discussed the usefulness of animation creation to support not only the literacy programme but also it solidfy learning in other areas, for example creating an animation to illustrate life-cycles in science. We even had one uploaded to www.teachertube.com by the end of the session. It’s entitled "Mr Mouse" Enjoy!

ps. It was also great to know about a couple of sound wikispaces today. One of the attendees has been struggling with establishing her class wiki on wikispaces. I would have loved to sit down with her and assist in creating her class wiki, but that would be another 3 hour session so I pointed her in the direction on Wonderfulworldof.wikispaces.com and encouraged her to look through the material there before she gave up. Often I find its better to have the pointers than to be able to ‘Fix it’ then and there. Thanks Chrissy

pps. Thanks Derek for sharing this . What a powerful illustration of Storytelling in the 21st Century

I have been engaged in conversation with folk today about “What would it take to address raise the standard of achievement for students today”. The Gift and Talented roll is one that is currently in a state of flux. You have some schools around NZ who are going ‘hell for leather’ in their provision for such students, others that are paying ‘lip-service’ to the notion and finally others that are merely paralyzed with indecision.

Something that was talked about was the idea or funds channeled into an ‘academy’. But we hit the sticking point of the justification of ‘ring-fenced’ money only benefitting a small portion of the school community.

How would the argument go for such fund? Is it justifiable for the top 5% of students within a school?

Also I would love here about is the variety of models for addressing the issue. I know Melaine Holtsman works within the G&T domain and perhaps other of you could share your thoughts?

The future looks nothing like democracy because democracy which sort to empower the individual is being obsolest by a social order that hyper empowers them.

Mark Pesce

I would love to tell you of the great tales he told, but I really couldn’t do them justice. He first tried writing when he was 16 or 17, trying to impress a girl. Then he leaves it alone for a decade until he finds some old notes he made…. Now 23 chapter books later and still writing, in fact we were honoured with the first public reading of his, yet to be published, next book.

If you ever get the opportunity to invite David Hill to your school, take it. He is well worth listening to.

1. Five year olds in this European city are not due to start school until they are six, in fact ON their sixth birthday. This five old I heard about is very, very bored at kindy and mum and dad want her to start school early. As part and parcel of the procedure for that to happen the kid needs to be assessed by a some Educational Psychologist or similar, there are a raft of result coming through regarding the kid but what stands out is the IQ of 140. The kid begins school immediately and is put in the Y0 class, where she spends the first week learning the number ‘1’. Are her needs being met?

2. Intermediate kid, he has special needs that I am unable to disclose. The school has streamed maths and literacy programmes. His ability is somewhat below even the lowest of groups in the lowest of classes. His class contains 29 students. The teacher sees him for focused teaching time, with 4 others three times a week. Are his needs being met?

The recent push in education towards ‘personised learning’ is merely rhetoric. The reality of one teacher personalizing the learning of 33 students on a continual basic is beyond the time and energy of any regular teacher. It is why Primary (Elementary) teachers have been organizing ‘differentiated’ groups for a long time now; it is the realistic balance between ‘personalized learning’ and ‘whole class teaching’.

When my kid finally hits school I want to know what is really happening in the classrooms. I don’t want some Principal talking to me about their ‘personalised learning plan’ when really its ‘differentiated learning’ in a new coat of paint.

Let’s keep it real people, let’s call it what it is.

But it got me thinking…

If these kids were in my class which do I need to encourage, which do I need to push to reach their full potential, which should I report to CYF or to the RTLB service. Who is performing, whose average, whose just not up to schooling. What should I say to their parents?

How do we know, who we know? Our classrooms are full of potential, of greatness. If these kids WERE in my class, how much responsibility do I take for them, and for how long?

But today I was teaching in an Intermediate (Y8) class today in Hastings, New Zealand who were working on ‘projects’ on oral language-

One group was practicing and a play, another looking a Shakespeare’s Macbeth. But the group I was most interested in were considering Martin Luther King’s ‘I have a dream’ speech. They have to go on Youtube and listen to the footage then they accessed the ‘script’ via the web.

They had to identify the techniques MLK used in his speech to connect with the audience and then answer some questions independently.

They needed to find out about:

Ku Klux Clan

‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’

Rosa Parks

Segregation

Civil Rights

Slavery

All through the web and then present their findings.

If I were doing this with my class I’d have them use photo Story or Voicethread to make the final presentation.

What a fantastic use of technology in the classroom context.

I must confess this session was not my creation but the teacher of the class. Well done.

“What does DNA stand for?….. National Dyslexic Association”

Back in April of this year the government finally recognised dyslexia as reading and writing disability- Hurray for you!

I must confess that I am somewhat delighted that I grew up in Britain where it has been recognised for yonks. In fact, if it were not for that and a very determined mother I happen to have I would certainly not be sitting here in this hemisphere typing this right now.

It troubles me just a little that the Dyslexic Foundation leaflet has the by-line “The gift of picture thinking” – It hardly feels like a gift for the kid and looks like a total nightmare for parents. I appreciate the upbeat nature of the material being presented, however in going upbeat I would hate to think we are trivalising the nature of the difficulties.

I was 12 when I was diagnosed with Dyslexia. I then had additional reading lessons in school and out targeting the way I learn so I could learn. If only I’d spent more time considering how they were teaching me and what I was being taught, perhaps I be a better teacher for it. You see often people assume that I know how to educate the educationally challenged ‘just cos I was one’ – that is not the case at all. I fact I have very poor understanding the strategies I use. You see I have been taught that way, I read that way, I write and spell that way…. I think everyone sees the world as I do. But then don’t we all. I was amazed the other day to discover that people view a page and scan from left to right in zigzag pattern in a density to match the density of the text they are scanning. Others move down the centre of the page scanning left and right to get the essence of the text. I NEVER look at a page of writing in either of those ways. I start at the start and move right along to the next word and the next and …..so on.

I echo Clare Coulson’s words: “I am a “compensated dyslexic”, which means my natural cognitive strengths have compensated for the cluster of cognitive weaknesses that characterise dyslexia.”

The dyslexic foundation has worked hard over the last I don’t know how long to get dyslexia put on the agenda. When I was asked to look into dyslexia provision in New Zealand I thought there was none. School after school appears to be ‘not very far down the road’ in terms of acknowledging it let alone doing something about it.

There are an estimated 70,000 dyslexic children in New Zealand. These are children of regular or higher intelligence that think in a more creative and kinestic manner whose needs are not yet being address. 70,000 that’s 8.25% of school aged children in 2001. Is it a small enough percentage for the education system to ignore? I don’t want to list a whole heap of famous dyslexics, New Zealanders or not because lets face it they made it… You could argue that they reached their full potential with or without educational establishment help. But for every John Britten there were 69,999 other dyslexics who we haven’t heard about.

John Britten was plagued with his dyslexia all his life… I say plagued but somehow it would seem you can ‘overcome’ the disability.

“A world authority on dyslexia, Californian Ronald Davis, told the opening function that dyslexia was highly treatable.”

I don’t like the language of ‘overcome’ or ‘treatable’, it sounds like its something you get past and move on like that challenging 20 foot wall you see on all those SAS/ Survivor shows. Not so….

There are many myths surrounding Dyslexia.  Many people think it is a disorder that is simply impossible to beat – no matter how determined you are.   John O’Shea says: “It does get better.  You learn to cope.”

The point of me sharing this… I don’t know. The provision of educational opportunities for ALL should always be front and centre in our minds.

Regardless of their needs and challenges our students deserve the best possible education. They are entitiled to it, are they receiving it?

Links:

ThankGodI’mDyslexic

Clare Coulson’s article: Spelling it out

Dyslexia Foundation

Today we were looking at the Gifted and Talented register. Angi delivered a paper she’d written for Uni back last year. The presentation can be found on slideshare, unfortunately I’m having a few issues with embedding in my blog so you’re left with a screen capture and the link to the slideshow, Sorry.

I’ve managed to grasp some key aspects. 
 

 Our school definition reads: 

Gifted and talented students are those who have potential (gifted) or are Performing (talented) well above average in any of the following domains: general intellectual or social, specific academic, cultural traditions, values or ethics creative or productive thinking, leadership visual or performing arts, and psychomotor ability. 

There is huge provision for ‘special needs’ kids with SEA, JOST, ‘Seeds for success’, hearing and vision screening, NUMPA, ESOL assessment and Ministry cohorts English Language Assessment.So why not identify those with special abilities? Those with ‘special abilities’ need appropriate learning experiences, lest we are in danger of switching them off and ‘giving’ them behaviour issues, or worse, they’ll be labelled the class know-all. They need the challenge, but what does that  look like in our classes? 

A little bit of theory: 

Conservative definitions of giftedness are the traditionally recognised ones. They tend to focus on one area – usually academic intelligence – and base their identification on high IQ scores.  Some of the supporters of these conservative definitions were the early theorists, Alfred Binet and Théophile Simon devised the Binet-Simon Scale, which measured the mental age as opposed to the chronological age.

Liberal definitions are much broader in their base and therefore a lot more inclusive. They allow for a much higher percentage of students to be labelled as gifted or having special abilities.Among others, there are three key people who have contributed to current thinking on liberal definitions of giftedness: Renzulli, Gardner and Gagné.  Joseph Renzulli(1978) is one person who led the way in the area of using a multicategorical approach to giftedness.  He included three key components to his model of giftedness: 

•         Above average ability (as opposed to high IQ)

•         Task commitment

•         Creativity 

Often a trait of ‘gifted’ children is their isolation within there peer group. Often they are ‘loners’ and require What impact does economical background play on the gifted and talented?

What about Maori andPacific Island children?  Within their culture ‘gifted and talented’ looks very different to our white-middle class background. 

‘Dyssynchrony’ is a term coined by Gibello (1976) when intellectual skills develop a lot quicker than affective and motor development.  In other words, there is internal and external unevenness in development with corresponding consequences. Following are some examples of  kinds of dyssynchrony evident in gifted children.

Intellectual-Psychomotor DyssynchronyAs the name suggests, this is when the intellectual development surpasses the physical/motor development, causing an imbalance between the two. An example of this is a child who reads fluently before starting school but has problems with handwriting, or has difficulty co-ordinating their writing with the speed that their brain is thinking. This is more common with boys than girls.  

Language-Reasoning DyssynchronySometimes what can happen with gifted children is that their powers of reasoning are in advance of their language ability. Their thinking abilities exceed their knowledge. They may be able to understand something without being able to explain it.

Intellectual-Affective dyssynchronyIntelligence may mask emotional immaturity at times. ‘Too much information’ can in turn cause anxiety and fears when the child is unable to process that information appropriately. 

Some cool examples: 

•         Einstein was four years old before he could speak and seven before he could read.

•         Isaac Newton did poorly in grade school.

•         When Thomas Edison was a boy, his teachers told him he was too stupid to learn anything.

•         A newspaper editor fired Walt Disney because he had ‘no good ideas’.

.•         Abraham Lincoln entered the Black Hawk War as a captain and came out as a private.

•         Winston Churchill failed the 6th grade.Back to my school. 

The gifted and talented register is split into these key areas:

• Motivation
• Problem-solving
• Interests
• Reasoning
• Communication Skills
• Intensity
• Memory
• Insight
• Cultural
• Inquiry/Curiosity
• Humour
• Sporting
• Imagination/Creativity
• And Sensitivity

What I would love to here about is what does your school do to provide for the needs of the gifted and talented? 

If you know of any Web2.0 tools that could be used to address some of these areas please let me know. 

Also please feel free to comment about the whole nature of ‘gifted and talented’, I am just learning about it and would really appreciate a broader perspective on this subject.