Michelle Moloney KingMichelle Moloney King: ICT

Showing posts with label ICT. Show all posts

Scratch 2.0

It's here, the new Scratch 2.0. You don't have to download it as a software and save on your pc, you can use it directly from the internet. If you are logged in, it will save your projects as you work. So it's Scratch on the cloud. I still don't think that you can use it on your smart device. And that is a question that I get asked about from the kids. Not many kids have access to the family computer, but they all have access to a smart device.

There are some cool new features. Go have a look and sus it out. And, yes, they will be working on a stand alone versions for your computer with the new features.

Sure, It's Easy For You.

I hear that a lot in relation to computers, and its rubbish. Did you learn to drive a car the second you sat in it?

Anyway, I accidentally deleted my youtube account and so went my playlists. See, I'm not that great at computers?

I spent hours curating them! I set up a new account and made a play list of some pretty great pop music but I never got around to my classical music playlist.

So, if you area kind soul, as I believe you to be, you will leave a comment with some edgy and dark classical music.

How to Make it in the future...

It was inevitable; bound to happen so it was. 'Twas only ever a question of time....we are being replaced by computers. How do we survive in this new world? Learn how to programme the computer - of course.

I will be teaching a five day course about Scratch (coding software) in Kilkenny Education Centre July 2nd to 6th. There are only two places left, if you are interested then google Kilkenny Education Centre and email 'em.

The below is an update from LERO (The Irish Software Engineering Research Centre)

'Scratch Training:
In conjunction with CoderDojo Athlone, Clare McInerney will run an introductory Scratch workshop in Athlone IT on Saturday July 7th from 9:30 to 3:00pm (for adults). Places are available for this event. For more details and to register for this free event click here.

Taken from Silicon Republic(Left to right) Minister for Education and Skills Ruairi Quinn, TD, Harriett Walsh of Alexandra College, Clare McInerney, education and outreach officer for Lero and Jim Friars, CEO of the Irish Computer Society

Scratch as Gaeilge:
LERO are delighted to announce that Rory McGann PDST and Íde Ruaidh have made an Irish version of the Scratch interface available. Instructions for the update to use the Irish Scratch interface are available here.

We are really excited about having an Irish version of the interface - thanks Rory - and we hope many of the gaelscoileanna will enjoy this.

Scratch Competition Photos:
We finally uploaded the Scratch competition 2012 photos. Please see here.'

Learning Spaces ICT Conf in LIT Thurles 2012

I won’t yap on for ages here. For those of you who were at my presentation at the ICT in Education Conference in Thurles have already gleamed all the necessary information. Here are the main points from my presentation. The ICT in Education - Learning Spaces in LIT Thurles was an amazing day, I hope the other the other presenters will post theirs too. My, this was written on my ipdad in a few minutes so let me know if you see errors. The presentation I use - Moloney King Prezi Here are a list of some of the main and great resources: To make your own carton Directory of Learning & Performance Tools Over 2,000 tools for learning and working in education and the workplace - tools Edutopia - video Edutopia teacher development - video ICT in 60 - ideas Mind map – classroom management of pc use Mind map – the possibilities of ICT in your class Mind map – reading across the circulicium How to - care for your pc How to thrive in a - one pc classroom Know your systems - site The Windows desktop - here Files and Folders - explained Storage on your pc - here No to the cyber bully How to know when you can trust a website – here bits and bytes - here • KB = kilobyte = about 1,000 (one thousand) bytes, (1024 or 2^10) • MB = megabyte = about 1,000,000 (one million) bytes, (1,048,576 or 2^20) • GB= gigabyte = about 1,000,000,000 (one billion) bytes (1,073,741,824 or 2^30) Hardware on the inside - here Hardware on the outside - here ePals – WOW! Love this site They even have some fantastic lesson plans with resources here Skills builder library - here Teacher Guide for epals - here A lovely email learning guide from epals - here I am sure you all have heard of think, pair, share...well now we have; think, pain, email - here Fiction Character Email Exchange - here On a separate note – I found this great site about setting up a class routine. I wish I had found it before TP but hey....it can be of use to other teachers. here Loved my day at; Learning Spaces in LIT Thurles 2012 ICT Education Conference

Mitch Resnick & Natalie Rusk of MIT -Scratch

I found this on South Dublin Libraries. But it's a school night and I am baseded all the way down in Tipp.....so I will miss it. If you attend can you please let me know how you get on.

"April 23, 2012 South Dublin Libraries in association with ITT Dublin Tallaght and LERO (The Irish Software Engineering Research Centre) are delighted to welcome Mitch Resnick & Natalie Rusk of MIT Media Lab What are people creating and learning with Scratch?

Tuesday May 1st 6.30 p.m. to 8.30 p.m. County Library, Town Centre, Tallaght Scratch is a visual programming language that makes it easy to create interactive stories, animations, games, music and art and share these creations on the web.

Mitch Resnick is LEGO Papert Professor of Learning Research & head of the Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media Lab, Massachusetts) Natalie Rusk is Research Specialist in the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Laboratory developing creative learning technologies. Spaces for this exciting event are limited. If interested in attending, please ensure that you book online now by clicking signup below.

For more information click here Directions to the County Library are available here. ITT Dublin, Tallaght, celebrating 20 years serving South Dublin, Ireland and the world."

快乐学习

Have you ever tried to talk in French? I have, and guess what keeps happening? I end up talking a mixture of French, English and Irish.

When I teach Irish in school, I stick to my lesson plans and books. Whenever I can, I use informal Irish throughout the day.

When I started the post grad I had better French than Irish! The Gaeltacht was morto mixture of French, Irish and English! I had to remember Irish and forget my French.

I want to learna new language, or at leadt learn a few key phrases. I am doung so much in Irish, the language of maths and computer programming languages that I now demand something completely different.....something like Chinese.

I found these online resources below:

Learn Chineae

More Learn Chinese

iTunes Learning Chinese

Until my next blog post..... 快乐学习
Kuài yuè xuéxí

Teaching teachers Twitter and Scratch

Mr. King said, 'the day you get a job from Twitter is the day I will dance in the middle of the street.' Well, good sir, you owe me a dance!

I will be teaching two courses in the Kilkenny Education Centre, one in an introduction to Scratch computer programming and the other Twitter for Education.

Now, before I go on to give you more detail I just want to say one thing; NO! No you do not need to be an IT guru to programme. All you need is to be curious and stubborn, (stubborn to stick with it and troubleshoot till you have your issue resolved.)

Course Details see below, to book a place on the course go to the Kilkenny Education Centre.

Introduction to Scratch (Tues 28 Feb)

Course Content

Module 1- Introduction to Scratch, layout of the graphical user interface (stage, sprite, background), create and manage multiple forms of media to create your own sprite and background), ending with the creation of an animation in Sprite.

Module 2- Exploring the process of coding a game ending with the creation of a basic game in Scratch.

Module 3- Combining the animation and game to create a more complex game.

Overview:

This course aims to develop the basic computer programming skills apply these skills to creating an animation and game. Become familiar with the Scratch layout. Create an animation and game and become familiar with the programming tools. Become familiar with troubleshooting skills in fixing programming issues. Use useful Internet sites for learning and sharing Scratch. Using your own resources (images, music, voice) to create your own game and animation. Using troubleshooting skills to resolve issues. Scratch can be used to create teacher resources (you can even create quizzes (advanced)), pupils can create their own games or you can show your pupils.

Twitter for Education (Tue 21 Feb)

For Primary and Post Primary Teachers

Module 1- Introducing the layout of Twitter, setting up an account, following educators/classes, sending a tweet. Discovering the power of using lists in Twitter, intruding the pupils to hastags for education, discover the Tweetdeck/Hootsuit Twitter apps Vs the internet site.

Module 2- Using Twitter for specific subjects eg - Creating a multimedia tweets, designing a background, tweeting a book review, subject facts, asking questions, conducting polls/surveys, Twitter pen-pal, sharing class information with parents.

Module 3- How to set up your account to be private and the importance of monitoring of what you tweet. As social media becomes more popular so do Tweet-ups, we will discuss the safety issues of using social media and how to encourage safe tweeting.

Overview:

This course aims to develop your ICT skills in the filed of social media, harnessing Twitter for educational purposes. We will go over the layout, Twitter apps, how to use Twitter in the classroom/subjects/connect with pupils off-site and the local community in a safe way. Other examples of what we will be covering are: Tweet about upcoming due dates or assignments. Provide the class with a running news feed. Create a list. Coordinate assignments. Track a hash tag. Connect with the community. Follow the issues. Write a story or poem. Ask questions. Set up a foreign language news stream. Role play. Take and share notes. Connect classrooms/ pen-pals. Engage parents. Facilitate research. Track the government. Write reviews. Post supplementary materials. Design a background. Compare religions. Take a poll. Go on a scavenger hunt. Track weather patterns. Create a character. Create a progressive poem. Post math puzzles. Create an online art gallery. Join #EdChatIE

For both courses:

Course Duration: 2.5 hours

Target Audience:

Both Primary and Post Primary teachers with any computer knowledge are welcome.

Pre-requisites: A sense of curiosity and a love of learning is the main pre-requisite. Computer programming is not difficult, you are just breaking down the instructions to minute levels and the computer will follow.

Places limited so book early!

Random thought from editor:

You know something.....life sure is funny! I hated doing that degree in Information Technology and telecommunications, I swore that I would never, ever use it. Well having that degree got me my first job, it got me in the door of teacher training college and now it is getting me teacher jobs! The best thing I ever did.....was a degree in IT. I am no IT guru, but I sure am stubborn and can trouble shoot till the codded cows come home.....which make me the best IT teacher, like, ever!

Free on-line story books

Clouds of Confusion

A thank you to all who stop by here and who voted. I won a runner up place in the Int EduBlog Awards 11

If you are an educator, ICT head or just like discussing/reading about technology then join the CESI I received the below story from a member in this group. It certainly made me laugh, and in these days we all need a laugh.

Onwards

Michelle

'A GALWAY councillor has refused to apologise for swearing at a County Council committee meeting after he told a fellow councillor to "go **** himself."

Local area councillor Seamus Tiernan made the amazing outburst after he was told he was a "feckin eejit" for thinking that cloud computing was only suitable in areas with lots of rain. He had told the Infrastructure Committee meeting this week that his native Connemara would be ideal for cloud computing because it has heavy cloud cover for nine months of the year."

The Independent councillor said that the Government should be doing more to harness clean industries for the Connemara area and he named wind energy and cloud computing as two obvious examples. "Connemara in particular could become a centre of excellence for wind energy harnessing, as it is open to the Atlantic. Also in terms of cloud computing, we have dense thick fog for nine months of the year, because of the mountain heights and the ability to harness this cloud power, there is tremendous scope for cloud computing to become a major employer in this region."

However his mistake was pointed out by an incredulous Cllr Martin Shiels who said that "this is taking the biscuit. I've heard it all now. You must be a fecking eejit to think that the cloud computing had anything to do with climate." Cllr Tiernan took umbrage at the remarks of his colleague and called for them to be withdrawn. When Cllr Shields refused to do so, Tiernan said "go **** yourself, Cllr Shields."

Chairman Sile Ni Baoill asked for both councillors to withdraw their comments, but Cllr Tiernan was repentant that Cllr Shields was wrong and that cloud comouting is linked to cloud cover.

"Tell me why large companies are opening server farms in cold wet countries then", he asked Cllr Shields.

HOWEVER it is a fake. Just check the list of Galway Co Councillors for all 5 electoral areas and none of the names quoted in the piece are listed. Pity! There is no Infrastructure Committee either. There are no such entities as Local Area Councillors - just Councillors who represent local electoral areas (5 in all for Galway, with 30 Co Councillors) the list is here.

Sometimes the truth is better that fiction, sometimes we just wish it was. It still is good for a laugh though. '

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Thousands Nominated for an International Education Blog Award

I am officially nominated for an International Education Blog Award 2011, thousands were nominated but only a few went to the public voting round. I was nominated in the of category of Most influential blog post.

You can vote once a day. You can vote here.

You simply select the Category of Most influential blog post.
Then in the box beneath the category you select my name Michelle Moloney King.

A huge thanks to these amazing Writers and Bloggers who nominated me:

Caren Kennedy
MissionV
Shirley Benton
Carnsoreboxer
Derekf03 (in 2 categories)
Alibali Walker
Trich Dee
Spit Toons Saloon
Alison Wells

I grabbed the below for more info on the Edublog Blog Award.

'Each year there are more and more nominations, and of increasing excellent quality, reflecting the the ever growing edublogosphere .

Unfortunately we can’t list every single nomination in each category — that’s too overwhelming for everyone.

Instead, our intrepid team of judges combed through thousands of nominated sites to whittle them down to a manageable number of shortlisted nominations for each category.

There are many factors that determine whether a nomination is shortlisted, and some categories were considerably more competitive than others due to the incredible number of nominations.

Factors used for shortlisting included for influential posts – indicators of reader engagement (such as # of comments, bookmarking, pingbacks)

Please do vote for me!

My Edublog Awards 2011 Nominations

Here are my nominations for the Edublogs. To make your own nominations, click here.

■Best individual blog - Bernie Goldbach has been blogging forever, his blog has a lot of varied information and it really made me want to be a better blogger.

■Best individual tweeter - The one and only Fred Boss. He started #edchatie

■Best group blog - Irish Teachers

■Best new blog Pamela O'Brien started this blog after joining the #edchatie. It is well worth a read

■Best class blog - I just love this Ms Gil Martins Class Blog

■Best student blog - This is a great TY student blog by Caitriona.

■Best ed tech / resource sharing blog - These are the guys behinde the virtual classroom - MissionV

■Most influential blog post - We are given an insight to e-learning policy in Irish schools by Ddonal O Mahony.

■Best twitter hashtag This has got to be #EdChatIe

■Best teacher blog Without a shadow of a doubt this has to go to Anseo.net.

■Best librarian / library blog - Tipperary Libraries

■Best School Administrator blog - Clontuskert School.

■Best free web tool - Class Dojo This helps you to manage behavior and boost engagement in class really quickly and easily.

■Best open PD / unconference / webinar series - Gifted Kids

■Best educational use of a social network - Nigel Lane has all areas of social media covered.

■Lifetime achievement - Without this site, not one teacher could get through TP, Seomra Ranga - thank you!

“A man's errors are his portals of discovery.” James Joyce