Working on the Circumference of the Earth

This was a fun task to complete and I know I would want to do this with my own students if I taught grades 5 or 6. I learnt the most about creating blog pages and what a powerful tool they can be in school. I would love for my class to have enough time to access the computers for a blog page. Unfortunately the reality is that this might be a homework assignment or a year long project that has only a few entries because of the limited time most classes have in the computer labs. Blogging would be a great way to get students to reflect and become more accomplished typers. I believe that being familiar with this type of technology will benefit me in the instance that now that I know how to use it  I more likely will.
Because our group had difficult time schedules we had to do quite a bit of work by correspondence and shared passwords. I found that this was a very effective way to work as long as the whole group understands the deadlines and objectives of the project. I think our group did very well when we divided the tasks and had an outline created. It was the easiest to do because of our schedules and everyone became accountable to the group for specific projects. I put the most pressure on the group because of my holiday plans and they were very accommodating by agreeing to meet a week earlier than we would have normally to plan everything out. Being away I did not see the finished project until I returned and was really impressed how it all came together. The most frustrating thing that we encountered was even though we all thought the project would be a great experience, we could not replicate it because it was the wrong time of the year and we could not get in touch with anyone from a school on the same latitude as us to complete the experiment. Because of this we had to find a more complicated way to figure out the circumference which involved several extra steps. I felt disappointed that I could not be part of the final steps to putting the project together, but I really enjoyed my holiday.  Next time I think I will invest in a fortune teller to inform me if the holidays written in the handbook are correct or not so I could be part of the whole process. the only thing I need to work on now is finding those contacts so that if i do attempt this project in the future I will have another teacher who is 500km away that I can work with.

Presentation on Second Language Aquisition and Researching

I have always been really  interested in learning other languages. I have learnt French, German, Japanese, Spanish and Latin and the FL Teach site looks great for me to find sources to translate and help improve my vocabulary. I really forgot how isolated I was when I lived in a small town considering language learning. We were lucky because my brother and I were in a French Immersion school that had teachers from Quebec. I remember though, being 11 and wanting to learn Japanese and having to use a huge old textbook and the audio tapes. Even access to the internet have improved the ability of students to better learn a second language.The group presenting gave some excellent sites and ideas about what to do  to help assist and hook students learning.

The second group also gave some excellent sites. I am really excited to use Jing; it looks like a great program. I also didn't know about the e-library on the Calgary Public Library site. It is just amazing that you can get papers from around the world for free and that are current. I would get so frustrated in my first year when I would find a great video and not be able to play it in the class. In this way you can download the video and share it in the class. I found this class extremely helpful and I cant wait to use it.