Lynne Horn

Over the last 2 days S2 have filmed their weather forecasts.  3 groups filmed yesterday and 3 today.  Yesterday I was looking after them as the Gaelic teacher wasn’t there, so whilst they started their Gaelic posters 3 groups went off a group at a time with one of our classroom assistants and filmed - today in French time the other 3 groups went with the classroom assistant and the rest finished the Gaelic posters, very multi-lingual of them! 

Over the last few weeks though I’ve been thinking more about the use of classroom assistants - at times over the last year I’ve run around the room sorting out technolgy whilst the CA has tried to cope with some of the language questions and sort out groups who have forgotten what they’re supposed to be doing.  During some of the time we’ve had over study leave, I’ve shown one of the CAs how to use iMovie and she’s edited the video of S2’s trip to Loch Eil, trained in Drama she’s been the ideal person to take over the filming of the weather forecasts and help them with the presenting, and I’ve sorted out the language and queries back in class.  Much more as it should be and hopefully next term I’ll be able to train them a bit in podcasting as well - makes life much easier all round.

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I hadn't heard this for years, and it was a bit of a surprise to hear some S2s discussing it today.  Maybe it's time for a comeback.

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And to think I brought work home with me…What are the chances?

Pacman

Tetris

Space Invaders

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Much as I love Mull and the trees in the garden, at this time of year the birds are singing outside my window from around 4.00am until late into the night.  However despite my early morning rise it wasn’t me that was run down, but yet again batteries…

Before period 2 I was charging batteries for the digital camera so S3 could take photos of themselves - we’re doing transport so they can glue themselves on the drawing of their chosen transport. 

S2 came as a bit of a shock period 3, I was expecting them period 5 and the video camera wasn’t charged to film their weather forecasts - however they spent the period making sure they were really well prepared for tomorrow, when you’re an S2 boy and can spend the period transforming yourself into a glamourous weather girl in blue polka dot skirt, mismatched yellow shirt, wooly hat and a bust that Jordan would sell her soul for, if you can then spend 10 minutes happily dancing the cancan towards the end of the period, well who needs technology.   Tomorrow we begin filming, move over Heather the Weather!

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As quickly as it disappeared from me yesterday, Websense reappeared this morning, apparently it does this sometimes - our’s not to reason why…

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My relationship with Websense hit an all time low today when it blocked me from everything… 

I tried the computer next to it which is older, but still running on iGear, slowly it creaked its way to the SQA website, eventually opened what I wanted to look at, I wanted to print 5 pages, they shuffle their way to the printer, 15 minutes later it was still trying to print them and I decided to cancel the printing, 2 hours later it was still trying.  I gave up - after all tomorrow is another day…  

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Another free piece of software.  Available on the BBC website, you can make you own Doctor Who comicstrips, using the backgrounds, characters, monsters and gadgets available.  For me it could bring a whole new angle to some topics, “Mes voyages en TARDIS”, “Une journée dans la vie d’un Dalek”…

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I read about Scratch in today’s paper.  This is a free programme from MIT which allows you to animate and to create games.  Within minutes I’d managed to “create” a dancing, miaowing cat - as you can import sounds and pictures I guess I can do the same with class photos and pupil recordings.  Anyway the weather doesn’t look good for this weekend, so it’ll give me plenty to explore!

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This afternoon S2 had a listen to today’s weather forecast courtesy of tf1.fr. 

On first listening they claimed to have understood nothing, however we listened again, not to translate, not to understand every word, but simply to see what words we recognised.  They demonstrated by standing up everytime they heard a word they recognised and as it turned out, this was a lot more than they originally thought - weather words, numbers, north, south, east, west, days of the week etc. 

Now they ‘re going to have a go at their own multi-media forecasts, from powerpoint to digital video and some experimental podcasting, hopefully available for viewing in the next couple of weeks.

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Last part of the day - looking at how easy it is to publish podcasts using Podomatic. A few hints on how to make enhanced podcasts, adding photos or slides and finally how to convert to be sent to DVDs or indeed phones (yet another good use of a mobile phone!)

Watch out for lots of language podcasts coming your way soon…

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