See: http://oxleylearning.org/cms/?p=25

A lot has been happening! What follows are highlights from the past three weeks.

Business Studies

Mr. Freeman’s Business Studies class has requested a Wiki site to use as a knowledgebase. Called Adopt-a-Business, each student will investigate core aspects of high profile Australian companies. Mr. Freeman will use QANTAS as a case study to which students can compare the strategies and performance of their companies.

See: Adopt-a-Business - http://www.oxleylearning.org/wiki/index.php?title=Business_Studies

Maths

Ms. Culey’s Year 8 maths class continue to use Web-based resources as they study topics like speed, averages and ratios. Several Web activity pages have been created to support this: How Fast is That? Hotlist and an enhanced Subject Sampler on the importance of numbers. Newly developed is a Maths Weblog that acts as a main online gateway for their work. Currently called the Number Crunchers, about half the students met today with Mr. March to begin brainstorming important topics related to numbers that students could focus on to create a ClassAct Portal. We will continue to meet on Fridays to grow this site and our contribution to the world of numbers.

See: Number Crunchers’ Blog – http://oxleylearning.org/maths

History / Geography

Mr. Freeman and Mr. March continue to meet regularly to develop technology enhanced approaches across the humanities curriculum. A draft document outlining the scope of a common set of thinking and learning themes for use across the years and content areas may be part of the outcome of these discussions. This kind of approach will likely inform the professional development day on October 16.

Science

Mr. Bevan continues to steam ahead on his use of Weblogs. His Year 7, 8 and 10 students share resources they find online and then comment on their value. Take a look at the general Science Blog to see an example.

See: SciBlog – http://oxleylearning.org/sciblog

English

A proposal has been tabled to the IT Committee for Mr. Graham who wants to enhance his presentations with interactive media. Music, video, photographs, artworks, historical documents are just some of the Rich, Real and Relevant ways Mr. Graham will infuse technology into classroom learning.

ICT

Mr. Bright has been very helpful getting the latest versions of the FireFox browser installed in Lab 18. This will help students use features that many Web sites offer that aren’t supported by older versions of Internet Explorer.

The Library

Ms. Anderson has requested a Weblog for the David Wright Library where she can post updates about new acquisitions and items related to the life of the college library.

See: The David Wright Library Web site - http://oxleylearning.org/library

Curriculum

Mr. March has begun sketching out a potential interdisciplinary project for Year 9 called MyPlace.com. It’s inspired by the phenomenon called MySpace and the whole online experience many of today’s students engage in. Furthermore, the project will seek to expose students to significant issues that will have an impact on their lives. These include topics like Globalisation, Australian demographics, technology and current geopolitical events. Stay tuned for more on this topic shortly.

See the document: Oxley Learning Scope & Processes

8 September - 16 October

Maths

I took eight of Ms. Culey’s Year 8 maths class to the Oxley Room to launch their role as Oxley’s “Number Crunchers.” The students were chosen because they had achieved a level of proficiency at the Maths they had been studying. We used a Net-connected computer and projector to understand how students can make significant contributions to the real world. This was achieved through the example of the Child Slave Labor News Web site and brainstorming ways that students see that “numbers matter”.

See: Number Crunchers’ Blog – http://oxleylearning.org/maths/?p=10

The following week I took about 11 students to Room 18 Lab to explore links and choose teams and topics to pursue as Number Crunchers. Students were selected to participate this week based upon their level of cooperativeness and focused behaviour. It was pleasing to see the number of students increase.

See: Number Crunchers’ Blog – http://oxleylearning.org/maths/?p=11

I will continue to team teach with Ms. Culey on Fridays or alternatively as the schedule allows.

I have also explored other Maths drawing software and chosen Compass and Ruler (CaR) as the best free application. It offers the same features as Geometer’s Sketchpad and is downloadable from the Web and runs cross platforms. This could be an option if we want students to use this kind of software at home and we decide not to renew licensing for Geometer’s Sketchpad. I also learned the basics of the Geometer’s Sketchpad to learn how to export images.

See: Compass and Ruler - http://mathsrv.ku-eichstaett.de/MGF/homes/grothmann/java/zirkel/doc_en/index.html

History / Geography

Peter Craig asked me to look into resources and strategies for the HSC study of Chu Teh (Zhu De). As he expected the online resources were very limited. I posted them on a Wiki page and suggest that a small budget of $50 - $100 be used to purchase scholarly articles. To respect copyright the content from these articles could be posted on a password protected section of oxleylearning.org. Ms. Anderson has already agreed to fund the purchase for these materials, hard copies of which can go into closed reserve in the library.

See: the Oxley Wiki page - http://www.oxleylearning.org/wiki/index.php?title=Chu_Teh

English

Another meeting with Robert Graham has focused the needs and Web publication requirements of a student-run and teacher facilitated online literary journal. Rather than a blog, a portal site using Drupal will be set up and a meeting set for early Term 4 to assess student interest and form a group / club whose members will oversee the publication (quarterly?) of verse, short fiction, reviews, artwork, etc.

The Library

I meet weekly with Ms. Anderson to help update the library Web log and customise the Weblog.

See: The David Wright Library Web site - http://oxleylearning.org/library

ICT

• Began Greenpaper for next generation of technology integration at Oxley College
• Received proposal from Michael Pugh for 6 computers for advanced D & T students
• Submitted a list of those technology items / expenses I have heard mentioned

Curriculum / October 16, Professional Development Day

• Secured 12 Apple laptops and wireless base stations for Oct 16 PD day.
• Tested Wireless set-up on Mac in Music Centre
• Will take delivery of the Apple-loaned computers on 13 October and set up each for wireless Net access in the Music Centre. The rooms will also be arranged to facilitate the work of the day.
• Installed ELGG personal Learning environment for faculty use on Oct 16 and beyond. See http://oxleylearning.org/ple
• Outlined Learning Implications into common bands based upon the Core Questions
• Expanded the MyPlace document to incorporate the Learning Processes and Scope. Posted the Learning Scope as a Wiki page for faculty editing / contributions. See: http://www.oxleylearning.org/wiki/index.php?title=The_Oxley_Learning_Approach
• I have developed the activities for October 16 and secured the support of some staff members to act as peer facilitators.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 20th, 2006 at 11:46 pm and is filed under updates. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.