Saturday, 26 September 2009

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Tuesday, 1 September 2009

Saturday, 18 July 2009

Dr Hill Podcasts

Year 7
States of Matter
- How to draw the states of Matter - Vodcast for iphones Phones M4V 8Mb

Year 10
Evolution
- Darwin Wallace and Lamark: Social and Personality factors in Evolution MP3 32 mins.

Moodle help for Teachers
How to upload Hotpotato and include animated gifs in Quizz link

Friday, 22 May 2009

Wonder Wheel

Look here for my next article

Sunday, 12 April 2009

Practical Teaching Stratergies

Background references
http://learningforlife.fsu.edu/ctl/explore/bestPractices/docs/teachingwithlaptops.pdf
http://www.premier.nsw.gov.au/Newsroom/Articles/2009/April/090401_The_digital_education_revolution_is_here.html


This document cover classroom management strategies to get students on task, keep them focused and transition in a Laptop Environment.

Let me paint a typical scenario for Year 9.
- 30 Students
- 2 Students report at the start of class they have lost their laptops.
- Students talk on entry to class, squable over power points.
- 2 Students report their laptops have failed to work
- After 5 minutes 24 students are on Moodle - 2 Report their password does not work
- For homework 4 students report that the website given did not work.

Students will test out the Laptop system to take the initative, and hobble the teaching momentum.

With this realistic image of a classroom fresh in you mind let's look at basic whole of school policies.

1. 8:45 at the start of the school day, if a student does not have the Laptop he/she fills in an online form on a schools computer or friends laptop. This is automatically appended to their records, school records, emailed to parents, updated to teacher's electronic rolls. The student will have a profile assigned to them if necessary to be managed.

Importantly: School ICT systems have to manage online forms etc.

2. For homework, students work throught Moodle, this gives Data Logs of their activity. Students will claim that a certain website does not work. They need to email you a sequence of screen grabs, - the browser looking at the page that does not work and an agreed page that does work, showing infact that it is purely the page.

Importantly: The school needs a functioning Moodle. In the case of Epping Boys High this is administered through Maquarie University. The students need to sign a E Learning protocol so that if the try passive resistance a process addresses to seal off red herrings.

3. Students come in and sit to a seating plan. Initally, called into the class one at a time and sat down. The class is equipped with 5 - 10 power banks. These are portable emergency external power supplies. At approximately $100 each
http://www.bigboxstore.com/super-power-bank-for-laptops-battery-capacity-3-7v-20000-mah.html
Importantly they learn to keep a workbook Log of their computer activities. Thus the students 1. Come in switch on
2. Open Workbook - note date, and lesson topic.
3. Input password

4. Students are working, Teacher instructs "Rest Laptops" Students are given 20 Seconds to save and lower screens to 30 degrees. Students continuing to work are told "Rest Position". If they continue to work on their laptops, as part of misbehaviour they are asked to present take their laptop to the Head Teacher. Continued disobediance and a student is asked to fetch the vice principal, and a reflection process is initated even if the student then complies.

Important: This "Rest Laptops" is read over from military weapons training. Basically in a weapons lesson, while the student is being instructed the weapon is in the safe position on the ground.

5. Teachers need to keep Classblogs that are also imbedded in the Moodle. Students need to keep lessons notes under their profile section of Moodle along with Blogs from moodle. Their personal notes should be kept with OneNote.

6. Wireless cameras, or usb web cams can allow the student to broad cast to the IWB their key strokes.

7. Traditional written skills need to be maintained through a new system of:
1. Web cam to IWB of teachers sample
2. Class copy on A4
3. Scan on School's Photocopier to Scan Dump
4. Teacher access to Scan Dump PDF and marking
5. Publish to Moodle

8.http://www.simplywireless.com.au/home.htm

Tuesday, 7 April 2009

Sites


 

Clifford the dog

http://teacher.scholastic.com/clifford1/flash/story_4.htm


 

Fish tank maths

http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/mathsfile/shockwave/games/fish.html


 

Planets

http://www.engineeringinteract.org/resources/astroadventure/astroadventurelink.htm


 

Dancers of degas

http://www.metmuseum.org/explore/dancers/index.html


 

Pythagoras and his umbrella

http://mathszone.edexcel.org.uk/Repos/Content/291/case.html


 

Music room

http://www.nyphilkids.org/lockerroom/main.phtml?


 

Edheads Machines

http://www.edheads.org/activities/simple-machines/frame_loader.htm


 

Open heart surgery

http://www.abc.net.au/science/lcs/heart.htm


 

Edheads deep brain surgery

http://www.edheads.org/activities/brain_stimulation/swf/index.htm


 

Projectile motion

http://phet.colorado.edu/sims/projectile-motion/projectile-motion_en.html


 

3D body

Faculty, science, resources


 

Celestia earths magnetic field


 

Exercise and Diet

http://phet.colorado.edu/simulations/sims.php?sim=Eating_and_Exercise


 

Magnetism

http://phet.colorado.edu/simulations/sims.php?sim=Faradays_Electromagnetic_Lab

Interactive whiteboard workshop


 

At the end of this workshop you will be able to:


 

  • Turn on white board using remote
  • Calibrate white board
  • Boot up computer
  • Log on
  • Search web for resources
  • Run an interactive program
  • Connect a laptop to the white board
  • Blue tooth?
  • Moodle?


 


 

You will be exposed to ideas for use of white board, such as:


 


 


 

My best advice


 

  • Don't reinvent the wheel – there are mountains of resources out there.
  • Don't lose the remote – there is no switch to turn it on.
  • Always check program on the white board before lesson – what works at home doesn't necessarily work here!


 


 

Sunday, 15 February 2009

First Computer Music

1999 marked the 50th aniversary of CSIRAC- The world's fourth computer and Australia's first. You can see it today in the Museum of Victoria and read about it from CSIRO which was it first home and University of Melbourne it's second.

People involved with CSIRAC knew my father, Geoffrey Hill well, as he was the enthusiasic programmer. He got his BSc from Sydney University in 1947 and worked continously with CSIRAC from 1949 to 1964 at Sydney and Melbourne.

His parents were a critical influence in both his interest in Mathematics and Music. His father Richard Hill had invented (1921) a counting block system that was a precursor to Cuisinaire Rods. Richard published work on Educational Physcology and worked at the NSW Department of Education. He left to commericalize "Hill's Constructive Counters" that were manufactured by his brother. During the depression he returned to teaching, but his prior work was not acknowledged so he took a post as Principal in Armidale in country NSW. He had coached his children, and so when on the first day at Kindergarten my father drew a map of Australia, could read and count he was moved to Grade 2. This flowed through to him recieving his BSc. at 17 and writing computer music at 20. The "Hill's Constructive Counters" are two colour, white and red, presumably because this is preferable to confusing colours. It was fortunate that this also lent itself to exploration of binary or digital maths at home in the thirties.

Mildred Hill was a music teacher, and would often use her son Geoffrey's gift of perfect pitch to tune her piano and other instruments. Geoffrey was told off for listening to music on the clothes line. Skeptical, Mildred gave her son the benifit of the doubt, and was indeed surprised to find he had build a crystal radio set. This relationship continued when late at night in what is now the basement of Sydney University Marsden building, Geoffrey was coding Green Sleeves and mucked up the mathematics of sharp notes. He played the music down the phone to his mother in Strathfield. Mildred corrected the note, but was convinced that her son was playing the note on paper and comb.

Another critcal influence was St Josheph's college in Hunter's Hill. The Hill's had spent the early war years in Armidale, and then moved back to Sydney. Richard had visited the Principal and the exclusive Catholic school offered Geoffrey and his older bother Brian schooling in their last years of secondary education. Here Geoffrey, developed his reading of Philosophy and Catholic Theology. This social dimension lead to Geoffrey investigating whether computer would be able to be conscious (the question before having a soul). Geoffrey's interest in Peace and University politics lead him to study Esperanto. The interest in communication lead Geoffrey's Master's work on "INTERPROGAM" to allow people to communicate with the Computer in plain English. The paper tape on the spine of the "INTERPROGAM" manual on display in the Museum of Victoria has what could well be the first "Computer Joke". It says "This is Waffle". No section on St. Josheph's college's influence leave out the highly revered brother (author's note: I will find out his name). Besides getting class taking out the top ten positions in the State, his insights into thinking before rushing to pen and paper, flowed to Geoffrey's "can do" strategies as the Programmer at Melbourne University, that then flowed into the Australia's first computer science lectures. Now days it would be considered good, systems analysis and progam design.

TO BE CONTINUED
The day they threw out the designs for the next generation computer.
How's the Mercury Surf? Is it any good for computing today.
Computer Games in 1963.
If you want it solved come to Geoffrey's Goon party.
Spag bowl at 3am in Lygon St because the triodes work best at night.
Forget "Ring a ring a rosie" this is how you invert Matricies.

Friday, 23 January 2009

NewScienist 24Jan

Science a gogo Page 6 Show Obama is backing science as the way out of the US's problems

- important for Year 7 Introduction to science Also Obama


This is interesting footage of a water drop in Zero G relivant to Y10 Motion, Y12 Space, Y7 Forces. Seen in ScienceAlign Center Friday a good source of News


A alien planet atmosphere has been seen. The use of the Spitzer Infra Red Telescope Y7 Space


Testing DNA has ethical issues- Y10 Genetics - extention


Magnetic fields come strange places- Y12 - Scientists are still guessing on the origin of Magnetic Fields


Pulsars gamma rays are interesting


Y7 Space the moon should run into metors.




Y10 Evolution from darwins perspective has to be modified by swapping. Snake DNA in cows, Viral dna in humans.


Y7 great article on scientific control, and the influence of the church


Y7 Scientific control and history of science where an ancient King experiments on hapless prisoners

Thursday, 22 January 2009

Staff Development Day 27 Jan


-How to Log with a Blog

-How to use Delicious

-Future automated Registration with Blog bots

-Moodle for work submitted and multiple choice

- Scanning + Bluebeam + ISSU for written work.