WORLD READ ALOUD DAY / DIA MUNDIAL DE LA LECTURA EN VOZ ALTA

Calling all classrooms around the world! Grab a book and join @BevLadd & @msoskil on World Read Aloud Day as they celebrate the power of #literacy ! Register here: http://my.sociabble.com/tHcauPba #WRADSkype  
 #WradSkype #MicrosoftEdu #EdTech #edtech

We are already registered!!




¡Aviso a todas las aulas del mundo!Coged un libro y unios a @BevLadd & @msoskil en el día mundial de la lectura en voz alta, celebrando el poder de la #alfabetización
Registrate aquí: 
http://my.sociabble.com/tHcauPba     WRADSkype

#WRADSkype #MicrosoftEdu #EdTech #edtech

¡Nosotros ya nos hemos inscrito!

Celebrating the day in the school

GONOODLE: CHILI CHILI

This month there are 10 new videos coming in #GoNoodlePlus and they are all fantastic!

My class loves ending their day Chili Chili with this new Moose Tube tune on GoNoodle Plus!!

Este mes GoNoodle nos trae 10 nuevos videos en su versión Plus. Todos ellos son fantásticos!

A mi clase le encanta acabar el día con Chili Chili con esta nueva canción  de MooseTube de GoNoodle Plus.

Gestionar el Cambio

Las TIC y E-learning nos brinda una cantidad infinita de posibilidades a la hora de gestionar el cambio. En un colegio como en cualquier otro situó hay que tener un idea muy clara de lo que se quiere conseguir. 

Una de las herramientas importantes para analizar y encontrar un punto de partida es el análisis DAFO – Debilidades, Amenazas, Fortalezas y Oportunidades (SWOT en Inglés). Es un análisis rápido de la organización que puede ser muy útil a la hora de efectuar cambio.  Antes también de gestionar y implementar cambio es aconsejable mirar competidores u otras organizaciones y ver como han gestionado cambios estratégicos y aprender de sus éxitos y sus errores. Aunque queremos efectuar cambios y revolucionar con las TIC y e-learning, no hace falta siempre ‘reinventar la rueda’.

Un claro ejemplo de esto en una organización – Caixa de Catalunya (ahora Catalunya Caixa). Durante la segunda parte de la década de los noventa, en plena ebullición del internet y e-banking /e-comercio Caixa de Catalunya quería efectuar un gran cambio en su sistema informático y gestión. Durante 18 meses un equipo de profesionales fue por todo el mundo mirando ‘Best Practice’  - buenas prácticas de muchos bancos en sitios diferentes. 

El resultado fue que cuando implementaron los cambios  en sus sistemas no solamente ahorraron dinero y tiempo pero tuvieron tiempo también para analizar su organización, consultar empleados, tener Focus groups (grupos de enfoque) de clientes . El cambio e implementación de nueva tecnología fue gestionado correctamente.  El ejemplo de Caixa de Catulunya es un buen modelo. Muchas veces no tenemos ni tenemos tiempo ni recursos para hacer lo que ellos hicieron. Pero ellos se prepararon antes para el cambio.

SHHHHHHH! ¡SILENCIO!

Shhhhhhhh!

It is true that these current generations are generally more talkative than previous ones. A variety of techniques may work. It really depends on the group. Some groups work very well with Class dojo points' system whilst other classes will not. Some classes benefit from GoNoodle brain breaks and use that moment to let off steam and go back to work in silence or semi silence. There are other classes where this sort of incentive doesn't work and we have to use other techniques until we find the appropriate one.

https://www.weareteachers.com/how-to-quiet-a-noisy-classroom/

🌞 Es verdad que las generaciones actuales que están en el colegio son más habladoras en general que otras anteriores. Hay una variedad de recursos para aplicar en el aula que pueden funcionar. 

WHAT IS / QUÉ ES SCIENTIX

Last October we wrote about European Schoolnet.  We have been working with this organisation towards the Scientix Ambassadors certification. Given that both of us are interested in Science, it seemed the natural thing to do in order to keep disseminating the love and passion for science to our primary school pupils.

http://www.scientix.eu

What is Scientix?

Scientix is the community for science education in Europe.

It helps teachers with innovation in the classroom, sharing ideas with teachers from a variety of European countries. It provides teachers with resources and ideas for better teaching and better learning and professional development.

🌞 El pasado octubre, escribimos sobre European Schoolnet. Hemos trabajado con esta organización realizando el curso para Embajadores de Scientix. Ya que tanto Andrew como yo estamos interesados en las ciencias orientadas a la clase de primaria, parecía lo más natural para apoyarnos en esta organización y poder beneficiar al proceso de enseñanza aprendizaje, y con ello poder inculcar ese amor y pasión por las ciencias a nuestros alumnos de primaria.
¿Qué es Scientix? Es la comunidad para la enseñanza de las ciencias en Europa. Ayuda a los profesores con innovación en el aula, compartir ideas con otros profesores procedentes de toda Europa. Proporciona a los docentes recursos e ideas para una mejor enseñanza y aprendizaje y orientado también a perfeccionar el desarrollo profesional. 

TECHNOLOGY AND TEACHERS

I am missing here "the sharpenings". They pretend to be interested and look like they want to update their knowledge, butv really they don't give a penny about it!!

THE IMPORTANCE OF MUSIC AND SINGING IN EARLY DEVELOPMENT

We both found this article so interesting and close to our hearts as this is what we do on a daily basis with our pupils.

From the TES

The importance of music and singing in early development cannot be underestimated

Bernard Trafford

11th November 2017 at 14:00

The Ofsted chief inspector is right: nursery rhymes are hugely important, writes one educationist. But they’re also just the tip of a developmental iceberg

Jack and Jill still have a role to play, according to Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman, who bemoans the fact that children aren’t learning nursery rhymes anymore – neither, it appears, at home nor in school. Ms Spielman’s views were reported in a light-hearted piece in The Sunday Times, which also dedicated an editorial to amusing updated versions of old favourites.

It was all good fun and, to be fair, The Sunday Times also quoted Amanda Spielman’s serious point on the topic: “Humpy Dumpty may seem old-fashioned, but children who can sing a song and know a story off by heart aged four are better prepared for school. Nursery rhymes provide a collective experience – and teach a little bit of social history to boot.”

Amen to that! People such as Ms Spielman and me aren’t nostalgically hankering after some kind of half-remembered golden childhood when we all sang songs at our mother’s knee in lush meadows in the summer sun and then headed indoors for cake and lashings of custard. We’re deploring the loss of a powerful contributor to children’s early learning.

I suspect that, like me, Amanda is old enough to remember those wonderful BBC Music and Movement radio programmes, which did precisely what the title suggests. They brought those two elements together: just as, in that “golden age” of childhood, parents would sing catchy, often nonsensical but always strongly rhythmic songs and encourage their infant to clap hands, stamp feet – at root, to respond physically to the rhythm of the music.

'Music used to teach'

There’s science underlying this. Called Eurhythmics (not to be confused with Annie Lennox and David Stewart’s pop duo) and expounded by Emile Jacques-Dalcroze, it is “a system of rhythmical physical movements to music used to teach musical understanding or for therapeutic purposes”. I can only assume that Professor Dalcroze remembered and later codified how he had himself learned in his infancy from music and rhythm.

Funded by National Lottery money around the Millennium, my wife ran some after-school Eurhythmics courses for five-year-olds. The differences she observed in children in only a matter of weeks, while they learned to respond and move to music, were remarkable: she (SEN-trained, as it happened) also reckoned she could spot, among those who found such responses difficult, children likely to encounter a range of Specific Learning Difficulties. Sadly, after two seasons the lottery money ran out and the local authority in question declared itself unable to continue the courses.

Why do children respond physically to music? Because they listen to it. And the more they enjoy such response – and the better they get at it – the better they get at listening. In 2017, when too many young children are perhaps entertained and pacified by being given screens to watch, that is arguably of vital importance. We have much work to do on children’s listening skills.

Nor do the positives end with rhythm and response. There is the whole business of singing in the first place. There’s copious and still growing evidence of the contribution of singing to wellbeing: why not catch children and give them the habit young, before they get into the nonsense of either copying whining pop divas or deciding it’s uncool to sing at all?

Can just singing a few nursery rhymes with young children really make so much difference? Well, yes. Simple input, huge returns: that’s not a bad educational formula, is it? 

Dr Bernard Trafford is a writer, educationalist and musician. He is a former headteacher and past chair of HMC. He tweets @bernardtrafford 

To read more columns, view his back catalogue