Kree's Reflections on Ulearn07 Conference

Sunday 7th October 2007
Hi All,
Hope you have all had a good break and are feeling refreshed for the 4th and final term – only 79 days to Christmas :-)
I spent the first week of my holidays entertaining visitors from South Africa – it was wonderful catching up with two of my neighbours from Durban, who I have known since the age of four. The second week kept me busy with spring-cleaning and the last three days I was fortunate to attend the Ulearn07 conference at Sky City. What a fabulous conference it was with three inspiring keynote-speakers and some amazing NZ teacher/presenters.
I have learned so much and by the last day I was on overload. The biggest message for me was about networking, collaborating and connecting with others in order to prepare our students as lifelong learners of the 21st century.
I have learned that one of the aims of teaching is to develop and extend students' thinking and learning by catering for pupils’ individual learning styles, multiple intelligences and providing meaningful assessment which informs learning. Computers and the Internet has revolutionized the world we live, learn and teach in. There are numerous exciting programmes, tools and software for teachers and students that can make learning fun. ‘Many computer applications have been developed explicitly to engage learners in critical thinking.’ ‘…computers should be used as tools to help learners build knowledge…’ If teachers have an attitude of: ‘Please don’t give me any more information; I already know what I think!’ (Longworth, 2003) then I believe today’s classroom is not the place for them because learning is a lifelong process and it is forever changing. According to Tony Ryan, in this Information Age of the 21st century, computers are rapidly overtaking many of our analytical functions. Occupations for future generations will probably require a strong imaginative and personal component that computers are not capable of doing. It is therefore important to integrate a variety of creative teaching strategies into our classroom practice in order to prepare students for success in their learning as well as in their uncertain future.

Below are some links that you may find useful:


Keynote speakers
http://blog.core-ed.net/derek/


Conference Photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ulearn/

Kree’s Ulearn Pics
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kreeraman/


Kree’s twitter
http://twitter.com/kree4sai


Kree’s favourites/bookmarks
http://del.icio.us/kree12



Ewan McIntosh’s Blog
http://edu.blogs.com/


http://newzealand.takingitglobal.org/


Tonnes of valuable resources
http://www.tki.org.nz/e/tki/


Evolution of Communication
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/evolution_of_communication.php


http://aucklandregion.takingitglobal.org/connections/stories/story.html?MemberID=25064


Free Books on the Internet
http://users.erols.com/jonwill/freebooks.htm


http://www.linkedin.com/home?trk=tab_h



Kree Raman
Room 12 Teacher
Kelvin Road School