Learning in the 21st Century

Introduction As I have recently come to the end of my 2 year contract teaching Mathematics at my first IB teaching post. I wanted to record my experiences while they were still fresh in my head and ripe for reflecting on. My particular context was that of a full continuum school where we had the PYP, MYP & DP programs running. The relatively new CP program was not running at the school where I was teaching. The majority of my time over the two years was spent teaching Mathematics in the MYP program and then about a quarter of my time was spent teaching Mathematics in the DP program  I also acted as a personal project supervisor (PP) for M5's and was also lucky enough to go on a number of Interdisciplinary Unit Trips (IDU's) and Outdoor Pursuit Trips (OP). This is an overview reflection and therefore quite broad, but hopefully at some point I will get to go into more detail on other relevant aspects. General Structure  In terms of understanding the overall design of an IB e...

Introduction A couple of years ago I became fascinated by project based learning (PBL). As a result, I conducted my own experiments by designing unique educational engagements, based on literature I had read about PBL -   2015 , 2017 . I was impressed by the engagement achieved and it made me wonder how could I get a similar level of engagement, but with a content base more directly tied to my maths curriculum? The theory that seemed to offer the most promise was the concept of " Authentic Learning & Authentic Assessment ". To me, it seemed to offer a reasonable way of combining the strengths of project based learning, together with a process for acquiring understanding of a universally agreed upon useful mathematical content base. As a first step in the process of designing authentic learning experiences in mathematics, I tried to create a comprehensive list of topics that covered the context in which mathematics most commonly appears.  I would love your suggestions or a...

Introduction Most teachers begin their introduction to Pedagogy and Learning Design with Bloom's Taxonomy as a guide. So it's a useful place to start, as you begin to come through the initial phase of constructing some sort of functioning Learning Ecosystem online and move to wanting to deepen the quality of your Online Class. Something really important to remember as you move into this deeper level of ICT integration, is to explain the rationale for each step to your students. This is also really new to them and so guiding them through it carefully, deliberately and as slowly as needed is important if you want to get proper engagement and establish a fully functioning system. My experience is that normally teachers, including myself, underestimate how much time this setup stage actually takes. Bloom's Taxonomy and Extending it to the Digital Realm Make a Copy of this Doc >

GOAL "Create your own digital learning portfolio showing evidence of your individual learning path." A Personal Learning Portfolio is a virtual, personal space that serves as a dynamic planning tool, archive, profile, and showcase of an individual’s lifelong learning experiences, goals and achievements. It is created by the learner, controlled by the learner, and is on a platform of his or her choice. Though the tool is geared to be an open tool that records the digital footprint of the individual, the learner controls who has access to any section of the portfolio at any given time.  Definition Credit Explanation Video Possible Content: ArtsWorks , Writing Pieces , Video Clips , Audio Recordings, Projects, Books read and reviews of them, Online Courses or Programs , Blog component, Social Campaigns, Growth Filled Experiences, Leadership Roles, Projects Initiated , Volunteer Work , Places you’ve travelled or want to travel , Interviews with Interes...

I have been thinking a lot lately about the fundamentals of education. There is so much written about new innovations or new ideas on the web these days and it’s easy to get overwhelmed as a teacher. It’s also hard to know how to capture the good stuff you see out there, and actually use it to make your the learning environment a more effective and exciting place to be. A strategy that I am being drawn to more and more is mindmapping excellent pedagogical content I see on the web to retain and process the information. I can then come back to it a later stage and customise it for my context and hopefully add even more useful information to this new resource that informs my ever growing skills as a teacher. I have a small example below taken from one of my favourite Youtube Talks done by Robert Duke. In it he mentions what he thinks are the fundamental skills of effective teaching. This is something all teachers would benefit from bearing in mind whenever they plan for learn...

My Take: A while ago, I saw a fantastic Ted Talk on how to give engaging presentations and I decided to make this mindmap to preserve the information in an easy to access format. It’s a great mindmap to glance over before giving a presentation, as it reminds you of a lot of the fundamental stuff you should be bearing in mind, if you want to reach your audience. Full Page MindMap Link Ted Talk Link