Mission Log 2

Slight detour to the flight path:

Celebrating a small victory. I have sent an email to a number of people to try and initiate an idea to build a link between our school and our feeder primary schools.

I have been trialling a gamification challenge with my year 7 class. My suggestion is to extend this challenge to our feeder primary schools. To have year 5 students compete against year 7 students. I can see many benefits to the idea, but the challenge is to convince others of its value. It is a good opportunity to build relationships between the schools and also support the students to develop their mathematical fluency and problem solving skills. I'll let you know how I go, whether I can get some others to accept the challenge, to help their students take flight.

Mission Log 1

Implement Prototype Phase 1
• Change my learning space and use a google form to get feedback from students about the new design. Give students the opportunity to submit design ideas of their own, critique each others designs and then vote on a design to trial. 
• Start flipping the classroom by recording lessons live. I know the lessons wont be pretty and they wont win any prizes, but it will be a start. It means I don't need to find extra time to do the recordings, it means the students are involved in the process and it gives it an organic feel. (Plus I'm sure there will lots of blooper opportunities available) 
• Increase student collaboration with my senior students. I'm going to allocate each student problems that they are responsible of solving. They then will share their solutions with the other students in the class. This hopefully will help to keep them all on track together, make it easier for me to see issues of concern and increase a feeling of connectedness. I will archive all their solutions in google drive, which will then become a great resource over time.
• Provide more opportunities for student directed learning for my junior classes.

10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 blast off!

25th September 2014 marks the start of something amazing, it is the start of a quest, the beginning of an adventure. It is the day when a small idea became a bigger idea. Which then became a chance to be something and do something better than I ever have before.

I have been encouraged, by the amazing Hamish Curry, Tom Barrett, Matt Ives and my GTA family, to create my own flight path. To set my sights for the stars.

I am now a fully fledged Google Certified Teacher, and this is where this journey begins.

My mission (and I choose to accept it) is to co-create meaningful learning experiences for young people in order to foster risk taking and a love of learning. 

I have my mission, I have my prototype and this will be my mission log.