To Blog or Not To Blog?

Thank you to those of you who have responded to the poll asking whether you'd like to continue blogging in Geography. I really appreciate those of you who took the time to write a comment and let me know what you think.

This is the first time I have taught using blogs and, like you, I am learning a lot! Your work continues to improve as you use the tools available to you more and more effectively. I am especially impressed with your work on Assignment #8. I have read some wonderfully creative and well-researched imaginary interviews.

Some issues you have raised and that I am thinking about:

More class discussion - Some people have suggested that we do some class discussion along with our blogging. I think this is a great idea. So far, you have been working fairly independently on your blogs (and doing a great job, may I add!), I will work on finding ways to interact even more.

More guidance from the teacher - In other classes you've taken in the Social Studies (History, Geography), you are used to having the teacher lead you through a concept and then you do a reading or an assignment. With our projects so far, I've been releasing the responsibility to you. You have been responsible for working with information I've given you, that I've directed you towards or that you've found on your own. Some of you want more guidance and I will be happy to provide that to you.

More clarity - You may not believe it, but you are flying through curriculum expectations for your grade. What I will do is I will let you know, with each assignment, which curriculum expectations you are covering (there is a whole bunch of stuff you're expected to learn each year and that's put together in curriculum documents that teachers refer to). Also, I've started to add more information at the end of posts to tell you how I'll be evaluating each assignment. People have also expressed that they miss learning in units. I'll add more info at the beginning of assignments to let you know which unit we're working on. I'll get even better organized and hopefully that will help you.

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Fewer Assignments - Some of you have said that you would like more time to read your peers assignments before you are given your next one. I've been trying to give you assignments of different lengths, but to also keep you busy during class time. I'm thinking about how many assignments to give you.

Distractions - Several of you have said that blogging is distracting. I'd argue that it's not the blogging that is distracting, but it's all the other cool stuff on the Internet that is distracting. It is up to you to monitor your use and make sure you are staying on task. The world is a distracting place and I think it is an invaluable tool to learn how to stay focused amidst many other tempting things.

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Once again, I really appreciate your opinions and I really appreciate the respectful, mature way in which you are expressing them. Like I've said, I am learning from our blogging project along with you, and your input helps me to continue to learn and improve my teaching. Thank you.

If there are any other issues you'd like to raise, please don't hesitate to do so in the comments area.

Be Creative! Be! Be! Creative!

Hello dollies,

I absolutely encourage and embrace any creativity you can bring to these assignments. This is a learning process for all of us (even me, your perfect teacher!) If you can figure out a better way to present your information, let me know. Helena and Sarah in E7/8 were in one of my classes last year and are a great dramatic duo. They will be working together to create their Louis Riel interview. They came to me with the request to incorporate their powers (what word did you use, girls? It was something better than that!) and made an arrangement that is fair and still showcases the things they've learned. Awesome. Another group is looking into getting their mark through a video of their interview. Just as awesome. Come and see me or leave me a comment with if you have creative ideas you'd like to try out. I'm happy for you to try new things, we just have to make a deal so that it's fair!

Just FYI, I felt I needed to offer you this because my brother Sam (who many of you will remember) was very upset about homework on the weekend. He was assigned a project in which he HAD TO use visual aids. He feels he works better without visual aids. He got stuck on that one requirement and had difficulty getting the content for his project completed. I learned a lesson from that. I always try to create assignments that I feel will be fun-teresting (fun+interesting) for you. Sometimes I get things wrong. Please, in a respectful way, tell me how you can reach a higher level of success - the options for creativity on your blog are ENDLESS!

I look forward to reading about and seeing all your juicy brain nuggets!

Random Acts of Kindness

Hey friends,

This week is Kindness Week in Ottawa. People of all ages are encouraged to be extra conscious of how to be kind to others. I have already seen Random Acts of Kindness around the school today. I saw a student loan another student a pencil without even having to be asked. I saw a student offer to share her snack with another student who forgot his.

Do you have some ideas of ways to show Random Acts of Kindness? Have you seen any Random Acts of Kindness today? Leave a comment if you wish.

Try every day this week to do at least one thing to help another person. Don't think about who will see you or what benefit it has for you, just do something to be kind to another person.

The Great Upper Canada Adventure

   I found a cool online interactive game, called The Great Upper Canada Adventure, to explore some of the difficulties early Canadian settlers had in moving from Europe to Canada.  You take on the persona of a European peasant family member and make decisions.  It's pretty interesting.  The game is kind of like those "Choose Your Own Adventure" books that I read as a kid.  Based on your decisions, the outcome of the story changes.  If you're done all your assignments or need a break, you can play this.  

   Also, as always, I'll be reading comments that you leave here.  If you play, let me know what you thought, and read and respond to your peers' feedback.  (Note: This is a great way for you to show me that you're working with the information that you're given and for me to see that you're understanding the things your learning - this will help me to give you marks!)

Assignment #8 - The Real Riel

Good Tuesday morning, pals!

I hope that you had an absolutely wonderful LO-O-O-ONG weekend! I'd love to hear what you did this weekend, you can leave a comment and let me know what you did for Family Day! I don't know if you realized, but yesterday was not only Family Day, it was also Louis Riel Day, a holiday celebrated in the province of Manitoba.

Louis Riel was a colourful character who helped to form the country you know and love today. There is a lot of controversy surrounding his legacy. Some people see him as a Father of Confederation, while others see him as a traitor.

In this class, we think a lot about the impact of the things that we do. We've talked a lot about what the world will look like in the future. I wonder if Louis Riel ever thought about how much impact his actions would have on present-day Canada.

Your assignment is to read about Louis Riel to try to understand some of the reasons why people feel so strongly about him, either positively or negatively. You will then write an imaginary interview between you and Louis Riel, giving him an opportunity to talk about himself and defend his decisions. You have to make sure to introduce him, like an interviewer would, telling your audience a little bit about who it is you are talking to and why he is important. Then, you will write three (or more) questions to be asked by you and answered by him. You must write both the questions and the answers.

You should write this as a new post on your own blog and in the form of a script. For example,

Miss Pollock: Welcome, Mr. Banana-Pants. We are so happy to have you here today to talk about all your experiences.

Mr. Banana-Pants: Thanks so much, it's my great pleasure and passion to be here with you today.

(Note: Your interview will obviously be much, much superior to this. It may be difficult to do that, but I have faith in you.)

I suggest that you begin your research by using a search engine (such as google) and entering "Louis Riel", or reviewing some of the information on wikipedia.org or another online encyclopedia. Once you've found out some basic information, you should go into more depth with your search. For some bonus marks, leave a comment here to let us all know where you found great information and what your process was for working on this assignment.

I will be evaluating your Interview with Louis Riel based on the following criteria:

-link to this question

-links to source websites (at least three different sources used)

-interesting questions asked

-insightful answers provided

-accuracy of information

-layout of your post

-conventions: spelling, grammar and punctuation

***UPDATE: (Feb 18th 12:03 p.m.) Jamal in E7B found a one-minute long video about Louis Riel. You can check it out by visiting his blog.***

***UPDATE #2: (Feb 18th 2:13 p.m.) Hanifa in E7A also found a wonderful site with lots of information about Louis Riel.***

***UPDATE #3: (Feb 23rd 1:11 p.m.) The lovely Carly in E7/8 has found two sites that have not yet been linked to. Check out her first link and her second link.***

***UPDATE #4: (Feb 23rd 1:16 p.m.) Magnificent Jessica has found a site for research as well. Remember that each of you have to use three sites for reference!***

***UPDATE #5: (Feb 24th 8:32 a.m.) Hasan has found two sites that he thinks are really helpful.***

***UPDATE #6: (Feb 24th 8:33 a.m.) Ahoy,Metis (yes, you do say it like "Matey"): Tale and Firas in E7/8 have learned about what Metis means. Tale has even created an explanation for you to check out.***

***UPDATE #7: Froher in E7/8 found a site that she found helpful.***

***UPDATE #8: Russell in E7B found a site that he liked.***

***UPDATE #9: Marsha has made a post describing lots of great sources.***

***UPDATE #10: Alem in E8C found a really cool site about the Mysteries of Canada. It has a terrific article about Louis Riel.***

***UPDATE #11: Firas in E7/8 has written an excellent interview.***

Shh...

Are you interested in taking a Vow of Silence for an entire day?  In order to raise awareness for children all over the world whose voices are not heard, those who cannot express their needs and wants, you can vow to stay silent for twenty-four hours.  That means no talking, no texting, no blogging with words, no note writing, no instant messaging, no facebook updates.  It also means you'll be sacrificing your voice for a full day to think of others and remind your friends, family and teachers to do the same.

Let me know what you think by commenting here.

Free the Children has tons more info.

Comments: A Quick Reminder

Those of you with funky templates,

Make sure that people can comment on your blogs! I just tried to comment on Amit's blog and was unable to! Egads! Go to Settings-->Comments-->Show comments in pop-up window

Also, make sure that people do not need to type in a scrambled word. For that, go to Settings--->Comments-->Show word verification for comments-->"No"

Have a friend comment on your blog so that you know comments work. The Tech Experts are pro at this if you still need extra help.

***Note to Tale - try following these directions or ask a Tech Expert for help - I'll be back tomorrow if this doesn't work!***

How to post a comment: This is actually the first thing we'll do as a class

  You will comment on the Welcome entry on this blog so that you can see how easy it is to make comments.  Because we will be doing this right now, together, live in class, this is called "Live Blogging".

  To comment, you simply select the "comment" button at the end of a blog post, then enter your comment and necessary information.  Please post comments by using your blogger username and link back to your own blog.

Assignment #2: Comment on three blogs

This assignment will be due by the beginning of our next class.


Your first homework assignment is to find the blogs of three of your classmates (I will post links to these on my blog on the right hand side) and make comments on their first entry. That means that you are reading their entries and responding appropriately and thoughtfully to the things that they said. You are not telling your friends how awesome their new shoes are, or about a person you have a crush on. This is your professional educational blog and you are expecting people to be respectful of that and you must, in turn, be respectful of your classmates.


Good luck!