Friday, August 28, 2009

The first years journal is online

The First Years Journal is now available online. What a great resource this has been for our team as professional development facilitators. Along with Early Education this is the most often referred to Journal in our work.

Although specifically targeting those who are interested in the education and care of Infants and Toddlers, many of the articles are alsorelevant across all ages.

We often refer to articles on planning that were published here, written by such luminaries as Diti Hill, Kingston and Wright, Robyn Lawrence and Ann Hatherly amongst others.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Central Auckland Cross Sector Seminar





We had a great day on Saturday with a roomful of teachers all buzzing with questions, ideas, challenges and solutions. We began with a look at what they are currently doing in terms of transition between ECE and School environments.
















Two teachers from Mangere Bridge Kindergarten ( see blog list) who shared their continuing journey with Mangere Bridge and Waterlea Schools. A very inspiring set of stories and ideas. Thanks Pat and Gemma.







Then Tracey Towner from Forrest Hill School shared her exciting learning journey since her involvement in our Cross Sector programme last year. Thank you Tracey.If you want to contact her we have her email address so get in touch with us first.





A final discussion got you thinking about what you could do with the information shared today. This will be sent out to centres who participated and a summary will be posted here at the end of all three seminars.



We look forward to the next two seminars for teachers in other parts of Auckland and apologies again to those who applied but had to be turned down. We originally had only 40 places and have tripled this by running extra days but still refused places to nearly 200 teachers!

How exciting that transition is of such interest to so many teachers in both sectors.

Down the back of the chair

This website for Ministry resources is now included in the links on the right hand side of this blog.

DOWN THE BACK OF THE CHAIR

Monday, August 17, 2009

A video about changing communities

Naketa from Core Education showed this (or something similar ) to our team a while back.

It is a really interesting video about changing communities and what that might mean for teaching and learning.

Did You Know? from Amybeth on Vimeo.

Still here!

Yes there has been a huge gap with no posts but we are all still here for now . Our contract with the Ministry continues until the end of this year.

This blog has been a bit schizoid as we explored what it might become, what its purpose might be. With the knowledge now that it will end along with the contract in a few short months we may try some new ideas.

So far it seems to have worked well as a portal for people with an interest in NZ ECE Assessment. Lots of our visitors are accessing other websites through us - centres of innovation, ICT PL Centres, NEtsafe, and the Ministry of Education pages.

What we have not done is put up a lot of information about assessment or the Kei Tua o te Pae resource itself. This is not a part of our contract and so blogging hours are not funded but are seen instead as a part of our personal professional development and even as a bit of collaboration at times.

We may continue to use this space to share interesting sites and discussions.With no responses to a recent survey, or comments to posts, it is hard to knoppw what people are looking for and what visitors would like to see here. (Hint hint).

Sunday, August 16, 2009

A really good video about creativity and education

It looks long but is one of my favourites. Interesting, informative, insightful and even funny



Watch creativity.. in How to Videos  |  View More Free Videos Online at Veoh.com