Leadership and Managemant

TeachMeet Nottingham has launched! #tmnott

@MarcWithersey Collaboration, Leadership and Managemant, Social Media, TeachMeet , , , ,

Following the success of Tom Barrett’s TeachMeets for the Midlands and Nottingham, I am pleased to be hosting a follow up TeachMeet event for Nottingham and the East Midlands.

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Sign up for Tickets here

Tom Barrett has been working hard to secure a new home for TeachMeet Nottingham, and has found a venue at The University of Nottingham’s Jubilee Campus (Learning Sciences Research Institute). Tom’s vision for TeachMeet Nottingham is a smaller scale, more manageable event which doesn’t rely on sponsorship or equipment hire. This partnership with LSRI is perfect, and the venue is resourced with state of the art facilities, such as the capability to stream online coverage of the event.

Pete and I are very excited about organising this event and we look forward to welcoming as many teachers and students as possible on the night. If you are a TeachMeet regular, we are challenging you to bring a TeachMeet Newbie with you. This will help to promote TeachMeet as an alternative to Continual Professional Development. Those of you will be attending for the first time will be overwhelmed by the variety of resources, ideas and strategies shared by real teachers in classrooms around the Midlands.

We advise you to bring your smart phone, iPad, tablet, NetBook or laptop along in order to record all of the ideas shared. TeachMeets are rapid and topics move fast with the 7 minute and 2 minute presentations from attendees, so be ready to take lots of notes. If you are on Twitter, you can follow our TeachMeet hashtag before, during and after the event (#tmnott). As the event is streamed live online, you can interact with viewers from around the world and also those in the room with you! Lots of interesting discussion occurs during and after the event so will want to be involved in this, it’s when the best learning happens!

Both Pete and myself understand that in our profession there is a blurred line between work/life balance, and we are aware that this event takes place on a Friday night until 9pm. Please, don’t let this put you off! TeachMeets are now are crucial aspect of our continual professional development and with challenges faced with budgets and workload in school, it is essential that we build our own professional learning networks so that best practises can be shared outside of our Local Authorities and schools.

“After attending, and being inspired at, a number of TeachMeets over the past year, I’ve decided to take part in the organising and running of TeachMeet Nottingham. TeachMeet offers ‘those in the field’ chance to share and evaluate ideas with like minded people in a friendly and relaxed environment. The content of peoples’ presentations are so varied that there will always be something relevant to your own practice. I’ve never left a TeachMeet without my head being filled with ideas and resources to try out with my class.”

 Peter Bevington (@PeteBevington)

Tom Barrett also started the first TeachMeet 100 at the last TeachMeet Nottingham. We will continue this format of sharing. During the event you will be asked to write down simple ideas, advice or resources which have been successful to you as a teacher. This can be anything you have enjoyed using in your class!  These will be gathered on post-it notes and displayed in the room for us all to share at the end (it’s like Twitter, but with paper and pen!)

Please visit our TeachMeet Nottingham wiki to sign up for tickets and we will see you on the night!

Jan Dubiel’s Lecture "A New Landscape? Exploring the Implications of the Early Years Review

@MarcWithersey Early Years, Leadership and Managemant , , , ,
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On Saturday 10th March, the same day as the NAACE TeachMeet in Leicester, Derbyshire County Council also held a big event for their Derbyshire Early Years settings at the University of Derby. I was lucky enough to be invited to attend this with Tiny Tots Day Nursery to showcase a range of ICT equipment and demonstrate the appropriateness of Games Based Learning in Early Years settings. This blog post is one of two, here I will reflect on the Keynote Lecture given by Jan Dubiel which focuses on Curriculum change in Early Years. My second blog will provide links and advice based on the discusses I had with visitors to the workshop I featured in.

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Our INSET day: Using iPads to Create Movies and Animations #ukedchat

@MarcWithersey iPads, Leadership and Managemant , , ,

Background Information

Classes at my school currently have 1 iPad per class and staff have struggled to integrate these into classroom life.

Towards the end of last year I began a partnership with European Electronique (@euroele) to promote the use of games and apps based learning in the classroom environment. After working at the BETT Show with the company, they organised an INSET day at my school to train staff to use an iPad as a collaborative learning tool in the classroom. This promoted the effectiveness of a 1 iPad classroom, proving that tablets can be used creatively and successfully beyond 1:1 ratio.

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What is Games Based Learning? My reflections from TeachMeet

@MarcWithersey Child Initiated Learning, Games Based Learning, Leadership and Managemant, TeachMeet , , ,

I haven’t felt the need to define what Games Based Learning is on my blog as I’ve been too busy trying out different strategies and resources. However, at TeachMeet Play in February half term, I presented for 7 minutes (yeah right, more like 30 minutes!) on these strategies and what Games Based Learning meant for me. Alongside me at the event, Ray Chambers (@lanky_boi_ray) and Bill Lord (@Joga5) also presented and discussed their experiences of gaming in the classroom. We all work with different age groups so our reflections and advice vary which has provoked me to write this blog post.

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Poster: Starting a Twitter Account

@MarcWithersey Collaboration, Leadership and Managemant, Social Media , , , , ,
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Using Twitter has become one of the most valuable tools I use for planning and learning. I have ‘met’ so many inspirational teachers through Twitter who have impacted on my classroom by debating educational issues with me, providing other strategies for teaching and through commenting on my Class Blog.

Teachers on Twitter have given me confidence in my NQT year when I’ve had those moments that start with a thought like ‘Am I doing this right…?’.

What has also been brillliant about Twitter and networking is it’s usefulness in promoting TeachMeet. Before and after a TeachMeet, teachers on Twitter share their ideas and reflections. TeachMeet has also allowed me to meet up with the teachers who I tweet with.

Twitter has also filled that gap that university and teacher training left behind. I have missed those conversations with lecturers and other students about what they are doing in school. Twitter has provided me with even richer debates and discussions through #ukedchat. There are so many people who I could have added to the ‘Folks to Follow First’ text on the poster, there just isn’t enough space!

(@ideas_factory, @peter_obrien1, @kvnmcl, @johnmclear, @NoTosh should all be on the poster too)

For me, the question isn’t ‘Why do I need to be on Twitter?’. It’s more like ‘Why are you not on Twitter?’.

Sent from my iPad

Changing Spaces: Improving Continuous Provision Areas in Foundation 2

@MarcWithersey Child Initiated Learning, Early Years, Leadership and Managemant , , ,

Over the Spring Term I began researching classroom organisation and looking for other ways to use the areas in my classroom. I had observed children’s activities during their choosing time and found that the library was one of the places few children visited during a session. I also noticed that the children would role play whatever their imagination wanted, rather than stick to the theme we had set in there that week or term; post office, kitchen, DIY store, construction site…

What could I do to enhance play? What could I do make sure children access the spaces with more energy?

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Geography Association Conference 2011

@MarcWithersey Collaboration, Leadership and Managemant ,

Geography Association Conference 2011: University of Surrey, Guildford

This blog post has a few firsts for me.

The first time I’d driven further than the route to work in my new car | The first time I’ve presented a workshop at a conference | The first time I’ve blogged about a conference

I hope this blog also has a few ‘firsts’ for you too.

If you’re a Geographer and haven’t been to the GA Conference, I hope this encourages you to visit the conference next year | If you’re not a Geographer, I hope this opens your eyes to how creative Geography is.

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Enhancing Foundation Stage Assessment with Technology

@MarcWithersey Assessment, Child Initiated Learning, Early Years, Leadership and Managemant , , ,

After Reception’s assessment was moderated in June, September gave an opportunity for the Foundation Team to give our assessment strategies a make over.

Amongst the staff we decided that photographic evidence provides excellent opportunities for assessment. The problem we found was the management and recalling of the hundreds of photographs we would be taking each week.

I began to investigate hardware and software options.

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