Neil Goodfellow

Ah, feel better now thats off my chest.  Normal service will resume….

We started the 2nd of the Int2 case studies today, Mumbai.  I used this excellent Creative Storyboard idea to inspire a bit of creative writing.  I had the picture board on the IWB so the class could come up and have a closer look at the images. The stories were ‘interesting’, and raised a few stereotypes (swiftly dismissed).  It also identified some gaps in the kids general knowledge.  Apparently all people in India charm snakes and the Dali Lama, is actually Buddah (close!).

I think this idea would work as a great introduction to loads of different topics.  It certainly got the class talking.

India Storyboard

Creative Storyboard 6X6

How good is Google Earth? A simple tour of Paris (thanks very much Kenny O’Donnell) had my class of sixteen years olds engrossed.  The Arc De Triomphe and Eurodisney parts went down really well.  It also something that can be made available to the class to use at home for revision. A great inspiration and its spurred me on to design a few of my own tours. Watch this space….

Another great thing happened today. I finally got my Interactive Whiteboard up and running.  I had a little play with it this afternoon.  I can’t wait to get using it with my classes.

here goes nothing….

Rather than dwell on my brief initiation into the profession (8 full weeks and counting) I felt for my first post I would hit the ground running and start off positively with something i’ve done today.

With my intermediate class we began to look at  urban change in Paris.  I decided, in my wisdom, to let them investigate the city and turned it over to them. I put them in pairs, gave them an area to focus on and set up a wiki to collate their research. I’ve been advised that the best site is wikispaces.com. It took all of 5 minutes to set up.  A word of caution however.  If the intention is to let the pupils update this information, warn them that inappropriate content will be removed.  Secondly, check they all have a valid email address and know how to log in to it. The, slightly limited, results can be seen here North Berwick Geography Wiki

The intention is allow them to update the information as the course progresses.  The end result will then be (fingers crossed) a full case study which everybody has contributed too.