Favourite Language Arts Links

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Cliff's Notes on Film- Techie Site of the Week

 William ShakespeareCover of William Shakespeare

For all those Shakespeare fans here is a wonderful film capture, and summary  of Shakespeare's classics on film.  In animated form your students will have a great way of studying for their upcoming test on Shakespeare!  Cliff'sNotes have certainly moved into the 21 century with style:)  Thanks for sharing Carma. 

Blessings to you
Pippa

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Sunday, January 22, 2012

Disturb us Oh Lord!

English: Needle Rock There is a climber just b...Image via Wikipedia
At church today we recited this prayer together.   I was reminded again of how God through poetry, can inspire men and women to move out of their comfort zone,  and pray for adventures or storms,  that are often out of their realm.  I think these words, written by Sir Francis Drake, (world famous explorer) are not only poetically beautiful,  but full of grace and encouragement.  They remind me of my dear brother- in- law who went to be with the Lord a year ago.  He was an amazing rock climber who lived life to the fullest, with adventure in his heart.

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wilder seas
Where storms will show Your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask you to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push back the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

This we ask in the name of our Captain,
Who is Jesus Christ.


Do you pray for comfort or for storms?  


Blessings
Pippa

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Wednesday, January 18, 2012

High Tech High Touch in HCS Learning Commons- Letting go of the Physical Book



Change is happening in our HCS learning commons, and we are embracing the excitement with futuristic ambition.  As this video so beautifully portrays books are still part of our universe, but for how much longer?  New forms of reading take place on a different platform from Kobo readers, Kindles, Sony and iPad.  New E reader versions are released on a daily basis, striving to provide the best reading experience from lighting, to note taking, bookmarking and 3 d effects. 


English: A Picture of a eBook Español: Foto de...Image via Wikipedia
This coming week we launch our Overdrive E book library (not compatible with Kindle in Canada) with an amazing collection; from  professional development, historical fiction, and Christian fiction for all ages.  We have included great titles like Number the Stars, The Cay, The Giver, Lord of the Rings and many, many more. Authors such as Bryan Davies, Ted Dekker, Chuck Black, Eric Walters, Elizabeth George Speare, Deborah Ellis will catch your eye.  Although our collection has started off small (a subscription charge ate into our purchasing power), we look forward to growing it over the coming years.  


As I read about other libraries which have joined the movement to Overdrive,  I have come to realize that we are all on a train that knows no station.  We are all learning together, as publishers negotiate with libraries, technology innovates, and disruption breathes life into libraries.  We are all enjoying chasing the cheese even though it keeps moving! 


Having experienced the personal benefits of reading on my iPad,  I can say without a doubt that I love the ease, comfort, and free downloads which libraries allow me to access.  I can read way faster on my iPad as the font is enlarged and I love the illuminating light for night reading.  We hope to also grow our iPad collection in the campus library, but at the moment we will be loaning out the Kobo and Sony readers to our patrons. 


The training is ongoing, and our learning commons team is learning how to absorb information at an incredibly fast rate, and to make changes on a daily basis.  Our physical commons experienced a huge weed in the fall to make way for more furniture that will suit our new electronic environment.  I will be posting photographs shortly. Thank you God for libraries, for an amazing learning commons team and for books both physical and electronic.  We love ya!


Question for you?  Are you plugged in or do you still need the physical book?

Blessings
Pippa



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Sunday, January 15, 2012

Motivational factors in Education

English: Shows early psychological student mot...Image via Wikipedia


I recently watched this video by Daniel Pink , based on his best selling book Drive, and I am in the process of reading the book.  I was interested in some of his ideas on intrinsic and extrinsic motivators;  all the 21 century talk right now.  Of course they have always been part of good educational pedagogy for most teachers, but with the focus on personalized education they have resurfaced.  This Ted talk is geared towards business,  but many of the principles can be applied to education.  Pink says only three intrinsic characteristics are needed in most work situations, while extrinsic motivators only work in simplistic goal oriented tasks.  Here are his three intrinsic motivators:

1.  Autonomy
2.  Mastery
3.  Purpose

The basic presupposition is that if we give all our students, or employees these attributes in their work situation,  we won't need to motivate with extrinsic motivators.  I am wondering if our homeschooling students are the recipients of this kind of environment?  What works best for you as students,  parents, teachers or tutors?  Do stickers and grades still entice our students to work harder, or are students motivated by sheer enjoyment or love of learning? How do textbooks or online learning meet this need?  What makes learning fun?   I would LOVE to hear your stories?





Blessings
Pippa


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Wednesday, January 11, 2012

My IEP Meeting - An App for IEP Meetings

Français : Créateur : Onjaniaina Ramarokoto Cl...Image via WikipediaMy IEP Meeting - An App for IEP Meetings



Check this out HCOS teachers, an App for IEP meetings! Love it! Thanks for sharing Richard!

Blessings
Pippa
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The Critical Thinking Consortium

educationImage by Sean MacEntee via Flickr

 TC2 or the Critical Thinking Consortium is the Canadian next best digital answer to sliced bread:)   This group of non-profit education professionals "are committed to promoting critical thinking from primary to post-secondary education through professional development, publications and research".  Their goal is to embed critical thinking into all their educational publications in Canada.   Now all we do is add our own biblical interpretation and Voila!

Check out their free resources that are available for teachers and students to use!  The Governor's Letters, and Great Unsolved Mysteries, Library of Canada new exhibits, including The Canadian Immigrant Experience, Men of the Northwest Mounted Police and the Thinking Critically about Food are all free websites that will help your students learn to critically assess what they are reading and studying. 

Blessings to you!
Pippa




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Sunday, January 8, 2012

Tiki-Toki Timeline. Techie site of the Week!



I loved making timelines as a history student, but they always took a ton of time and energy, with paper and markers to complete a perfect presentation.  Tiki-Toki is your digital answer to timelines,  and history students are going to love you for introducing them to this tool.  Engage your readers with multi-media story lines, and beautiful visual effects!  Flickr, Youtube and Vimeo, are easy to integrate  into your created timelines.  With much anticipation I  am going to show this to Matt tomorrow,  and hopefully he can incorporate this into his project on the Metis in virtual worlds.  Yes for Tiki-Toki!!

Blessings to you
Pippa
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