Chalkface Blog

The best teaching materials in the most practical format.

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  • Addictive messages

    Message bloc

    After much nagging from members, we’ve finally introduced messaging into Yacapaca. An unaticipated consequence is that my productivity has fallen almost to zero. Watching users’ posts tick in is hypnotically addictive. It doesn’t help that I can overview, list , sort and select them using the site admin tools. Info junkie that I am, I’m now mainlining the self-introductions, questions and suggestions of teachers from across the English-speaking world.

    And it’s going to get worse. Sergej’s clever messaging engine allows us to attach messages to almost any object in the database. We already have a discussion area for each support group, and one for each authoring group. In principle, we could attach one to every course, quiz, task, question, teacher, student, assignment… even with that list, I think I’ve missed some. Fortunately for my sanity, not all of those would be used or desired by users – but some of them will be really beneficial to our growing community, and now the core software is written, they are relatively easy to implement.

    Which leaves me at serious risk of overdose.

  • Summer Fun

    kaleidoscopeWant a really easy lesson at the end of term? Fire up the data projector, whack the browser into full-screen mode and click here. Then sit back, and watch your whole class go into trance. By Krazydad

  • iPhone launched – will it really change education?

    iPhone2

    Apple’s sexy new iPhone launches in America today, though it won’t be over here for some time. When I blogged its announcement in January, I drew a storm of (largely critical) commentary. That notwithstanding, I am now more convinced than ever that kids will get the point of a truly pocketable, always-connected computer. The price has to come down first, but in the mobile phone industry that takes only a few months. This, and devices like it, will quickly come down to the cost of a commodity mobile today.

    The big question as far as I am concerned, is how long will it take teachers to adopt these as teaching tools. Read the comments yourself, and join in the debate!

  • Not a forward-thinking Prime Minister

    So Gordon’s in post at long last, and we are all wondering what he is going to do to for education. So far, his grand contribution is to rename the DFES to DCSF. If everything he does is that inspired, we are in for reasonably quiet time.

    In fact, as I posted in January, we do have evidence that Gordon is singularly uninspired when it comes to education. Much as I would love to see some of our structural problems addressed, I can’t help thinking that most teachers will welcome any lessening of the initiative overload.

  • Flowol

    flowolMartin Molloy from St. Paul’s School in Milton Keynes has been authoring nice stuff for a while. Here’s his latest; a couple of nice little quizzes for assessing students’ knowledge of Flowol.

    Incidentally, quite a few people have authored Flowol resources in Yacapaca. If you have something you think merits inclusion in the public space – especially if it has a different flavour to Martin’s – let me know!

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