Useful sites for designing space for learning

Hmmm I don't know much about designing educational spaces, nor have I given it much thought, however here are some helpful links on the subject. Does anyone have any more to add?:

• Becta: Improving Learning Through Technology 
• Teachers TV - Building Schools for the Future
• CABE - Commission for Architecture and Built Environment
• CoSN - Consortium for School Networking
• JISC - Planning and Designing Technology Rich Learning Spaces
• Futurelab
• ISTE - International Society for Technology in Education
  

Tags: educational design learning spaces learning workspace
Posted at 10:51AM Jan 06, 2009 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]

Merry Christmas

Best wishes for a wonderful Christmas and a very happy and safe new year.

I will leave you with the gingerbread houses I have created for this year's family festivities!

Tags: gingerbread houses christmas
Posted at 11:08AM Dec 10, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[3]

edna newsletters - keep up to date

edna publishes several newsletters for different audiences in the education and training community.

The newsletters present information from a wide variety of sources both within Australia and internationally; items or stories are chosen by edna's Information Officers.

Select from our list of newsletters below - all the newsletter are also available in RSS as well as email!

  Early Childhood News
This is a monthly service identifying relevant quality sites, new to edna, for those working with children 0-8 years old.
Subscribe to early childhood news

  edna for schools
The edna for schools newsletter is published fortnightly, providing resources related to a theme.
Subscribe to edna for schools

  Higher Education Update
Published weekly, this newsletter provides coverage of higher education news both nationally and internationally.
Subscribe to the higher education update

  The Networker
Published monthly, this newsletter contains news about edna resources, services and tools for the education and training community.
Subscribe to the networker

  VET and ACE e-news
A fortnightly publication for the Vocational Education and Training (VET) and Adult Community Education (ACE) communities compiled by the VET Project and distributed through edna.
Subscribe to VET and ACE e-news

  E-learning Insights
E-learning Insights is a cross-sectoral podcast that aims to provide academics, teachers and trainers with interviews on leading tools, technologies and issues in e-learning.
Subscribe to E-learning insights

Tags: school education early childhood information edna newsletters higher education ace and vet news elearning insights podcast news
Posted at 04:23PM Nov 25, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]

Dr. Michael Webb and the MMGS

This morning I had the honor of listening to Dr. Michael Webb present a very engaging and enjoyable presentation at the Term 4 conference of the South Australian branch of the Australian Society of Music Educators (ASME). The topic of the day, as I mentioned in a previous blog post, was Closing the Gap: Engaging students and delivering educational outcomes through pop culture and technology.

Dr Michael Webb, is a lecturer in music education at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music. He researches and publishes in the fields of ethnomusicology and music education. His current research activities include new literacies and classroom music learning, popular culture, ethnomusicology and education, and Melanesian hymnodies.

Michael presented on the topic of "The Music Motion Graphics Sequence (MMGS) and cross media listening", which was based on and article entitled "Music Analysis Down the You Tube" which he wrote for the British Journal of Music Education. In it argues that as school students are almost constantly immersed in an entertainment media environment, that this in turn has a great impact for classroom listening habits.

How many times have you heard yourself or colleagues say "the kids just don't listen", or "they don't focus when we are doing analysis work" or "they don't know how to sit still and listen", "they love doing practical but I have to just about tie them to their seats when we have to do listening!"

In this talk today Michael presented the idea of encouraging music analysis and listening through the Music motion graphics sequence (MMGS) and cross media listening. And I feel he is definitely on to something, because when you think about it, we hardly ever just sit and listen to music! Music always accompanies something else - driving, washing the dishes, talking with at a social gathering , standing in a lift, walking the dog, watching a movie or TV program, even watching an orchestra on stage - we don't pay the privilege of going to a concert to sit and stare at a blank wall or behind a screen whilst a 100 piece orchestra plays on stage hidden from our view! So why do we insist on making our students do it??

As educators we need to consider the way that music analysis and listening activities are presented, and need to take into account the myriad of aural, visual, spatial and kinaesthetic ways in which structured music listening activities and analysis can be successfully engaged in.

So what is MMGS? According to Michael MMGS involves the presentation and creation of  "visual musical works, pieces from moving image genres that are structured according to the codes, materials, devices and processes of music."

I hope the following clips Michael shared with us on You Tube will help to demonstrate what MMGS is all about and the creative opportunities our students can have by similarly responding to music through the use of with technology and constructing their own learning !

Rowan Atkinson performs on the Invisible Drumkit (there are many from Rowan Atkinson more including The Piano Player and The Conductor). When you are watching it think of the learning possibilities to be extracted including timbre, call and response, rhythmic and melodic devices, instrumental range, layering etc.

Tags: engaging asme mmgs australian society of music educators pop culture students you tube
Posted at 03:51PM Nov 22, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[5]

Music Education Resources on edna

The South Australian branch of the Australian Society of Music Education is holding their Term 4 conference this weekend. The conference's theme is Closing the Gap: Engaging students and delivering educational outcomes through pop culture and technology. Right up my alley I think!

Here is the handout that I will be sharing with them and hopefully you will also find some interesting and useful resources as well!

General Music and Music Education Resources
Find a wide range of online resources on the composition, improvisation, performance, appreciation and critical examination of music and musical instruments.

General Music and Music Education Theme Page
In this theme page teachers will find links to resources within the edna repository to songs, editing software, lesson plans and interactive sites:

• Interactive music sites
• Lyrics
• Music
• Music lesson plans
• Music theory
• Musical notes
• Songs
• Sound editing
• Writing Music
• Music events
• Virtual Instruments
• Software
• Music History

Early Childhood: Music and Movement for Years 0-8
A collection of resources related to teaching music and movement with young children, including songs, drama and related activities.

Upcoming Music Education Events
Monitor upcoming national and international education events in the edna Calendar. The collection if fully searchable and a range of Music Education events can be found.

Tags: resources music ideas music education
Posted at 05:36PM Nov 21, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[1]

Concetta's Christmas Carnival of Learning

Concetta has collected a myriad of great ideas to do in the classroom this Christmas season. Check them out on her me.edu.au blog post Christmas Carnival of learning

If you have any great ideas or have seen something you'd like to add, leave a comment on Concetta's blog post!

 Also the OzProjects team has been hard at work again, putting together the December Celebrations Around the World online project: A place to share information and link to useful resources about December celebrations around the world.

We've already had lots of interest in this project from schools from around Australia and even an International school in Saudi Arabia! We hope to see a lot of interaction in the coming weeks.

Don't forget to check out the Christmas Theme Page in the Schools Sector of the edna site. The aim of edna's Christmas theme page is to help provide educators with a selection of highlighted links to online resources from within the edna collection. Basically we've done the testing and reviewing for you!

Tags: ideas christmas december celebrations resources ozprojects concetta
Posted at 04:11PM Nov 21, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]

Music Education meets the Web

Thanks to my Plurk buddy Skip Z, a wonderfully active educator from the US of A, (you'll also find him here on me.edu.au) I have finally stumbled across something I have been waiting a long time to see...

Noteflight is the first online music composition tool that sits entirely on the web. Although not as powerful as other software programs such as Sibelius, the Noteflight score editor allows you to do the basics: compose online, play back your work and print it. Also after creating your own scores, you can choose to share them with others, can publish them to Noteflight's online music library, link to them, or embed them in your blog. Composing and accessing your work on the run just got easier!

Still in Beta, Noteflight has limited instrumentation - piano, bass, drums, violin, guitar, flute, soprano sax, trumpet and electric bass but the actualy instrument sounds are pretty good - you don't get the horrible squeaks you get with other score writers on play back!

Some other great features include:

• Versioning allows you to make keep earlier versions of your work to make changing your mind easier! 
• Note input with the keyboard or mouse
• Ability to add a comment to parts of your score or specific notes
• Describe your work and tag it 
• Simple key, time and transposition functionality
• Feedback - tell them what you want to see!
  

I would suggest reading the terms of use outlined when first signing up with Noteflight. It appears that you, as the composer, own all of the content you place on Noteflight. However your work will be covered under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license, something which may be quite alien to most musicians... Reading up on it is best to make sure that you understand how your music can be viewed and used by others,as well as what lisences you must abide by if you edit someone elses's work - do this before you decide to place your entire life's work online...

As I mentioned before Noteflight is only in beta but there are some great possibilities on the horizon, including the ability to import your scores from other programs uaing MusicXML. Finale can export this format directly, and Sibelius allows MusicXML via Recordare's Dolet plugin.

So what's missing?

• You can't add dynamics or ritards or accelerandos
• No lyrics functionality
• No cut and paste between scores
• Can't add grace notes, tremolo or other ornaments
• You can't isolate parts of a score.

Judging by their feedback forum these are all things that they are hard at work on. For the first free service of its kind I think that the team at Noteflight should be very proud at what they have achieved and, most importantly, what they have started. It can only get better from here.

Viva la Musicia!

Tags: composing online tools music music education score writing
Posted at 09:57AM Nov 12, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]

Teacher feedback with Diigo

John Travers explores the possibilities of online research and providing timely teacher feedback to students using Diigo. Not just a really cool bookmarking tool!:

Tags: bookmarking diigo feedback you tube video john travers
Posted at 02:42PM Nov 11, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]

Sanitation and Disease OzProjects Student Forums

Two special guests will be available during the next 10 days in the Sanitation and Disease Project to answer questions about their work .  

Do Not Go Quietly into the Classroom

Do not Go Quietly into the Classroom: David Truss

A thought provoking look at the benefits of using technology in the classroom - for your own personal and professional growth. Why do you use technology and web 2.0 tools in your teaching and learning?

Tags: teaching web 2.0 learning technology
Posted at 12:31PM Oct 28, 2008 by Alison Hall  |  Comments[0]