The Journalist

Hi guys! I am Irene Gea and I was the journalist last week. I am going to talk  about our personal diary during last week!

It was a strange week, on Monday we didn't have class because it was San José (the father's day) and  on Friday Linda couldn't come to our class. Although we didn't have class, we had  a task to do. We had to do a story or a folktale about the negative aspects of using text books as the only teaching resource.

On Friday 23th March, we met at the university at 9:oo and we started work. Ana, Marina, Pablo and me worked in the story and Isa chose some topics in the texts. We did in Spanish and when we finished we share the task of translating  the story.

On Saturday 24th each one sent their part and Isa also sent a draw. Ana and me put everything  together and ready to submit!

On monday 26th we had a tutorship with Linda and we put our story in the blog.

And that's all! I see you soon! =)

The Analyst

Hey guys! I'm Marina Gómez and this week I've been the analyst of the group. Well , to begin with I will answer the following questions in order to my criterion.

What was the best part of the activity?

Well, the best part of the activity was when we were joining our ideas of our imagination, because, we realized that every member of the group was really useful and important to create a perfect story. We didn't know that until we observed that when a member couldn't know how to continue the story, because of the lack of his/her imagination... ( I'm joking.. :) ) another one could do it. I t was fantastic.

What was the worst?

Well, the worst part was when we had to be agree  to meet to do the work because when one member could meet, other had to do other important thing...but definitely we chose a great day when everybody could go to the university to do the task.

What have you learnt?

We have learnt  several things, like a lot of vocabulary ( when we were translating our story into English. We also learnt the importance of the new technologies inside a class. We have learnt new methodologies that we can use in the future as teachers. Finally we have learnt how to create a good story.

What do you need to conserve –as a group- for the next weeks?

To my mind, I think that we need to conserve the good atmosphere of work, because if we conserve that we can work well  and  comfortable.

What do you need to improve- as a group- for the next weeks?

We have to reflex more between us, before starting the task. We also have to work more to have better results, and I think we are capable enough to get that. To sum up, we have to devote more time and we have to be more concentrated while we are doing a task.

THE FACILITATOR

Hello, everydody! I am Ana and I was the Facilitator last week. These were the different roles:

Ana- Facilitator

Irene -  The Journalist

Marina -  The Analyst

Pablo -  The Star

Isa - Tracker

On Friday 16th only Isa attended to class because some members of the group were ill. So, she contacted with us to explain the work for the week and we started to work. I, as the facilitator, divided the work. Every member of the group should read the texts  in order to  put the ideas in common on Friday 23th. In fact, that day we stayed at the university to do the story. Isa volunteered to do a drawing about it. Firstly, we decided to do it in Spanish and then everyone was assigned to translate a part of it. Finally, we agreed to send all parts translated by email and Irene and I had to join them in one document. And… that was the planning for last week! 

Let's go!

Hey, guys! We have had some problems with the group but... Let's go! Let's do it better! We can do a good work... a good cooperative work.

Go ahead! ... YES, WE CAN! :)

Translation...

Hey! Here you have our story translated into Spanish! 

“EL ZORRO QUE NO SE DEJA ACONSEJAR”

Hubo una vez, no hace mucho tiempo, en un bosque conocido por sus habitantes como “El Estanque”, un enorme lugar plagado de niños con ganas de aprender y divertirse, de enormes patios de juego, clases llenas de color y un horrible sonido que anunciaba la vuelta a casa. Asistían a él respetables señores, algunos más amables, otros más testarudos… pero al fin y al cabo, todos ellos resumidos en una simple palabra: maestros. El lugar del que hablamos se llama escuela.

Un día de primavera, con el sol saliendo sobre la colina de al lado y los pájaros cantando mi canción favorita, esperaba a mis amigos en el río de siempre para ir “al cole”. No tardaron mucho en llegar Ratoncín y Serpentino, con los que comparto pupitre en clase.

- ¡Hola, chicos!- dije alegre.

- ¡Hola, Ardillen!, ¿Cómo llevas los deberes que mandó ayer el Señor Zorro en clase? No entendemos nada, por más que nos leemos el tema de “Los seres humanos” todavía no podemos entender cómo se reproducen.

-  Bueno, yo más o menos creo que si que lo he entendido… ayer estuve navegando por la red y encontré algunos dibujos muy buenos que lo explicaban a la perfección -  repliqué.

-  ¿Navegando por la red? ¡Pero si el Señor Zorro dice que eso es de locos!

Mientras tanto, a lo lejos se oían las risas de nuestros amigos: Mofeta (o más conocido como “El Mofetilla”), Buhez y Patita, con la que me encantaba pasar las tardes en el río.

-   ¡Buenos días! – dijeron todavía entre risas.

- ¿Qué os pasa que venís tan alegres? – preguntó Serpentino.

- Nos estábamos riendo de lo que ha twiteado el Señor Conejo hace unos minutos. Nos está preparando una actividad chulísima para hoy – dijo Patita aún fatigada de la risa.

- El Señor Zorro dice que “eso de la red” son sandeces, que los que la usan están locos – dijo Ratoncín con tono sarcástico.

- Bueno, ¡vámonos que vamos a llegar tarde! – dijo “El Mofetilla”

Caminamos durante un rato hasta llegar a la escuela, y allí estaban como todos los días el Señor Zorro,  un ser inteligente, culto y serio. Su método de enseñanza es la clase magistral, le encanta impartir clases en las que el libro de texto es el protagonista y su principal ayuda. Es reacio a utilizar las nuevas tecnologías, ya que las tacha de “dispositivos vacíos de contenido que no aportan nada”, y el Señor Conejo, también inteligente y culto aunque, a diferencia del Señor Zorro, es muy hablador y dinámico, siempre está preparando actividades nuevas y creativas que hacen que los alumnos se sientan motivados y quieran aprender.  Como siempre, se encontraban discutiendo en la esquina del pasillo que unía sus clases.

- He oído que quiere invertir el dinero en la compra de más ordenadores, y la biblioteca está falta de libros -  dijo el Señor Zorro.

- Ha oído usted bien, Señor. ¿Y qué problema hay en ello? Los estudiantes con los ordenadores tienen acceso a un montón de libros electrónicos, tutorías online, video lecturas… aparte de otros muchos más recursos.

- Los libros de hoy en día, perdone que le diga, no son como los de antes, están muy actualizados. Además, una máquina no proporciona inteligencia. Míreme a mí, yo fui educado con libro y papel.

- Usted fue educado por su maestro/a, el libro solamente era una ayuda, al igual que Internet hoy día. Señor, los que verdaderamente educan son los docentes. Lo que debemos conseguir es que nuestros alumnos construyan su propio aprendizaje, que investiguen, que no se resignen a memorizar lo que esté escrito en el texto, sino a comprender esa información y extrapolarla a otros campos. ¿No le parece impactante que en la sociedad tecnológica en la que vivimos solamente haya un único recurso de información?  

- ¿Pero usted piensa que yo tengo tanto tiempo libre? ¿De verdad cree que yo puedo centrarme en aprender como funciona ese “fantástico mundo” de la red, o en preparar actividades cada día? Lo que yo prefiero es que los niños aprendan los contenidos, como siempre se ha hecho. Y ahora, si me disculpa, debo dar mi clase. Buenos días.

Sonó la campana y fuimos a clase. Buhez, “El Mofetilla” y Patita fueron a clase con el profesor Conejo, mientras que Ratoncín, Serpentino y yo fuimos con el Señor Zorro. Quedamos en vernos en la hora del recreo para jugar a “las madrigueras”.

- ¡Hey, chicos! ¿Habéis visto la que han tenido esta mañana los profes? Siempre están igual… ¿Cómo os ha ido hoy? - dijo Buhez.

- Sí, los hemos visto – replicó Serpentino – Hoy no hemos hecho gran cosa, lo de siempre, el profesor Zorro ha dado su clase dictando y nosotros hemos copiado, aunque no sabíamos ni lo que estábamos copiando. Y vosotros, ¿qué habéis hecho? , ¿cómo os ha ido?

- Pues hoy ha sido una clase genial. Hemos hecho una línea de tiempo con la herramienta "Dipity" para explicar la evolución humana, buscando fotos e información. ¿Sabíais que los antepasados de los humanos son los monos? A lo mejor la profe RaiMona se convierte algún día en uno de ellos… - dice “El Mofetilla” riéndose- Luego, lo hemos colgado en la red y lo hemos compartido con alumnos de otros colegios, ¡nos han dicho que les había encantado!

- ¿En serio habéis hecho todo lo que nos decís? ¿y por qué nosotros no hacemos nada de eso?

Sonó el timbre que anunciaba la vuelta a clase tras media hora de recreo y, como siempre, Buhez, “El Mofetilla” y Patita fueron a clase con el profesor Conejo, mientras que Ratoncín, Serpentino y yo fuimos con el Señor Zorro. Cuando entramos a clase y nos sentamos en nuestros pupitres, antes de que el Señor Zorro comenzase su explicación, Ratoncín levantó valientemente la pata  y dijo:

- Profesor Zorro… ¿por qué tiene usted tanto miedo al cambio?

Moraleja: El cambio cuesta, requiere esfuerzo y dedicación. Debemos reaccionar y  apostar por nuevos métodos, no dejarnos llevar por el camino fácil… no tener miedo a lo nuevo, lo diferente. 

The star

Hi guys, how are you? Do you enjoy doing the weekly work? I'm Pablo and I was the star last week. Here I put our story:

"THE FOX WHO DID NOT LET HIMSELF TO BE ADVISED"

Once upon a time, there was a time not long ago in a forest known by locals as "The Pond", a huge place full of children who want to learn and have fun, there were huge playgrounds, colorful lessons and a horrible sound announced the return home. There were attended respectable gentlemen, some softer, others stubborn ... but after all, all summarized in one simple word: teachers. The place we are talking about is called school.

One spring day, with the sun rising over the next hill and the birds singing my favourite song, I am Ardillen, the squirrel. I was waiting for my friends at the river as usual to go to school. Ratoncín, the mouse, and Serpentine, the snake, didn’t take long to arrive, with whom I share desk in class.

- ‘Hey, guys’, I said.

- ‘Hello, Ardillen! How do you do the homework that Mr. Fox sent in class yesterday? We do not understand anything, even if we read the topic of "Humans" we still can’t understand how they reproduce.’

- ‘Well, I think if I've understood more or less ... yesterday I was surfing the net and found some very good pictures explaining it to perfection’, I replied.

- ‘Surfing the net? But Mr. Fox says that's crazy!

Meanwhile, in the distance we could hear the laughter of our friends: Skunk (or better known as "The Mofetilla"), Patita, the duck, and Buhez, the owl, with which I loved spending the afternoon in the river.

- ‘Good morning!’ said still laughing.

- ‘What's the matter you come so gay?’, asked Serpentine.

- ‘We were laughing at what the Mr. Rabbit has tweeted few minutes ago. We are preparing a very cool activity for today’, Patita said laughing.

- ‘Mr Fox says that “the network” is nonsense, that those who use it are crazy’, Ratoncín said sarcastically.

- ‘Well, let’s go, we’re going to be late!’, said “ The Mofetilla”

We walked for a while to get to school, and there were like every day the Lord Fox, an intelligent, cultured, and serious being. His method of Teaching is the lecture. He loves teaching using the textbook, that is the main protagonist, and his help inside the class. He is reluctant to use the new technologies, he dismiss them as “ meaningless devices that do not add anything”, and Mr. Rabbit, who is also intelligent and educated but, unlike Mr. Fox, he is very talkative and dynamic, he is always preparing new and creative activities that make students feel motivated. As always, they were arguing at the corner of the hall that connects their classes.

- ‘I’ve heard that you want to invest money in buying more computers, and the library is lack of books’, said Mr.Fox.

- ‘You have heard right, Lord. What's wrong with that? Students with computers have access to a lot of e-books, online tutorials, video lectures

... apart from many other resources.’

- ‘Nowadays’ books, I'm sorry to tell you, aren’t like before, now they are very current. Furthermore, a machine does not provide intelligence. Look at me, I was brought up with books and paper.’

- ‘You were brought up by his / her teacher, the book was only an aid, like the Internet today.

Professor, the educators are actually the teachers. We have to get that our students can build their own learning, can research, they don’t have to resigned to memorize what is written in the text, they must understand that information and extrapolate it to other fields. Don’t you think that is shocking that in the technological society we live in has only a single source of information?’, said Mr. Rabbit.

- ‘But do you really think I have so much free time? Do you really think that I can focus on learning how the world of the Internet works, or preparing daily activities? I prefer children to learn the contents as it has always been done. Now if you excuse me, I have work to do. Good morning’.

The bell rang and we went to class. Buhez, "The Mofetilla" and Patita went to class with Professor Rabbit, while Ratoncín, Serpentine and I went with Mr. Fox. We agreed to meet during the break to play "burrows."

- ‘Hey, guys! Did you hear about the teachers’ argument this morning? They are always the same ... How has the morning gone?’ - Buhez said.

- ‘Yes, we heard about it’, said Serpentine. ‘Today we have not done much, as usual, Teacher Fox has dictated his class and we have copied, but we did not know what we were copying, we did not understand anything. And you, what have you done? What was it like?’

- ‘Well, today it was a great class. We made a timeline with Dipity tool to explain human evolution, looking for pictures and information. Did you know that the ancestors of humans are the monkeys? Maybe, one day teacher RaiMona, the monkey, will become one of them... ‘Says "The Mofetilla" laughing. ‘Then, we put it on the web and shared with students from other schools. They told us that they loved it!’

- ‘You really did everything you say? And why we do not do anything like that in our classes?’

The bell rang announcing the return to classes after half an hour of break and as always, Buhez, "The Mofetilla" and Patita went to class with Professor Rabbit, while Ratoncín, Serpentine and me went with Mr. Fox. When we returned into class and sat at our desks, before Mr. Fox’s explanation, Ratoncín legged up boldly and said:

- ‘Professor Fox… Why are you so afraid of change?’

Moral: The way requires effort and dedication. We must react and we must looking for new methods, we don’t have to let laziness get the better of you. We shouldn’t be fear of the new and neither to the different things.

After doing this work we can do a reflection, in our opinion and after reading the documents we noticed that in some countries there are some people who say that they are good teachers and it isn’t true at all. Those people thinks that being a good teacher means giving all the information which appear in textbooks to the students, but our opinion as a group and agree with most of the authors a good teacher is another thing. A good teacher is someone who achieves to teach in another way, without a special attention to the units of the books, someone who gives freedom to his students for building his own knowledge. That is the consequence of the bad use of the textbooks; textbooks are plenty of contents but sometimes this contents aren't useful and teachers don't stop and think about it, and the reason of this is that it's easier doing a class with the book as a reference than doing a class including ICT, and also it carry more work.

The Analyst

Hi! I am Irene Gea and I was the analyst last week. I had to examine these different questions as a reflection of the global group work.

a) What was the best part of the activity?

The best part of the activity was on Monday when Manel Rives came to our class and we paid a lot of attention to him! That morning we felt like children: we were playing with the dinosaurs and the iPads (I had never had an iPad in my hands and I was really nervous with it). On Monday, we could say, for the first time, that we are Primary Education Students!

b) What was the worse?

The worst was that Manel was only one morning with us and we had to do everything very fast. We did not have much time to learn a lot of things.

c)  What was the best moment of the week (in the work of the group)?

The best moment of the week was the day that we were taking photos in the university. We were with our dinosaurs in the parking and everybody look at us in a strange way. We had to take 100 photos in the plants and we had to move the dinosaurs every time. The situation was very funny.

d) What was the worse?

The worse moment of the week was when we realized the pictures we had taken with the camera in the university were not useful, because the program Stop motion did not work on the computer. In the end we had to take the pictures with mobile again.

e) What have you learnt?

We have learnt that we cannot go the easy way, if we effort and we work hard, we will be able to get best results and even in a funnier way. If we standstill in the classics methods, society will never evolve. Nowadays one of the most important breakthroughs to progress is technology; we do not have to be afraid of new technologies. If it is possible, we have to take advantage and use them.

Finally, I would like to add that it is very easy to say but very hard to do it. But with the visit of Manel, I think that we are closer to put it to work.

f) What do you need to conserve -as a group- for the next weeks?

I think my group is improving, we are working all together and we are sharing homework and I am very happy with this. I will conserve the wish of teamwork which is starting to grow.

g)  What do you need to improve –as a group- for the next weeks?

We still need to improve the distribution of work among us because we all do not work the same sometimes. Some people always get the responsibility of the group and to make it work but fortunately, we are improving all these things!

The star

Hello everybody! I’m Isabel Abril Pérez-chuecos, and last week I was the star.

Last week, the stars didn’t have to expose because we had to do a better activity that consist on telling and showing us what we did in the class of Monday.  

On Monday, we had a guest at the university; he was Manel Rives, a teacher of primary school in Galicia that came to show us some technological activities that he does with his pupils. 

He proved us that technologies can be incorporate in education. He showed us some presentation and exposition made by children of six and seven years old; it was incredible.
He has achieved that we see the education in other way, through the creativity and technology. Besides he proposed us to do his activities, it was very interesting and funny. To do the activities, everyone brought plasticine, dinosaurs, cameras and computers.
Firstly, we did a dinosaurs comic using an internet program called " Toontastic". Manel lent us an I pad to do every activity. This is our comic.

Secondly, we did a video about dinosaurs too, with the phone camera we did many photos and we put them in an internet program that joined them and it did a video. Here you can see it.

And thirdly, we did another story about dinosaurs using a program called "Stop Motion". Here it is the link to see it.

http://toontube.launchpadtoys.com/17628/

These activities made us feel like kids again and we learned a lot of things about dinosaurs. For example that the Tiranosaurs measured between ten and fourteen metres and that it could weigh four or seven tons.
In brief, we learnt and enjoyed very much.

The Journalist

Monday, 5^th of March

Today, we have had a special visit; Manel Rives has come to our class. He was invited by Linda. He has shown us some activities (using technology, of course) that his students have carried out and that are very impressive. It is so amazing that six-year-old children could do so many things, the ability to recollect information and the ability to use new technologies (like Ipads, for example).

The exercises we had to carry out were about dinosaurs. All the members of the class brought dinosaurs toys, plasticine and colours. One of the activities was the production of a comic. We had to do it in groups. We had to make up a story where some information about dinosaurs was shown. To produce the activity we took some photos of the dinosaurs with the Ipad that Manel facilitated to us. It was very funny; we laughed a lot and learnt too! Here is the picture of our comic

The second activity that we had to create was a story made with the Toontastic application. We invented another story about a little girl that makes a dinosaur become vegetarian. It was so funny too! We had to role-play different voices and move the different characters of the story.

Finally, we did not have time to do the last activity (a stop motion). Linda proposed us to do it for Wednesday class. So…this is our activity for this week!

Tuesday, 6^th of March

Today, we have had free time between the different classes. So, we have used this time to take the pictures we need to make the stop motion. We seemed like mad people, taking photos to dinosaurs toys at the parking of the faculty. 

Thursday, 8^th of March

Today, we have had some problems to download the stop motion program. Finally, we have discovered that this program could be downloaded with our smartphones. The problem was with the photos. We had to take all photos again because we could not change them from the computer to the mobile phone. Finally we did it perfectly! 

Friday, 9^th of March

Today we have started the class with some questions that Linda asked us. These questions were about “what do we think about “Manel experience”? After that, Linda proposed an activity. It consisted on thinking (in pairs) about how we could implement some of the activities that we made with Manel to our future students. Finally, Linda talked about video and its implementation in the class, the ten mistakes using video in the classroom. 

Ana González Zapata

The facilitator

Hello, I'm Pablo Jaquero Yépez and I was the facilitator last week.

Because of there wasn't too much work we only meet on tuesday after class in order to do the task, that was a stop motion with some dinosaur.

The facilitator

Hello! I am Isabel Abril Pérez-Chuecos and I was the facilitator last week.

I organized the week as follows:

On Monday, after classes finished we talked about we had to do and which days we could meet to make our task.

On Tuesday, we started the task; we had lunch at university, then we went to the cabins work on the library until eight o’clock p.m. Besides I organized a consultation with Linda for asking our doubts.

On Wednesday, we were talking with Linda and after that we worked at the university.

On Thursday, we had to finish our work and our task was finished in a short time, after that, Ana and Irene had to meet to practice their oral exposition.

The Stars

Hello! We are Ana and Irene . Last week we were the stars and we were very nervous because we had to do a “Pechakucha” presentation, but… What is that?
Pechakucha is a presentation methodology in which 20 slides are shown for 20 seconds each (approx. 6' 40" in total), usually seen in a multiple-speaker event called a Pecha Kucha Night (PKN).
Last week was very hard, we had a lot of things to do and not enough time; so, it was very stressful. Finally, on Friday we did our presentation the best we could but we were very nervous. We had a problem with the power point and we had to present our work in the third position. In addition, we read a bit on the paper and we shouldn’t have done it. In general terms, we are happy with the result considering the little time we had to rehearse it and as nervous as we were. Consequently, we think that the time we devoted to this task worth the while.
We leave you here both, the video of the live presentation at the #SOyER12 at the UM and the one done with Knovio! programme. We hope you enjoy it and that you learn a lot with this project. It is not a waste of time.

http://go.knovio.com/watch/99cacbc5ff65468baa8220c4ac63ae2e?preview=true 

The Stars rehearsing!