The next network IWB meeting will be held on Wednesday, 15th October 2008, at 3.45pm – 5pm.

The meeting will be at The Gallery, Mt Druitt District Office, unless any network schools have an interactive whiteboard and would like to invite the network.

Please email or phone Michelle Du Ross-Smith, Relieving PSP Consultant, to confirm you are able to attend the meeting.

If you’re finding the concept of “signing up” to edublogs a bit daunting, Scan editor Cath Keane developed this simple visual pathfinder for how to sign up:
http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/raps/identity08/pdf/signrapblog.doc

I tried emailing invitations from this site to everyone in the group, but the messages bounced back – unless you’d already signed up to Edublogs.

Regards, Ian

Penrith PS

To join the actual rap, go to http://www.schools.nsw.edu.au/raps/beijingolympics/index.htm and follow the prompts. The rap blog itself, where you enter your class responses, is over at http://rapblog3.edublogs.org/

There’s still time to join, do jointly-constructed introductions and then Rap Point 1.

I’ve also been asked about one of my school’s Stage 1 teachers’ “Cranky the crocodile” project. This is like a “Travel buddies” set-up, but just for the one class to share. Cranky is a stuffed class mascot/puppet, who goes home with a different selected student each weekend. That child is responsible for documenting the adventure with photos, stories, drawings and small, flat souvenirs (such as cinema ticket stubs).

The teacher took Cranky home the first weekend, then Cranky went home with the most able students first, so there were some good model examples in the first few pages of scrapbook. This set a high standard.

Another school ran a “Travel buddies” project to complement the NSW DET’s “Possum Magic” book rap a few years ago. Grandma Poss and Hush – and their bicycle! – were posted off to numerous schools who’d signed up, and Grandma Poss collected photos, postcards, souvenirs and diary entries along the way.

Details on “Travel Buddies” is at http://www.oz-teachernet.edu.au/projects/tb

When all our schools have their IWBs, I’d love to do something similar and maybe send a stuffed animal from school to school. I have a great flying fox toy the students have named Phoenix. currently, he’s helping the Stage 2 students with the new rap.

Here’s the wiki page we’ve set up.