Well, this was unexpected! Earlier this year, I was asked by the lovely team at Catholic Education SA’s Learning and Technology Team to present at an O365 networking day. I couldn’t – I was going to be on school camp! So, the wonderful Chris came to my school with a fancy computer and recording equipment, and we made some videos together. He put them onto Vimeo, and next thing, I was being asked over Skype by none other than Mike Tholfsen of the OneNote Hall of Fame to write a guest blog post or two. So I did! And, here it is, listed as Number 9 on the Top 10 top tech guides from educators for 2017! If this doesn’t encourage me to keep blogging, I don’t know what will! Thanks Microsoft!
Oh, and here are the links to the videos we made about OneNote. They’re looking a bit outdated – only a few short months later, but that’s technology for you. The ideas are still solid. Hope you enjoy.
When I first came across the idea of Mystery Skype, I thought it would be a fun experience. I didn’t truly appreciate what a fantastic learning experience it would be too! We did our first two Mystery Skypes during this year’s Skypeathon. To get started with Skype for the Classroom, you need to be a member of the Microsoft Education Community.
Use the free Mystery Skype OneNote from the website – it’s got great resources, and I could tweak them to my colourful, tabled heart’s content.
A few pointers that we picked up over the last two weeks of getting ready for our first Mystery Skype…
Play class vs teacher to help learners develop questions.
Play small team vs small team to build confidence (we did two-on-two).
Be clear about the different roles, and assign them early – this gave learners a chance to conduct research, print off resources and build team skills (lists of roles are included in the free Mystery Skype OneNote – seriously – download it!)
If possible, arrange to Skype with another class in the same school – to check the equipment.
Just dive in and do it already!
Learners experimenting with how to block out regions in response to answers.
I was so nervous when we connected with another school for the first time! But, it was amazing. The buzz in the room was electric, and everyone played their parts beautifully. The excitement as we got closer to discovering the other school’s location was wonderful. Everyone was so involved and engaged!
Found you!
I tried out Mystery Skype as part of Skypeathon – a fun, end of year experience for my learners. But, I will be including it as part of my Geography, Mathematics and English curriculums next year. We covered;
Northern and southern hemispheres
Continents
States and capitals of Australia
Major landforms and landmarks of Australia
Oceans of the world
Time zones
Compass directions
Flow charts
Problem solving
Teamwork
ICT skills
Love how my students used flow charts to help them to plan initial questions.
We also learnt lovely snippets of information about the Mystery Locations – such as the Taj Mahal is in India, it doesn’t get very hot in New Zealand, ideas for asking different styles of clues and how to use visual and oral slips from Mystery Skypers to help us on our way.
You should have seen the ‘ooooo’ faces of the kids when our Mystery Skyper from India greeted us with, “Good morning!” It was 2pm our time!
The list goes on! There are a whole range of different Skype for the Classroom experiences available, including incursions and meetings with experts. I’m looking forward to trying them all out in 2018. My students are already asking me if we can have a class slumber party so we can Skype a country that’s normally asleep when we’re awake. I can’t wait!
