Intercultural understanding

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Technology as if people and planet mattered

Technology saving millions of lives.

As simple as a smoke extraction system?

Over four million people die each year after inhaling smoke from kitchen stoves and fires.

Most victims are women and young children. But these are deaths that could be prevented – using simple solutions.  

Have you been looking for authentic content?

Technology as if people and planet mattered – catchy title? I was hooked…

Who would have ever known that the world of Technology was so HUGE!  It’s not really enough to write just one or two blog posts for a university assignment, to reflect the distraction that all this new information has inflicted on my days.

With a strong passion for justice and equity I am thankful for the Australian Curriculum, General Capabilities for giving me permission to incorporate Ethical Understanding, Intercultural Understanding, Personal & Social capability and Creative and Critical thinking into my professional life as a teacher. Whilst I am thanking the Australian Curriculum, let’s say YAY!! for the Cross-Curricular Priority of Sustainability.

If you are looking to broaden your perspectives on Technology and its uses, check out this website. http://practicalaction.org

“Practical Action is an international non-governmental organisation (NGO) that uses technology to challenge poverty in developing countries.

We find out what people are doing and help them to do it better. Through technology we enable poor communities to build on their skills and knowledge to produce sustainable and practical solutions- transforming their lives forever and protecting the world around them”.

Subject:                 Design and Technologies

Year Level:          Teachers of all year levels

Strand:                  Knowledge and understanding 

Sub strand:         Technologies and society

Technologies contexts

  1. Engineering principles and systems,
  2. Food and fibre production
  3. Food specialisations
  4. Materials and technologies specialisations

Strand: Processes and production skill

Sub strand: CREATE SOLUTIONS

  1. Investigating and defining
  2. Designing
  3. Producing and implementing
  4. Evaluating
  5. Collaborating and managing

Using this resource…

Build your content knowledge and be supported with ready-made resources.

Practical Action is just one of many organisations promoting the positive use of technologies in developing countries. It offers many ideas and resources to use as inspiration for your technologies content. A free book (link below) on the subject of social justice is also available through their website. Supporting power point presentations and resources from Practical Action can be found on the TES website.

https://www.tes.com/member/PracticalAction

“A powerful new book sets out the need for looking at technology from human and environmental perspectives, and how to change the status quo”.

http://practicalaction.org/rethink-retool-reboot

Free download of the book at this address

http://www.developmentbookshelf.com/doi/book/10.3362/9781780449043

An article on Technology perspectives from Simon Trace – author of Rethink, Retool, Reboot

https://www.eiuperspectives.economist.com/simon-trace

 

Did you know?

‘that burning an open fire in your kitchen is like burning 400 cigarettes an hour”

Dr Kirk Smith – Professor of Global Environmental Health.

BE CHALLENGED AND BE INSPIRED

 

 

                                            

 

 

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‘Scratch’ – A Resource for Teaching Technologies in Primary Education

Scratch

“With Scratch, you can program your own interactive stories, games, and animations — and share your creations with others in the online community. Scratch helps young people learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively — essential skills for life in the 21st century. Scratch is a project of the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab. It is provided free of charge.”- (Scratch.mit.edu, 2016)

“The ability to code computer programs is an important part of literacy in today’s society. When people learn to code in Scratch, they learn important strategies for solving problems, designing projects, and communicating ideas.” (Scratch.mit.edu, 2016).

Scratch Overview from ScratchEd on Vimeo.

 

So how does this fit in with the Western Australian Curriculum?
Scratch can be used in a variety of ways to target the specific curriculum requirements of each year level. Below is an example for a Year 4 classroom.

Activity Idea
Year Level: Year 4
Learning Area: Technology
Subject: Digital Technologies
Strands: Knowledge & Understanding
– How data are represented and structured symbolically

Processes & Production Skills
– investigating and defining
– designing
– producing and implementing
– collaborating and managing

(K10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au, 2015)

Students can have the opportunity to create their own interactive story using this digital technology. Whilst this program is targeted for children aged between 8 and 16, students of all ages have the opportunity to use this technology to engage in computational and design thinking.

Students have the opportunity to express their own personal creativity through designing their own interactive story using Scratch. The students use the selection of different coding in order to process an animation that creates their desired image. In doing so, students begin to understand computational thinking and how the codes influence the movement and sounds presented by their created character and setting. The students also have the opportunity to work collaboratively with other students to create an interactive story.

This activity targets the following Year 4 Technologies Western Australian Curriculum links:
– Data is represented using codes (ACTDIK015)
– Collect, store and present different types of data for a specific purpose using software (ACTDIP016)
– Design, follow and represent diagrammatically, a simple sequence of steps (algorithm), involving branching (decisions) and iteration (repetition) (ACTDIP019)
– Implement and use simple programming environments that include branching (decisions) and iteration (repetition) (ACTDIP020)

Please Note: This activity is easily adaptable to a variety of year levels. Follow the link below to view the Digital Technologies curriculum to see how you can incorporate this activity into other year levels.

http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/p-10-curriculum/curriculum-browser/technologies/digital-technologies2

Cross-Curriculum Priorities
This activity is also a great opportunity to target the cross-curriculum priority of sustainability.
As your students are creating an interactive story, you may ask them to identify an environmental problem giving prime consideration to sustainability. Students can then critique the problem, and create a solution through their interactive story designed on Scratch.

General Capabilities covered:
Through this digital resource, you can adapt these lessons to cover all of the general capabilities set out in the Digital Technologies Curriculum.
– Literacy
– Numeracy
– Personal and Social Capabilities
– Information and Communication Technology
– Ethical Understanding
– Intercultural Understanding
Critical and Creative Thinking

 

 

Reference List

K10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au,. (2015). k10outline – Organisation. Retrieved 8 January 2016, from http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/p-10-curriculum/curriculum-browser/technologies/digital-technologies2/technologies-overview/organisation

Scratch.mit.edu,. (2016). Scratch – About. Retrieved 8 January 2016, from https://scratch.mit.edu/about/

 

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iMovie

iMovie App Logo_Fotor

iMovie is a video editing software application created by Apple and comes pre-installed on Mac computers and iOS devices.

It is an incredible application, which provides basic, ‘no-frills’ editing tools to put together a movie from a set of video clips. You are able to import video footage using either the FireWire interface on most MiniDV format digital video cameras or the computers USB port. iMovie can also import video and photo files from a hard drive. You are able to edit the photos and video clips and add titles, themes, music and effects, including basic colour correction and video enhancement tools and transitions such as fades and slides.

Students can share and publish finished iMovie projects as movies to any number of social media platforms including YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, or through iTunes.

Subject: Technologies

Strand: Digital Technologies – Processes and Production Skills

Sub-Strand:

  • Collecting, managing and analysing data
  • Digital implementation
  • Designing
  • Producing and implementing
  • Collaborating and managing

Year level: Year one to Year six

Cross-curriculum priorities and General Capabilities:

  • Literacy;
  • Information and Communication Technology;
  • Critical and Creative Thinking;
  • Personal and Social Capability;
  • Ethical understanding; and
  • Intercultural understanding.

Links to other learning areas:

  • English;
  • Science;
  • The Arts;
  • Humanities and Social Sciences;
  • Health and Physical Education; and
  • Mathematics. 

How to use this resource:

For a great iMovie tutorial, visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vbzDXk4vKk

Another fantastic way to use iMovie, is to record yourself reading a text and then insert your recording into iMovie. If you have students with hearing difficulties, you can import a video of yourself (or someone else) signing! A great YouTube demonstration on how to do this can be found at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60RqTYp4xhQ&feature=youtu.be

 

References:

ACARA. (2015). Australian Curriculum. Retrieved from http://v7-5.australiancurriculum.edu.au

Apple Inc. (2015). iMovie for iOS – Apple (AU). Retrieved from http://www.apple.com/au/ios/imovie/

Bove, T., & Rhodes, C. (n.d.). Knowing What You Can Do with iMovie – For Dummies. Retrieved from http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/knowing-what-you-can-do-with-imovie.html

IPad Teachers. (2015). Add Sign Language Videos using iMovie on iPad. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60RqTYp4xhQ&feature=youtu.be

SCSA. (2014). Digital Technologies. Retrieved from http://k10outline.scsa.wa.edu.au/home/p-10-curriculum/curriculum-     browser/technologies/digital-technologies2

Ultimate YouTube Resource. (2013). iMovie: Tutorial For Beginners. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vbzDXk4vKk

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Behind The News (B.T.N.)

Behind the News – B.T.N.

 

Year Levels: 4-7 (This blog will focus on Year 6)

Subject:  Digital technology

Strand: Digital Technologies: Processes and Production Skills

Sub-strands:

COLLECTING, MANAGING AND ANALYSING DATA

Collect, sort, interpret and visually present different types of data using software to manipulate data for a range of purposes (ACTDIP016)

DIGITAL IMPLEMENTATION

Implement digital solutions as simple visual programs involving branching, iteration (repetition), and user input (ACTDIP020)

COLLABORATING AND MANAGING

Work collaboratively considering resources and safety, to plan, publish and manage projects, including sequenced steps

Link to the website/resource: http://www.abc.net.au/btn/

Cross-curricular priorities and general capabilities covered using B.T.N. in the classroom: 

  • Literacy
  • Numeracy
  • Information and communication technology (ICT)
  • Ethical understanding
  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
  • Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
  • Sustainability
  • Personal and social capability
  • Inter-cultural understanding

Links to learning areas: English, Mathematics, H.A.S.S.

B.T.N. in the classroom:

Behind The News (B.T.N.) is a long-running news program broadcast on Australia’s ABC TV network made in Adelaide and aimed at school-aged children (8–13 years of age). B.T.N. is aimed at upper primary to lower secondary aged students with the goal of helping them understand current issues and events in their world.

B.T.N. explores major news events using the language, music and popular culture of young people. The program explains the concepts that underpin the issues and events, while also providing background information that puts current affairs into context. B.T.N. also covers kids’ issues that are often overlooked by mainstream media, and makes use of online resources including streaming video of B.T.N. stories, study materials for teachers and additional information and activities for students. B.T.N. explains news items in a fun, simplistic way that is easy to understand.

Many schools allow students to watch it on a regular basis in the hope that it will give them an insight into politics, current affairs, sport and various other topics, this promotes the improvement of each students’ civics and citizenship.

Students in my previous school created their own short version of B.T.N. which was filmed by the students, then posted to the school’s shared folder, so teachers could show the short videos to every classroom prior to recess. The students would cover topics of;

– Daily school life

– Weather

– Upcoming events

– Student Birthdays

– Often ending with a silly joke just for fun.

Each week two new students would take the role of being news anchors, each getting the opportunity to put their own personality into their reports.

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From Paddock to Plate Schools Program

Subject:   Design and Technologies  images (1)

Year Level: 3-4 (can be used across all year levels)

Strand: Design and Technologies knowledge and understanding

Sub Strand: Food and Fibre Production

4.3 Recognise the contribution food and fibre production and food technologies make to modern and traditional societies

Link to Resource: www.frompaddocktoplate.com.au

Description: Founded by Louise Fitzroy, From Paddock to Plate Schools Program was created to give children the opportunity to make more informed and healthy food choices. In this program students learn about the origins of the food they eat and the importance of supporting those who produce it. The program is an easy-to-use multi-media resource that focuses on a variety of foods, producers and agricultural hubs, each accompanied by corresponding worksheets and follow on activities for your students.

Click on the link below to hear Louise Fitzroy tell us more about the Schools Programs

//soundcloud.com/fitzroyl8b/from-paddock-to-plate-schools

Cross Curricular Priorities and General Capabilities: Literacy; Numeracy; Intercultural Understanding; Ethical Understanding; Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia

Links to other learning areas: Mathematics, Science, English, Health and Physical Education

 Suggested Classroom Activity for Resource:

This resource enables teachers to adapt the program to cater for differing year levels and abilities. A suggested activity could be focusing on one product per week of the eight part series (honey; eggs; wheat; cherries; fish; vegetables; milk; grass-fed beef). For example, the students watch the video about honey; learn about where it comes from and why it is important. After a class discussion they can complete the corresponding activities from the Paddock to Plate program. An extension of this would be using the featured product to make food for students to sell to the rest of the school. At the end of each week the students could create a stall to sell their produce and also provide information about the process it went through to become said product. Students can be broken into groups; taking turns each week to be in charge of a certain product. This resource allows for many cross-curricular links including Mathematics as the students learn to buy and sell with real money.

Watch the YouTube Video below:

 A great resource to get adults and children thinking about the produce they buy at the supermarket and how it got there; an insight into the journey of from paddock to plate.

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BTN- Behind the News

Subject:  Digital technology

Year Level: 4-7

Strand: Digital Technologies Processes and Production Skills

Sub-strand:  Implement simple digital solutions as visual programs with algorithms involving branching (decisions) and user input (ACTDIP011)

Implement digital solutions as simple visual programs involving branching, iteration (repetition), and user input (ACTDIP020)

Link to the resource: http://www.abc.net.au/btn/

Cross curricular priorities and general capabilities: 

  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
  • Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
  • Sustainability
  • Literacy
  • Numeracy
  • Information and communication technology (ICT)
  • Personal and social capability
  • Ethical understanding
  • Inter-cultural understanding

Links to learning areas: English, Humanities, Society.

A classroom activity using this resource:

This resource is great for getting students to find out what is happening all around the world; there is a weekly news video posted pitched to the younger generation. This helps open students minds to the world around them, making them think and become aware of worldwide issues. Students can watch BTN as a whole class or individually, then answer and discuss the topics being raised.

BTN is on a variety of social media sites and therefore students can use these to discuss topics with others and find out further information. The website holds weekly polls where the results are shown in the next weeks addition, this gets students voicing their opinion safely on-line, as well as seeing the perspectives of others around the world. There is a weekly live Q&A session which students can also participate in, this would involve students searching the website and opening other links from the site in order to further their knowledge. If there is a particular topic students are interested in they can then do some research on-line and then share this information with the rest of the class.

This is an amazing resource to get students voicing their opinions in a variety of ways, and to gain interest in the news and the world around them.

How to use this resource:

  • Go the the website http://www.abc.net.au/btn/
  • Follow the links provided on the page
  • Explore and interact with a variety of interesting and engaging activities
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3rd World Farmer

Resource: 3rd World Farmer

3rd
Description: 3rd World Farmer is an interactive game where you must make decisions on how best to manage a farm based in a third world country. The user must make decisions on how to best spend their money to build their farm with no knowledge of what disasters await. There are multiple strategies that can be used to yield the best return for your investment and there is no one right way to achieve success.

Subject: Technologies
Strand: Design and Technologies
Sub-Strand: Design and Technologies Processes and Production Skills

Negotiate criteria for success that include consideration of sustainability to evaluate design ideas, processes and solutions (ACTDEP027)
Year Levels: 5-6

Link to Resource: http://3rdworldfarmer.com/

Cross-Curriculum Priorities: Sustainability.

General Capabilities: Literacy, Numeracy, Information and Communication Technology Capabilities (ICT), Critical and Creating thinking, Personal and Social Capabilities Ethical Understandings and Intercultural Understandings.

Links to other Learning Areas: Mathematics, Humanities and Social Sciences.

Review: I believe this game could be used effectively in the classroom as it not only activates students critical thinking skills, it is also a platform to begin open ended discussions about ethical and intercultural problems within our global community. Students are also forced to make critical decisions with no knowledge of the eventual outcomes. This encourages students to reflect on any failures and informs their future thinking.

There is also a range of mathematics embedded throughout the game. This may appeal to gifted and talented students as mathematical understanding can be used to gain small advantages during the game. This game appears to have strong links to Facebook so teachers need to follow teaching standard 4.5 (Use ICT safely, responsibly and ethically) appropriately when using this resource.

Screenshots:

3rd2
References:
Australiancurriculum.edu.au,. (2015). Home – The Australian Curriculum v7.5. Retrieved 10 August 2015, from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/

3rdworldfarmer.com,. (2015). 3rd World Farmer: A simulation to make you think.. Retrieved 10 August 2015, from http://3rdworldfarmer.com/

 

 

 

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Poultry Hub

TEACHERS RESOURCE KIT

TEACHERS RESOURCE KIT


RESOURCE: POULTRY HUB

Subject: Design and Technologies

Year Level: Year3-4

Strand: Design and Technologies Knowledge and Understanding

Sub strand: Investigate food and fibre production and food technologies used in modern and traditional societies (ACTDEK012)

Elaborations:

  • exploring tools, equipment and procedures to improve plant and animal production, for example when growing vegetables in the school garden and producing plant and animal environments such as a greenhouse, animal housing, safe bird shelters
  • describing ideal conditions for successful plant and animal production including how climate and soils affect production and availability of foods, for example Aboriginal seasons and food availability

Link to the resource: http://www.poultryhub.org/education/primary-secondary-schools/

Cross curriculum priorities and general capabilities: Critical and Creative Thinking, Literacy, Intercultural Understanding, Numeracy, Sustainability and Personal and Social Capability

Links to other learning areas: English, Science and Geography 

About the resource:

Poultry Hub is an informational resource package that is designed for both teachers and students in either a primary or secondary setting. The Teachers Resource Kit contains a range of worksheets, presentations, suggested experiments, videos, books and further resources that can be accessed online.

This highly educational resource links directly to a number of year levels and specific sub strands in the Australian Curriculum. The information provided in the resource kit promotes and stimulates individual thinking that allows the each student to develop their own informed opinion regarding a number of topics explored, for example: the types of eggs they would purchase at the supermarket.

How to use this resource/ An activity using this resource:
Explore the theme ‘Journey of the egg: Farm to shop’ that allows the students to discover how eggs are produced, processed and packaged and then placed in supermarkets for customers to purchase. This activity will allow students to learn the steps of each process that contributes to the overall production process. Select from the resource kit the book “The Story of Eggs”, which takes students onto Australian egg farms where they are able to learn more about the process of farming chickens, as well as the equipment and tools used to package eggs. The Egg Resource Kit includes a number of sequential ready-to-use lesson plans, activities and resource sheets.

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Puppet Pals App

Puppet pals

Image courtesy of Google Images

Resource: Puppet Pals

Subject: Design and Technologies

Strand: Knowledge and Understanding Technologies contexts

  •        technologies and design across a range of technologies context.

Year: 2-4

Content Description: 

Elaborations:  

  • exploring, playing with and testing materials for their appropriateness,
  • investigating materials, components, tools and equipment, including by using digital technologies, to discover their characteristics and properties, how they can be used more sustainably and their impact in the future,
  • developing new meanings for objects and action during play,

Links to other learning areas: English, Humanities and Social Sciences, The Arts, Science

Cross Curriculum Priorities: 

  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures
  • Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
  • Sustainability

General Capabilities: 

  • Literacy
  • Information and communication technology (ICT) capability
  • Critical and creative thinking
  • Personal and social capability
  • Ethical understanding
  • Intercultural understanding.

Resource Link: https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/puppet-pals-hd/id342076546?mt=8

Description: This is an interactive app available for ipod touch, iphone or ipad. The app is free however, you are able to purchase add ons. You are able to create and tell a story through design and creation. Students are able to choose backdrops, use characters and record their own voice to tell the story. To be really creative, they can even upload their own photos for backdrops or crop/cut the photo for characters. This is a fantastic app to create your own story or retell an old one. Upon completion of their stories they can be published or uploaded to the interactive whiteboard for viewing. This app is fantastic for both an individual activity or collaborative work.

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Toonatastic

Screen Shot 2015-08-09 at 11.54.38 pmSubject: Digital Technologies

Year level: 3-4

Strand: Digital Technologies Processes and Production Skills

Sub strand: Creating and Interacting Online

4.7 Manage the creation, sharing and exchange of information with known audiences and apply agreed social protocols to protect people when communicating online

Link to the resource:

https://itunes.apple.com/au/app/toontastic/id404693282?mt=8

Cross curriculum priorities and general capabilities:

  • Literacy
  • Information and communication technology capability (ICT)
  • Critical and Creative Thinking
  • Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Histories and Cultures
  • Intercultural Understanding
  • Ethical Understanding

Links to other learning areas:

  • English
  • Science
  • History and Geography

Classroom activity using this resource:

A creative story telling app that allows students to express their ideas, knowledge and understanding on any topic by using drawings, animations and voice recording.

Students can create their own movie of “A day in the life of…” to demonstrate their understanding of the European families, children, convicts, Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islanders or free settlers during the colonisation of Australia.

Students will then be given an iPad to create their movie which includes:

  • Hundreds of characters and backgrounds
  • Special FX
  • Voice recording (so students can narrate their story)
  • Camera (students can take a photo of themselves to personalise their movie)
  • ProtoToys (allows students to draw their own animated characters)

Movies can then be exported to then be watched on the IWB as a class. Students will love watching their own and classmates movies.

Screen Shot 2015-08-09 at 11.54.32 pm

How to use this resource:

A class set of iPad’s is required.

  1. Download the application from the apple app store (free app).
  2. Share to iPad’s.
  3. Students click on the app symbol on the main menu.
  4. Click start.
  5. Students are able to apply backgrounds and characters by using the prompts.
  6. Apply voice by using the record function displayed on the menu.
  7. Animate characters.
  8. Export.

Screen Shot 2015-08-09 at 11.53.46 pm

 

Screen Shot 2015-08-09 at 11.54.12 pm