Distance Learning Resources
With the movement to distance learning by many schools due to the rapid spread of Covid19 I put together a collection of resources to support educators wherever they are The First is Google Classroom 101 And one looking at using Google Classroom …. Read More
Distance learning Hangouts
Check out the info at https://sites.google.com/stevesmith.org.nz/ for links to some ideas around distance learning. These will focus on the teaching side of things and demo how to use different learning tools remotely.
The Aotearoa History Show
The Aotearoa History show for NZ teachers
Design Thinking and Social Action
This year I have been looking at Design thinking from a few different angles. Via building structures to solve a problem, Using Scratch coding to design an outcome or planning a program of learning for our students. At the recent Social Sciences …. Read More
New Zealand – The Future of the Classroom report
This report is part of a series on the evolution of education and maps out current and emerging trends in classroom education. In collaboration with a research partner Canvas8, Google conducted a global analysis spanning: ● Fourteen expert interviews with global and …. Read More
When a good idea is still a good idea
Three years ago we embarked on a vertical form class structure at school to encourage interaction between age groups rather than the older style of Horizontal homogenous form classes. To complement this move we instigated a 30 min time where the class …. Read More
How far does a tweet travel in a day ?
As a task in my Ib Geo class, I sent a tweet out to ask people to tweet back where they read the tweet. (idea from Matt Podbury aka geographypods) The map of the results was really interesting. As it was tagged …. Read More
Being a ‘Lone Nut’
The other day I watched a great Ted Talk by Derek Sivers that can be seen here. I stumbled upon it after watching a couple of Simon Sinek’s talks about why we do what we do. I watched Sivers’ talk a couple …. Read More
Canterbury Workshop
In the April Holidays, after I presented at the Edtechteam Summit, I facilitated a workshop on Using Google Geo Tools for the Canterbury Geography Teachers. We worked through how they could transform the learning for their students with the appropriate use of …. Read More
Google Geo Tools Workshop
On Friday 14th June 20 Geo teachers from around New Zealand attended a workshop I hosted looking at developments and product updates for the Google Geo Tools. We were lucky enought to have Dr John Bailey from Google Earth Education with us …. Read More