Reward Yourself

Getting through your classes in an online environment requires personal strategies that help you to get things done. Setting short term goals and rewarding yourself for getting there is a way of motivating yourself. On Thursday afternoon we were testing a mobile wireless connection with a laptop for a school web conference. We connected a webcam to a laptop, logged into the school assembly room, and participated in the discussion from our car. We started in Air Ronge, drove around La Ronge and eventually ended up at the Transwest Air water base to ask people about how they motivate themselves to get things done. Online students from different locations in Northern Saskatchewan were participants in the chat. This is an excerpt from our adventure.
Many thanks to Ken for speaking with us.
Click here to watch. ( length: 7 minutes and 43 seconds)

The Last Ride

We don't often see horses here in La Ronge. This man from North Battleford is in La Ronge taking a six week heavy equipment training course. (The heavy equipment school does the majority of their training on simulators in a shop a stone's throw behind the online school location). The owner keeps the horses out at the golf course, and decided to ride them into town today.
These horses are being trained to pull a magnificent horse drawn hearse. His new business will be called "The Last Ride".

Looking at blog engines

Here are two new experimental blogs:

Write Connection was created for sharing and responding to writing in English Language Arts A10, B10 and ELA 20. created at: edublogs.org

e-learning reflections was created for sharing ideas about learning and technology. (wordpress.com)

Both of these blogs are experimental. I am interested in exploring interactive spaces that are easy to set up, low maintenance, free, without ads.

Indispensible ICT Tools for Teachers

Need a new tool? Here are over 100!

The following list of ICT tools was crowd sourced from individual educationalists and not companies when the question 'What Indispensable ICT tools do you use in education' was asked and is not meant to be exhaustive in any way.

This particular wiki was created by Drew Buddie.

http://indispensibletools.pbworks.com/

Almost all FREE!

edcentre.ca rocks!

Why publish student work?

Sharing ideas, thoughts and inspiration and learning are all part of what this big world is all about. I found this posting somehow through Twitter and it inspired me again. Learning should be shared. If we do a lot of "dummy runs" for the teacher in the traditional classroom paradigm of schooling.
Go this this link and watch the video when you feel like you need to smile from the inside out.
http://educationaltechnology.ca/couros/1603

Congratulations!

Congratulations Aaron Mckenze!!

Aaron received the Northlands College Achievement Award at the awards ceremony held in La Ronge on Friday, May 22.

Golf is one of my favourite summertime activities. Golf is big business and many people enjoy the sport. So where do you golf? I like to try different courses and one of the places that I get information on golf deals and stay and play packages is from the online site: Saskgolfers.com. This site lists pretty much all Saskatchewan golf courses and has articles on golf.
While Saskgolfers has not really improved my golf score, I recommend subscribing to the email newsletter or bookmarking this site to anyone interested in golf.
http://saskgolfer.com

The Essay: Is this girl crazy?

Wordle

A Friday morning "wordle" for edcentre.ca created in less than five minutes. You can make one and share it with your friends. It's fun, and it could be useful if you are creating a poster to illustrate almost any topic.
http://www.wordle.net/

Don't like the weather ...

... just wait a couple of days. This picture was taken Tuesday, May 19th. Today (3 day later) we are expecting a high of 14 degrees. Tomorrow will be 19. Only 30 day until the 1st day of summer!

Bubble Mystery

This photograph was captured last Monday. The bay is still not free of ice, so the water temperature is likely just above the freezing mark.
The mysterious thing about this is that there are no other similar bubbles in the immediate area, and there is a bug inside the bubble. (I had a look at a separate image at high resolution to confirm this.)

Childhood ends when we are no longer astonished by the world around us.
-Ianesco

Please leave a comment.

Social Networking

This is about the shift in the way we are connecting. Things are changing quickly. I stumbled across this chat about an hour after it happened. Some edcentre.ca folks will recognize the presenter, and maybe recognize the voice of the other teacher in the room.
Are our relationships and the way we connect changing through social networks? How can we use social networks to learn and grow? What cautions are important to remember about relationships through social networks? What are the values in connecting through social networks?

What is the twitter all about?

I just read a Blog post titled, 10 Things Teachers Should Know to Get Started with Twitter . Even if you are not a busy teacher trying a keep your life balanced, this is a pretty good introduction to how Twitter might be used.
It would be interesting to know how many edcentre.ca students are using Twitter. Please post a comment if you use Twitter and let us know how you are using it.

World of Teaching Powerpoints

Do you need a powerpoint to help you teach in one of your classes?
Do you have a resource that you would like to share with other teachers?
Check out worldofteaching.com.

Montreal River Sucker Run

Spring is officially here! The suckers are running in the Montreal River.
What signals Spring for you?

Student Profile

Colin King was in Desile on May 2 competing in archery. He has been shooting since he was in grade 4. He won a bronze medal in the Saskatchewan Summer Game and looks to make the team to compete in the next Canada Games.

Colin is a student from Dene High in La Loche. He will soon be finishing Math A30 online at edcentre.ca.

Want to win this netbook computer?
All you have to do is complete one of your courses that you are currently enrolled in at edcentre.ca and you automatically get your name put into the draw.
The draw date is at the end of June
So hurry and get you work done!!!!
This laptop could be yours!!!
Click here for the features of this great netbook!

A baby is cuddles and tickles on toes

The sweet scent of powder
And a kiss on the nose

Today we had a shower for Erin and Emmy
There was plenty of treats and Emmy got a

chance to meet everyone She is such a little cuttie
we all enjoyed meeting her today