January rundown of the best posts

Porto | Lighthouse Atlantic ocean

photo: Veselin Malinov

http://photography.nationalgeographic.com/

Hello again from Porto, Portugal where I am months away from anything resembling warm weather. Rain, fast winds and huge storms on Atlantic ocean. 

Yes, Porto is a city open to the Atlantic ocean and huge storms are happening on the sea as you can see on the photo above.

http://www.nationallibrariesday.org.uk/

Before January  most popular posts, I would like to point the National Libraries Day 2014.

Tomorrow, Saturday 8 February 2014, is National Libraries Day. It rounds off a week’s worth of celebrations in school, college, university, workplace and public libraries across the UK

National Libraries Day shines a light on the people that provide access to knowledge in UK communities, workplaces, schools, colleges and Universities; librarians and information professionals. 

Every day they are improving literacy rates, connecting people with the information they need to succeed and helping to build a fair and prosperous society. 

So, get involved on National Libraries Day. Use the library events map to find out what libraries in your area are doing to celebrate National Libraries Day. Simply click on its Google Map to see what’s happening at a library near you.

And now, here are January's most popular posts:

To MOOC or not to MOOC! And what about SPOCs?

Apps for Educatipn: Touch Van Gogh

Comics in Education

First inGenious Competition for Schools : STEM

Éducation: Appli BnF

Education: Sciences on Mars

Education: Dian Fossey, a great woman in the mist

Education: The Book Thief and the Holocaust

I kept the order of the most viewed, but eliminated the posts that seemed less relevant. The main reason is that sometimes certain posts acquire too much visibility, not for their value but for the keywords that the search engines "like" indexing. 

As the last post of the selection is about books, I would like to finish this post, returning on libraries. I love libraries. 

Did you know that Portugal have two of the most beautiful libraries in the word?

University of Coimbra, General Libary

http://www.bestvalueschools.com/

The University of Coimbra General Library, Coimbra, Portugal and Mafra National Palace Library, Mafra, Portugal

Mafra National Palace Library

http://www.bestvalueschools.com/

“In the 21st century libraries are more necessary than ever. We are in the middle of an information revolution and librarians and information professionals are central to it. Their contribution to society is immense and wide-ranging and includes helping people to find work, supporting the government’s digital by default agenda, improving literacy and encouraging reading for pleasure."

Phil Bradley, CLIP President

G-Souto

07.02.2014
Copyright © 2014G-Souto'sBlog, gsouto-digitalteacher.blogspot.com®


January rundown of the best posts by G-Souto is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

First InGenious Competition for Schools: STEM

http://www.eun.org/

Are you a curious and innovative teacher? Have you creative students?  So InGenious is for you.

http://www.womenandtechnology.eu/

inGenious, the European platform in STEM education, is looking "for teachers from the European Union, FYROM, Switzerland and Turkey, and from all disciplines, to be rewarded."

You have some days left to enter the competition, 31 January 2014, by presenting activities you have implemented in your class to help pupils understand the role played by STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) in our lives and the career opportunities that STEM skills can open.

http://files.eun.org/

The inGenious competition aims to raise pupils’ awareness of STEM studies and careers, by exploring innovative sectors, breaking down stereotypes, addressing tomorrow's challenges, and understanding how we can make a difference. 

Where is is taking place:

This competition is for any and every motivated primary and secondary level teacher from either of the European member states, Israel and Turkey. 

What is it about: 

inGenious is looking for creative individuals that have a real passion to inspire and prepare students for innovative and highly recognized paths and careers in science, technology, engineering and maths.

Teachers are asked to help pupils find the link between their passions, such as mobile technologies, robotics or space exploration, and obtaining the necessary skills to reach career paths in these domains.

• Teach and inspire by conducting thought-provoking lessons, activities in class, takling issues around false stereotypes, understanding which skills lead to which opportunities, and talking about the many attractions towards high level STEM sector jobs;   
• Reach out and Discover by inviting experts, visiting a factory, testing industry practices, conducting role plays;
• Show and tell by creating high quality materials and resources that can be shared in classrooms across borders, make the experience fun and interactive.

"Explain what you have done, and why other colleagues from across Europe may find it useful and should apply it in their class, and get rewarded: you will be invited in Brussels for the European Award ceremony award and a science workshop."

The competition was launched in September 2013 and the deadline is 31 January 2014. 

Important information: 

Only activities conducted between this time-frame will be considered eligible. However, teachers will still be able to submit their entries throughout the month of February.

How to apply:

Visit Guidelines, Terms and Conditions here

Important: Download the inGenious Competition Guidelines

To submit your entries go on My Entries here

In My entries, you will be able to access a private area to manage the submission of your competition entries! 

If you are looking for inspiration, check the inGenious resources. And now watch the video Ignite your Future below:

Ignite Your Future is a video with supporting lesson plan series that challenges pupils directly to think about a future in a science related career. Ignite Your Future makes powerful connections between the innovations pupils enjoy, their school studies and STEM careers. 

Why participate?

There are many reasons to participate in the inGenious competition! 

• Earn the chance to be one of the 30 finalists to attend the Award Ceremony in Brussels 
• Earn the chance to win an invitation for the Science disseminators workshop
• Share and learn from like-minded teachers across Europe

Some thoughs:

I teach Humanities. And since 2000 I could understand the importance of technology in curricula. So I introduced ICT in my Languages lessons. It aimed to deliver high impact in building digital competences in Languages curricula. My students were very happy.

ICT enhanced learning in the classroom, formal education, and online, informal education.

It's interesting that I practiced flipped classroom on the time, but we didn't name it like this. After all pedagogy doesn't change so much, only the wordsto name it.

Now, we are talking a lot about STEM (technology, maths, science...) but the curricula students must take outside of the major, is still part of every degree. That we call General Education.

Students need Humanities as they need Arts in School Education. And of course STEM as well. Not only STEM.

The time is for STEM. However, Humanities, Arts and STEM must continue stand up together for a complete education.

" I may still have a conflict of interest in that I want my children and grandchildren and my students' children to get not simply a degree, but a basic and substantive education. They are growing fast, and this rehabilitation is long past due."

J. W. Powell

You are a STEM educator? Go on and show your creativity with your students and apply to InGenious competition!

G-Souto

24.01.2014
Copyright © 2014G-Souto'sBlog, gsouto-digitalteacher.blogspot.com®

First InGenious Competition for Schools: STEM by G-Souto is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.