June 2014
Here we are in early June already as the year marches on! Thank you so much for your regular support of e-classroom. You’ll notice that our resource bank of CAPS-related worksheets and lesson plans on our website https://e-classroom.co.za is growing daily and we thank our many sponsors for making this possible.
So much is happening technology-wise right here in South Africa. In a post on Twitter recently I read about the ‘Tshwane Free Wi-Fi Project‘ http://goo.gl/0FqIdz The City of Tshwane is the first metro department in South Africa to offer free Wi-Fi in public spaces. I also saw in a report that DBE and DOC have partnered with Telkom to rollout the 2010 FIFA World Cup Legacy E-Connectivity Project in Schools. We are getting to that fork on the road where we choose either to inject technology into the learning process or not, and if we choose the latter we are really missing out.
The future of learning involves embracing technologies such as cloud computing. This will most likely continue to change many aspects of our society, particularly education. Learning resources stored in the cloud means no more lugging heavy textbooks to school and includes having constant access to education materials.
At e-classroom we are endeavouring to keep up with the times and bring you new technologies to consider. We have recently partnered with MindMeister, global leader in education, to bring mind mapping to schools. Mind maps are a helpful tool for students to organize ideas and understand concepts better. Mind mapping allows for rational processing, in particular for students that may not be process inclined, but visually oriented. If you would like a free 30 day Trial for your school or to use at home contact [email protected]. MindMeister is very favourably priced for education – R100 per student per annum if the school buys 20 licences.
I would like to urge you to consider registering for the not-to-be-missed Google in Education Summit that is taking place at Dainfern College in Johannesburg in July: http://za.gafesummit.com/. These summits are held all over the world every week and are instrumental in getting teachers well-versed in the potential of using Google’s myriad of free technologies in the classroom.
There is another ICT conference taking place at Wynberg Girls High School from 07-09 October, namely the Innovate 2014 ICT Conference for Teachers which is a biennial conference run by e-schools’ Network. The Conference website is www.conf2014.school.za and currently they are calling for presenters. Read more at http://goo.gl/oJv0jR.
Microsoft has changed the name of its Partners in Learning Network for teachers to the Microsoft Educators Network http://www.pil-network.com/. They are on a big drive currently to encourage teachers to join this network (free) and partake of all its wonderful free resources and lessons for teachers.
We would like to thank our recent sponsors:
In closing, we encourage you to keep looking at our competitions page – these are renewed all the time. The Old Mutual ‘Tell me your dream and win’ competition. Entry details are available on their http://dogreatthings.co.za/education/ website and our competition page: https://e-classroom.co.za/old-mutual-dream-competition/ where scholars can win R 5000.00 and R 10 000.00 for their school. Faber-Castell have a lovely “learn to draw” competition for the foundation phase learners which can be downloaded from https://e-classroom.co.za/competitions/
Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and subscribe to our Facebook page.
Until next time.
Serving you in education,
Natalie