Jay\’s Mutterings

last night I went onto QUT virtual to see if I could get to the readings for my second subject, (eventually I will learn their codes and names)
I managed to link to the readings and saved some so that I could print out and read in a cooler part of the house. By the time I saved those, read my emails etc I was feeling really tired and couldn’t keep my eyes open. I think it was the heat as yesterday was really hot, around 37 degrees and with all the stress over the bushfires etc in Victoria where my family are and watching the news and bauling my eyes out because of the tragic deaths of so many people in Victoria I was not up to reading. So I have better intentions tonight. Because of the heat I am not going linedancing tonight and so I will have an early night to get into the readings. I hope to go into Cyberlearnings and check out the wiki and blog etc before I go home because my internet connection at home is really slow. So less blogging and more surfing QUT Virtual

Despite my best intentions yesterday things didn’t go to plan. I went scrapbooking in the morning and left early so I could come home and get some study done. By the time I got home it was quite hot so I jumped in the pool to cool off and then turned on my computer and made myself a cup of coffee. I was just about to look at Animoto, suggested in class as it can create avetars etc, Kristen and Carine came in. They were just having lunch. They were supposed to be canoeing but it was too hot so they came a calling. I still had my phone on silent from the Orientation sessions so I didn’t hear their calls on my phone. They even tried to skype me but I wasn’t at my computer when they were trying.
So I talked for a while and Kristen wanted to play games or start a jigsaw. I asked how long they were staying and they said till tomorrow morning as they were canoeing at Lowood Sunday.
I told them that I was going on a very early motorcycle ride and was leaving home around 4:30am. No problems so I really didn’t get a chance to do any study.

This morning I woke up around 4:00 and quickly got dressed, had a hot lemon drink and 1 piece of toast then jumped on my bike. It was quite dark so I had to take a torch to see where my bike was etc. then the headlight doesn’t really stay on until you are doing around 10mph which is really too fast to negotiate the muddy and bumpy driveway. Normally my light is fine when I come home at dark for most of the trip down the drive but it wasn’t working all that well this morning. I managed to get up the drive and then on the road it was fine. I was expecting around 40 bikes but when I got to the service station there were around 160 bikes and 200 people. It was amazing. We all left at 5:00am and headed through Walloon to Aratula then across to Mt Alford and Rathdowney. At one stage I could see no bikes from Maroon dam to Rathdowney. When I arrived at Rathdowney most of the pack were parked and finally the last bunch came in as I was in the queue for the loo.

After a short stop we then headed to Beaudesert then across to the Cunningham highway then Roadvale, Rosevale, Harrisville then Warril View, Rosewood and finally to Laidley Cultural centre where we were given a goodies bag with a T-Shirt, water bottle, cap and keyring. we then lined up for breakfast. A welcome sight and plenty of food despite our fears as they were way more bikes and people turned up than was originally anticipated.

After breakfast and the fundraising auction, raffles etc., of which I won a Spyder pack which consisted of a cap, a polo shirt and a keyring holder. I headed off home.

Got back around 10:30 and I was really tired so I had a nap until my phone rang. It was Wendy and Tanya to say that Bethany has had her baby. 1:00am this morning. It was a boy Xander Samson. and all were well.
I was still a little sleepy but jumped into the pool and then when I was more awake I made a coffee and logged on to my computer.

I checked out Animoto and it wasn’t at all what I expected. It is a free service where you send in your pictures and they will put some music on to it and make a great slideshow to the music. That is all, nothing else. It is free if the movie is less than 30 seconds. otherwise you have to pay $3.00 per video made. No two movies are the same as you can get them to recreate the music etc and the photos are mixed up etc.

I then had a look at iSpring and downloaded my free copy to my external hard drive and my flashdisk. I was then going to start the program but I couldn’t find a powerpoint that has music and animation etc. ISpring will convert your powerpoint with music, voice, animation etc into a flash movie which is really what we want when we want to load powerpoints up into my.TAFE. I just didn’t have the energy to create a powerpoint with music and animation at this stage. I do have some at work so will wait till tomorrow.
Now I am going to tidy up my igoogle page and put in some links to QUT virtual and this blog from the one page.
That’s it for Sunday so far

Just thought I would put down some of the notes from the last couple of days as we had a 2 day orientation session at QUT
The Admin person that can sort out any problems that I have is Cian Rodgie phone 31383936

The library liaison person gave us a couple of links for msn if we need to contact her
qut_librian@hotmail.com (sometimes uses this one)
constancex90@hotmail.com (uses that more at home etc)
I can change my library profile and if I check the box to keep a history of what I have borrowed. This could be useful when referencing books or remembering what I have read etc. I will check it out a bit later.
Google Scholar is something I haven’t used but it can be found in my igoogle page under a blue menu called more>>
Google scholar is really good for referencing articles as well as EndNote. I think we have access to this at Bremer so it will be interesting to learn how to use this in more detail.

EDN610 Professional dialogues in education
two areas we are looking at. The first is looking at ourselves and what were the catylists for the changes in our lives and why we are doing what we are doing now.
Until you can lead you need to know how you got there. This topic is the first assignment. the lecture suggests that we don’t go too deep but some thoughts that came to me straight away were
change of schools
David’s influence
MLC
options – females/geology
maths – RMIT-Travel NZ
Computers family career, Richlands,

should try the personal style inventory by R Craig Hogan + David W Champagne

free software that converts Powerpoint to flash I-spring and it is free. Must tell Robyn as well.

One of the second semester units is EDM611 a research one.
We talked about Research is an organised and systematic way of finding answers to questions By organised we mean that research always has a definite sequence. Systematic means structured method, planned, focused. Finding answers means the reason for the research. Questions means the Central issues, provides focus and purpose. We will be looking at Research fallicies, ecological research where conclusions are made about individuals based on an analysis of group data. Also Exception fallacy where conclusions are made about a group based on exceptions or individual data.
Methods of acquiring knowledge.
Tenacity – based on superstition or habit
Intuition – based on a belief or faith
Authority – based on the strength of the source
Rationalism – based on logic and strength of reasoning
Empiricism – based on observation or experiment
Scientific – based on reality and repeatable proof
assignments in this subject can be uploaded rather than go through the Assignment minder (posting in )
CLN601 Cyberlearning
Weeks 1 – 3 general familiarisation of blackboard and using blogs and assignment upload. We also have to explore a new piece of software or technology, animoto (talking avetar – might be useful for me) or something like cloud computing.
We will be using a blog in blackboard and uploading our assignments into the blog. we will also be looking at a wiki to find out about each other and have discussions rather than the blackboard discussion board.
Assignments will be focued on “how does it work in a rpactical situation and How can I use this in my work”
we will also be doing some group work to develop a learning object this will be from week 3 – 9 This actually falls within the month that I am away in Tassie. Denise Morgan will alsob be away for those weeks as she is in New Zealand.

Digital Pedagogies
Michael, this was a litle disjointed and it didn’t help that a coupld of colleagues kept interjecting with trivial comments.
We will be looking at the policy that drives change within our organisations. things like enforcing blended learning with LMS’s etc.
There were other things that Micheal was talking about but I wasnt taking too many notes and unfortunately I have forgotten for the moment. Just as well this unit is in second semester so I can go over it again.

There were a few videos from Taylor Mali that would be good to do some more research on YouTube. He is a teacher with some powerful messages.

On creativity young kids “if they don’t know they will have a go. they are not frightened to make a mistake.