Dinner with James Farmer – creator of “edublogs.org” November 22, 2006
Posted by Joseph Papaleo in AGQTP/AISV, Ed Blogger, Personal, blogs.add a comment
I have only been blogging for a few months (first heard about blogs and wikis in 2003, did lots of research, but never took the plunge to get involved). Within my first week, I tested a couple of blog sites and settled on edublogs.
In my first few weeks as an edublogger, I discovered that the creator of edublogs, James Farmer, did a seminar in Australia. This was very exciting as I had assumed he must have travelled all the way from the US or UK to do this seminar. I had a look at his blog and read that he would be getting up very early to watch his new country, Australia, play in the soccer World Cup. “Wow! He’s Australian!!” I thought to myself.
I kept reading his blog and discovered that he worked at one of the biggest newspapers in Melbourne, my home city. Wow!!
I contacted James and it turns out that he actually lives 5 minutes away from the home that I had just purchased. Talk about a small world.
James has agreed to do a talk at my workplace next week (as part of the AGQTP/AISV project I am leading) and so we met face to face and had dinner to chat about it and other blog stuff. I must admit that I was quite nervous and tired as I’ve just finished reports and preparing this presentation at the same time.
Sitting and chatting with James was invigorating. To hear about:
- his journey into blogging and creating edublogs and his future plans were quite exciting (and it is not for me to tell, you’ll just have to wait!!).
- how he hosted the recent k12onlineconference and other people’s sites.
- how there are 30,000 teachers using his edublogs site and it is doubling every 6 months.
- how looking after edublogs is both rewarding and despicable (the people who bag him for problems should have a good look at themselves – it is a free service he is providing after all)
James has a background in philosophy and as an ESL teacher at various universities, hence his interest in creating blogs for ESL students and unistudents and teachers. His philosophical background shone through last night as he made me think about a range of issues (man, I was too tired to think through some of his phiolosophical thoughts last night).
One thing is for certain. I’ve hired the right person to challenge some of our policy setters at our school to look at the way we may deliver education in the future. I’d love to know what they will say to each after the presentation
Thanks James.
New Background November 6, 2006
Posted by Joseph Papaleo in General, Personal.add a comment
I’ve been trying to change my background settings for some time and I think I’ve found one that I actually like – Regulus, developed by Ben Gillbanks at Binary Moon. It is adaptable like Fauna which allows for the image, colour, number of columns, etc to be altered. I was happy with the supplied image (can choose from about 5 or upload your own). Thanks Ben.
k-12 Online Conference, Screencasts and kids October 19, 2006
Posted by Joseph Papaleo in General, Personal, Screencast, Video Conference, k12online06.1 comment so far
A very short note to say I’m still here reading others thoughts. I’ve created my first screencast and tried to put it up on my podomatic site, but after many tries, it doesn’t want to work. I’ll keep at it. I gave it to my students via our server and they just laughed at me!!
I’m also preparing for a presenation at work and for the k-12 Online Conference on Video Conferencing. So I’m very busy, developing ideas and I’ll be posting entries more frequently soon (oh, did I mention one of my children had her face whacked by a swing, requiring facial surgery and now my two eldest have contracted chicken pox?) Gee life can get hectic.
Ryan’s “Funeral” or “Celebration of Life” September 14, 2006
Posted by Joseph Papaleo in General, Personal.comments closed
You may need to read my entry on September 9 to get a better understanding of this entry
Today, I attended what I thought was going to be a funeral. Instead, A & D made sure it was a celebration of Ryan’s short life. His school closed down for the day and made their facilities available for this day. A sad, but wonderful day.
There was lots of colour, cheeriness, happy greetings, messages from family members (both natural and adoptive), school teachers, nurses, etc.
Ryan obviously touched many people’s lives. It was nice to hear about a side I really didn’t know about – his school life and his cheekiness. Of course, we never saw that at family functions – he was a good lad.
The singing of his favourite football team’s theme song was something he enjoyed and it was sung today with passion and tears – well at least I teared up.
A & D’s request to make sure it was a celebration was a nice tribute. Greeting other people with a positive statement was a first for me and it changed the focus of the funeral to a celebration for me, however, I still teared up. I know I’m a big sook.
Releasing balloons and having a slideshow of pictures throughout Ryan’s life and school days brought back many memories and still brings back a tingle down my spine.
From a personal point of view, the school did a great job today. Well done.
And lastly, to two very special people and their own family – a big heartfelt thanks for loving and cherishing Ryan when he was so young and ill. Your love for Ryan and sacrifices that you made for him make you and your family Ryan’s own Angels.
May he run around, jumping and chatting with his Great-Grandmother in his new body.
Thanks to Will Richardson September 14, 2006
Posted by Joseph Papaleo in Personal, Skype, Web2.0, Will Richardson, blogs, podcasts.comments closed
Before getting into this blog proper, I must say thanks to Will Richardson. I stumbled upon his blog some time in 2005 and started to follow it religiously. At that stage, I didn’t know how to use RSS, so I set up my Mozilla browser to access his page every time I accessed the Internet. His blog entries have helped me get a better understanding of how I can use this technology in my classes and at work.
I’ve been working on a project to introduce interested staff at my school to Web 2.0 technology. Part of my project was to show how Video Conferencing could be used for PD or in class. What better way to do it than to ask Will to speak at our seminar, speaking from his home in the States to our school in Melbourne, Australia. Time zones were sorted out and technical issues resolved. Unfortunalty, there were a few technical issues on the day, but we managed to have a Skype Video call (we could see Will, he couldn’t see us!) and we were also able to see his presentation on our projector as he controlled it (thanks must go to Chris Ross and Winston Mattson).
So Will, thanks heaps. Now all I need to do is get you here one day.
