The CRT Resource Challenge!

Heather over at the Rowville CRT Network blog occasionally throws up a thinking challenge for her members and I think challenges like that are a great idea.  Having just concluded our Network's February monthly meeting it was time to decide on what to do for the next one.  Drawing on Heather's inspiration I decided to base our March meeting on a challenge. 

The idea was to encourage our members to just go crazy and explore the extent of their skills, use that to drive the 2.5 hr Meeting's discussion and, hopefully, end up with some resources to stick up on our Skydrive to help everyone populate their CRT toolkit with some really useful, and adaptable, lessons and activities.

And then I sort of thought, why stop there?  Ours is only one network of 26 and I'm sure there's a lot of CRTs out there who don't belong to Networks that have plenty of good things to show us too!

Simply pick the first random thing you come across in your everyday life that you could build a bunch of lessons or activities around!  Just one base resource and see how flexible you can make it and just squeeze every last piece of learning you can out of it.

Just go crazy!

To get the ball rolling I'm going to continue on from a blog post about finding a page on Pears out of a Woolworths catalogue and provide some examples of the many ways I could think of to use it in a classroom setting!  These are still "works in progress" but I'll get them finalized (and add more) as the month wears on.

My chosen resource:

 

Pro Forma examples (PDF for Acrobat Reader, also viewable/printable online through Skydrive): 

Science idea I still don't have a writeup for yet:

 

As usual I've gone a little berzerk and jumped right into it with both feet like I usually do when I'm on a roll. Remember that this isn't a game of "keeping up with the Jonses" and everyone's contribution matters, no matter how much free time you have to devote to it! If it takes you a week, a month, a year? Whether you produce a lot or one tight and bulletproof lesson plan that uses up 2 hours in a productive way? That's just fine!

Note; don't forget that the sidebar is full of useful links to other sources of inspiration like Teacher blogs, Youtube channels and handy resource sites!

If you would like to share your work when you are done, send it in to us and we'll put it on our Skydrive in a public folder.  People get access to your ideas to populate their CRT toolkit, you get access to theirs to do the same!

Full lesson plans, pro formas, dot point ideas, "thought webs" and everything else are just fine.  If you can include the basic resource then feel free to include it in some form.  Scan it, take a picture of it, if you have based it on a book include the ISBN number orif you used a Youtube video then include a link.

Will you need help building pro formas etc?  Well, we'll even help you with that if we have the time.

An archive of free lesson plans, pro formas and ideas by CRTs for CRTs!  Let's give it a go!

Technical resources;

Finding it hard to make or type your own lesson plans or pro formas?  As CRTs we often aren't supplied with computers or laptops so don't have access to the same whiz-bang software that our full-time counterparts do.  Although we use Microsoft Office ourselvs to keep us compatible with the Victorian Education system's computers, we recommend Apache OpenOffice as a free yet powerful and easy to learn alternative to commercial office suites if you just can't afford to be shelling out all of those dollars!

You can then use the free Bullzip PDF Printer to turn it into the reliable, multi-platform PDF format!

Submissions and contacting us;

If you wish to share, simply email your dicuments (or Zip file) as attachments to Wodongacrt@vit.vic.edu.au. In the body of the email please include who you would like them credited to (or simply tell us you wish to remain anonymous), the year levels it's intended for (Primary, Secondary, VCE, Grades 7-9 as examples) and a shortlist of curriculum areas you are covering.

Don't hesitate to just email or leave a comment on this post if you have any questions or comments either!

Australian National Standards:

Please keep in mind that the new National Professional Standards for Teachers places a heavy emphasis on self reflection, seeking advice from colleagues and engaging with colleagues through professional networking to improve practice and identify professional learning needs. Part of the idea of this challenge is to kick start the expansion of your professional network to make all of that a lot easier in the long run!

Regards,

Mel.