Comments (0) Oh, no, this is a worry. A recent report that Enid Blyton books are to be re-written to bring them into line with modern day language usage is a shame. I enjoy reading these stories to not only my classes, but also my own children – it gives us chances to talk about the language and the words used, as well as being just plain fun!!
What do you think of the idea?
Image Source: Kevin Grimm
Want to save some ink??? The other day I was reading about a University which had changed their default font in documents to save on the amount of ink being used. It turns out, Century Gothic and Times New Roman top the list for being ink-friendly. But be careful – just because you change to Century Gothic – it might not be all good, as Century Gothic is a “wider” font so takes up more space on the page. So though you might save on ink, you might not save on paper.
Coincidentally, just before I read the article referred to above, I came across EcoFont a few days before – a font which has holes in it to use less ink (they claim it will save up to 25% of ink or toner).
View a PDF Sample (the first picture is at normal size, the second is enlarged so you can see the holes):
These ads are becoming too much – this came my way via Twitter, and shows why you can’t think everything is OK because the children are on a “child” site. Supervision is still required. Take a look at the ad that appeared on Barbie.com recently.
Another News Report which came across my screen, this time about Parents who took control of and posed as their 11yr old daughter on Facebook to trap a pervert. Very worrying and something all parents and teachers need to be aware of – Internet Safety has to become everyone’s business.
From Norton, comes this report of the top 100 searches for 2009.
Youtube, Google and Facebook come in for the top three, nothing surprising there perhaps.
But the 4th and 5th most popular search term may be a bit more worrying.
Throw out the red pens – according to Queensland Health – they are too aggressive.
I heard this on the news tonight and thought how ridiculous.
TEACHERS are being warned to use bean bags to reduce student stress, organise “mind dumps” to clear kids’ thoughts and even stop using “aggressive” red pens.
In a controversial suite of tips that has divided psychologists, a Queensland Health kit tells teachers to use blue or black pens to mark assignments because red is considered too confrontational.
The effort to handle students with care – backed by Health Minister Stephen Robertson, pictured – also includes teachers being told to apologise to them when necessary and organise “check-ins” at the start of each day to assess how they are feeling.
The Queensland Council of Parents and Citizens Associations last night demanded the kit be scrapped.
“It is definitely over the top and quite unbelievable,” council president Margaret Black said.
“We’re calling for our children to grow up normally, including their work being marked with a red pen.”
The Good Mental Health Rocks kit – of which 1000 have been distributed – was revealed in State Parliament yesterday by the Opposition, which has labelled the red pen advice “kooky, loony, loopy, Left policy”.
The kits were distributed to 29 schools which participated in the Queensland Rock Eisteddfod this year.
The Bligh Government yesterday defended the kits, which cost almost $3000, and labelled the attack a “cheap political stunt” which failed to understand serious mental health issues.
Mr Robertson said teachers did not have to use the advice devised by specialists as it contained only hints and tips.
“This is not something you ridicule,” he said.
“You only have to look at the suicide rates in Queensland to know that this is no laughing matter.”
Opposition health spokesman Mark McArdle said the pen advice showed priorities were wrong when literacy and numeracy levels were so low.
“This is a kooky, loony, loopy, Left policy from a Labor Government that is out of touch,” he said.
The kit said the so-called “mind dumps” allowed students to write down everything in their mind and then throw the piece of paper in the bin.
Another tip was a “steam time”, allowing for one-on-one chats with teachers each week.
Psychologists are split on the red pen advice but Toowoomba child psychologist Paul Bramston said a softer colour could help some children with problems.
“The red pen brings up association of aggression more than blue or black as red is linked more with dramatic things like stop signs,” Dr Bramston said.
Queensland Teachers Union president Steve Ryan hung up on The Courier-Mail after claiming the kit did not exist and the Government would never give that advice to teachers.
“Mental health is a serious issue,” Mr Ryan said.
“It is disgraceful the Liberal National Party would make fun of mental health.”
Mental illness group Mind Frame said about 14 per cent of children between four and 17 suffered from mental problems.
Of course, nobody wants to see their work looking like this:
If you think you’re going to need it, you can always order the shirt…
Hopefully, things never get this bad.
Comic from F-Minus. See more of them at Comics.com
The boss showed me this recent newspaper clipping – Teachers in Texas have been allowed to carry concealed firearms to protect against school shootings when classes return.
This newspaper report from the Canberra Times talks about how the ACT Education Minister believes that their best teachers should be earning $100,000.
What is interesting though is actually hearing it come from a minister within the Government.
Maybe we’ll need to keep an eye on the positions vacant within ACT over the next couple of years???
The ACT’s best teachers could earn six-figure salaries within three years under an ambitious plan to halt a skills shortage and increase the status of the profession.
From The Australian comes this report. It would be very handy if we could have access to all the other Google Apps as well – Chat, Docs and Calendar.
GOOGLE has edged out some of the biggest brands in the enterprise IT services market to pick up another major contract win in Australia’s education sector.
Google partner SMS Management and Technology has emerged as the leading bidder to supply the NSW Department of Education with 1.5 million student email services using a customised version of the search giant’s Gmail service, Acting NSW Minister for Education and Training John Hatzistergos said.
“This commitment is a further demonstration of the NSW Labor Government’s commitment to equip teachers and students with the best possible means to compete successfully in the constantly evolving world of information technology,” he said.
NSW education department chief information officer Stephen Wilson said the department was yet to finalise its contract with SMS but confirmed that it had lodged the winning bid.
SMS will be the prime contractor alongside Google and Telstra to fulfil the contract, valued at $9.5 million over three years. It’s expected to be completed by the end of 2008.
The department rejected bids from Hewlett-Packard, Telstra subsidiary Kaz, and incumbent provider Unisys, to award the contract to SMS.
It’s understood that the contract will be one the largest private deployments of Gmail in the world.
The win is Google’s second major victory in the academic sector after Macquarie University signed up for Gmail in September last year. It could have massive implications for the Australian software market, as it places Gmail’s online word processing software, Google Docs, in a strong position to challenge Microsoft’s Office software suite in the education sector.
Mr Wilson said the agency had no plans to switch on Google’s online word processing software at this stage.
“We haven’t made any decision there. This contract was just email,” Mr Wilson said.
SMS chief executive Tom Stianos said the trend towards providing software as a service was “unstoppable”.
However, the Gmail deployment at Macquarie University hasn’t been without controversy.
Gmail is hosted offshore and the university chose not to extend the service to staff due to concerns that it would generate excessive bandwidth bills retrieving messages.
The education department’s Gmail roll-out will increase current email storage allocated to students by a multiple of 170 times from 35MB to 6GB.
The department is also deploying extra security filtering, which will be carried out locally.
“You have to remember we’re the largest consumer of internet traffic in NSW by a long way.
“We’ve modelled it so we can grow substantially on the current email traffic and still have a cost-effective solution,” Mr Wilson said. Students will not be given access to Gmail’s chat service and NSW teachers will be moved to the agency’s corporate email system rather than being allocated Gmail accounts.
Mr Wilson also said Google may host some of the email storage locally, further easing pressure on international bandwidth requirements to operate the service.
Mr Stianos said Google was examining local hosting options.
“I understand that they are talking to other state education departments in Australia and as part of that they’re looking at the potential of establishing a centre in Australia to host Gmail,” Mr Stianos said.
NSW DET, News Reports
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Email, Gmail, Google
It looks impressive, don’t it?? I think I would have enjoyed going to the opening of the new Apple Store in Sydney. Located on George Street, apparently it has the biggest sheets of laminated glass in the world, biggest Apple Logo in the world, biggest Genius Bar in the world. It’s not the largest store in the world however, it does come close – it’s the second largest!! The glass is 15 metres high!! Pretty Amazing.
Martin Levins has some more pictures which are worth a look.
Next time I’m in Sydney, I’ve definitely got to call in and have a look, and try to keep my wallet in my pocket. 
Photo: Apple Images
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