Presentation - done! (NOT DONE)

How do you even SAY Pecha Kucha?

So it seems I've been pronouncing it wrong.

I say Pet-cha-koo-cha. I've seen it described as Pe-chak-cha (which I actually think might be the correct version) and the little clip above is more Pe-char-ker-char.

If you find a website with audio from Japanese speakers, it's seems to be said the way I originally said it!

So who knows!

Pecha Kucha

I first heard of Pecha Kucha at Mathsjam, when Alex Bellos presented in this style. I learned that it is a style of presentation that takes the 'ugh' out of 'Death by Powerpoint' presentations.

I've read it described as "Show and Tell for smart people".

The idea is to show exactly 20 slides, each lasting for exactly 20 seconds (often described as 20x20) with auto advance so you can't talk for too long on any one slide. This makes a total of 6 minutes 40 seconds exactly for your presentation.

Description of Pecha Kucha from pecha-kucha.org

Pecha Kucha on Wikipedia

Apparently Pecha Kucha means 'chit'chat' in Japanese!

Watch this (6 minutes and 40 seconds) video if you want to know more!

Crazy timetable changes (NOT DONE)

Thinking about my forthcoming presentation

So I've got to give this presentation that is to last exactly five minutes and apparently we'll be timed and stopped when our time runs out.

I'm not the best of presenters anyway - I get really nervous and prefer to hide in the background than be the focus of attention. (Odd for a teacher? No, I think lots of us are more than confident in front of children, but can't quite do it in front of peers.)

I'm thinking of presenting using Prezi. Or maybe a Pecha Kucha style Powerpoint. I need something that will focus me and keep me within my five minutes, but be enough to prompt me on what to say.

I know it also needs to be quite quirky, or at least a little bit funny - something to hold the attention of my observers. And something very far removed from the types of presentations that I've been witness to in the past!


Right...........




I've come to the decision that Prezi will probably be a little too complicated for me to produce, so Powerpoint it is then. Pecha Kucha style.

#mathsjam!!!!! (NOT DONE)

I'm coming out! (Well thinking about it.....)

And I don't mean declaring my sexuality!

I have pretty much had an anonymous presence on Twitter. I go by the name of @mathsatschool and next to the part where you write your real name, I've put MathsTeacher@School.

Why the anonymity?

When I first joined Twitter I was tweeting and blogging about my unhappy experience at my previous school. I didn't want anything to bite me on the bum (so to speak!) so I stayed anonymous. I also kept my profile public so anyone in the world (including pupils and parents) could see my tweets.....and rants.....and moans......and whines...... (you get the picture).

But I have made 'proper' contact with a few people. I've exchanged emails and linked up with other 'tweechers' on NCETM. I've shared files on Googledocs and someone even gave me access to their dropbox files.

Now, with #mathsjam fast approaching (in 3 days!), I wonder if I really need to stay anonymous. Lots of fellow twitterers will be there and meet the real me, so why not be me on Twitter itself?

Another thing I've been thinking about is encouraging others at my school to use Twitter as a means to push forward their own Professional Development. Why keep this wonderful resource to myself?

And despite a big department, and an even bigger school, I know no-one from school is on it already because they would have come across me - I have a reasonably good presence on there and a respectable following.

(That's not to say they don't have personal accounts - I mean creating their own PLN of teachers from around the world.)

So.... I am seriously thinking about 'coming out' and just putting my real name up there. I still, however, have reservations about pupils and parents seeing my tweets.

AND I have some contentious comments on there, so I would have to go back through my entire timeline and delete off anything that could be remotely attributed to a real life person. There's no names of course, but if any one person from my department reads some of the things I've written, they would know immediately who it is about!

So what to do? 1. Stay anonymous and admit my real identity to people I have no day to day real life dealings with? 2. Stay anonymous and let real life people know my Twitter identity but keep hidden from other interested parties? Or 3. Come out completely and add my real name but run the risk of people reading my comments (however banal).

I sense that eventually more and more people will create a PLN of their own accord, so I may have to delete off old contentious tweets anyway.

Hmmmmm - what shall I do?

Getting into everything (NOT DONE)

Dyslexia
CPD
VLE

Getting ready for #mathsjam (NOT DONE)

#mathsjam

MA: Mathematics: A Human Activity Session 3 (NOT DONE)

to post

By jove, I think she's got it!

Waiting for the clocks to go back, last night I think I totally understood the nature of our first MA module assignment.

I was so worried that I didn't 'get it', that I was considering emailing the course tutor, but then was further worried, that I would look incompetent, idiotic, an imbecile. So I had decided to wait until the next session and try to clarify what we're supposed to be doing there.

BUT - having read a paper we had been given, and a few scribbled notes that I had made, I now am sure I understand the nature of the task.

We are to take a problem, and analyse HOW it is to be solved. How different groups of people approach it, what diversionary routes could be taken.

I'm even more sold on using 'The Chessboard Problem', purely because it is one that I am very familiar with - having used it with pupils as a problem solving task many times over. I have ideas in my head as to how I can analyse it - get different groups to solve and record the methods. By different groups I mean younger, older, top sets, bottom sets, even A level classes and teachers / other adults.

The trouble with this choice is that I think we are meant to stretch ourselves mathematically, and this doesn't really do that. There is a definitive answer, a definitive algebraic equation for the general term.

But however many other problems I consider, I keep going back to 'The Chessboard Problem'. I'll take it along with me to the next session and see how it is received.