The Journey » carlaarena

Moving

carlaarena — Sat, 06 Dec 2008 00:29:29 +0000

I’m moving back to Brazil and making some moves digitally. All to make my motto work, simplicity.

You can read more about the changes I’m going through at http://collablogatorium.blogspot.com/2008/12/moving-physically-and-digitally.html
Please, add this feed to your reader for us to keep talking and interacting and I hope to meet you at

Flickr & Images4Education Online Session

carlaarena — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:31:21 +0000

As we’re in full steam preparing for one more exciting free online session for educators all over the globe through the Electronic Village Online, I was just following my thwirls when I saw Nik Peachey ’s tip of http://flickriver.com

Well, I thought I’d better give it a try as it was totally related to what I was doing, planning our Weekly tasks in our images4education session, and, more specifically, working on tasks for Flickr.
So, here’s the result:

I chose the tag Uniqueness, but it could be any, as well as a combination of a username and its tag. I think Flickriver will be useful when our group is in action and we could decide for a unique tag, participants upload a photo and we play around with Flickriver to see where it takes us in terms of images.
I could even imagine doing the following activity with students. They enter a tag they want to, five random photos will be displayed and they could have the photos as a springboard to a very creative story! How cool is that? Well, teachers, teachers, teachers…Always finding a pedagogical twist to social media!
PS: the funny thing? I was checking Nik’s link to his blog and realized he, in fact, wrote about Flickriver. So, enjoy two blog posts on the same topics by two educators. You might find something useful!
Want to find more useful resources to use images in the classroom? Check our Diigo group which we’re using to collect the resources for our Images4Education session in January 2009.
Group EVO2009-Images Bookmarks

Edublogging with Passion

carlaarena — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 02:51:12 +0000

A friend of mine in Italy, Seth Dickens, has kindly asked me to talk a bit about edublogging. We had planned for an interview, but due to technical issues, we went for a recording.
Edublogging… How many times have I written about it, gave tips, presented, and tried to inspire others? Fact is the ones who endure the first stages of discoveries and experiments are the passionate educators, those who teach with heart and soul, who truly believe in their transformative potential as an educator. These are the ones who, later on, become passionate edubloggers.
The point of my talk was what I’ve been saying from the beginning and what I wrote about in the article “Blogging in the Classroom: It Doesn’t ‘Simply Happen‘ “. Persistence, fearlessness, being passionate and knowing that you have something that will add value to someone are key to make it a successful endeavor.
We make lists of how to be a successful blogger, but formulas are not in the core of Edublogging, conversations are. Conversations don’t mean that you need to get tons of comments. They mean a talk to yourself, commenting on other people’s blogs, and yes, getting comments when your readers feel the urge to interact with you. I sin as a blogger, for I am not consistent as I should be or as would be willing to. However, I’ve decided to let it go, for I have little ones and a husband to care for. I have professional projects and other ways to connect. Nowadays, Twitter is my means of quickly connecting to others, though it’s not a substitute to blogging. Twitter is connection, blogging is reflection + connection. One complementing each other in my circle of learning.

Through blogging, edublogging my mind pours out, I learn, share, re-shape who I am and how I see things. But, my ultimate question is how could I show that to other educators? Maybe I can’t. Just through their own blogging journey they will learn what passionate blogging is all about, some will just find the excuse for not even giving a try. Blogging is a transformational act one should be willing to undergo. It won’t work if it’s just mechanic, technical. No. It’s humanistic, contextualized, personalized, collective, cultural, intense.
I’ll never forget some memorable posts that show the power of blogging:
Marina’s post - A psychologist talking about her experience about being a clown.
Having Dennis Newson as our class mystery guest
Motivating my adult students to predict a short story by Edgar Allan Poe we read in parts in class.
The rich cultural exchanges my group had with Dennis Oliver’s group in the US due to our International Exchange blog.
Emerson, a quiet adult student in class, surfacing as a wonderful blogger and commenter.
Discussion with Russian students and readers about the Brazilian movie “The City of God”.
Sharing Love Stories
Wow! Just so nice to travel back in the past through blogging. It’s a record of a moment, a state of mind, it shows us and our learners in ways we’d never share in the old brick and mortar classroom in such intense exchange and connection. These are just some of the examples mainly with students in it, but there is the other side of edublogging as a professional and personal development. This is another story and certainly deserves another blog post!

100 Learning Tools

carlaarena — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 21:54:40 +0000

Jane Hart has released the list of 100 learning tools in 2008 based on the contribution of 223 educators.
How about focusing on learning about, at least, one of these tools and trying it out to make your classroom even more engaging?

Top 100 Tools for Learning 2008

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: tools learning)

3 educators.

Kwout Annotation

carlaarena — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 02:45:39 +0000

I’ve been using Kwout for a while as a way to quote some interesting parts of resources I read online, to add little reminders of cools stuff to my Tumblr or to Flickr.
What a surprise today when I noticed that now we can even annotate in Kwout using a third-party app called canvas.
How cool is it?

7 Tips For Learning A Foreign Language On The Road

Still on Poverty: Blog Action Day 08

carlaarena — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:56:51 +0000

I just got the information of the TED prize winners 2009 and wanted to share here the wonderful job a maestro is doing connecting music, souls and adding hope to thousands of Venezuelan kids.

TED Prize » 2009 Winners via kwout

This is the kind of social action, mobilization, compassion that transforms lives and gives back dignity.

Poverty, We, Empowerment – Blog Action Day 08

carlaarena — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 16:50:16 +0000

Silent, it surrounds us, no matter where you are. We want it to be invisible, untouchable, but it’s there waiting for you, me, US. No government can really change it. WE CAN.

I am the daughter of parents who struggled, who came from very poor environments. I’m the daughter of Italians immigrants who lost the little they had during World War II. I’m the daughter of Brazilian migrants who moved from the hardship of one of the poorest states in my country, Piauí, in search for better, decent living, in search for opportunities, trying to leave poverty behind…I am lucky. I live a comfortable life because my family survived and thrived. I am the generation of the inheritance of what my parents, grandparents fought, dreamed, worked hard for.
The president of my country, Lula, is a vivid example of a childhood of the dispossessed kids in my country that fought against his own poor destiny. Lula was a shoe-shine boy. Now, his government tries to fight poverty. He takes the reigns.
We want poverty to be invisible, but it is around us even in the countries considered the richest in the world. Even if Brazil is still considered Third World, it is full of richness. The paradox lies in the inexorable truth. In a country where natural resources abound, millions of people are hungry. In a place where the biodiversity is generous, we struggle with health care. In my Brazil full of bright minds, creative souls, millions just don’t have the minimum education that empowers one to dream of a better, decent life.
How can we reverse, re-imagine, redo the world surrounding us with the contrasting beauty and the ugly, superfluous hot bodies and sick ones lying on the streets, brightness of a sunny day and the gloomy senseless darkness of the ones without hope, decency, or food to eat?
Maybe WE could start with little steps, WE could start by seeing what surrounds us, WE could take small actions that could make a difference to one person or group, WE could hold the hands of the ones who need to stand. No. Fighting poverty doesn’t need only to begin with huge governmental actions. It’s easier, isn’t it, to blame invisible forces and governments for viable possibilities. The solution starts in our homes, teaching our kids about generosity, sharing and giving. Facing poverty is being brave enough to see reality through different lenses and taking action in every little way we can.
I’m a believer in the transformative power of social action, mobilization. Just like my parents and their families changed the course of their poor lives, WE can help others do the same. I try to do my share, but still I feel I’m not doing enough. It’s time for action and engagement.
I finish with Sebastião Salgado, a Brazilian photojournalist, whose work and willingness to raise awereness touch me deeply. He’s doing his huge contribution to poverty. How about US? What can WE do?

Sebastiao Salgado – biography via kwout

Terra: Brazil’s Landless Movement via kwout

_____________________________________________________________________
Of Interest: Brazil’s Economic Boom Marred by Social Inequalities
Friends’ Posts:
Dennis Oliver’s
Mary Hillis’s
Cris Costa’s
Holly’s
_____________________________________________________________________

21st Classroom – Teachers as Catalysts

carlaarena — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 17:39:58 +0000

Teachers as catalysts
communities
anectdotes
empowerment
learning
excitement
audience
connecting
inclusion
democracy of learning
Stephen Heppel
me
we
see
mutuality
exchanging
the sense of others
the sense of us
No more words. Listen.

Blog Action Day – Say it Out Loud

carlaarena — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 14:32:18 +0000

Last year, I wrote about the environment. This year I want to add my voice to the worldwide blogging effort to raise awareness, to discuss an issue which is latent in my country, poverty.
Join me. Join everybody else in the world. Say it out loud and let others hear you. Let us make this a way to foster true change, to reach souls, to seek solutions.
Blog Action Day 2008 Poverty from Blog Action Day on Vimeo.

Telling Stories, Developing Multiliteracies

carlaarena — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 14:31:04 +0000

I just got this video via Twitter (a microblogging site) from a dear friend, Ana Maria Menezes, a mineirinha, who has a bag full of tricks to share.

The story is simple, but then, I just realized that it is a wonderful springboard to explore language. Imagine a group activity, or even a collaborative project with sister classes in which they have the same claymation and learners are responsible for creating the stories to go with the animation. They could even record the stories.
How motivating would that be? Is it the kind of experiential learning we could add more frequently to our lesson plans? Do you have any other ideas to go with this video? Or do you have any other video that could be used for the same idea?
Originally posted at http://webtools4educators.blogspot.com/2008/10/telling-story.html