bookmark_borderHTAV Agora Article: A little birdy told me….

HTAV Twitter Article_Page_1A while back some #histedchat participants were asked to write an article about how they use Twitter and #histedchat as Professional Development and as a Personal Learning Network. True to form, we used Twitter to write the article collaboratively. It was put together by these wonderful colleagues: Jan Molloy, Catherine Hart, Matt Esterman, Simon McKenzie, Matt Schultz, Ilja VanWeringh, James Oliver and Matthew Ward. The result has now been published in the HTAV‘s (History Teachers Association Victoria) magazine “Agora”.

Please download the article here: HTAV Twitter Article

Continue reading “HTAV Agora Article: A little birdy told me….”

bookmark_borderHexagon learning: making and justifying connections

This week I tried hexagons with my students. It worked really well.hexagon

The beauty of following inspiring educators on Twitter is that you benefit from their ideas and knowledge. I first saw Hexagon learning on @jivespin’s blog, which led me to David Didau, NoTosh, SOLO (HookEd), Chris Harte and TheLearningGeek. All explain how these versatile hexagons encourage deeper thinking and rich conversations in the classroom. Hexagon learning can be used in ANY subject and for any topic.  Continue reading “Hexagon learning: making and justifying connections”

bookmark_borderUsing a scanner app for resources

I have to share this: Using a scanner app is a great way to collect and share resources with your students.

Sometimes you are not around a photocopier or scanner and you might want to copy text from a book, or a diagram from a textbook. Taking a normal photo with your phone is an option, but particularly when photographing text, it just doesn’t come out very well.  In that case, I recommend you download a scanner app for your phone. The result is of a very high quality and it just looks better than a normal photo.

I have tried these two apps: Scanner Pro (my preferred one, $2.99 when I last checked) and JotNot (free when I last checked).

Below are two examples. I use this technique a lot. Perfect for when I’m reading a history book on the train and want to share key quotes or passages with my students.  Continue reading “Using a scanner app for resources”

bookmark_borderEssay writing with TEAC

There are many essay writing frameworks out there. I am sure you know the old hamburger image and the TEEL structure, but I find that these models do not convey the sophistication and analytical depth that is needed for a good paragraph / essay for IB History. So I came up with my own. I am calling it TEAC (Click on the poster):

  • Topic sentence, Theme, Thesis 
  • Evidence and Explanation 
  • Analysis and Assessment 
  • Conclusion 

Some further explanation:

  • A clear first sentence should convey what the key point (thesis) is of this paragraph. Also, a thematic approach is far stronger than a simple narrative account. Categorising events in themes like political, military, economic, social, long term, short term, strengths, weaknesses, causes, effects, ideology etc etc will produce a much more sophisticated and analytic essay than just telling the story.
  • Evidence and explanation should contain stats, quotes, years, events, people. Great sentence starters are: An example of this is, it can be seen that, this is illustrated by, as shown by, for example, as historian XYZ stated etc. This is where you show you know your stuff.
  • Analysis and assessment. Every IB History essay will require you to make a judgement. Just spitting out everything you know is not enough (avoid simple narratives), you have to place your knowledge into context and analyse why it was significant, what was more or less important, assess its effect or reasons why. Go to the Google doc for good sentence starters and conjunctions.
  • Conclusion: Always stay on track in addressing the essay statement. Conclude each paragraph with something that links to either your topic sentence or the essay statement itself. You can reuse some of the key words from the essay statement (but not verbatim, that is too simplistic). Also, take note of the command term of the question; do what you are “commanded” to do.

Some good links:

Here’s a good question for you: Why can’t I just use Google for my research? The pros and cons can be found here. 

How to write a great history essay, by Ms VW

 

Love your conjunctions:

Agreement / Addition / Similarity

Opposition / Limitation / Contradiction

Examples / Support / Emphasis

Conclusion / Summary / Restatement

in the first place

not only … but also

in addition

coupled with

first, second, third

equally important

by the same token

equally

moreover

comparatively

correspondingly

similarly

furthermore

additionally

although this may be true

in contrast

different from

of course …, but

on the other hand

on the contrary

at the same time

in spite of

even so / though

be that as it may

then again

above all

in reality

after all

but

(and) still

unlike

or

(and) yet

while

albeit

besides

although

instead

whereas

despite

conversely

otherwise

however

rather

nevertheless

regardless

notwithstanding

in other words

for one thing

as an illustration

in this case

for this reason

that is to say

important to realize

another key point

first thing to remember

most compelling evidence

must be remembered

point often overlooked

to point out

on the positive / negative side

with this in mind

notably, including, like, namely, chiefly, truly, indeed, certainly, surely, markedly, especially, specifically, expressively, surprisingly, frequently, significantly, such as,

in fact

in general

in particular

in detail

for example

for instance

to demonstrate

to emphasize

to repeat

to clarify

to explain

to enumerate

as can be seen

generally speaking

in the final analysis

all things considered

as shown above

in the long run

given these points

as has been noted

in a word

for the most part

after all

in fact

in summary

in conclusion

in short

in brief

in essence

to summarize

on balance

altogether

overall

ordinarily

usually

by and large

to sum up

on the whole

in any event

in either case

all in all

bookmark_borderHistory Blogs

Below is a list of blogs about History, as suggested by the participants of an online PD I am enrolled in for the IB History IA. One activity was to share our favourite History blogs.

  • I really like the aptly named “A Blog About History” (http://www.ablogabouthistory.com) which contains mainly news. Great way to keep up to date.
  • http://jivespin.wordpress.com/ John Mitchell shares a lot of creative resources for teaching history.
  • My preferred method of to keeping up with History news is using the app “Zite“. It allows you to choose areas of interest which the app will then aggregate and curate for you. (e.g. “History”. “Ancient History” “Archaeology” “World War II” etc etc.)zite

 

 

1. http://coldwarhistorian.com/
This blog is written by Nick Blackbourn. The website blog contains information for people specifically interested in the cold War. It is particularly useful as Blackbourn offers information on books and movies related to the topic which he reviews regularly. There is a newsletter which students can subscribe too and there is information of academic links that students can use. Blackbourn also comments regularly on latest developments within the history of the Cold War. Continue reading “History Blogs”