Traveloteacher

Recently I've become an associate partner in a newly launched European project called APLaNet (Autonomous "Personal Learning Networks" for Language Teachers). The aim of the project is to introduce language teachers to social networking sites and help them build their personal learning networks. You can read more about this exemplary project in the post by Burcu Akyol , one of the coordinators of the project. I'm a strong supporter of social networks, especially Twitter, and I've already tried to introduce Twitter to newbies many times before - with a disastrous result! I failed every time but once. Now, I don't want to lament about that, but I've been thinking about what I've done wrong. And I think I might know the reason why my mentees haven't made it further than a couple of introductory tweets. What they needed was a constant, gentle push, which I didn't give, simply because I didn't want to be a bore. I used to tell them that Twitter ...

In support of Safer Internet Day, my students and I did some of the actitivies I wrote about in my last post. After seeing the video clip about parental protection and online dangers, my students took part in a walking debate. The idea for this activity came from the Debating the issues activity, which I downloaded from the excellent Think B4U Click Click website. However, unlike the suggested procedure, I decided to go paperless, so I created a short Power Point with five issues to be discussed. After reading out loud each of the statements, they took a stand and explained why they agree or disagree with it. What really surprised me was the fact that most of the students feel safe on the Internet. Some of them supported their feeling of safety with the fact that teachers and parents constantly talk about it. Others explained that they are very careful about the stuff they publish on their blogs or on Facebook. Only some of them think that adjusting Facebook privacy settings keeps ...

My students spend a lot of time on the Internet and even though they say they know absolutely everything about the perils of the virtual world, I strongly believe that every now and then this topic should be brought into discussion. The most suitable occasion is of course Safer Internet Day, which will be celebrated on February 8. I think that teachers around the globe have the responsibility to dedicate at least part of their lesson to e-safety and help their students to acquire essential skills about the efficient, safe and more responsible use of the Internet. Last week I held a webinar for Croatian teachers on how Safer Internet Day is celebrated around the world and I found some fabulous resources. So here are some that you might use in your classroom on Tuesday, or, as a matter of fact, on any other day of the year. These two pages helped me find my way around the www resources: Insafe , which is a network of national Awareness Centres in 27 countries in the European Union, Norwa...

It's more than a game, it's your life! is the motto of Safer Internet Day 2011 which will be taking place on February 8. Safer Internet Day is observed every year in countries around the world. It is coordinated by the Insafe Network , co-funded by the European Union. Its main golas are to promote safer and more responsible use of the Interent and mobile technology by children and teenagers and to raise awareness about online safety issues. A wide range of activities, initiated by the Croatian Teachers Network, will be conducted in Croatian schools, with contests, workshops and webinars being some of them. I'm delighted to be able to take an active role in the event with a webinar in which I'm going to talk about how this important event is celebrated in other countries. So that's why I'm asking your, dear PLN , to share your best practices with me and my audience of teachers and parents. How have you celebrated this event over the past years? What do you plan ...

If a good beginning is half the battle, then I'm on the right track. It's still the early morning of 1/1/11 , and I've already posted two comments to my virtual friends' blogs. Actually, I started writing comments last week, on the day I made my resolution and I really hope I'll keep it in 2011. Not so much because of the resolution itself, but because I know that commenting is the best way to connect and interact with like-minded teachers from all parts of the world. So watch out for my name in the comment section of your posts, dear bloggers. But not before Jan 10, because my travel bug has been bugging me for a while so next week I'll be trying to discover the secrets of the pyramids.

Last year I made some New Year resolutions: one was to meet my Twitter friends f2f, the other was to share with Croatian teachers everything I learned on Twitter. A year later, I think I may say I've accomplished my goals - to a certain extent. My blog for Cro teachers is still alive - by no means is it a lively, dynamic site, because only three people are subscribed to it and only rarely (actually: never) have my posts been inspirational or catchy to make my visitors leave a comment. However, there have been more than 2500 visits to the blog and more importantly, I've written 45 posts about different web tools that can be used in the classroom. Perhaps one day someone finds something useful in one of my posts. The tweet-ups began early in January when I met @kenwilsonlondon (and his wonderful wife Dede) in London. March brought a fantastic opportunity for a tweet-meet with @cheimi10 in Zagreb. In April I went to Berlin and met @janwebb21, @MrMalcontent, @w2YDAvid , @jugosl...

Merry Christmas to all the visitors of my blog! May your holidays be filled with joy, peace and love.