#ALTC Hangout

Directly after my keynote at ALT-C,  along with my co-presenters Becca Smallshaw and Kate Bartlett (who were absolute stars), I took part in a Google hangout discussion. Ably hosted by Simon Ensor (France), Alan Levine (USA - @cogdog barks here) and Rebecca Hogue (who was with us in Manchester) we had a wide ranging conversation about digital literacy, the use of virtual learning environments, digital citizenship, openness in education, personal learning environments, assessment and student centred learning. It was a great conversation with many interesting and thought provoking questions and comments. Below is a YouTube recording of the hangout for those who couldn't join in live. [Other hangouts are also available.]






#ALTC Hangout by Steve Wheeler was written in Plymouth, England and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

The #blimage challenge spreads

It is barely a week since the fabulous Amy Burvall and I started the #blimage challenge, and we are both just a little breathless as we watch how rapidly it is catching on. The challenge was just a little fun between the two of us at first. We didn't plan for it to become a global movement, but that seems to be the way #blimage is heading. In just 6 days, almost 100 edubloggers have taken up the challenge, and have then paid it forward to their colleagues and friends. There is now a Dutch language version called #blimageNL and a Spanish version (#blimageES set up by Juan Domingo) and other language versions will also follow. Who will be the first to set up a Japanese version #blimageJP or a German version #blimageDE or a French version #blimageFR?

We anticipate that #blimage will grow even wider in its influence, because it has an appeal for everyone who is thinking about education and learning. Ultimately, it's great to see how people are enjoying blogging about education, sharing their ideas, having fun with images, discussing their interpretations and generally connecting with each other in new ways. It has spread across all sectors of professional practice, from primary, secondary and tertiary education, into the workplace learning sector.

Here's the video Amy created to explain the #blimage challenge:



As Amy says, #blimage 'makes your brain dance with metaphorical thinking', it compels you to think more creatively, and I might add, it gets you involved in dialogue and connections with your personal learning network. Some educators are now blogging for the first time. Others have returned to sharing their ideas after a time away from blogging. Still others (like me) have discovered new and fascinating education blogs for the first time. The #blimage challenge exposes new ideas, new resources, and new people you really should get to know. It's about learning through storytelling, and this is lucidly explained by H J deWaard in an insightful post entitled Stories and Spaces within a #blimage Challenge. I would argue that this is learning technology at its very best.

Here are just a small selection of #blimage posts:

Space to make ideas your own by Jeff Merrell
Organic Growth by Andrew Jacobs
The #blimage challenge by Jane Bozarth
Fortunate Learning and Learning Fortunes by Sue Beckingham
Desks of Doom by David Hopkins
Taking up the #blimage challenge by Ignatia de Waard
Not just a waiting room by Rachel Challen
Human Writes by Simon Finch
It's only a jigsaw puzzle by Sandra Sinfield
Playing chess with the enemy by Steve Wheeler
Learning while wandering by Tracy Parish
The #blimage challenge by Charles Jennings
Learning in limbo by Wayne Barry
Time for a fresh perspective by Sukh Pabial
The colours of active learning by Anna Wood
Breaking bread with Steve Wheeler by Amy Burvall
The joy of learning #blimage by Jane Hart
The Web: Network, dreamcatcher, patterns by Whitney Kilgore
The #blimage challenge by Sheila MacNeill

You can see the diverse range of topics these bloggers have written about, inspired by the images they were sent. I'm looking forward now to seeing what the #blimage challenge will unearth next. Do visit the collection of #blimage posts and artefacts that are being collected on a Pinterest Board and a Flipboard, both set up by the marvellous Simon Ensor.  So please do take up the #blimage challenge yourself - and use the image above to inspire your next blog post. You never know where it might lead you!

Photo by Steve Wheeler


The #blimage challenge spreads by Steve Wheeler was written in Plymouth, England and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Blimey, it's #blimage!

I'm always looking for new ideas to promote blogging for teachers. For me and countless others, blogging is a very important part of professional practice, and I have written extensively about its benefits for teachers in articles such as 7 reasons teachers should blog and The truth about blogging.

In conversations recently with members of my PLN including Amy Burvall (USA @amyburvall) and Simon Ensor (France @sensor63) another method began to emerge. It's a challenge/game that Amy called #blimage - a confection of Blog-Image. (Yes, we are now in the age of blim!) You send an image or photograph to a colleague with the challenge that they have to write a learning related blog post based on it. Just make sure the images aren't too rude. The permutations are blimmin' endless.

My first challenge came from Amy and my response was published under the title of 'Off the rails'. It made me think hard, because I incorporated the 3 images she sent me into one blog post. Following on from that, Simon sent me another #blimage challenge, which became the post 'Piece by piece.' Subsequently, other bloggers took up the same challenge, and Simon set up a Pinterest board to capture their efforts and aggregate them in one place. The discussion on the blogs and on Twitter is just beginning around these efforts. It's a very creative way to encourage teachers to think about their practice, and get them blogging about these thoughts. So, if you're up to the challenge, and you're at a loose end, let me start you off.

The challenge is this: Use the image above (or another of your own choice), incorporate it into your blog, and write a post about learning based on it. It's OK - the photo is mine and it's licensed under Creative Commons so you can use it with attribution. See what you can make of it! (Then pass an image of your choice on to someone else so they can do their own #blimage challenge).

Photo by Steve Wheeler


Blimey, it's #blimage! by Steve Wheeler was written in Plymouth, England and is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.