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Author Archives: Kerrie Smith

I have worked at education.au since winning the position of EdNA Online’s Schools Information Officer in November 2000.
In 2006 I became the Communications Officer managing edna’s Collaborative Tools.
From the beginning of 2007 to mid 2008 I was Assistant Manager, edna, Professional Learning and Online Communities. In that position I wrote the Networker (an edna newsletter), and managed various places on edna Groups, edna Lists, and edna Sandpit Groups.

In mid 2008 I became the Education.au Limited Executive Officer with direct responsibility to the CEO.
I am passionate about online communities and their ability to connect people and assist them in their professional development or simply as a complement to their day to day life.

Other places you can find me: http://me.edu.au/p/ksmith and Smik’s Learning Space (often neglected)

I am one of those lucky people whose work and hobbies mesh, and boundaries between them are blurred. In the course of my work I spend a lot of time each year travelling (which I love), giving presentations and leading hands-on workshops on a variety of topics such as making online communities work, getting the most out of RSS and so on.
I have occupied various positions in CEGSA, Computers In Education Group of SA, and won a number of awards both state and national for my work with teachers in ICT.

In my ’spare’ time I review crime and mystery novels for Random House Australia and run an online murder mystery discussion group called oz_mystery_readers. My reviews are published at http://www.reviewers-choice.com/kerrie_smith.htm

Track this side of me at CrimeSpace, Mysteries in Paradise, and LibraryThing

Online Professional Development Courses are effective

Teachers who took online professional development courses improved their instruction and subject knowledge, as well as produced gains in student achievement, says a new study by e-Learning for Educators, a 10-state consortium funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s Ready to Teach program.
The 330 teachers in the study participated in three 30-hour online professional development […]

myfuture 2010 User Survey

Complete the myfuture 2010 user survey to go in the draw for a chance to win a weekly prize of a Kindle Reader.
The myfuture annual survey seeks user feedback to ensure the provision of services and website information layout meets the needs of all users.
The user survey covers aspects of the site such as the […]

e-book essentials for educators

A recent online forum that I led for over a week has brought me to the conclusion that the most essential thing for educators and educational librarians is to get some experience in using e-book readers and reading e-books. The cause needs some champions in their ranks, otherwise it will drown in the “which device?” […]

The School Uniform debate

Every now and again the issue of school uniforms crops up.
This morning the Sydney Morning Herald claims that Australian students are “growing up in a society where the dominant and long-held view is that school uniforms instil discipline, a sense of self-worth and equality.” It says that strict uniform codes have been cited as […]

IFLA WORLD REPORT 2010

The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is the leading international body representing the interests of library and information services and their users. It is the global voice of the library and information profession.
The World Report series is a biennial report series that reports on the state of the world in terms of […]

Book Week Australia celebrates 65 years

Book Week is the longest running children’s festival in Australia, celebrating its 65th birthday in 2010.
The date for Book Week 2010 this year is August 21st - 27th.Each year, many schools and public libraries from all over Australia spend a week celebrating books and Australian authors and illustrators. Classroom teachers, teacher librarians and public librarians develop […]

19 August, World Humanitarian Day

Humanitarian Principles represent the foundation of humanitarian action. Key humanitarian principles include:
Humanity: Human suffering must be addressed wherever it is found. The purpose of humanitarian action is to protect life and health and ensure respect for human beings.
Neutrality: Humanitarian actors must not take sides in hostilities or engage in controversies of a political, racial, religious […]

The device is less important than the principle

In my news items today - reports of a North American university giving iPads away to its students, and another giving students a choose between a free iPhone or iPod Touch.
Recently Reuters commented “It’s the old razors and blades thing. You give away the razor and sell the blades in perpetuity“, commenting that the price war […]

Australia’s biggest generation heads for retirement

The Baby Boomers are categorised as those born between 1946  and 1964 - that means the first of them basically turn 65 next year. Many of them, like me, are on the cusp of retirement. Currently they constitute 36% of the workforce, and, from my own experience, may actually constitute a bigger percentage of the […]

I love my Twitter Daily

If you take a look at my personalised twitter Daily what you are looking at is an aggregation of twitter and RSS feeds from people I follow.
The Daily is divided up into “interest” categories and each displays a number of posts. In the top right corner of the categories a number tells me how many more items […]