Clashnafree 1911 Census

A very interesting but time consuming task. Trying to get all the details in the right cell with the right people was a tack. All these different lines had my eyes going hazy. But I eventually got the information in. Now the next task was to calculate the data.......Clicking here there and everywhere. Break, cup of tea back again and same luck.

I got one column calculated but every time I went to the next to calculate it came up as error. Another attempt and again the same story.

Then I went to look at the difference between the 1901 and 1911 census. There are interesting changes such as new members to the street and deaths of family members. What is more interesting though is there are fewer numbers living on the street and information on house given in the 1901 census is not found in the 1911.  Reasons for this can only be guessed but death in some cases are very strong as the occupants were of old age.

The majority of the people employed on the street continue to be laborers and some a minority have private servants.

The literacy rate of the street is some what alarming. In two families children under 12 cannot read and some have no literacy at all. Considering that children received free primary education under the British government.

All in all this task was a challenging one. It was very time consuming and for a first time user of excel took a bit of getting used to.

Zotero 'a handy ol tool'

My God why haven't I heard of these kinds of technologies before now. The simplicity is the key to Zotero . Previously I was searching through the internet looking at items of interest for my thesis and just downloading them and saving them. Now with one click they are all organized into one complete area where I choose where it is saved and what name it is under.

I really like the fact that all the different items can be saved in individual folders. What makes it worthwhile for me though is that there is no need for external memory key or printing it off as it is all saved online.

The one downfall to Zotero is it is only available on Firefox. I mostly work off a Mac and safari is my choice of browser but I could look at safari as my playground and Firefox as my classroom. I need some discipline.

Now that I have been introduced to Zotero I shall be using it indefinitely when researching. Any item of interest can be saved and read through ally at a later date while I continue on my quest to gather as much information as possible.

Web Logs and Online Discussions as Tools to Promote Reflective Practice

The myth that a teacher is simply put in the room to dictate to students who reel off what was said not taught in an exam situation is not a myth at all. It is fact.

The above picture highlights how the internet has taken over our lives. But why is this a bad thing? The article that I have read concentrates on how we are using the internet and blogging as a tool for teaching. Making the material more accessible and creating an easier forum for student to contact teachers and vice a versa.

I agree with the suggestion that the blogs would aid the student more. Whatever the student writes and posts online in an open forum they are writing for an audience thus encouraging them more to learn more and produce a clear and informative post. Im doing it right now

Threads Vs Blogs is one of the debates being put forward. I can honestly say that having taken part in both forms I feel that blogs are easier for the student and teacher. At a simple level the lay out is far more readable and commenting on the one blogs post is simple. As opposed to threads we had a class of 35 and all were expecting to write on the thread. Some were new to the technology and posted new threads and reposted and it ended up being a very messy affair. Both systems did achieve its goal  the students were corresponding with each other. But , I feel, the blog is a far easier method of achieving this aim

It is only a matter of time before the use of technology becomes central to education. The use of blogging and threads posted on the internet as a public or private information will occur more frequently and over a broad range of subjects. In universities it will be easier to implement but the real challenge will come in secondary schools where the teachers are tied by objectives of the curriculum. A new approach has to be adopted by the government in order to stay one step ahead and give the children of this country a better quality of education.

The Amateur in the Operating Room: History and the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning

Advancements in the field of teaching has only come about in the early 90s when groups realized the need for a systemic approach to teaching rather then a hap hazard teaching style where no clear direction was understood and teachers were left alone. These teachers oblivious to the other teaching styles that were occurring in the room ext door were left to teach the only way they knew how.

The idea of proposing questionaries to first year students in semester one of college on their idea of history is a fantastic tool that would help faculty determine how bad the student body is and what steps to take to change this. No doubt popular culture history will dominate the results but these results would be invaluable in designing a course that would maximize the understanding between teacher and student. A class simply on how to read primary and secondary texts would be a huge help to the incoming student. I did not receive this help until my 4th and final year in college.

The gulf that exists between the teacher and student is evident with how reading of texts occurs. For students to understand primary documents they have to abandon all they know of the modern world and read blind. For many student they are taught what the primary document read and never how to read it for themselves

The argument that the history text in schools are becoming just a learning item rather then a book where the student can take information, interpret it and come up with his/her own opinion on the issue. I agree completely with this point as having completed history for Leaving Cert the texts we used were simple books of information that we learned off. Going from line to line highlighting dates and names and coloring all other information around it.

For my first year in university history this method was still being used by me as it was the only method i knew.

There simply has to be a complete turnaround in the method of teaching history if we are to really get the full value of student interpretations of information of the past. History in the primary and secondary level of education is crying out for proper investigation. Students should not have to rely on their teacher to give them information rather the teacher should be a guide on how to obtain the information.