2009+letter

 Dear students, Welcome back & welcome all! I had a mind altering experience at the end of 2008. A friend from America, who I haven’t seen or spoken to in 25 years found me on face book! It was amazing to reconnect and find out what she has been doing. Her nature and humour hasn’t changed but there was so much news to catch up on I couldn’t stop grinning, and I was bursting to check my email each morning (12 hour time difference). This experience inspired me for some activities at the beginning of this term, tell me what you think?   Another thing I would like to do is set up a mystery pen pal. Write about yourself but don't give too much away. Your letter will be passed onto someone else and after several weeks we will see if you have found out your mystery pen pal. You are not allowed to show your letter to others, and must talk /interview each other with stealth. Nor are you allowed to ask a third person for ideas/ clues. You must describe your passions, talents, needs and conscience. You may also write a little about your family but if you say, I have a dog called Gabbie, I was born in New Zealand or I am Aboriginal, this is giving too much away! If you are able to write about these four elements your 'voice' should come through.
 *  join face book
 * write down some names from the past, eg primary school friends,
 * <span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">write a short biography about yourself and questions you have for each friend.
 * <span style="font-size: 120%; color: #2500ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; color: #5e19f5; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">Check your face book/ email each week to see if you have made contact.
 * <span style="font-size: 120%; color: #2500ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; color: #5e19f5; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"> Write some journal entries of your memories / experiences together/ questions and predictions about them. Then if you do make contact you can see if your predictions were right.
 * <span style="font-size: 120%; color: #2500ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; color: #5e19f5; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"> Journal entry: how did it feel to re- connect?
 * <span style="font-size: 120%; color: #2500ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; color: #5e19f5; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">I tried to find some primary school friends and went into face book groups (on the far right corner of screen) type in the name of your primary or high school. Unfortunately all the faces looked so young, i had to leave a notice on the wall saying: " I'm looking for your parents!"But then i did find a friend, although he had used a picture of a famous wrestler! I sent him a message & joked about his body size has changed since primary school! If you think you have found someone, write a funny message and you will be more likely to get a quick response!

So just what have you signed up for? The learning to learn unit will envolve self motivation and self directed learning. The writing/ reading for personal purposes is more like creative writing. However you will find that we are very flexible and our main aims are: that you enjoy what your doing, at the end of the day feel you learnt something and I like to spark your critical thinking, curiosity and questioning. One of my aims is to encourage **__your voice.__** As some of you may know my other passions are digital story telling so I would also like to do some of this & perhaps make some movies? You can look through the web page at examples. <span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;"><span style="font-size: 120%; color: #2500ff; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">We got so busy last year with the learning plans etc that we didn’t up date the web page, so this is also a project. Let me know your goals, interests, hobbies etc or you will be stuck with mine !

Many of the subjects in the CGEA have been set up for you to work independantly, so if you are also working or have family commitments you can work on the Units Learning to Learn & personal writing in your own time. Plus if you are already computer literate you may want to get RPL for this unit. Please see me if you would like to study in an alternate mode & not come to class each week.

We will be using online learning tools for many of our classes & you will also lead the class in some activites (eg spelling rules & sourcing stories) <span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">http://www.virtualilc.com/ Having said all these topics/ activiteis I'd like to explore: podcast of local history, digital stories, face book reunions etc I think much of our time will be spent getting to know the new Windows 2007 computer program!
 * username: 683vilcst password: contender**

Please send me an email about yourself and for old students what you did over the holidays (& something for your webpage)? How are you feeling? What are your goals? What do you want to do after this course? What are you into? The more you can tell me about yourself and your interests the more I can tailor- make the course material for you.

<span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">welcome again, I'm looking forward to getting to know you (better)

Robin <span style="font-size: 120%; font-family: 'Comic Sans MS', cursive;">flossytogo@hotmail.com