Chris Betcher

The things you discover by accident... I was sitting at home watching late night TV tonight and there wasn't much on that I thought was interesting, so I started flipping channels. We don't have cable or satellite, just free-to-air TV, and to be honest I usually just stick to the handful of "standard" channels - 7, 9, 10, ABC and SBS. Since we got a digital TV, it's been nice to get the High Def versions of these channels, but the other thing about free-to-air digital is that it also gives you a whole lot more free channels outside the standard ones. Flipping through, I discovered a new channel I'd never seen before - Teacher TV. It had an interview with an Australian teacher talking about literacy strategies and how to give kids opportunities to express themselves in other ways than just traditional writing activities. She was talking about how important it was to offer ways to create and express, not just pass tests. This got my attention... I had no i...

We hear a lot about the notion of Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants, a concept originally suggested by Marc Prensky in a paper by the same name .  It makes a presumption that those born after the widespread introduction of digital technologies are somehow out of step with the world of technology, while those who were born and raised in the digital age are naturally able to function within it.  Prensky contends that these younger folk - the "natives" - are born into a technology rich environment and are therefore akin to those who grow up natively speaking a given language, immersed in its use and able to converse fluently with it, while the "immigrants" are like those who come to a foreign land and need to learn to speak a whole new language. He argues that the immigrants will always have a digital "accent", and therefore their non-native heritage will always be conspicuously obvious. To be a native implies that you are not only comfortable, but know...

There is a Twitter phishing scam going around at the moment that I'm unhappy to say I fell right into. This quick post is just a warning to anyone who reads it to hopefully help them not do the same thing. I'd been off the grid for a few days so I hadn't heard the news about this scam, but it's been floating through the Interwebs for 2 days apparently. It did strike me as odd when i clicked on it that I had to relog in to Twitter, but I'd been playing with different browsers so the fact that it was asking me for a password didn't seem all that unusual. Of course, I should have taken more notice of the URL that was in the address bar, but I was too late. I got a direct tweet from John Pearce that said... "fixed it.. hehe here is that blog i wanted to show you http://twitterblogs.access-logins.com/login" I know John. I trust John. So I clicked it. It asked for a password, which as I mentioned, was not unusual considering I was trying a new browser (...

I'm in a hotel in Montreal, Quebec at the moment, just about to leave to spend the day with Sharon Peters at her school. But before I leave I wanted to share this little note that was left in the hotel room. "To our guests, Because this hotel is a human institution to serve people, and not solely a money making organisation, we hope that god will grant you peace and rest while you are under our roof. May this room and hotel be your second home. May those you love be near you in thoughts and dreams. Even though we may not get to know you, we hope that you will be comfortable and happy as if you were in your own home. May the business that brought you our way prosper. May every call you make and every message you receive add to your joy, and when you leave, may your journey be safe. We are all travelers. From birth to death, we travel between the eternities. May these days be pleasant for you, profitable to society, helpful for those you meet, and a joy to those who know and ...