Journalist Post

Hello everyone! I’m Alba and I’ve got the Journalist Role this week. This week we have finished with the Educational System Game, and to close the subject we had to do a competition with all the groups.

In this competition only took part the stars of each groups, and our selected stars were María and María Dolores. On Tuesday, the day of competition, they were very nervous because of the pressure and the big responsability they had, so the rest of the group tried to calm them. 

 Although we couldn’t win we really had fun with the contest and we had a very good time supporting them. They had prepared very well all the questions but like all games, luck had a big relevance. The winners were T8T Team and we want to say congratulations to them, they did and excellent work.

What about the rest of the group's work during this week? Well, we did summaries for María and María Dolores of the six topics, in order to facilitate them the study of the law. Also we did a type of ' psychological therapy' to calm them and awareness them that it was just a game and whatever happened they were our winners!

 With this experience we had learned many new things about the Educational Laws in Spain but in an interesting way. We think that we can use this method when we become teachers because students learn in an original way that motivates them with prizes and recognition. About prizes, at first we thought that it was unfair that only two groups could win the competition, but talking with Linda we realized that it was the only way to motivate us to study the questions and to do and effort, so now we know that rewards were necessary in this case.

Best regards.

Stars Post

Hi everyone! We are Maria Dolores and María and this week we have been the stars of “The Little Ants”.

This week the stars had a big responsibility, because we competed for an important prize, so our effort was so important. We divided the topics and each of us developed three of them, then we passed our summaries and we studied the six topics.

Our task have consisted on participate in a game, which it was like a “parchís”. If we remember, the two weeks before holidays, we were working on the LOMCE and its changes in relation with the LOE. Linda, our teacher, gave us six topics to work. Firstly, each group had to do two conceptual maps, with two of these topics and then, explaining the permanencies and the changes between both laws. Secondly, every members of the class met to establish a common conceptual map of each topic. Then, we had to obtain or elaborate eight questions of each conceptual map.

These questions have been the protagonists of the task we have done this week. The game was structured in the following way: two stars of each group had to represent the rest of the same. The rest of our classmates were the public, including our partners.

All stars of different groups were together, although it wasn´t possible that two members of the same group were close, obviously. Then, Linda gave us a “piece” which would move our position in the panel. Our piece was a pair of heels. The rules of the game were the following: firstly, a star said a number between five and ten. Linda counted the question until she arrived at the correct, and then, she asked the star the correspondent. If the participant guessed the answer, she could roll the dice, and her piece would be moved on the panel. If she failed, her/his dice would stay in the same place.

The game was developed during one and a half more or less. We finished in the fifth position and T8T were the winner, they played very well! Although, we have to recognize that the luck played an important role.

However, it was so funny, and we learnt a lot of things about LOMCE, because we listened different answers of our partners. At first we were very nervous, but we when we saw that we were going to spend a good time we felt calmer.

Analyst Post

Hello everyone! I'm Alba, the Analyst of this week. And as you know I have to put the marks of my partners. I had really enjoyed my task because I didn't have any problem with any of them, so I put them very good marks because they deserved it. We worked very well together and for this task we had only a few difficulties printing the cards, but we solved it immediately.

The task of this week was doing questions about the LOMCE according to the conceptual maps done the previous week, and once you had the questions, put them in cards.  We met one time and because this work was easy to divide, we did the rest of the task separately. We worked by couples and divided the topics. Although this can be seen as an easy task, we wanted to make very good questions, so we spent many time doing it.

The best part of the activity for us was correcting the cards with Give me 7 and voting our classmates's cards. We really enjoyed seeing their work and learning from their questions.

For us, the worst part was printing the cards because we had a little problem with the size, but we solved it very quickly.

We have learnt many things about the LOMCE, LOE and the changes between the two laws. I consider very useful to know about the subjects, the role of teachers, the autonomy of schools and so on.

We have to conserve that we work very well together, and we do not have many problems among us, and it is important to continue working in this way.

Although I think that we work well, for me we have to improve that in determined moments, we are a bit stressed beacuse we have too much work and we do not know what to do, we have to learn how to keep calm.

Evidently, this content is very related to many things in this course, specially with the part of the curriculum of the subject 'Planificación de la Acción Educativa' but in general it is related with most of our subjects.

Of course there are many social connections with the politic of our country nowadays, beacuse LOMCE is a very recent law and like everythings, it is being very controversial and critized by the citizens, so it is essential to know it closer.

In my opinion, it is being a very good experience for learning more things about the current law in education and the running of spanish schools nowadays. Something essential for us when we become teachers. All the groups are working very hard, and I have to recognize that after all, we are a bit afraid of this game, but we know that with effort and work we can reach it! We are very motivated to keep on working and learning. 

Best regards

Facilitator - María Mula Pérez

Hi everyone! I´m María and this week I have the Facilitator role. As we know, the last week our task was to investigate about permanencies and differences between LOE and LOMCE and all related with educational system according to this. Linda, our teacher, gave us six topics with the most information we needed. We had to realize a “mind-map” to remark the main ideas and the most important aspects. Finally, in class everybody worked together to elaborate a complex map with the ideas each group had extracted.

This week the activity is the second step of the last week. Now, we had to develop some questions basing on these mind-maps. The condition was these questions wasn´t very obvious or easy, because the next activity will be to realize a “game”, in which the stars of each group are going to participate. The winner will be who was able to answer every question, and the reward will be a white letter for the exam!

To elaborate our questions, we divided ourselves in pairs or three persons group:

-          - Esmeralda and Blanca have been the responsible to develop the two and three topics questions.

-          - On the second hand, Raquel and Rosana have taken of four and five topics questions.

-         -  And finally, Alba, María Dolores and me have elaborated the first and the last (six) topics questions.

This morning we have collected the questions of every group in the following way: we have put all our questions in order piling up in six groups, which correspond with the six paragraphs our teacher gave us the last week. Then, each pile or topic has been delivered to each group, and the three remaining groups have been the supervisors. We have chosen eight question of everyone, and these will be the representatives of the topic one.

After holidays we will have the game! Good luck everyone!

Stars Post

Hello, dear readers!!! We are Esmeralda and Blanca. Today in class we have to vote from 0 to 10 the different aspects that we have to take into account for evaluating the questions of the changes between LOE and LOMCE.

Us, “The Little Ants” with the assistance of the group “Give me 7” as supervisors, had to mark the questions of all the groups of the Topic one: “An Overview of the Educational System”.

The questions we have to evaluate were:

C'mon Tutankamon:

-        What are the two features that the Educational System needs to combine?

-        The Spanish Education offer Specialised Education, inside Specialized Education, what subjects appear?

-        Basic Education is divided in...?

-        How many types of provision there are in the Educational System?

Brainstorming:

-        Can you "repeat" grades in the "ESO"? In which grades and how many times?

-        What is needed to access the "basic training cycles"?

-        Can you "repeat" grades in primary education? In which grades and how many times?

-        Are the two cycles of primary education free? Why?

Step by Step:

-        What are the main objectives in the Primary Education System, according to LOE and LOMCE?

-        Once we have finished ESO, what options have we to continue studying?

-        If you are less than 14 years old, what do you need to access to the intermediate level of language part in Upper Secondary Education? And if you are over than 16 years old?

-        If my father, who is 45 years old, wants to study, what kind of school could he go?

Education Rush Hour:

-        What can a student who gets the Lower Compulsory Education Certificate do?

-        Why can we go from training to employment and vice versa?

-        Apart of the 5 principle studies the Spanish Education System provides, What three types of Specialized education offer the Spanish Education system?

-        What kind of autonomy does school have?

Give me 7:

-        What percentage of knowledge does the government set to maintain the common training throughout the national territory?

-        What two core competences are evaluated in the diagnostic test that is completed at the end of the third year of Primary Education?

-        What subjects are relevant for the average mark of Primary Education, that weren't in the previous law?

-        A 12 year old boy has failed all his exams and had to repeat the year. Can this child receive a scholarship? Why?

The Little Ants:

-        After what degree of education you obtain your first official certificate?

-        In which two main principles focus the law the quality of school?

-        What two possibilities offer Upper Secondary Education?

-        Apart of these studies: Pre-Primary Education, Basic Education, Upper Secondary Education, which more offer the Educational System?

The Teachleaders:

-        At what age can the adult education and training start?

-        The Upper Secondary Education is provided by secondary schools, what are the possibilities that you can choose?

-        We know that one of the characteristics of the Spanish Educational System is the flexibility. So, what does it means leaving the theoretical framework of lifelong fixed by Spanish Educational System?

-        If you finish the provision of the Spanish Educational System, including masters and doctorates, can you follow the studies?

 T8T:

-        How could the LOMCE face up a disadvantaged school where there is a wide diversity of students?

-        Is a seventeen years-old student able to access to the adult education, according to the LOMCE? Explain why or why not.

-        According to the LOMCE, is all the education free until the bachelor?

-        According to LOMCE if you have the Lower Compulsory Secondary Education certificate what do you need to access to Advanced vocational training?

Hide & Seek:

-        What are the most important features of the Educational System? Describe what the Educational Authorities want with these characteristics. 

-        What are the basic competences of primary education?

-        Who supervises the schools?

-        Apart from Upper Secondary Education, Higher Education, and Adult Education, what type of training can I do after Basic Education?

To sum up, we must say that in spite of having little time to evaluate the questions, we think we have chosen them right.

Greetings.

Stars Post

Hello everyone! We are María and Alba, the stars of these weeks of The Little Ants and we want to show you our conceptual maps. First of all, we have to say that we decided to do a very complex map with related concepts in order to show all the ideas reflected in the documents about the current law of education LOMCE and its changes respect the previous one, LOE.

Each group has to work in two different topics respects LOMCE and its changes. Our topics were the Organization of Primary Education and Administration and Governance at Local and/or Institutional Level II.

In our conceptual map about the Organization of Primary Education we showed from the organization of the school year, the classes per day students have, the differences of admission requirement among private and public schools, the geographical accessibility, to the role of tutors, how them oriented their students, the addition of a second foreign language with the LOMCE… This work has helped us to understand better the reality of schools nowadays, how they work, and also the adaptations to the students’ necessities.

Our second topic was based on “Educational administration and governance”. We have divided our mindmap in two areas. The permanencies and the changes.

The first point is based on on the curricula. We want to explain that the original curricula emerge from the state, then it pases to the authonomous communities and finally it arrives to schools. Along this process, the curricula suffers a Our second topic was based on “Educational administration and governance”. We have divided our mindmap in two areas. The permanencies and the changes.

-          On the first hand, inside the permanencies we find a very important topic through which develops the rest of the points, Educational Institutions.

The first point is based lot of changes, so we can deduce that it deteriorates somewhat.

The second point mentions the areas of educational institutions, which are pedagogical and curricular organization, organizational management and management of resources. In addition, educational institutions can induce experiments, forms of organization and working plans (this is the third aspect).

Then, we find that educational institutions have The School Board and The Teachers Assembly.

 Finally, the three following points explains the plans of schools (values, objectives, etc.).

-          On the second hand we find the main changes. We illustrate school autonomy, which develop pedagogical resources and the changes in the curriculum (common contents, different teachings and minimum teaching ) and the influence of government.

Last Monday, the day of the exposition, we had to work with other teams and supervise that they put their marks correctly; we really enjoyed working with Give me 7. We thought they did a very good work in their conceptual maps so we let them to mark their own work very high.

This week we had learned many necessary things for us when we become teachers, and we want to continue learning. We are encouraged to work very hard; it is the only way to reach our goals!

Best regards.

By: María Mula Pérez and Alba María Velasco Martínez

Translator Post.

Hello everyone!! I am Raquel and I have been the translator of my group this week, as all of you know, the translator have to choose five key words about the work that we have done, It has to include the definition of each concept with my own words and based on academic resources. This week we have done two cmaps about the actual law of education LOMCE, of course to do this cmaps we have reviewed the last law LOE.

1. Cmap (Conceptual map): It is a grafic representation of knowledge which consist on a network of concepts which are connecting each other, the relationshipos between these concepts are the arrows. It is a form of structure the knwoledge to study and to have it more clear.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mapa_conceptual

2. LOE: It was an educational law, the previous law before the LOMCE, which organized all the educational system's functions, including the teachings, the teachers framework, the schools, their inspection, the economy, etc. Providing an important role in to the attention to student diversity. It was approved officially in 2006 when it was of obligated fulfillment.

http://www.ali.es/modules/miprofesion/item.php?itemid=34

3. LOMCE: It is an education law which have modified the last education law, LOE, but it do not change it at all. It is known popularly as Wert Law but it is abbreviate as LOMCE. As I have said before it is only a modification of the last law called LOE, so it also organized all the educational system's functions, including the same things as the other but with the modifications.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ley_Org%C3%A1nica_para_la_Mejora_de_la_Calidad_Educativa

4. Organization: It is an instrument which organize those with you work. In conclusion, organization is a form of organize a system to get the whised results. There are a lot of kind of organization, but in this case we talk about school organization, and it is based on how school is organized, the relationship between teachers, students and so on. In the same way a school organization can exist only when there people who are capable to work together in an organize form to get a common objective.

http://www.significados.info/organizacion/

5. Administration: It is an action to administrar o gestionar people, companies, resources and so on to get targeted. This concept refer to the structure, the operation and the performance of those organization which are being administered.

http://www.significados.info/administracion/

Finally, I would like to say that with this task we have learned several things, we have learned how to organize the information that we have, we have learned to do a cmap and also that we have several tools to do it online. And finally, although we are not expert in this laws, after this taks we know a few more about them. We have enjoyed a lot doing this cmaps, I hope you enjoy it!!

see you soon!

Curator-Farmer's Post.

Hello! I'm Rosana and this week I have had the Curator Farmer's role. This week we have done two conceptual maps about two different topics: 'Organization of Primary Education' and 'Educational Administration and Governance'. I have done the pearltree about it, and the reference of it is: http://pearltrees.com/p/cRcqX 

Furthermore, I put here the references that we have used for this task:

1. BOE (Boletín Oficial del Estado). Martes 10 de Diciembre del 2013. (Núm. 295. Sec. I. Pág. 97858)
2.  CCOO Enseñanza. ¿Cómo será el nuevo sistema educativo LOMCE? (Diciembre del 2013)
3. https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/fpfis/mwikis/eurydice/index.php/Spain:Organisation_of_Primary_Education
4. Comparación LOMCE-LOE. Ley Orgánica 2/2006, de 3 de Mayo.
5. https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/fpfis/mwikis/eurydice/index.php/Spain:Administration_and_Governance_at_Local_and/or_Institutional_Level

To sum up, I would like to say that we have learned a lot of things while we've done the conceptual maps.

Analyst Post

Hello! I’m Blanca and this week I have the role of Analyst. I have to evaluate the work of every member of the group and make a reflection about the task. This week we started the part of the subject of Educational Resources and the task, as you know, consists on the changes in the Spanish Educational System.

This week we have to compare the two lasts laws, LOE (Ley Orgánica de Educación) and LOMCE (Ley Orgánica para la Mejora de la Calidad Educativa). At first, I found this task a bit difficult because it was the first time that we deal with this kind of laws. We saw it in the subject of Planificación de la Acción Educativa, but with this task we really understood how it is.

On the one hand, the best part of the activity was to analyze, examine and vote three conceptual maps and do a new one with all the information. With this, we realized how to be critical, new perspectives and ways of thinking and madding conceptual maps. We also learn that this subject is more than learning content; we have to develop new competences by our own with assistance of our teacher. For these reasons I think it was the best part of the task.

On the other hand, the worst thing is that it was a bit difficult to put the marks of the conceptual maps of the classmates because each member of the group thinks about different aspects. But finally we take into account everything and we carried out with our work. Moreover, we should encourage more comradeship among classmates to be better in class.

With this task, we have learnt the main differences between LOE and LOMCE. We understood how was and actually is the educational law of Spain and the main characteristics. It is a very important thing for our future as teachers because we will use it all along our work. We also learnt with this task and with the other ones, how to work cooperatively and with autonomy organizing our own ideas of the differences between the laws with conceptual maps. I think it would be very easy to us understand the laws with conceptual maps which contains the important information. But one thing I want to remark, how we are going to use all these knowledge we are acquiring in our future work as teachers?

I think we need to conserve our dedication and implication with every task. We do our best to improve every week. In my opinion, I think we are very united with an objective: learn as much as we can!

As far as I am concerned, we have to improve the presentations of our tasks because we are always nervous. We have to speak louder and put more enthusiasm in everything we do. Although our work is well done, we can improve!

The content of this task, as I said before, is related to the one we learn on the subject “Planificación de la Acción Educativa”. Then, I have to say that the law is going to be present all along our future as teachers, because we need to know the framework in which we are going to develop children’s knowledge and our own knowledge too. We are going to deal with this content the rest of the degree.

In my opinion, there are some evident social connections of this content in the recent protests we saw in television because of the new educational law, LOMCE. This situation entails people who is in favour or against of it. For example, I think it is a bad implementation that they remove music from the subjects of Primary Education. It seems to me that it should remain compulsory.

I have found this post in a blog of a school which consists on what I have explained before: http://ampapaulofreire.blogspot.com.es/2014/03/manifestacion-por-la-musica-en-la.html

Greetings!

Differences between LOE and LOMCE

Hello everyone! 

This week we have started with the part of this subject called, ‘’School Organization’’. So, during these five weeks we have to developed this work which is based on the Educational System in Spain, this week the winners of the game will have a price, 1,5 plus in the portfolio, for the first winner, and 1 plus for the second winner. This first week we have worked with two laws, LOE which was the previous law and LOMCE which is the current. We have known better the laws, LOMCE didn´t change all the aspects which were in the LOE at all, but it does some changes for example in the part of administration schools have more autonomy in order to elaborate their curriculum. Also about the previous law, LOE, we have studied the differences between them and also we have studied some things which have not changed respect to the topics.

To show these changes, we have had to do two conceptual maps about our topics, Linda sent us some basic tips, and there she wrote each group and two of the topics which we had to do. Our topics were number 3, organization of primary school and number 6 administration and governance at local and/or institutional level II, below of there appeared the main aspects which we had to treated in our conceptual maps.

According to this, the stars of each group had to present the conceptual maps in class. In the presentation we have to evaluate all the conceptual maps and only two groups can win, and that group will have their prices.

But in the class of Monday was different for our group because we were divided in two and some of us went with “Hide and Sick” and other with “Give me 7”. While other group had to evaluate other conceptual maps about a topic we had to be supervisors, this means that we have to see that they evaluated other conceptual maps in an objective way. Some of us treated one of our topic, organization of primary school, but on the other hand, the other members had to evaluate other topic, the primary school, which we didn´t know very well, despite of this we learnt some aspects of this new topic because we were awake to evaluate three of the conceptual maps. In short, half of our group were the supervisors of "Give me 7" and the other part made a global conceptual map with "Hide and Sick" about the Organization of Primary Education. Here you can see it:

We have done a big effort to do two conceptual maps clear and beautiful because the groups which reach this prize will have easier in the exam and they can be more relaxed.

To make our conceptual maps we used the next web page 2.0 which had all the tools which we wanted to use and it was adapted to our desires.: ExamTime.

https://www.examtime.com/es

Here we show you our conceptual maps, we chose fun colors, red and green to make them, red color to number 6, administration and governance at local and/or institutional level II and green to number 3, organization of primary school.

https://www.examtime.com/es/p/693136

https://www.examtime.com/es/p/678772