In my fifth year of teaching, embarking on the adventure of my Master's in Education: Curriculum and Instruction. Currently also teaching math, English and physical education at Central Collegiate in Moose Jaw, SK. I am a cat mom, love adventures in the outdoors, as well as taking part in plenty of activities and sports.
I officially made it to the end of my Master’s degree in Curriculum and Instruction and I have to say I feel pretty good right about now! Am I a little sad? Yes, because I have learned so much over the last couple of years and met a lot of amazing educators I otherwise would have never met. Am I excited? You better believe I am! I’m so thankful for these courses and the ability to connect with all of you and I’m also grateful that we can remain connected via twitter and other ways.
This semester has been A LOT for us all. Trying to take my final course and juggling hybrid teaching in COVID is no joke. I learned a lot this semester – history, old tools, and new tools as well. The opportunities to present of specific types of tools allowed for us all to learn from each other and test out many of these tools that I am taking back to my classroom. Connecting via blogs and twitter is always a great way to learn from each other, and it’s something I know I will continue to do past this experience. So without further ado, here is my final summary of learning! Enjoy!
Thank you everyone for a great semester and for getting through this crazy roller coaster of a year together! Good to all my colleagues that are graduating as well, and good luck to those of you that have a few courses left! Stay in touch! 🙂
This week we had another excellent presentation from Megan, Leigh, Jenny, and Kalyn on assistive technologies. Like some people in our class, my knowledge on these technologies is pretty limited. I use the basics in my classroom, but I haven’t had a whole lot of experience teaching students who use some of these more intense technologies on a daily basis. In most of my experience, the students I have taught have used apps like Google Read and Write, Google Translate and other translating apps, smart devices or chromebooks, audiobooks, and planners or low tech organization tools. Some students need scribes or to type their exams, or need extra time for assignments or exams, etc. When it comes to expertise in the area of assistive technology, I’m pretty low tech and inexperienced!
When students are in need of assisitve tech tools in my classroom, I don’t agree with the stigma that can be attached to using them, such as using Google Read and Write or audiobooks in classrooms. Often I offer these tools to all my students, giving them all the opportunity to use them, explaining that we all learn differently so why not use the tools you need to be more productive and make learning or writing easier? The article, Assistive Technology: Impact on Education, employment, and independence of individuals with physical disabilities(Stumbo, N., Martin, J., and Hedrick, B, 2008) even stated that, “about 76% of children who received AT were able to remain in a regular classroom, and about 45% were able to reduce school-related service” (100). This is significant when we are talking about students with physical disabilities as the article states, but also for students with behavioural issues and other learning disabilities within our classrooms.
I absolutely love using graphic organizers in my ELA classrooms! They are so helpful for students to organize thinking, brainstorming, and allowing me to see students’ thinking processes as well. I often make students hand in their outlines and organizers before we begin essay writing and some students feel it’s an unnecessary step, but others need it. The ones who think it is unnecessary also learn valuable skills – like how to break down their thinking and explain how they got to a certain point instead of just doing it (a.k.a. metacognition). The students who need those extra steps also benefit from the slow down process and don’t feel that stigma of “needing” the help to get started. I am even going to attempt to use graphic organizers for notes in my Calculus course block three and encourage students to make their own helpful notes for the future. I have to thank Peter Liljedahl and his Building Thinking Classrooms mentality. If you teach math, I strongly recommend his book and following him on twitter!
Another adaptation I use most frequently in my classroom is playing audiobooks when we are doing novel studies or studying Shakespeare because it gives so much more context to the play. I was surprised how many of my students loved this option for reading books and used it frequently. There are a lot of novels we read in Grade 12 that are contextually difficult and the audiobooks make it much easier to comprehend. I also tell my students I enjoy using Google Read and Write to help me write sometimes, do research jot notes, or simply complete a task faster than physically typing.
I like to allow my students to use laptops and apps on their devices to complete their assignments all the time. Once again, this draws the attention away from students who absolutely need the tools and from students asking, “why do they get to use a laptop and I can’t?” I love having an inclusive classroom and allowing students to show their learning how they can best and make it easier for all students to stay focused and completing their tasks. This is significant when we are talking about students with behavioural issues, mental and physical barriers within our classrooms.
As I don’t have a whole lot of experience using the techier tools in my classroom, the experiences I do have using them stand out a little more. Using Read and Write has become the most common tool I end up using with students to help them with the writing process. I’m sure I have barely scratched the surface of this tool, but its capabilities are quick impressive. Giving my students the opportunity to speak out their words is an awesome way for them to make progress quickly on exams, essays, and other assignments, but one of the drawbacks is they need a quiet place to work where they also will not be overheard. This can be a challenge in our building and in my classroom. I obviously can’t have a few students speaking out their essays at the same time as others trying to work quietly; it just doesn’t work. Not to mention, it is distracting for others around and the students speaking out loud could be self conscious of their words. The highlighting functions and screen reading tools are also awesome to use for research and also showcasing how to complete research online with students. Another great feature is that it is free and easily accessible on chromebooks and Google Chrome!
I would think one of the biggest drawbacks is price for many of the higher tech tools. Such tools are great for students who really need them but achieving funding can be incredibly difficult. Another drawback of assistive technology according to this blog post, Assistive Technology: What It Is and How It Worksincludes the point that AT cannot “make learning and attention issues go away.” I could see some people expecting that using the more high tech assistive technologies with students would solve all their problems but the truth is that these tools need to be used effectively and appropriately or there really isn’t a point in using them at all. If there is limited education behind why we use a certain assistive technology with students, it could become more distracting than helpful to the student in need.
It’s also important to recognize that these tools don’t “make up for ineffective teaching” and can’t be used as replacements for good teaching. Adaptations and differentiated instruction are still essential to using these tools to their full potential and allowing the students who need them to benefit the most from their uses. Education, professional development, and time are essential for teachers when it comes to apps like Google Read and Write, Evernote, Notability or PECS. If teachers are given education on these tools, they will be able to use them effectively with students in their classrooms.
Stumbo, N., Martin, J., and Hedrick, B (2008) state, “AT is meant to improve functional independence by circumventing environmental barriers, maximizing personal independence, and increasing activity participation. This, in turn, then affords greater opportunity for societal participation and integration, including in institutions of higher education and the workforce” (101). Used properly, students have more opportunities than they ever had without these tools and it doesn’t have to be super fancy and techy to be successful and meaningful. Sometimes all it takes is the right plan and the right idea to help make student’s life easier, more impactful and engaging toward the future.
I know I will be spending more time educating myself on the cheaper options available to my students so I can be a more effective teacher and help my students find the right tools to help them in school and beyond.
This week I decided to take a look at a couple of different tools: Classkick and Formative. I wanted some options in case one was a complete fail, but both turned out relatively well! I have played around with Formative a little because of previous classes, but I haven’t used it very much in my courses before and Classkick is entirely new to me! I was really impressed with the presentation this week from Dalton, Matt and Trevor! I’m always in awe every time I discover new tools and I’m so grateful for these classes so I can stay up to date! So, without further ado, here is my review on the tools I used this week!
Classkick
Why did you choose this tool?
I chose Classkick because it was entirely new and seemed to fit the best for what I was doing in my ELA 20 course this week. We have been playing around a lot with Nearpod and the students love it, so I figured Classkick would give them a similar feel. It also fit in with the style of discussions we have been having. I wanted them to answer some questions about having and being a sibling without necessarily communicating with one another about their answers.
I realized as I assigned the activity to them that what I really wanted was to be able to pull up all their answers at once so we could have a big class discussion about it and you can’t do that on Classkick. We ended up having a class discussion and I assigned the questions for a formative check.
Challenges Setting Up the Tool
I thought setting up my presentation was simple. A few clicks here, a couple sentences there and we were ready to roll. I think all together, it took me about 10 minutes to set up my assignment. I liked that I was able to use a variety of different tools and set it up so students could be creative with how they answered the questions.
One challenge we did have was getting the students logged in. Initially, there was some confusing on where to log in and how to use the code. I had linked it in Google Classroom and most of them were able to click the link and get right in using the given code. A couple couldn’t get in, so we had to go the long way but grade 11’s are pretty logical and they figured it out quickly.
Student Response
Initially, my students didn’t really like using it. Most were trying to use Classkick on their phones and they noted there were limited options, and it was trickier to use than on a computer. Most of my students gave up on their phones and switched to chrome books to make it easier. They did like the format and enjoyed the options for answering questions using pictures, audio, and written words. Some of them actually used their fingers on their phones to write out their answers! We were able to discuss their answers together as well by using the view option so we could discuss and everyone could contribute to the conversation, whether or not they spoke.
When I asked for some feedback, they said it was confusing at first but after they got the hang of it, it was pretty simple to use and they enjoyed the options to play around. However, for formative class discussion assignments, they said they preferred Nearpod. (even though they enjoyed being my guinea pigs for this assignment!)
How did you use the Tool for Assessment?
When I selected Classkick, I knew I wasn’t going to be grading the work students were doing; it was all for formative assessment. I wanted to give them a space a explain their family dynamic and connect with our topic which was siblings and birth order. We were discussing how our personalities change and develop because of our siblings and because of the order we were born in. They were able to use the space creatively and I was able to see their responses after which was awesome. It’s early in our block and having these conversations can really help me get to know the students better. I found using Classkick for some formative assessment was a really informal way to help me understand how students make connections with ideas and themselves, as well as help me get to know their writing style more. They didn’t feel the pressure they would by writing their answers on paper or on a google doc. Instead, they had fun with it and gave themselves some freedom to be creative and not worried about the “grades.”
A sample of some answers from my ELA 20 class
Pros/Cons
I really enjoyed how easy it was to set up and use. The students loved the creativity of it, but found some of it clunky to use. I found the layout of the website easy to use and connecting it with my students are simple. I also enjoy being able to check in on them as they are writing and working. I think the help feature is an awesome addition, especially if we had to move to online learning again. I did notice a lot of features cost extra, like embedding your classes from Google Classroom and the ability to export grades and assignments. There is also a limit of 20 assignments per teacher in the free version.
Formative or Summative Purpose?
I think this tool could be used for both formative and summative assessment. I see a lot of uses for it at the elementary level and there is so much creative freedom within the program to ensure you could create both formative and summative assessments. However, at the high school level, I would probably only use it formatively as the grading could be tedious as it seems like you do need to visit every student and every slide to grade and there is not a “quick” grade option.
Overall, my students and I enjoyed using this tool together and I will probably use it again in a similar setting!
Go Formative
Why did you choose this tool?
I also wanted to try my hand at Formative because I have really been meaning to try it out and use it authentically in my classroom but we all get comfortable and used to our routine. I decided to try out Formative on my Grade 12 ELA course this week. We were doing an activity with some engagement needed and they are a quiet bunch. I decided to use Formative because Dean pointed out being able to annotate a PDF. The assignment was already laid out in a PDF but I wanted the students to be able to contribute to it without having to talk a whole bunch. This ended up working pretty well, despite some hiccups getting started.
Challenges Setting Up the Tool
The hiccups began when I started creating my “quiz” on Go Formative. I have to say I did not have a good time. I was using a PDF which was very easy to upload and dropping the questions where I wanted was easy too. What wasn’t easy was moving the questions around. I don’t know if I was doing something wrong or clicking the wrong things but I could not reorder my questions. I also hated that I could not find a duplicate button that would go to the next page of the PDF. I could duplicate my questions on the same page, but could not move them to the next one. I found it very frustrating. I eventually got the assignment made, but it probably took me 30 minutes and I was essentially repeating the same 4 questions on each page of my PDF, four times. Dean might have to give me a lesson on making this tool easier to use (LOL)! After my hiccups of getting it ready, I loved that it easily uploaded right to my Google Classroom roster and I had all my students with accounts within seconds! I thought for sure it would be smooth sailing the next day.
Student Response
It was not smooth sailing however. I instructed my students to go to the Google Classroom and follow the link to Go Formative and the quiz would be there. I bet one third of my students couldn’t get in through the Google Classroom. This was really frustrating, and I ended up having to create a “guest roster” and get the other students in through using the code. This wasn’t that big of a deal, but I expected it to go so smoothly and it didn’t work as such. Again, maybe I did something wrong or it was student error and they just weren’t listening (this does tend to happen a lot in grade 12!). Once we were in, they flew. The quiz was easy to use, they typed in their answers and we were done in 20 minutes. It ended up awesome!
A Glimpse of my Student Responses
When I asked students what they thought, they agreed that it was very easy to use and they enjoyed the format a lot. They also said if we had to go to online learning, this tool would be perfect for quizzes. I agreed. I loved being able to see all their answers very clearly for each question. They also commented that the format worked well on their phones, and I didn’t have as many try to switch over to the chrome books. The only complaint I really got was that the PDF was small on their phone screen and therefore more difficult to read and answer the questions at the same time.
How did you use the Tool for Assessment?
Like I said before, I wanted to use this tool to begin some class discussion and also see students’ thoughts and responses to Gatsby. We have been doing a novel study on The Great Gatsby this week and were getting into some background information on him. I wanted to know how much and why they believed him, but also if Nick, the main character, also believed him. It was really nice to see all their answers, and I loved that I could hide their names as we went through the answers together, post-quiz. I read off some of their answers, and students added to the discussion by speaking up about some of the comments they could read. We also rated, on a scale of 1-10, how much we believed Gatsby’s story and it was nice to have students expand on their choice, beyond what was on the screen. Overall, we had a good lesson and the students also appreciated seeing the answers others said, especially the quieter ones. This also encouraged them to talk more because they could see they weren’t the only ones who thought a certain way.
A screenshot of my assignment
Pros/Cons
I really enjoyed the class discussion and the ease of using this tool in a classroom setting. I hated setting it up but that might have just been my personal flaws preventing me from being more efficient. I liked that it was able to be uploaded directly into Google Classroom and that I could connect my rosters. I also think it is incredibly easy to grade and if you are using multiple choice, it’s self grading. It was also great to see the progress bars and I could tell when students were done, and I didn’t need to ask 10 times who are finished and who needed more time.
The things I didn’t like was obviously the time it took to set up, and the troubles we had as a class logging in for the first time. There are also a lot of features that are locked to the pro-version that would be very helpful – like the timer and advanced questions like including audio responses.
Formative or Summative Purpose?
I think Formative is meant to be used formatively, hence the name, but I think it could be used for certain, quick summative assessments and quizzes. I used it formatively to create class discussion and I think it could be very beneficial for my classroom for this exact reason. I could see it being used frequently in a high school setting and to ensure students “get” certain concepts and ideas. It’s also great for teachers as it is quick and easy to see who is having difficulties and who is doing well. The idea that it could be used very easily in an online setting is my number one reason for liking the app!
Conclusions
I really enjoyed trying out these tools this week and trialing them out in my ELA classes. I wish I had a math class right now to test both on because I think my results would be different. I will just have to wait until Block 3 for this. I had some frustrations, and a lot of learning to do while using these tools but I enjoyed the benefit of having them start conversations in my classroom and having some concrete evidence of students both understanding and elaborating on our discussions. Overall, they are both excellent tools for students to show their learning, whatever that looks like!
I have heard all about The Social Dilemma on Netflix, and many of my co-workers watched it and encouraged me to watch it as well. This week, I finally got around to watching it. I was both surprised and worried by what I watched. However, many of my colleagues seemed flabbergasted, claiming to have deleted their social media accounts and turned off all notifications because of the acclaimed docu-drama. Maybe it is because of what I am learning in these courses, or because I have been a little more aware of what social media does to our brains, but I was left thinking, that’s it?
Don’t get me wrong, I think there is a lot of alarming information in the docu-drama and a lot of information that I learned about social media and the algorithms behind the screen. But, based on the reactions of others, I think I was expecting more alarming statistics, information and, experiences that I didn’t get by watching it.
The part that sticks out the most of me was actually at the beginning of the film. People behind the scenes ask former employees of major media companies, “what is the problem?” None of the employees can put into words what exactly the problem is, but all claim it is bad. I am not denying that social media and these companies have created a beast they can no longer control, but for the former employees to not even be able to begin their personal explanations, I found both interesting and off-putting.
As Nancy said in her blog post this week, “Many were responsible for the development of the technology that they are now condemning. Ethically I questioned how they made their money, and are now attacking them. This presented a very unequal perspective.” I too, wondered this as I watched, mostly because I have become a lot better at critically reflecting on information given and looking for bias. There was a lot of bias here, and unfortunately, no rebuttals from either current employees or the larger companies themselves within the film. As Nancy went on to say in her post, there were statements made by Facebook on Facebook.
Another big statistic that stuck out to me was about the young girls affected by social media in a negative way. I graduated high school in 2009, and am I glad that I did not have to deal with social media as a teenager. It was enough to deal with in university and young adulthood, but I could decipher between reality and fiction through the different apps. A young preteen just can’t, and it breaks my heart. The docu-drama links self-harm and suicide attempts of young girls to the advancement of social media on personal devices. This occurred in 2009 according to the docu-drama – right when I finished high school, and as a young teacher, I could tell immediately how different things were in high school because of this advancement in technology.
Screenshots from The Social Dilemma
There isn’t a direct correlation between these events, but I know it is definitely influenced by the advancement in tech availability. I see it now in my classroom and it still breaks my heart that these kids don’t know what it is like to not compare yourself to everyone else online. This also has an implication further into the classroom because I have very few students willing to participate in class discussion and it often takes weeks for me to get them comfortable talking in class. I assume this is anxiety as well as the worry that they will be talked about online if they somehow mess up.
One piece I think the docu-drama does very well is the explanation of privacy, data collection, and how the algorithms use every click you make to predict your next move. I found this part incredibly interesting and eerie. I instantly thought of everything I have ever clicked on or looked at, and it feels os invasive, yet there are minimal laws surrounding the use of that data. There is a quote used in the film: “If you’re not paying for the product, then you are the product.” This hit me. For some reason, I never truly thought about it like that, but it makes complete sense. The idea that we use these apps and services for free, insinuates that there is more going on behind the scenes. There are so many ads, yet I hardly pay attention to them. How could this do anything to my way of thinking? However, the film argues that slowly, these ads change the way a person thinks or gives them ideas they previously would not have if they chose to forgo the apps altogether.
I think this section of the film is done well and does its best to educate on how that data is used and abused. Really what we need are laws in place to protect our data as well as possibly limit how much of it these companies can store. This is incredibly important for the future and I think it is also a valuable lesson for students to understand how their data can be traced, used, and manipulated to keep them on the apps and growing within them.
The final piece I took away from The Social Dilemma was how these companies use notifications to keep you on the apps or to get you back on them. I’m not going to lie, when the film used some of the common sound effects for notifications, I felt a rush in my chest. I immediately connected this as a dopamine effect. I was a little alarmed and thought instantly, “Oh my. I have a problem.” However, I think this reaction comes from years of having a phone and getting so used to the effects those notifications have on our psyche. The film suggests turning off notifications on your phone, so you are less likely to waste time on your devices, and less likely to be distracted by them. I completely agree. I didn’t turn off all my notifications, but I did reduce them to the important ones I need throughout a day. I also silenced most of them because for me, the sound of the notification is far more distracting than the screen lighting up.
I think this is an important takeaway we all need and I found myself agreeing with the interviewees as they discussed how the algorithms attempt to lure you back to the app after too much time away. It’s incredibly addicting and it works. Then poof! 15 more minutes are gone.
When I think about the educational implications this docu-drama has, I think about my teenage students, in the most vulnerable place they will be in their lives, and how they do not understand what psychological affects these programs have on their productivity, their attention span and their self esteem. Now more ever, media literacy and digital citizenship programs need to be taught in all areas of the classroom – and don’t even get me started on the fake news debate in this film! (That might have to be a separate blog post all on its own!) Students need the tools to understand how these apps work and how they can be used in a positive and effective way. As Virginia Society for Technology in Education says in their article, “[Web 2.0 tools] are interactive and allow users to connect and collaborate with both the Web and other people.” (4) Could we just get rid of it all? Yes, but we are too far down the rabbit hole to turn back so we need to embrace the tools and learn how to use them effectively and how to limit our time spent on them.
As the film closes out, it makes recommendations for going forward. Turn off notifications, set boundaries, and live in the world. I think the most important message behind it all was remembering to actually live and not live through others or through a screen. These tools have done so much good during the pandemic to connect people, but we need to remind ourselves and our students that the real connections that matter are with the people in front of us. So set a timer, put the phone away, and have a real conversation with someone you love.
This semester, we have been exposed to many new tools as well as a lot of history of educational technology. Teaching in a pandemic has not been easy; there have been a lot of ups and downs, especially when I think back to the spring and our stint of supplemental learning. I felt like I was decently prepared for it, given my knowledge of tech tools, and my students trusted me to pull off the transition. However, it was still rocky. Engaging students in an online format, when they had already been given the green light to move onto the next level was difficult. I lost a lot of students and the few that stuck around preferred to do it mostly on their own. I was left feeling pretty unfulfilled and missing my students as I continued to post projects, videos, and schedule meetings with little turnout. I was so excited to get back to the classroom and back to teaching my students face-to-face and thankfully we haven’t had too many hiccups yet!
However, when we got back to teaching face-to-face, a lot of things had to transform to hybrid models of teaching. I was really excited for this opportunity to integrate more tools and tech into my everyday teaching because we had to be prepared to go online at a moment’s notice. Having an online platform set up also allowed students who have to miss school for a few days due to illness or covid testing to stay caught up on classwork. I have been using Google Classroom as my platform to keep students organized and so far, it has been working wonderfully. It allows students to submit work, ask questions, and stay caught up on all the things going on in the classroom.
Along with using Google Classroom to connect my students, we have been using lots of other tools like Remind, Flipgrid, iMovie, Google Docs, Slides and Forms, and occasionally Zoom. These tools work great for my ELA classes because they allow students to connect in a variety of ways. Remind allows them to send messages and pictures so I can help them out with assignment issues or they can notify me in a quick way that they are missing class. Flipgrid has been great for creating discussion about novels, stories, and other topics we cover in class. It also gives me an opportunity to see their speaking and presentation skills without a mask on! The other tools have been great for creative assignments and presentations. It’s awesome that students are able to collaborate in real time on the projects without needing to be together. Zoom came in especially handy this week as I was out sick for a few days. I was able to teach from home and zoom into my classroom to teach my students, answer questions and still be present. It definitely isn’t the same as being there, but being able to talk to them through a scene, assign and grade projects through Google Classroom and send messages through Remind made it much easier for them and for myself to stay connected to each other.
Being out sick also gave me the opportunity to really reflect on this week’s blog prompt and what I would do if we must suddenly move to an online format. I think if I were to move to an online or blended format, I could see myself using Nearpod and Pear Deck to organize lessons. We have had presentations using these tools in the last couple of weeks and they seem both easy to use and engaging for the audience. I love that students can follow along on their own screen or access the presentation to go through at another time, at their own pace. This gives the option to teach using both synchronous and asynchronous means and giving student more freedom to access content. As Jennifer Gonzalez said in her blog post about distance learning, “when we are kept apart from one another for whatever reason, our need for human interaction increases. So if you’re teaching a distance learning course that was set up that way to begin with, it’s important to build in structures to keep students interacting with each other and with you.” This idea is something I both lacked in the spring and crave if we ever go back online again. Keeping up engagement is important and I think by using tools like Zoom and Flipgrid, I could continue to engage students in those interactions.
One tool from this week that really intrigued me is Planboard. I have never heard of it but by the sounds of it, it would be an excellent tool to use for staying organized in the online world. In the spring, I used Google Classroom to schedule my days and it worked okay, but I needed something a little more structured. Planboard looks like it would do this for me! It looks like a Type-A personality’s dream and I am looking forward to exploring this tool further!!
I think my most difficult task in the spring was preparing my AP Calculus students for their exam. How does one teach an advanced level math course as well as run practice exams via online supplemental learning? Not easily, I admit. The amount of work that went into developing the lessons, quizzes, practice questions, and zoom sessions was easily triple the amount of work I normally did to prepare face-to-face. So, going online and teaching math again is my living nightmare. I have had a prep this block, and all I have done in that prep is make lesson videos for my Calculus students just in case we have to go online in the block system.
When I think about my math courses, I prep them in an entirely different way than my ELA courses. I have been using SmartNotes to create my notes for years, and then I use Screencastify to record my own videos. I began using DeltaMath in the spring and I know if we end up online again, I will be using this awesome tool to create quizzes and formative checks. I am also looking forward to checking out Explain Everything to see if it can cut some of my prep time in half. Desmos and Khan Academy are also a great help for my math courses and for giving students an opportunity to explore the subject on their own. Overall, when I think about teaching math online again, I know that engagement is key and if there is a way to do group problem solving over Google Docs or Zoom breakout rooms, I am going to do it.
If online learning does happen again, I’m going to take some advice from Jennifer Gonzalez first: “treat the beginning of the shift the same way you’d treat the beginning of a school year, by establishing routines and protocols before digging deeply into content, and giving extra energy to rekindling culture and relationships on the new platform even if they were already established in the face-to-face setting.” Once those routines and relationships are built, it comes down to remembering to go with the flow and as we talked in class on Tuesday, keeping a growth mindset is vital!
After our presentation this week, I feel a lot of relief, especially related to being one step closer to completing my degree! Thanks for the great teamwork Jocelyn, Daina, and Allison! Now, onto the rest of the semester and this week’s blog post! We had to watch this video before writing our blog post and I found it both very true and humorous. The best part about it I think was as I started it, I was doing the classic multitasking of a teacher: let me watch this video while checking my email on my phone and eating my lunch. As the video played on, I realized I was doing exactly what I was not supposed to be doing, but isn’t that just how a teacher’s life is?
I have always thought I was a great multitasker. I can do a lot at the same time and keep focus, but lately I have been wondering how truly productive this is. At work, I currently have a prep afternoon because of the block system and I always have a million little things to do before I can get to the truly productive tasks of my day. I find myself tidying up the classroom, printing lessons for the upcoming days, marking random assignments students have handed in, eating my lunch, checking emails, calling parents, and writing out my lesson plans on the board. All of a sudden, it’s 2:30 and I truly feel like I’ve accomplished nothing. I have 45 minutes of true prep time to do something actually on my list. I knew something had to change, so I’ve started doing my “to-do” list first and then focusing on the administrative tasks at the end of the day. Finally, I walk away from work feeling more accomplished and ready for the upcoming days.
Of course, I still try to multitask a lot of the time, and the idea of single tasking is intriguing. A couple of weeks ago, I remember having a conversation with my boyfriend in our kitchen. I said, “yeah but I’m great at multi-tasking so I will get everything done today.” He turned around to tell me, “multi-tasking doesn’t actually exist. You just switch your attention from many tasks, and you think you are doing two things at once.” I was caught off guard. For some reason I never thought of it like that and this thought stayed in my head; it clicked that this is 100% what I do all the time. I don’t remember the last time I was truly focused and present on one task. Lately, my boyfriend has been listening to Rob Dial’s podcast The Mindset Mentor (which is amazing) and he recommended it to me. I started listening and one of the episodes I listened to was called “Multitasking is Dumb.” I listened to it again this week and it really hits the nail on the head. Rob discusses how our brains are designed to focus on one task at a time and as we multitask, our efficiency goes down for whatever task we are trying to complete. At the end of the day, multitasking causes us to become more stressed out and mentally exhausts us. Maybe that’s why teachers are so tired all the time?!
I’m sure we’ve all had those whirlwind days where we feel like we are doing one million things or are operating with a million tabs open in our brains and sit down to think, “what just happened?” Teachers multitask everyday, (just check out this infograph to see how much we actually do) because there is so much going on in a classroom, and if we were to single-task, I actually think the classroom might implode.
So, is the Internet really a productivity tool or merely an endless series of distractions?
This week, our presentation focused on productivity suites and I think we can all agree, these suites have made teaching easier- whether it be through Microsoft or Google. Like Leigh said in her blog this week, the internet has made it possible for us to find resources online, so we do not have to do all the work ourselves as teachers. It has increased productivity by allowing us the opportunity to share sources on places like Twitter and Wakelet, so we can use our time for our students instead. The internet has a variety of productivity tools to help us be more productive, but I think the problem is that we try to do too much that it defeats the purpose of whatever tool we are using.
I remember back in high school, working on essays and projects online before the internet really got interesting and being able to focus on the project at hand without opening millions of tabs and switching focus from one website to the next. I swear my master’s papers take me twice as long to write because I am constantly switching my attention. I have millions of tabs open, checking the rubric, taking a “brain break” I don’t deserve on my phone, back to the essay, back to the research, taking another break, finding a snack, then back to the paper only to find the reason I left the essay in the first place was because I needed a citation from another website before I could continue.
It is very easy to get lost. As the Productivity Ninja Nancy said in her vlog this week, one tool we can try is the pomodoro technique – setting a timer for 25 minutes to get as much done on one task as possible. This is something I am really going to try to implement into my daily routine because I struggle with focusing on one task at a time. I actually tried it while writing this blog, and it is surprisingly difficult to focus that long without switching tasks!! I kept having the nagging feeling of checking my phone or getting up to complete some unnecessary task.
I think part of the blame is on the internet and social media for multitasking becoming so accepted. It is very easy to use and become distracted by, especially in this age. Many of the readings this week focused on making our students connected and heavily focus on ensuring they have skills for the future, by using these productivity tools. Perhaps, focusing too much on the digital side can create a negative effect on their productivity and use of these devices. I tried to do a focused writing activity with students where they wrote for 10 minutes straight. Most of them tried to give up after three. Focus is difficult when you are so used to switching tasks constantly and when that is just the norm of society.
Lots of these tools are great, but there is a fine balance to using them productively. Multitasking has become something we brag about being good at, and maybe it’s time to switch the importance from multitasking to being able to focus on one task at a time. As teachers we need to help students learn how to focus more often and give them more practice in the field of single tasking – in fact, we all need to work on it.
Neil Postman wrote: “…We now know that “Sesame Street” encourages children to love school only if school is like “Sesame Street.” Which is to say, we now know that “Sesame Street” undermines what the traditional idea of schooling represents.”
For this week’s blog prompt, we are tasked with unpacking this quote and extending the ideas to current models of education. The problem is, I have never really watched Sesame Street (shout out to The Magic School Bus for my educational TV background), so my prior knowledge of how Sesame Street encouraged students to “love school” is pretty limited. However, after a little reading, I have more of an idea of what Postman meant when he said this quote.
Students are taught to love a certain type of schooling, one that entertains and seduces them into blind obedience of watching more, and this is not what education is. In our current education system, teachers encourage students to think for themselves, ask questions, make mistakes, and to think outside of the box, but we are often met with resistance because “that’s hard.” I’m sure Sesame Street had many great life lessons and taught children a lot about life, but it is an unrealistic expectation for educators to follow and education and entertainment do not go hand in hand.
The idea that schooling needs to be entertaining for students to engage or benefit from it is a hindrance to what many teachers try to do in their classrooms everyday. This blog discusses more of what Postman discussed in “Amusing Ourselves to Death;” Postman goes on to say, “Television’s principal contribution to educational philosophy is the idea that teaching and entertainment are inseparable” (146). The problem with this idea is that students are often not “entertained” by our education system. If they have grown up to expect this, when they are not entertained, they gap out and think they are not learning.
This is where the recent trends in education comes in. More and more, we are beginning to see an increased use of cellphones, BYOD, and audiovisual technologies in our classrooms. Not only are we beginning to see more of this, they are becoming both a requirement and an expectation in the classroom – from both teachers and students. This is not necessarily a bad thing – education needs to adapt and advance for the future – but we cannot become reliant on it either. Audio and visual tools increase student engagement and help students learn visually. The critique of introducing these types of technologies is, where is the line? What is too much? When are we over stimulating children with new tools, new gadgets, and new technologies, when there is a much simpler form of completing the same task? What I believe it comes down to is engagement vs. entertainment.
For example, in my ELA B30 class, we are currently speeding through Hamlet in the block system and I have been racking my brain to try and get my students more engaged. Usually, I don’t have this much of a problem, but that was when we were only reading the play for an hour a day. Now we are up to 2 and a half hours a day. I have tried the audiobook, I have tried watching the play on Youtube, and yet the students are not overly engaged or entertained in the least. They came into the lessons expecting to be bored, proving they are bored, and checking out the moment we open the books. It doesn’t matter at this point if I decided to single-handedly act out the entire play or broke them into groups to act it out themselves, they would still be “bored.” I know next week I will have them hooked with the plot line (we are just getting to the good stuff), but this last week, I was entirely left exhausted and out of ideas. This is a point where it does not matter what audiovisual technology I introduce; they will not engage if they pre-determine they don’t want to. Sometimes it is irrelevant what we do as teachers, and it matters what the students decide to do instead.
Students have become accustomed to technology being part of their daily routine, and that includes within the classroom. This article from Fitting Image stated the importance of audio visual technology in the classroom: “learning via AV creates a stimulating and interactive environment which is more conducive to learning… [and] we live in an audio-visual age which means that having the skills to use AV equipment is integral to future employment prospects.” But we must be careful as teachers not to use too much; it also needs to be integrated properly and “not just consist of children working in pairs on a PowerPoint presentation or rewriting a piece of work using Word.” The use of AV technology in the classroom opens so many possibilities for learning and opportunity to challenge students in more creative ways. Instead of making a PowerPoint, they could create a video using Adobe Spark or Nearpod, like we saw from the presentation on Tuesday.
There are so many tools, and it is really cool to see how AV technology has advanced over the years. Just check out this graphic to see just how much the tech has advanced from the 80s to now. With all this technology, how can we not use these tools for what they are meant for? How do teachers justify teaching everything the same way, but with a different tool? We need to advance down the SAMR model, and leave substitution and augmentation aside, and push ourselves to modification and redefinition of our learning environments.
The rapid advancement of the AV technologies in education is changing the way we teach, and tools like Khan Academy, TedED and even Desmos for you math teachers, are enhancing that change. What does a future of education look like because of these advancements? I certainly hope different. The “cookie cutter” model with the same courses, same curriculum, and same class format with the odd tool tossed in to engage does not work for all students and it is important we use these tools to change the way we teach.
At some point, I could see teachers becoming more facilitators as learning becomes even more individualized, but as we discussed in our class this week, I hope that means it is more collaborative too. Maybe we will finally do away with the textbooks too! According to this blog, in 1922, Thomas Edison thought that “motion picture is destined to revolutionize our educational system and that in a few years it will supplant largely, if not entirely, the use of textbooks.” Well, in 2020 this still has not eradicated the use of textbooks, but we are slowly moving in the right direction. As we begin to focus more on skills, creativity and critical thinking, traditional knowledge does become less important. Maybe there is an AV tool out there or one to come in the near future that will help continue the revolution of education toward a brighter path. One that does not simply entertain students but immerses them in learning.
This week’s blog post had us exploring Google Chrome extensions. According to Chrome, extensions are “small software programs that customize the browsing experience. They enable users to tailor Chrome functionality and behavior to individual needs or preferences. They are built on web technologies such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS.” They fulfill a single purpose and I often think of them like apps for my browser. There are a few Chrome extensions I use currently in my teaching practice including EquatIO, Screencastify, Draftback, Read&Write, Grammarly and AdBlock.
I have had a few of these extensions because of previous Alec courses. Things like AdBlock and Grammarly are just very helpful tools when browsing the internet and Grammarly helps teachers like me that never catch their mistakes and occasionally forget how to spell. As an English teacher, this is pretty important when I am commenting on student work on Google Classroom; I catch my mistakes before I send them feedback on their own grammar, otherwise it could be awkward! AdBlock is helpful for browsing the internet and stopping those ads from constantly popping up AND for blocking those advertisements when you are watching videos with students on Youtube and other sites.
The extensions I really want to talk about today are Screencastify, Draftback, Read&Write, and EquatIO. I use these extensions all the time and they were incredibly helpful during our supplemental learning stint in the spring and I have continued to use them quite regularly this fall. Screencastify became my life saver in the spring and I made a lot of lesson videos for my courses. I am currently in the process of creating lesson videos for my entire calculus course. Since we are in the block system, I have made the decision to flip my calculus course when I teach it in January.
Lesson video created last year for Calculus
This means I need lessons students can watch at home, while we do the practice and exploration in class. I’m hoping this will make it easier to get through the content, but also give students the opportunity to go a little more at their own pace without feeling overwhelmed. I have 37 days to teach calculus and that’s not much processing time so wish me luck! Screencastify is incredibly user friendly and allows me to make videos quickly and even edit them if I need to. This has also become incredibly useful for my students when they are stuck at home this semester. I can simply screencast my screen and walk them through the day’s lessons and activities showing them exactly where to find that material, what to submit for homework, and answer any questions they messaged me earlier. It saves directly to my Google Drive and I can the either upload the videos to Youtube (which is what I’ve done for Calculus – like above) or provide the link in an email or on our Google Classroom for students to access.
EquatIO became another lifesaver in the spring because if you teach math, typing equations, copying them or saving pictures of them can be so time consuming. EquatIO works well on different document programs, but Google Forms is where I found it worked best for me. It is also incredibly handy for those lesson videos I’ve been creating! Essentially, this lovely tool allows you to type or speak equations directly into the form, doc, or place you need it. There are also keyboard shortcuts to make the typing faster and it translates handwriting into legible typed forms. This tool also allowed students using a Chrome browser to answer in the form or doc as well, making it much more legible and adding pictures with it.
Google Read&Write is a tool I often recommend to students when they like to think out loud about their writing process. Read&Write has many functions and I encourage you all to check it out if you haven’t already. This extension uses your microphone to record your speech and then write it on a doc for you. This is great for students who are slower typers, need to just talk things out, or are learning English. I often use this extension to write feedback as I am looking at projects or assignments. Instead of stopping to write it all down, I just think out loud and the extension writes it down for me. Then I can edit it quickly or just send what I’ve said.
The final extension I use regularly is called Draftback. This tool is so handy to have as an English teacher because it can help you detect plagiarism without sending student work through a program like Turnitin. Draftback allows you to watch the edits of a document in real time or faster. Here is a little taste:
This is incredibly useful for double checking plagiarism as well as watching the editing and writing process of students. It also tells you the number of edits on a document so you can clearly see if student copy and pasted a bunch of text or if they have been spending a lot of time working on their writing piece.
What a lot of these extensions have in common is that they can be connected to the Cloud, and most, if not all my educational data is attached to the “Google Cloud.” This is both great, because I can access my data and resources on any computer as long as I log in and sync my browsers, but this can also be dangerous because anyone could access my data if I accidently left the browser logged in or anyone could hack the Cloud and get a lot of student’s personal data as well. This begs the question of how far is too far and how connected is too connected? Yes, it is great to be able to access my schoolwork and apps anywhere, but is that necessary? Does it yet again blur the lines of work-life balance?
When I began teaching, I had a drive on my computer at work and I had to go through the process of logging into the remote desktop to access any of my data. It was painstaking to do and often discouraged me from working on things that way at home. I would question how important something was to do at home. Now, it is so easy to access my Google account and my One Drive that it is almost not even a second thought. These tools and connections have made it easier for both teachers and students to access everything they need, and this became critical in the spring. Even now, having students access schoolwork at home is critical, but has it created more of an issue for teachers? Where is the line and where is the balance of access and have we created another controversy by making things too accessible?
I just started my eight year of teaching and to say things have changed over that time is an understatement. I still remember my first year of teaching clearly – even though I’ve tried to block most of it out at this point. I was naïve, I was young, and I was not confident which is like most first year teachers I would assume. You know that saying “fake it until you make it?” That was my living mantra. I, of course, tried to do everything, coach everything, and make the perfect lessons every day. I’m pretty sure I spent every night at the school until at least 6:00 and then would come home and continue working until I passed out. There was little to no balance in my life and when I look back on those “perfect” lessons, I laugh to myself thinking things like, “you really did this?” and I shake my head.
The point to my little story here is that we were asked this week how our beliefs have changed over the course of our teaching careers, and although I would say I am still a young teacher and have a lot of learning left to do, I still feel like I’ve grown a lot as a teacher already. I started taking my Master’s of Education three years ago and the growth I’ve experience since then is tenfold to the first 5 years as a teacher. When I began my teaching career, I was focused on structure and teaching students what they needed for the next level of education – whether that was the next course or university. I was a very structured teacher and although I tried to be creative with my lessons, I didn’t embrace technology all the much. It was an “extra” when I had time, but as a young teacher with 5 different curriculums to teach, I was just focused on making it through the next day.
Cognitive theories focus on the conceptualization of students’ learning processes and address the issues of how information is received, organized, stored, and retrieved by the mind. Learning is concerned not so much with what learners do but with what they know and how they come to acquire it (Jonassen, 1991b). Knowledge acquisition is described as a mental activity that entails internal coding and structuring by the learner. The learner is viewed as a very active participant in the learning process (p. 51).
“Behaviorism, Cognitivism, Constructivism: Comparing Critical Features From an Instructional Design Perspective” by P.A. Ertmer and T.J. Newby is reprinted from Performance Improvement Quarterly, 6(4), 1993, pp. 50–72. doi: 10.1111/j.1937- 8327.1993.tb00605.x
Majority of my lessons were focused on ideas of content and how to teach it to students in such a way that they could carry it on to the next level. I also remember giving exams for everything, whereas now, I rarely give exams in any courses other than my math courses. I wanted to fill their heads with knowledge of the subject in hopes something would stick for them to use later on. I wanted my students to be engaged and involved in their learning, but in my own way.
I continued to think about my younger teaching years as I browsed the map of learning theories and I found I connected even more to the theories of Bloom and Mastery Learning defined as “the students are helped to master each learning unit before proceeding to a more advanced learning task.” This is not surprising to me at all as most of my university career was spent analyzing Bloom’s Taxonomy and learning how to implement it into every aspect of our teaching. It makes sense that my early teaching days were so heavily focused on reaching the higher levels of Bloom’s in my instruction and evaluation.
Of course, I have grown a lot and that is evident as I look back on my early years. I still connect with the ideas of mastery learning and Bloom’s but there is also a lot more freedom in my teaching strategies. Now, I see myself more in constructivism and connectivism defined as the learner being a part of the construction of the knowledge they are learning. I am also so much more engaged with technology now, and I am focused on the more important “big ideas” in my classroom. I want students to still learn the content, but more of my focus is on the skills they take away from my courses.
For example, in my ELA classes, we focus on implicit and explicit messages in what we see, watch, and read, as well as critically analyze different sources of information so I know they can make informed opinions on many topics when they leave my classroom. They learn how to communicate with me and others in different types of platforms, including email and face-to-face interviews. I know when they leave my classroom, they will be able to write their thoughts and opinions in an informed and practiced manner and are able to interpret meaning from literature and film and form their own educated opinion on it.
In my math courses, especially calculus, we focus on the content and they are also usually challenged academically for one of the first times in their education. We learn how to study, and how to persevere even when things get tough. We learn together every time, and we learn that mistakes are a part of growth and it is okay to fail sometimes, as long as you try again. They learn to think more critically about problems and understand there is no cookie cutter way through the course. It is about applying your mathematical knowledge as well as common sense to solve many different problems.
The starting point of connectivism is the individual. Personal knowledge is comprised of a network, which feeds into organizations and institutions, which in turn feed back into the network, and then continue to provide learning to individual. This cycle of knowledge development (personal to network to organization) allows learners to remain current in their field through the connections they have formed (p. 6).
When I look at this definition, I know the ideas are broader and it’s about engaging students in learning and how to learn and be creative. Students now more than ever need tools for the future, not content, so if I can help in any little way by challenging them to think critically and evolve their own ways of thinking and learning, then I think I have been successful and they will be too!
And so here I am, at the beginning of the end: my last first blog post of a semester! For this week’s blog post, we were asked to define educational technology. To me, educational technology involves all the tools, strategies and different pedagogical ideals teachers strive for in the modern classroom and making it work authentically in a classroom while appreciating digital citizenship, rights and privacy of students. I think this is true, especially in our new-found “pandemic” classrooms.
When we began our supplemental learning in March, I felt prepared to go online. Certainly more prepared than most teachers in my school, and I have Alec’s courses to thank for that! However, that doesn’t mean it was an easy transition for me either. Sure, I had a Google Classroom set up already and was ready to continue rolling out content, but I was not prepared for the consequences remote learning held. There was much more to it than just throwing some PDF’s up on my Google Classroom and letting students work through it. I needed to engage them and that involved a lot of technological tools. Thankfully, I had heard of a lot of tools, like DeltaMath and Socrative, through Alec’s courses and was able to flounder my way through figuring them out to actually integrate in my classroom, but a lot of teachers were left to drown in resources with little professional development support.
Meira’s blog post this week mirrored this idea when she talked about her experiences with online learning: “As with the majority of my Edtech experience, there was no professional development. I feel learning or implementing educational technology is up to the teacher to search out, ask colleagues, and experiment with trial and error, to find what works for them and their students.” Teachers need support with Edtech, especially with where education is heading. There is a big push for educational technology in classrooms, now more than ever, just as Jocelyn said in her blog this week. She talked about the resources there are out there, yet we don’t know how to use them to their full potential.
The biggest shift in my teaching has been because of the pandemic and its restrictions on my classroom this year. I am so happy to be back in a classroom teaching rooms full of students instead of teaching through a screen and hoping my students are doing okay. I love seeing their faces and ACTUALLY talking to them, even if their faces are half covered and I have to yell at them so they can hear me through the mask and over the uni-vent in the back of my classroom. (The struggle is real…)
The biggest struggle I have had so far though is similar to that of online learning: how to make my classroom engaging. I can no longer have group work, small group discussions, or any activities that involve too much movement or students facing each other within the walls of my classroom. Of course, I can take them outside and I find myself using this option more and more in our daily routine, but what do I do when it’s -40°C and we can’t go outside? Winter is coming after all! So, I’ve been using the educational tools I’ve had at my disposal because I have to, and I want to engage them in the best way possible. There has been a mandatory push in my school division and most others to have an online learning platform. Done. This was the easy part for me. What isn’t easy is creating videos for content, setting up platforms for online student discussion, and creating online quizzes for students to complete every day. This stuff takes time and in the teaching world, we are already short on that. We can’t simply upload a PDF and hope students read it; we could, but most of us are more inclined to do better for our students.
When I think about why I use Edtech ideas in my classroom, I don’t think it was ever my personal idea to start. There was the bare minimum of technology even in my high school days, but in university, the ideas of using educational technology in the classroom was pushed on us, using tools like Polleverywhere, interactive whiteboards, and inquiry learning. These weren’t ideas we wanted to incorporate in our classrooms, they were things we were expected to incorporate and evaluated on in our internship. It was never authentic, it was an add-on and in “Five Things We Need to Know About Technological Change,” Neil Postman says, “Technological change is not additive; it is ecological…A new medium does not add something; it changes everything” (p. 4). We were expected to be the new generation of teachers that accepted change and educational technology and incorporated it willingly, even if it wasn’t the best. I think now, this push is
obvious even more with tools like Zoom, G Suites, and Flipgrid. It is an expectation to incorporate technology in the classroom and as Postman goes on to say in his article, “we must be cautious about technological innovation. The consequences of technological change are always vast, often unpredictable and largely irreversible” (p. 4).
I’m not saying this push is entirely bad, it is needed because our education system is in itself flawed. There needs to be more project-based education and more teaching tools than content for the ever-changing world we live in, but there also needs to be support for the technology we want in the classrooms. If teachers are left to struggle through, there isn’t an authentic benefit to it, and as soon as they can, they will go back to the tried-and-true ways of education and leave the educational tools behind. In order for educational technology to help us into the future of education, we need to develop more ways of educating teachers on HOW to incorporate it effectively as well as USE it authentically.
The Secret Life Of a High School Teacher 