Category: EdTech Page 1 of 2

Hi Carly’s Crew,

We were back in class (kind of) today, well we were back on Zoom! It is so fun to see everyone’s learning spaces and we even got to meet some pets! I even showed everyone my cat, Jafar 🙂

We started off by listening to the remainder of EdTEch presentations. Next, we began talking about coding in classrooms and how it can be used in cross-curricular lessons. I really like the idea of using coding for language arts and allowing students a chance to tell a story through coding. I chose to do the coding with Anna and Elsa because I have zero experience with coding.

Here is the link to my final drawing of Elsa skating .

Here is proof that I completed 20 levels of code:

I really enjoyed learning how to code today but the best part was that it was taught in ‘game form’. I think that students would respond really well to this because it will allow them to learn without knowing they are learning. Honestly, I struggled to get through some of these levels so I have a feeling that many students would also struggle as they work through this program. With that being said, I think coding is a really good strategy to teach students problem solving skills and provide them with critical thinking skills!

Scratch would allow for teachers to differentiate learning for students because they can work at their own pace. For example, the Elsa program I used was extremely structured at the beginning but by the end it gave me as much freedom as I wanted. This will allow students to not feel overwhelmed and will hopefully stop them from comparing themselves to their classmates. This differentiation is a great way to implement Universal Design for Learning (UDL) into a classroom too. Finally, the coding apps will provide students with the majority of step-by-step instructions and this allows for the teacher to walk around and help students, assess students and ensure everyone is on task.

I definitely need to practice my coding skills so I feel more confident but I do hope to bring coding into my classroom one day. I loved the activities that Hour of Code provides teachers because even if you don’t feel completely confident with your coding skills, these activities provide structure and guidance for you as teacher.

Bye!!

Hi Carly’s Crew!

This week has been crazy…it seems surreal. Due to the spread of Covid-19, our classes have been moved online. This means that we did a 33 person video call today! It was so much fun and definitely cheered me up in a time where there is a lot of negative news happening. I even introduced the class to my cat, Jafar, and cooked up some eggs and avocado toast while listening to the other groups present their topics.

Zoom would be a super cool tool to use in a classroom, especially in circumstances like this, that prevent students from meeting in person. For example, if a student was sick at home but they still wanted to listen to the teacher, they could watch the whole class from the comfort of their bed. Of course, this process was not seamless. Many people had trouble connecting due to wifi issues and I personally had troubles with how fast my battery was dying. Zoom definitely sucks the battery so it is imperative that you have a charger ready to use.

In a classroom, Zoom could also be used when students need to complete group presentations or conduct interviews. For example, today I will be using Zoom to meet with Ari, Jahniaa and Claire to complete our music project while practicing social distancing.

We also learned how to use Twine which is an interactive story telling (choose-your-own-adventure type stories). I began writing a story about getting ice cream on a summer day but I wasn’t able to get super far into it. I have never had experience creating something like this so it was brand new for me. The hardest part was remembering the codes to create new links, italicize or bold words and anything else. Once I spend some more time working on my story, I will be much more successful. This would be super fun to implement into a Language arts unit for students to get creative!

I’m going to wash my hands now!

Carly 🙂

Hi Carly’s Crew!

I am happy to tell you I am now a Minecraft master…well almost. We had a middle school teacher and her students come in to teach us about Minecraft. I have never played Minecraft before and I had no idea that it could be used as an educational tool. The teacher shared how it can be used to enhance social studies, math or even language arts. One idea that stuck with me was getting students to create a Minecraft scene and then doing a free write about it. Another idea that stuck with me was creating ancient civilizations based on the 8 key characteristics that all civilizations have. Rich showed us a resource that contains pre-made lesson plans for Minecraft in classrooms. I think this lesson plan would be a super interesting approach to teaching grade 4/5 students about area and volume in a practical setting.

I loved learning about Minecraft but I also had a few concerns about how it could be implemented into the classroom. For one, I am not very good at maneuvering around the world and I definitely would not feel confident about teaching students how to use Minecraft. It can be a really cool experience to let students take on the role of the teacher and help teach Minecraft but this is definitely something requires the teacher to be vulnerable and be honest about what they don’t know. Also, I think Minecraft would only be appropriate to use to in a late elementary school classroom or middle school classroom. It would be too overwhelming for young students…it was even overwhelming for me! I still had lots of fun though and totally understand how it could be beneficial for the older students.

We also learned about Google Science Journal. Claire and I learned about Google Science Journal last week because we highlighted it in our EdTech blog! One drawback we talked about in class is that all students require a portable device like an iPad or phone and not all students have one. Similarly to Minecraft, this program would be best used in older grades and even into high school. My phone wouldn’t let me download it because my storage is full but I can’t wait to try it out in a classroom one day.

See you later Carly’s Crew!

Hey hey Carly’s Crew!

This my cat Jafar taking a nap. He inspired my provocation!

It has been a hot minute but we were finally back in the regular classroom today to learn more about educational technology. We debriefed about our experience at in Rebecca’s inquiry based classroom. Next, we learned how to screen record using Screencastify! I chose to wonder about if cats can have dreams and what they dream about. My cat, Jafar, always flinches in his sleep so I am very curious as to if he is dreaming or if it is just natural. It was super easy to create the screen recording of my wonder but I had some struggles downloading it to my computer. I was even able to voice record…just like a vlog! I think this program will be very useful in the future.

Check it out!! Does it make you wonder about what is going on in the cats head? This is something I would use a provocation in a primary classroom if we were doing an inquiry to cats and dreams.

We were asked to create an inquiry that could be used in a K-5 classroom and I think this inquiry about cats and dreaming would be great in a Kindergarten classroom! I would start by showing them this Giphy and asking them the three questions that Rebecca told us to ask:

1. What do you see?
2. What do you know?
3. What do you wonder?

From there, I would be able to create a unit plan. One idea that I had would be to get students to create drawings of what they think the cat is dreaming about. The students would then get to share their various ideas with the class. From there, we would watch videos and read books about cats (or other animals) and dive into their dreams. I don’t think we will find a black and white answer about what animals dream about but this would be a great opportunity to allow students some creative freedom! Students could go home and take videos or pictures of their pets sleeping and create dream bubbles for them. I would encourage my students to share WHY they thought their pet was dreaming of that. I would also ask students what clues did your pet give you that they were dreaming?

Continuing on with the topic of vlogging, we downloaded Audacity and learned about the art of podcasting. Personally, I don’t enjoy listening to recordings of my voice so I don’t think I’ll ever be a famous podcaster! I still tried out recording my voice and making some edits. The program was a little bit hard to navigate at first but once I got the hang of it I was able to create a pretty good recording. It was hard to record high quality audio when I’m in a room with 30 other students that are talking. On top of that, I was only using my laptop microphone so it can’t compare to a high quality snowball microphone. Let’s just say I think I will stick to blogging 😉

See you next week!

Carly 🙂

Hi Carly’s Crew,

Today we went on a field trip to George Jay Elementary school to speak to a kindergarten teacher that has built her entire classroom around inquiry based learning! The teacher’s name was Rebecca Bathurst-Hunt…she is AMAZING!

I left feeling inspired and excited! Especially with our practicum coming up so soon, it was nice to hear from her as she shared her journey with inquiry learning in primary classrooms. It was interesting to hear her talk about her educator heart and it really made me think about what my values as an educator are.

Her classroom is absolutely beautiful! There are a variety of quiet spaces that offer students flexible seating, and provocations for inquiry in every corner. I followed her on Instagram and she will definitely be a major source of inspiration as I begin to create my own classroom one day.

Right now, her students are working on a dinosaur inquiry. Even though dinosaurs aren’t in the curriculum, Rebecca was able to use dinosaurs to make cross-curricular connections and turn into a big project that students are fully immersed in.

My favourite part of Rebecca’s classroom was the wonder wall. It had pictures of all the students with thought bubbles coming out of their heads. Whenever the student has a question or a wonder, they teacher writes in their thought bubble as they work towards answering it. I will definitely want to incorporate this into my own class one day. Sadly, I couldn’t take a picture of it because it had all of the kids’ faces on it!

My biggest take-away from this field trip was that instead of beginning unit plans with a statement, we should begin them with a question that we can ask students. This will encourage student engagement because it is much more fun to have a class discussion rather than just have the teacher ramble on about all of the information. Rebecca shared that we need to provide students with skills and knowledge that is “un-google-able”… we live in an age where we can search the answer to anything in a matter of minutes. As educators we need to teach students the academics but also how to problem-solve and wonder!

We hear so much about inquiry learning and giving students voice, choice and agency in the class but seeing it put into practice gave me a much better understanding of how it all works. I loved everything about our visit to George Jay Elementary School!

See you next week dedicated followers 🙂

Carly

Hi Carly’s Crew!

Today in our EdTech class we had a guest lecture from Jesse Miller. It was all about privacy and safety online… It definitely made me think about everything that I have posted online. In middle school, I remember we had a guest speaker come in and talk to us about internet safety so this topic was something that I already knew a little bit about. However, Jesse made me really think about the repercussions of social media and how it will affect future employment.

One quote that stood out to me from Jesse’s slides that focussed on preparing students for the future and about how our job is to”…help children make sense of their on-demand media and online experiences, teaching & guiding how to uphold enduring values & empowering their communications expectations in the reality they live in…”  Technology can be a scary topic due to all the security and privacy issues; due to this, many teachers are quick to push technology off to the side and disregard the conversations that need to be had. We as educators need to provide students with skills to set them up for the future and to do this we need to prepare them how to use technology safely. Technology really is the reality of this world! Jesse spoke about digital footprints, and digital literacies and it was super interesting to learn about because that’s what Claire and I have been researching for our EdTech Inquiry. We definitely took away some interesting points that we will incorporate into our next blog.

I googled my name and I did not find anything surprising or anything that was inappropriate to be online. With that being said, there were definitely some funny things that came up that I had forgotten about and I honestly did not even know that my middle school Prezi presentation on Canadian history was still out there. From now on, I know I need to be even more careful with what I post on social media but more importantly, what others post about me on social media. I am proud of the digital footprint that I have left behind so far!

For the last hour of our class we changed our focus to video editing. I created a green screen video with chickens swimming in the ocean. I used to make iMovies all the time when I was younger so I am quite comfortable with navigating the program. Creating the green screen video was much easier than I had anticipated but the program seemed to lag behind a bit. I am not sure if I had too many other tabs open but it was quite frustrating trying to move everything around due to the time delay. I am excited to use iMovie in a classroom one day to get students to create projects like book trailers and mini movies. I attached my movie for you all to see!

Next week is reading break so you will not be hearing from me! Don’t miss me too much 😉

Carly

Hi Carly’s Crew!

This week we were back in the classroom learning about various educational technologies. We began the class working in groups of three and giving peer feedback to each other about how our blogs are coming so far. Lucky for you guys I got lots of really positive comments…clearly this blog must be pretty great 😉 Don’t worry, I also got some constructive feedback about how to make this blog even more AWESOME for all of my dedicated followers. One of my goals for my future blogs is to incorporate more photos (especially in my baking).

Katie, Lauren, Lauren and I chose to research iMovie trailers.Everyone had 45 minutes to research their topic and then we took turns presenting. It was super interesting to hear about what our classmates researched and watch how everyone chose to present their knowledge. Our group chose to use Google Presentation because we were already comfortable with it. My favourite part is the plethora of fonts, colours, themes etc. that Google has to offer. It is also perfect for working collaboratively because multiple people can work on it at the same time! One thing I learned about Google Presentation today was how to change the privacy settings so that everyone can see it.

iMovie allows for students to share their knowledge using photos, videos, audio recordings and words.

That was all we got up to today in tech class! Check back next Tuesday to see what else we learn on our educational technology journey.

Whew! Today’s EdTech class was an exciting change up but it made for a busy day…

We took a field trip to PSII – Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry in Downtown Victoria. The school was founded by Jeff Hopkins and we got to listen to him speak about what makes PSII special and the importance of inquiry based learning. I grew up in Victoria and until today I had never known what PSII had to offer, in all honesty, I didn’t even know it existed. All in all, I had a really great experience learning about PSII today but I am left with lots of questions still. It’s important to remember that it is a high school and that the students that attend it are much older and more responsible than young elementary students.

I think that the inquiry based approach to conquering the curriculum is super cool! It allows students time and freedom to learn about what they want, not just what the teacher wants. Personally, I believe the model at PSII resembles the real world much better than a public high school does. For example, when students need help they are expected to approach the teacher and schedule an appointment that works for them. Students also get to participate actively in the community by going on field trips to local parks, gyms and other facilities. This model gives students the opportunity to be held accountable for their work, however, the model requires an immense amount of self-determination and diligence.

I love that the students get to work at their own pace whether it is individual, collaborative or under the guidance of a teacher. Realistically, this model would be impossible in an elementary school. Early elementary students rely on their teachers and the structure of a classroom. With that being said, there are definitely some take aways that would be a great addition to an elementary school classroom. I think that a guided inquiry project would be perfect for elementary students! Additionally, this model does not fit seamlessly into university. How can you go from having completely personalized learning to entering university and sitting in lecture filled with 200 other people?

I tried to picture myself at PSII and if I’m being honest I don’t think it would be a good fit for me. I love having a timetable and set classes. I would feel overwhelmed without having much guidance from my teachers. I love the idea of being able to choose what interests you in order to complete the curricular competencies but I definitely would need some teacher guidance to get me started. After a few classes on a big idea, I would love the chance to dive deeper into a topic that interests me.

I highly recommend going and checking PSII out. Here are some of the posters that highlight the core values that PSII focuses on. I wonder if you guys would have liked to attend high school like this? Would you ever like to teach in a model like this one?

See you next week!

Welcome back Carly’s Crew! 

Today in Tech we dove into the topic of Open Educational Resources. We began by watching a documentary called “RiP! Remix Manifesto Documentary”. The documentary followed a DJ who created mash-ups which brought up many copyright questions and issues. The documentary was pretty intense and really made me think about what is considered copyright infringement…I had never thought about the fact that scientific ideas, such as the cure to cancer, fall under copyright laws as well.

After the documentary we debriefed in small groups and then as a whole class. We learned how to search for creative commons images on Google and it was super easy! After quickly changing the settings on Google Images we were able to see what photos we can reuse without getting into legal troubles. Don’t worry though…all the photos on my blog are allowed to be reused! In fact, some of them are my own photos. 😛

Following along with the topic of Open Educational Resources, we were introduced to a new website that provides teachers with a plethora of educational resources. The website was a little tricky to navigate at first and I think it was partially because we were just playing around. If I were a teacher looking for something specific to share with my class, I feel like it would be super easy due to the specific search options. One thing I noticed was that the curriculum was only linked to the American standards so as a Canadian teacher it makes it a little tricky. Beggars can’t be choosers though and I’m sure it wouldn’t be hard to pull up the BC Curriculum and find what fits! Personally, I think that OER would be a super cool research tool to help students work on personalized inquiry projects. For example, if a student was interested in learning about the weather in different biomes, this would be a great activity to physicalize the weather! I chose this topic because I love learning about different habitats and ecosystems but in my elementary school all we ever did was create dioramas and that gets boring pretty quickly. I definitely will look into OER in depth before I begin my practicum this spring. 

See you next week! 🙂

Hi again everyone!

Today in class we set up Trello boards to document our inquiry process. I had an easy time setting up my board in comparison to my experience with setting up this blog. It is easily customizable and the website is pretty easy to navigate. Go check my board out! It isn’t perfect yet because I am still working to figure out all the small details. I have never used Trello before but I think it will be a great resource as I work through my inquiry into baking and as I research my EdTech topic. So far I only have good things to say about Trello but I will have to keep you updated as I use it more. One thing that I love is the setting to create a checklist because it is such an easy way to track your progress. Throughout both of my inquiry projects it will be crucial to stay organized and on top of it. The projects will require me to spend time researching or doing hands-on work every week so it definitely will be tricky to not fall behind. With that being said, I am excited and interested in both of these topics so I am ready to work hard and learn lots!

See you next week!