Reaching milestones

Two crazy years of being a beginning teacher, MDTA teacher and part time student has paid off! Last week I was ecstatic to open an email informing me that I am officially a registered teacher! If that wasn't enough great news in one week, I also received an A- for my dissertation on integrated reading and writing instruction. I am super stoked with this result, as I put a lot of effort into setting up the intervention in my classroom, gathering data and drawing conclusions.

I am looking forward to continuing to challenge myself by sharing my practise through Manaiakalani Google Class OnAir.  The site is going live tomorrow and I am really looking forward to putting myself out there and sharing what I do.  Here is a sneak peak at my little introduction video which will be on my Class OnAir page.  Sorry it is not the best quality and location for filming, I had to film on my laptop and it was too rainy to shoot outside! I hope my video will help viewers get an idea of my personality and beliefs about teaching, as I feel that they heavily influence the way I teach and the lessons I create for my learners.  

I am glad to have my beginning teacher years behind me.  Now it is time to refine my teaching and ensure I am doing the best for my learners.  I think that Class OnAir will help motivate me to continue to push myself and get my learners to think critically. 


Onwards and upwards!

Creating my Digital CV

For our last (ever!) digital immersion day we created an online CV.  It was a great opportunity to use our digital skills to showcase our learning journey, teaching pedagogies and digital capabilities.  

I had a look at my 'digital CV' I created last year when I applied for jobs and I couldn't help but cringe a little! I had just been introduced to Google sites and I created my first ever site as my Digital CV. I used the drop down menu function and choose a template.  It was a pretty good effort for a first timer, but it shows just how much I have learnt.  

My 2015 digital CV

My 2016 digital CV

For my 2016 digital CV I wanted everything to be on the same page.  I wanted it to look as simplistic as possible, so used HTML to create tables for each of aspects I wanted to include in my CV.  I  wanted to use more images and less text.  I used Google Draw to turn my images into links.

With the help of Dorothy, I created an album of photos to provide a snapshot of my teaching.  I did this by creating a Google Presentations and inserting photos onto each slide.  Also, on each slide I included left and right arrows, which were hyperlinked to the previous or next slide.  You need to publish it to the web and make sure the auto advance settings are on. Once you have created your Presentation, you add it as a Gadget on your Google site.  The Gadget you use is 'Slideshow Maker'.  Then you follow the steps to add in the slideshow and specify the height and width.

Make your site pretty

I use a few websites to help make my website look good.  I like to choose fonts that look interesting and compliment each other.  I will always use different fonts for titles and normal text.  It can be hard choosing from such a large range of fonts, so I always use 100daysoffonts to help me.  Note that this probably shouldn't be shared with students as some of the text used is not appropriate for kids.

I also like to choose colour schemes and use a few different sites to help me. Color-hex and coolors are my go to.  My favourite is coolors because a) you can adjust the shades b) you can save your colour palette by exporting it and c) you can upload an image and use the colour picker to find the hex-codes for the colours you want!

Class OnAir Episode: How-to-Haiku's

Here is my first Class OnAir episode!  Last week we learnt about Haiku poems.  On Tuesday, we learnt about the structure and features used in Haiku's.  Following this, the students found their own examples of a summer, autumn, winter and spring haiku.  Next, the students annotated the features they liked about the Haiku poems they had selected. 


On Wednesday the class worked collaboratively to use what they had learnt about the structure and features of a Haiku, to create a class Haiku.  This is what I chose to film.  Something to note is that we had an ERO visitor in the classroom during filming.  This is why they were much more quiet than what they usually are.  There is also a lot more teacher talk than what would usually happen during our lessons, as I needed to give the learners extra support and prompts to encourage them to share.  I think my learners did a great job under the unusual circumstances.


Overall I was pleased with how the lesson went.  The learners were engaged and it was a great oportunity to use a new digital tool - padlet.  I like to use clips from YouTube during my writing lesson as the learners can draw on what they see and hear to create descriptive pieces of writing. This is particularly beneficial for our struggling writers.


Click on the screenshot to have a look at my Class OnAir site. It is quite daunting putting myself out there and it feels a little odd to watch myself teach, but I can use this to figure out what I can do to improve my teaching. 

Updating my PRT site

Last Friday the MDTA were very fortunate to have a whole day to update our PRT sites.  We spent the day sharing how we could illustrate the Practicing Teaching Criteria. In order to gain full registration, all beginning teachers are required to maintain a documentation which demonstrates that they are capable and knowledgeable quality teachers.  Registered teachers also need to maintain documentation in order to renew their certification.

Creating an online PRT folder an easy way to keep a record of all the documentation needed. As we are a digital school who uses Google Apps for Education, it made sense to create a Google Site.

I had created mine when I had first learnt how to create a Google site, so it was looking a little sad.  I decided to give my site a re-vamp to make it better reflect my personality.  It was much easier this time as I have had plenty of experience with using HTML to create a Google Site.

Here is a little screencast of how my PRT site is looking at the moment.  An easy way to put content on your site is to embed folders from your Google Drive.  Instead of having to edit your site, all you need to do is to put your documents onto the embedded folder, and it will automatically update.

When the Learning Keeps Going: Ubiquitous Learning

The 'learn' component of this weeks digital immersion was all about ubiquitous learning. This is about ensuring that our students can access their learning anytime, anywhere and any place.  E-Learning and the use of Google Sites (that are open to anyone) allows for extended learning times. 

How learning is ubiquitous for my students

Class Site

As we are a part of the Manaiakalani cluster, all schools and classrooms are required to have a Google Site, which is accessible to all. In Manaiakalani schools the expectation is that learning is visible.  This means that every link needs to have the sharing permissions as "anyone with the link can view".  To make this easier we create a main folder in our Google drive that has the permission "anyone with the link".  This means that

Screencasts

I have recently created a Google site for reading and writing. To help ensure my students understand everything, I have included a range of screencasts.  The screencasts help to the explain tasks and reading comprehension strategies

Teaching DLOs 

I always ensure my teaching DLOs are linked into our class site.  These DLOs are quite comprehensive and cover everything I am planning to teach. This enables my learners to revisit the learning anytime they need.

'Modelling Books'

They are not quite modelling books, but they are my take on it.  Whenever we are learning something, I take photos of the students work.  This is then uploaded onto a shared folder onto Google drive, which the students have full access to.  A next step would be for me to add these folders to the site.

My Takeaways from Manaiakalani's Annual Hui

On Friday the MDTA were very lucky to attend Manaiakalani's 5th annual Hui - a place where teachers and learners across Manaiakalani celebrate and share their accomplishments.  

This has ended up being a rather lengthy post, as I gained many new insights from the teachers, researchers and learners at the hui.

In the morning

First up we heard our Manaiakalani student ambassadors share their learning.  It was really interesting to hear from students how they learnt in their school.  What I like about Manaiakalani is that every school is different.  Although we are all following Manaiakalani's 'Learn, Create, Share' pedagogy, each school is able to put their own spin on it to reflect the community they are in.  There were plenty of ideas that I will borrow and repurpose in my classroom, like the use of a 'Goal Wall' to make goals visible to learners.  

Following this, the Manaiakalani Innovative Teacher's shared their inquiries with the insights they gained along the way. I came away feeling inspired to give my own teaching programme a shake up to ensure my lessons are engaging, motivating and using digital technologies as much as possible.  Whilst I do believe I use technology a lot in the classroom, these teachers had come up with ideas that I had not thought of before.  Check out my infographic to see my main takeaways from the MIT.

Next up

After morning tea we heard from Rachel Williams about her holiday intervention programmes 'Summer Learning Journey' and 'Winter Learning Journey'.  Rachel's aim is to help lesson the 'summer drop off', where learners achievement declines between T4 and T1 after the school holidays. Her results show that students who participated in the 'Summer Learning Journey' had less of a drop compared to students who did not participate in the intervention.  Rachel's data was very compelling and I am excited to encourage my learners to participate in 'Summer Learning Journey 2.0'.

Next Woolf Fisher researchers, Rebecca Jesson, Stuart McNaughton and Aaron Wilson shared their insights gathered from observing teachers, and challenged us to consider what we are doing to accelerate our learners achievement.

Lastly

Dorothy, Russell and Pat Snedden spoke about where we are now and where to next for Manaiakalani.  Although we are doing a great job accelerating our student's achievement, we need to continue to reflect, refine and improve our teaching. We have a series of outreach clusters which are looking at us and using what we are doing to accelerate their learners achievement too.  Therefore, we need to be at the forefront of change and be constantly seeking ways to help our learners achieve.  Pat Snedden's talk was the most inspiring of the day.  He is so passionate about lifting our learners out of subsistence to capital builders.  I think Pat Snedden gave me the kick I needed to ensure that I am constantly doing my best and seeking ways to improve my teaching, because it is what my learners deserve.

I also used Twitter when I heard something which resonated with me.  Here is a collation of my tweets from the Hui.

MDTA 6 Month Reflection

And here it is!

 This is my reflection of my experiences as a BT in the MDTA so far. I had wanted to create a reflection which portrayed my personality and experiences honestly and accurately. I had decided to not use a script when filming, as I wanted it to appear genuine and more conversational rather than interview-like. However I had forgotten to mention a lot of things, so I had to film some more this weekend (which explains the change in camera angle and different background).  A big thanks to Juliana who helped me film.

I am thoroughly enjoying being in the MDTA and have learnt so many new things which I have been applying in my teaching.   I'm looking forward to continuing to learn how to use digital technologies to accelerate my learners and get them excited about learning.

OnAir

During this weeks Digital Immersion we explored the Manaiakalani Google Class OnAir site.  We were lucky enough to have Matt Goodwin, one of the teachers taking part in Manaiakalani Google Class OnAir, come in for a chat about what it entails.  We were also able to provide feedback and feedforward regarding the overall site and individual teachers.  

Class OnAir is a site where Manaiakalani teachers share their classrooms and lessons online to a global audience.  They demonstrate Manaiakalani's 'Learn, Create, Share' pedagogy and provide insight to how Manaiakalani teachers teach.  By clicking on the faces of the teachers, you can find links to lessons with videos, lesson plans and evaluations.  Moreover, there are links to the students' blogs and Google Documents.

Each teacher's site layout is similar and easy to follow.  You can access the teachers inquiry blog, class blog and class site from every page, as all teachers have used a similar header to display buttons.  Scrolling down the page you will find links to lessons as well as the learners blogs.  I found it easier to have a quick read through the teachers lesson plan before watching the clip.  It is important to remember that the clip only captures a segment of the lesson, so it is best to read the lesson plan to gain a better understanding of the clip.

The teachers that have opened their classrooms and teaching practice to the world are extremely brave!  It makes me think back to university and the stresses that would come when we had our visiting lecturers observing us.  I cannot imagine recording my lessons and publishing them for the world to see!  However these teachers have done an awesome job and have created some great lessons for their learners

Getting Creative

Our focus for our Digital Immersion day last week was 'Create to Learn'.  We were tasked with creating an 'explainer' video to show our inquiry focus.  I chose to create something similar to RSA Animate, but I was cheeky and found images online as I cannot draw to save myself.  It is not perfect and I have noticed that I need a question mark on the first slide, oops!  However I really enjoyed this task.  It was quite time consuming! I saved a ridiculous amount Google Draws as JPEGS and imported them all onto iMovie.  Then I had to decrease the time for each frame and change the cropping from 'ken burns' to 'fit'.  Following that, I recorded the voice over.  After a few touch ups of the timing of the frames (so they matched the audio) I was finished!

Enjoy...

I am a Google Certified Educator

I may be a little late to the game, but I am now a Google certified Educator! On Friday I sat down at my computer and began the daunting 3 hour level one Google exam.  I was pleasantly surprised by how much I knew!  I can definitely attribute that to my learning during digital immersion days with Dorothy. All our learning about Docs, Sheets, Forms and Sites came back to me, and made the 3 hour ordeal much less challenging than I had expected. I also think teaching (and continuously learning) in a digital classroom for a term has given me a better understanding of how we can use Google to engage and accelerate our learners.