My biggest takeaways for this week's readings and ideas were the resources I can use with my students. Helping children become aware of how to act online (and in person) is such an important part of our role as their teacher. It is not something that can be ignored or brushed under the rug. It is so much part of their lives that they need to have some guidance and advice to walk them through this new normal (new to us, but not to them!)
Media By Example's mission is to help educators to:
This project lends itself well to the Citizen standard of ISTE's Educator Standards. There are many educators (including Trevor MacKenzie, Carlos Galvez) and students who have written guest blog posts for them related to their mission. I highly suggest taking a look at the many resources they have available. They also have a free four week course for educators that they are working on for summer 2020. Check it out!
A short one this week, but really powerful resources were brought to my attention. Fantastic!
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Data Privacy... alright... if I am completely honest... AGAIN this is something that completely confuses me. For multiple reasons.
Not only does moving jobs from country to country not help... but part of me seriously feels like it is "not my job" to read up on this. I didn't say act on this. I just said read up on this. I know it is my job to act on it... but there is no way all teachers should be expected to constantly know all of this information. My feeling is that if a school is serious about this, they need to do the research and tell us what we do need to know. Or involve us in the heavy lifting. Make it clear. They need to vet the apps, tools, and websites (based on teacher requests from what they know they need), if they are concerned about the student data attached to them and then train teachers in what they are/are not allowed to do. This even includes sharing on social media. I know many schools have rules about faces being shown, etc. which of course is great. But in my experience this usually comes out of the woodworks after they realize something is "wrong" in someone's eyes... or something actually goes wrong. I was teaching in Switzerland just as GDPR was becoming a large, important issue. I feel the school tackled it relatively well. We worked together and discussed what certain elements might mean, and what protocols might need to be in place in order to be GDPR compliant. But I was only there for one year. I would hope most schools go through a similar process, but feel like after that initial year of creation is done... it gets a little more hidden and hard for incoming staff to fully understand. I also have a bone to pick with photos... at one of my previous schools, a student decided to use staff photos from the school website, create a fake school Instagram account, and write things about the teachers. This was caught quickly but it was still out there. Should teacher photos be on the school website? Shouldn't we at least have a choice and give consent like students/guardians do? In this case I did not. Another thing.. and maybe I'm flip-flopping in my opinion here... but I guess that is an example of some of my confusion. Maybe this isn't as straight forward as officials make it sound. Bringing it back toJennifer Casa-Todd again from last week, I often think about this imposed censorship of students. If, as we say, our students WILL be "Googled" before university, or before getting a job... should we be sensoring their good, hard, positive, dedicated work? Should we not have their name and photo on their collaborative projects from around the world? On the active stance they are taking in their community? On the academic blog post or the creative story they are writing? Personally, I feel a track record of these things can only be good in the eyes of a recruiter or employer. But of course there is still the safety and child protection side. While this post by Monster is more on the side of employers viewing negative things on your social media, I can still side with Casa-Todd in that having positive things turn up in a search would be amazing. I am an avid Twitter-er. I have ebbs and flows of posting my own experiences of course. I feel these mainly come from feeling inspired/not, comfortable/uncomfortable (both good reasons to share!), seeking feedback, and just general sharing of things we are doing in the studio that I think are useful and that others will enjoy. It can be hard to cut student emotion out of these photos sometimes. They become a lot less inspiring, in my eyes. But of course I understand that I need to protect my students. I also can say with almost certainty that Twitter has helped me get the job I have today. Again, that goes back to the fact of posting positively in your field and having your future employers be able to access that side of you. It is like a portfolio of authentic examples (albeit usually only the positive ones) of who you are as a teacher. I, for one, want my name and photo attached to that. And... I guess the final reason is just that I find it BORING to think about, talk about, write about (sorry, COETAIL!) and sometimes even do. My students have been back in the classroom for just over a week! It was perfect timing to guide them through the conversation and questions for this post. They know I am participating in this course and were very willing to participate in this discussion with me. I honestly was surprised at how well they (grade 4!) responded to these questions. Just to recap, these were the discussion prompts:
Here is a summary of their answers:
How do you connect with friends?
Why are these connections important to you?
What challenges do you face with these methods?
How do you face those challenges?
It was an interesting conversation to have with 9-10 year olds. The closest thing I can think of at that age was chain letters going around in the mail, possibly resulting in a penpal for a summer. I also don't know if some of that (Google Meets, etc) was because of having to learn from home for a few months or not.
In my recent classrooms (not just this class or this school), I have used Social Media with students as young as grade 3. We look through Twitter and use it together. We discuss what to do when someone adds us, and think about what we might do if we didn't want someone seeing our feed anymore. I know media's will change, but there will still likely be a continuity of blocking people and having security settings, so feel like it is important to teach them while they are young and in a group. I think of Jennifer Casa-Todd again when I think of these lessons. I tried to pick just one blog post of hers to link here, but cannot. So here is the whole website! She describes part of her work as: "Tackling courageous conversations about the use of social media in school while highlighting the elements of what she defines as Digital Leadership. Students are learning, and sharing their learning, they are standing up for important causes and they’re being a positive influence on others. So in reality, it’s about changing our lens. Moving away from a fear narrative towards this more positive stance, and then looking at using social media in the context of our classrooms and digital leadership at a younger age through class accounts." - Jennifer Casa-Todd Here is a video of her talking at MassCUE Conference 2018 about her journey in promoting positive influencers in her students.
Do you use social media in your classroom?
Have you read Jennifer Casa-Todd's book Social LEADia? If not, I encourage you to. It is very inspiring and I shared some of the stories with my students a couple of years ago, who responded well. It is a great way for students to see these positive uses of media and technology.
How can you inform your students and peers about the importance of respecting the intellectual property of others? Do you see this as an issue in your school? How do we teach copyright in countries where international copyright law is not clearly defined or followed? What is our obligation as educators?
I'll be honest. This topic daunts me a little. Yes I teach it as often as I can. Yes I remind staff when we are in PD sessions. Yes I usually use my own creations or images I know are labelled for reuse. But it still daunts me because I never know if I am right. Even after reading through this week's readings and videos. As a creator and photographer myself, most of what I post is my own. But of course sometimes a blog post needs a little something extra to tie things together, visually. So yes, I do search for images I am allowed to use. I generally go to websites that I suggest for my students... The Noun Project, Pixabay, Pexels, or... Google. Yes, I said Google! This is because a few years ago I learned of a great (and EASY) trick to use on Google to find images labelled for reuse. My students came to me at the beginning of the year believing they were not allowed to use Google Images in their work. I had to re-train them. Yes they are allowed, but they have to be specific in their search. Below is a video I created to help you understand the steps involved.
One thing I love about Google Slides is that if you insert an image and search within Google Slides, the images are already labelled for reuse. This makes it really easy for teachers to use images they are allowed to use, and same with students. While this is an easy work around it doesn't really teach the students to look for images they are allowed to use, unless the teacher knows this already and explains it.
One thing that still confuses me is citing images that I want to use on my blog. I found this image below on http://langwitches.org. It definitely helps, but my brain is still a mess.
Another thing I love doing is creating in Pages or Keynote. There are many shapes available in these programs. They can be layered, coloured, and some are even editable. I love the simple look this gives a project. In fact, in January we got all 100 Studio 4 students to create a poster using only Keynote shapes (and an SDG logo, if they wanted). This was for multiple reasons, including copyright and printing parameters. The creativity we saw was amazing! Who knew that locking them into something would have made for such creative pieces.
Final reflection....
I guess stick to what you know. If you don't know, and are just taking images from wherever you want on the internet, ask around for some quick tips or websites. I like the simplicity of The Noun Project (as the first image in this post shows, they credit it for you, which is comforting), and I like creating. But if I want something specific, I know I have a few websites and tricks to fall back on. I also like to push the students to create their own content. The personal touch makes it interesting. Some trace images, some draw freehand (paper or digital), some use shapes, and some still use Google. And that's okay, because they know how to search properly. Learning Math From My Teachers While I am at Home...
Context for this unit is that we are currently teaching and learning from home. Because of this, we have adapted our Shape and Space math unit accordingly. We tried to involve ourselves in the teaching of concepts as much as we could.
Here is a video of me explaining a brief summary of the unit.
Links to Resources We Made and Used:
Shape and Space Unit Plan (UBD Template) Shape and Space Tutorial Slides Blank Student Progress Slides I chose to use our math Shape and Space unit for my final project because we needed to adapt our plans to suit home learning. We needed opportunities for weekly assessment and progress, so it seemed to fit nicely. I decided to use some of ISTE's Empowered Learner standards because we are really focusing on goalsetting, metacognition, and learning how to learn. This situation has given us the perfect opportunity to explore this even more than we would in the studio. Independence is valued and nurtured. I feel like we have added an important element of agency to this unit. In the studio, we would normally create math groups for the week (with the opportunity to pivot or persevere at the end of 1-2 weeks), have some teacher time and some independent time. We tried to recreate this online but thought it would be more valuable if we made tutorials for ALL areas and let students progress at their own pace. They are still getting time with teachers, as we all created tutorial videos for them, but they can work at their own pace and progress. Students have 17 areas to choose to improve on instead of 5-6 as would be in the classroom, due to only 5-6 teachers being available. We designed something similar to this last year, but I feel that this actually lends itself to more individualised learning experiences. We also added explicit extension activities this year, since it is harder to react to these situations immediately when we are not in the same room as the students. Some extensions are set by our challenge and enrichment coordinator, and some are set by us (creating tutorials for other students). Outcomes at the end of the unit I hope to see are that the students are a little more independent in learning how to learn. We have provided a lot of links, videos, worksheets, games, and activities for them, but I hope that they will realise what works best for them and what practice activities will aid them in a deeper understanding of the concept. I hope that their reflections will show this. Some have started to realise how valuable the slides are already, and I am hoping that as we progress this will help. I also hope that parents will clearly be able to see their child's progress from the beginning of the unit to the end (and even week to week), while learning at home. I hope the value of a video tutorial will be apparent. We are going into week 3 of this experience this week. So far it is working well for most students. Some students took longer to complete the week 1 activities, but it is easy for them to catch up once they are there. Some students are rushing through and not using this as time to practice and experience, but rather check it off and be done with it. This week my focus for those students will be really to take time and keep going deeper. I am hoping that because it is a repeat of routine from last week, it might be more DOING and LEARNING this week and less trying to figure out the process of sorting through the slides and documenting their experiences. I feel this unit reflects the learning of course 1 because the students are figuring out how to learn. They are connecting, creating, and using metacognitive skills to reflect on their learning. They are seeing clear progress, which at their age will hopefully show that their work and practice makes a difference, even if they are not within the walls of "school." My biggest influences from course one was the learning process. I hope that students can see that practicing skills will help their knowledge grow. That being reflective and seeking feedback will also help them grow. And that persevering is important. Speaking of Connectivism...
My original idea for this post was to compare constructivism and connectivism and showcase how we use each in Studio 4.
However, given the state of the world at the moment with Covid-19 and school closures, I think connectivism is the real winner here. Not to say constructivism is not happening. Here in Vietnam we are now in week 8 of online learning (however, one of those weeks was a much-needed holiday). Teachers everywhere are being thrown into the role of a teacher from afar. Many without warning, training, or collaboration. For the first 6 weeks everything in Vietnam was last minute, week by week decisions about whether we would be on or off campus, with our without students. Luckily at this point we were told it would be at least another 3 weeks (likely longer for primary school students). This gave our team the opportunity to actually plan for a unit that is based online. We made the decision to swap our Program of Inquiry around. A unit that we planned to be the final unit of the year, we decided to start right away. This unit allows for a lot of connectivism theories to be put into play. A quick Google search results in the following definition from Wikipedia:
With everything happening right now, how can you not be taking the opportunity to teach this way (or rather, to have your students learn in this way)?
In this post I will explain our unit progression and how we are infusing technology and connectivism into the more traditional reading and writing unit. Where We Are in Place and Time:
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"It’s not enough to provide a single path from a low floor to a high ceiling; it’s important to provide multiple pathways. Why? We want all children to work on projects based on their own personal interests and passions—and because different children have different passions, we need technologies that support many different types of projects, so that all children can work on projects that are personally meaningful to them."
- Mitchel Resnick, Lifelong Kindergarten
Wide Walls
(Expressed with any tool) |
One Tool
(Everyone uses the same tool) |
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Steps
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Plan
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Action (to be updated)
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1. Evaluate the Resources
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2. Build a Habit
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3. Set Goals and Rewards
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I am hoping the natural reward for this will be that I feel more calm and focused with everything on my plate at the moment. |
4. Write Down Your Learning and Teach Others
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"I can think of no more important context than right now, this time, to champion these things and to place them firmly at the centre of our work with children. Most importantly - our own bewilderment, anger and uncertainty have the potential to lead to helplessness, disconnection and even cynicism. Deliberately nurturing our own curiosity, optimism, courage and compassion can help avoid that trap and offer a more constructive way forward. Grief leans on compassion in order to recede - compassion for self, others and the planet. " |
Of course if educators are open to new ideas, we are probably already trying to attempt this on a small scale. I feel like we try to do this in Studio 4. We try to connect to their interests. We try to connect to their passions. We try to do what we can, given our contexts and our constraints. Are we getting the most out of our students this way? What would measure most in this situation? Are we doing a disservice to our students if we do/don't allow for space and their own passions/interests?
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"We don’t know what the world is going to look like in 5, 10, 15 years. We don’t know what jobs will exist, what systems will be set up, and what our students will be doing. But I do know they’ll have a choice in what they do. They will still have to fail and recover just as we do now. I hope you understand as a parent or educator that inquiry should not be a cool “option” to have in a child’s education. Giving our students choice is the only thing that will prepare them to handle the future. Whatever it may bring."
- AJ Juliani
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