Digital Fluency Intensive - Cohort #2 2019 - Day Four

Unfortunately I was unable to attend Day 4 of DFI due to illness but I did enjoy going through the agenda items later in the week when I was feeling better.

I think that I am beginning to really understand and appreciate the 'SHARE' part of Manaiakalani. When the students share learning on their blogs, it creates an opportunity for whanau to make a connection with their child in their learning environment. The majority of our students arrive at school on the bus so their whanau very rarely come to school unless we have assemblies, sports days or student conferences. This could be only 5 times per year. The student blogs enable parents to be part of their child's learning, anywhere, anytime, any day! They are also a way to connect with whanau who can not be there everyday for eg. grandparents who live overseas. The 'Connected Learners SHARE' slides are an excellent resource for anyone who does not understand the reason why our students have blogs. 



It's always very informative reading others blogs. The following example of an introduction to a students blog is something that we could use at our school. We have a similiar introduction on our student blogs but going further to say that the work may include spelling mistakes etc will let whanau know what the learning process really looks like.

I have a class site up and operational thanks to Venessa however I have not created a site from scratch so the DFI Intro to Sites slide deck was very useful for my learning. I have made a few changes to my site with what I have learnt and am very pleased with the results. I think the students will find it an easier site to navigate.

The multi modal slide deck gave me lots to think about in terms of engagement for students. I have used the following literacy type activities for the past 6 years and feel that technology has certainly enhanced and engaged the learners. The students enjoy working through the activities as they have choice in what they do and when they do it but I know there are so many more options that I could include to 'provoke interest and expand thinking and wonderings'.



I really enjoyed using the different resources to create a google site about Science and Gardening. I realise just how easy it is and how interesting it is for the students to have such a selection of learning material. I like the activities being accessible directly from the site and can see myself adding more pages to my site as opposed to slide decks. 

Click to view my 'Science in the Garden' Site

I am definitely becoming more familiar with google and what it can offer my learners and I. I have been pleased to share my new knowledge with my own boys and they have already put this into practice in their own learning which has been great to see.

Digital Fluency Intensive - Cohort #2 2019 - Day Three

I have had another great day being part of the DFI. Matt Goodwin from Point England School was our special visitor. Matt has been part of Manaiakalani since he started teaching so was a wealth of information and very enthusiastic in his korero around Manaiakalani pedagogy. 

DFI - Cohort#2 2019 - Day 3 Agenda

Ruth and Patsy were fabulous in teaching us the Manaiakalani waiata. These two teachers were so positive and engaging, I think the students at Bay of Islands College are very lucky to have these two kaiako.

My understanding of Create within the Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy was definitely extended today. Learn, Create, Share is not linear, as educators we should  start at Create more often as the students learn throughout the process and the results can be initiated by the student rather than an end product designed by the teacher.

I realised that at times I think through the learning process so closely in class that I am limiting the creativity of the students. I need to step back and let the students have a go for longer before stepping in. Not all of the students will be successful every time, but if I try to direct the outcomes then student engagement and ownership in the learning could be lost.

I learnt that using my You Tube channel is a possible way of managing my focus on rewindable learning. Matt taught us how to make playlists and recommended how to use these at different levels, I have had a light bulb moment in my digital classroom around the impact that rewindable learning has on the students. I have added a 'maths strategy' video to my class site with positive results from the students (especially the student whose video it was). I have more confidence in using You Tube videos now that I understand how to change the settings and make a play list.

There are many things that I will use with my students back in the classroom. At the top of the list is the website remove.bg, I know that my students will love to create with this clever tool. I also learnt how to use google drawing to create portrait drawings with the clever add on called colour picker eye dropper. I was absolutely amazed at the art work that could be created on google drawing. Click on this link to view the portraits that the clever students at Panmure Bridge School have created. Click here

We had a great session on google slides with Kerry. I learnt how to do so many things and we were some great examples to get started. I decided to create my digital pepeha as we will be working on our pepeha as a class next term. Check it out!

Another interesting piece of learning that I took away from today was live streaming school events. I think that there are plenty of live streaming possibilities at our school that would benefit students, teachers and whanau. This is something that we need to look into, class assemblies spring to mind.

The DFI is helping me to organise my digital world. Having a more organised digital environment, home and school, has meant that I am becoming more efficient in my time management thus creating more time for me to spend with my family. I am becoming more focused on the time I spend on tasks and enjoying the extra quality time I'm getting with my family!

Digital Fluency Intensive - Cohort #2 2019 - Day Two

I learnt that the LEARN component of the 'Learn, Create, Share' pedagogy relies on effective teaching matched with increased digital capability to really accelerate the outcomes for our learners. It is not about handing students digital devices and letting them go for it. There are definitely positive learning outcomes involved when students have time to try things out however effective teaching ensures the the learning is successful and acceleration will occur.

I have heard of SAMR before and have previously been at the first two levels in my teaching programme. I feel like I am designing tasks  that focuses on 'Modification' rather than 'Substitution'. My class has been learning about the longfin eel as our inquiry topic. The students had to create something that would share their learning about the life cycle of the longfin eel. Most of the students chose to create a google drawing but some wanted to use Scratch with positive results.

Today I learnt how to manage my gmail using labels and filters. I know that this will have a positive influence on my workflow as a professional because my email is so much more organised and I feel like I will be in control of what comes into my inbox from this day forward. I have always had reservations about using gmail until today. Thank you DFI!

Using google hangouts was challenging. I had issues with connection and with my microphone. However I persevered alongside Dave and Ruth with success and what a great feeling it was to have our first successful google hangout that we started! Edwina and I decided that we will have a google hangout for our next senior syndicate meeting and we can create this via our google calendar.

Link to Google Chat Video

Looking forward to DFI Day 3 at Taipa next week!

Professional Inquiry #3

12.06.19 - Inquiry Question - How will the Manaiakalani Pedagogy - Learn, Create, Share increase the agency of my students and accelerate their learning in literacy.

Taking Action - What can I do to learn more about what to do?

Development Goals for STUDENTS to gain AGENCY

Choice

To provide students with opportunities to make choices about the content and process of their work.

Group Work

To provide students with opportunities to work in groups to learn and practice agency necessary for group success.

Student Reflections

To provide students with opportunities to self-reflect using their blogs.

Student-Led Instruction.

To provide students with opportunities to demonstrate agency by leading instruction on a particular skill or concept - rewindable learning

Professional Inquiry #2

05.06.19

Upon  starting the Manaiakalani DFI Course I realised that I needed to ‘dig deeper’ to find out how the Manaiakalani Pedagogy of Learn, Create, Share could increase the agency of my students whilst also looking at student reflections. My inquiry focus has now changed to a Manaiakalani focus.

Inquiry Question - How will the  Manaiakalani Pedagogy - Learn, Create, Share increase the agency of my students and accelerate their learning in literacy.

I think that CREATE will be a key to increasing student agency in my classroom.

Learning

“Better outcomes for learners are a direct result of teachers acquiring new knowledge and skills.” Stewart 2017

“Understanding the need and being open to new ways of doing things.” Reid 2018 

Taking Action - What can I do to learn more about what to do?

• Connecting with students experiential knowledge, their prior knowledge
• Finding out what students know, what they want to know, how they want to learn and let it influence classroom opportunities
• Giving students more choices in their learning - what choices?

Digital Fluency Intensive - Cohort #2 2019 - Day One

Today was the first day of the 9 week Digital Fluency Intensive at Taipa Area School.

It started with a very warm welcome from Taipa Area School's DP and the junior kura class, followed by introductions from Dorothy, Kerry, Venessa and the rest of the group.

Dorothy's korero on the origins of Manaiakalani gave me an excellent insight into Manaiakalani's kaupapa and pedagogy. It is important for me to gain an understanding of the research that stands behind the success of Manaiakalani.

Once we got started we were inundated with tips and tricks. I learnt that you can organise the information in a google doc using the headings tool to create a table of contents to make it easier to find information in your documents. I also learnt that 'Google Docs' is a useful option when wanting to create an engaging document. I had always thought that the best option would be to use Google Drawings and was surprised by what can be achieved using docs instead. I was quite pleased with my google docs effort - see below.  I know that the students in my class will also find this useful.

I learnt how to organise my bookmark bar and the folders in My Drive to improve my organisation and work flow. It felt great to be sure of where my most used files can now be accessed from. It has certainly motivated me to run a lesson on file organisation with my class as I realise it is never too late to get things sorted in all our Google Drives.

I think Google Groups is something that will really benefit me outside the classroom. I am a member of many messenger groups and facebook pages related to my boys sports teams. I think a few google groups could easily take the place of these communication lines and would be far more effective and efficient.

I also learnt a few things that I think I should've already known:

• The URL browser is called the OMNIBOX
• When pasting always used SHIFT, CTRL and V 
• VOICE TYPING is a very useful tool to engage all writers.

I am really looking forward to our next DFI at Bay of Islands College next week.