Pecha Kucha and some last words for my #I4Ed class

Last class of my university career. Feeling excited, nervous, scared and nostalgic. On our last day of class we are having a Pecha Kucha/Pizza party! What is Pecha Kucha??????  Pecha Kucha "is a presentation style in which 20 slides are shown for 20 seconds each (six minutes and 40 seconds in total). The format, which keeps presentations concise and fast-paced, powers multiple-speaker events called PechaKucha Nights (PKNs)"

In this moment I feel like I can say that I will keep up with my blogging, and I will try to, however I should not make any promises right now. 

It was fun to see my classmates presentations, everyone added their own personality to their presentation. The pizza was also very good! Thanks MIKE for ordering a special vegetarian pizza just for me :)

Good luck to all of my classmates in their final student teaching placements! I will miss seeing all of you in class. Good luck in your future teaching career.

Thanks Mike for a awesome class!!

Final Project #I4Ed

Here is my final project for my Internet for Educators course! This is a self reflection of what I have learned this semester.

This video was created using iMovie



Enjoy :)

EDU Blogger: Cre8tive Havoc

I have been following Tara's blog Cre8tive Havoc for about a year now. Tara teaches ELA at Sturgeon Heights Collegiate in the St. James SD and was my cooperating teacher for my second student teaching placement. I loved my experience and learned so much from my time teaching with her. Cre8tive Havoc is her classroom blog where she posts assignments for her students and shares what they are doing in the classroom. She is very skilled with using technology in her classroom, and is always creating new ways to engage her students with technology.

Tara is also very active on twitter! Check her out at @msmclauchlan

She also has and iTunes U course available called Twitter and Flicker and Blogger; Oh My!

Internet Good or Bad?

When I think about how the internet has changed us, I feel as though it has it has changed us for the better. Not everyone would agree with this statement, and yes I spend a lot of time on my devise, I am always updating and checking social media, I am watching videos, reading blogs, articles, and looking at photos. And yes I have become accustom to the instant gratification that comes along with it. When my husband and I are in a restaurant we pull out our phones to check what is happening online, or pull up photos and videos. Some people may look at this as feel that we are not connecting with each other, but the couple who is staring in silence at each other at the table next to us does not seem to me as though they are sharing in a greater connection. Often times my husband and I are sharing things we have found or have read online, which often sparks conversation. Personally I do not have a problem spending times with my friends and leaving my phone in my bag, I spend most of my free time in the summer outside walking, hiking, biking, swimming, camping, and playing with my dog. The internet has changed the way I socialize, it is so much easier to stay connected to friends living far away, I can stay connected as I travel and with friends that are traveling. I feel as though I am more socially aware, there are so many more ways for me to connect and learn about what is happening in the world. I have access to information anywhere I want, I can easily learn about any topic I am interested in, or answer any question I may have.
This is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what the internet has to offer us. I do view it as a tool that can be used for good or bad. Using it for good requires educating yourself on how to use this tool properly.

The Future

What does the future hold for education?

I feel as though technology has already changed education so much from when I was in school, and we are going to be seeing big changes in the near future. I am excited to see what future holds for education and how we can continue to change the way we educate future students. I also feel that education is changing in the way we reach students, classrooms are becoming more student centred as well as inquiry based.

The K-12 Horizon Report points out certain key trends;

• Education paradigms are shifting to include online learning, hybrid learning, and collaborative models.

• Social media is changing the way people interact, present ideas and information, and communicate.

• Openness — concepts like open content, open data, and open resources, along with notions of transparency and easy access to data and information — is becoming a value.

• As the cost of technology drops and school districts revise and open up their access policies, it is becoming more common for students to bring their own mobile devices. 

• The abundance of resources and relationships made easily accessible via the Internet is challenging us to revisit our roles as educators.

Some of the challenges that come along with these trends are also outlined in this report. Key challenges include;

• Ongoing professional development needs to be valued and integrated into the culture of the schools. 

• Too often it is education’s own practices that limit broader uptake of new technologies. 

• New models of education are bringing unprecedented competition to traditional models of schooling. 

• K-12 must address the increased blending of formal and informal learning. 

• The demand for personalized learning is not adequately supported by current technology or practices.  

• We are not using digital media for formative assessment the way we could and should. 

Digital Footprint

It is easy to think that once we leave our computer screen that what we have done online is left behind or anonymous. The things we do not disappear, anyone can have access to it. The picture or video we posted, or the things we said are there for anyone to read or even copy. I have always been very conscious of what I put online. I care about the how I represent myself in person, so I also take care of how I represent myself online.
It is important that students growing up understand what their digital footprint is, and how to protect themselves.

Source

Your digital footprint can be something that you take control of to enhance your online identity. The infographic below gives some good tips on how to do this.

Source

App Show & Tell

One the apps that I will be using in my classroom is my TED app. I can easily search through videos, and save my favourites.

One of the other apps that I enjoy using is Imovie, I have used it many times. It is also easy for students to use. You can use in on a mac, Ipad, Iphone, or Ipod.

A great way to find educational apps is on pinterest! Here is a link to one board that I follow: 

 Top Education Apps

Using Video in the Classroom

I do like to use videos in the classroom, sometimes it helps break up the class, get students re-focused, and there are so many out there that we can use to help engage our students. Videos can help us reach our more visual learners. One of Youtube channels that I have used in the classroom, and I enjoy watching myself is Crash Course. There are so many videos in lots of different subject areas. The videos are easy to understand and presented in a fun way.
I have used the below video during a lesson about the war of 1812. Crash Course is American, but it was still a useful video, and it gave the students a different perspective.

Many of the videos are taught by author John Green, if you haven't read any of his books, I would highly recommend them.  The other videos I have looked at are the literature courses. I would suggest checking the video "How and Why We Read"

Creating videos are fun way for students to be creative and show their learning. I also feel that because people will be seeing their work that they may put in a little extra effort. Below is a video from one of my student teaching placements, the students were doing common craft book reviews of the books they had finished reading. I posted all of their videos to my youtube channel, and we took one class to have a viewing party.

Podcasts

I am on this zombie kick right now as a result of watching a lot of the Walking Dead, so I was excited when I found this podcast called "We're Alive - A "Zombie" Story of Survival." I also enjoy listening to audio books so this is something new I am excited to get into. I feel like a story like this is also something that I would be willing to use in the classroom similarly to how I have used audio books. This is a great tool for struggling or resistant readers to get into a story. Also creating a podcast is a great way for students to create their own stories.

If you want to check it out follow this link on itunes: We're Alive - A "Zombie" Story of Survival

 Steven and I were searching together and we found a few more podcasts that we liked on Ted Talks as well as Ted Talks Education. Most of the talks we listened to on Ted Talks Education were directed at teachers. They are all free downloads so you can listen to as many as you like. A couple of the talks that we listened to included "The technology of Story Telling" and "The Child-Driven Education." In the regular Ted Talks I listened to "Adventures in Twitter Fiction" which is something you could use in an ELA classroom, this is a great way to get students to use a social media tool in a new way by getting students to read and write their own twitter fiction.
Along with listening to podcasts, getting students to create their own podcast is something that you could do in any subject area. It is a interesting way to get students engaged and another way for students to show their learning.

Follow the links to check out these podcasts:

Ted Talks

Ted Talks Education

Organizing Myself Online

There are going to be a lot of blog posts going up in the next little while, the pile up of tech tasks has just recently dawned on me. With classes ending and all of the final projects and tests piling up, I can feel my stress level increasing. Getting myself organized helps me clear my head and make sense of what my next step is.

I like to find new ways to help me get organized online. I have enjoyed using Feedly to organized the blogs that I am reading.

Some of the other ways that organize myself are online are;

1. Goolge Chrome Bookmarks
2. Pinterest
3. Wunderlist
4. Evernote
5. The Pocket

I haven't been able to get into Symbaloo, however it seem like something people like to use so maybe I need to give it another try.

PLN

PLN (Personal Learning Network)

"A personal learning network is an informal learning network that consists of the people a learner interacts with and derives knowledge from in a personal learning environment. In a PLN, a person makes a connection with another person with the specific intent that some type of learning will occur because of that connection."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_learning_network

A personal learning network connects us to people and knowledge through different technological mediums. I think that this network also includes the devises and programs that we use and interact with. As I was creating a mind map on Mindmeister, I realized how extensive my PLN already is, and it continues to grow as a finish university and move into a career.

Below is my representation of the PLN of the 21st century connected student. creating this mind map I realized how different the PLN of students are than when I graduated in 2003. There are so many more resources available for students to grow their PLN. I feel that in the classroom we should be pulling from these resources to support the learning and engagement of our students.

There are a few different applications available to create mind maps such as these, using Mindmeister was really easy, and I like the clean look of their designs. I find that creating these mind maps is a simple way to visually organize information, and is another tool that can be used in the classroom.

Infographs

Infographs are a fun visual way to organize and represent information on any topic. This is a great way for students to show their learning. I like to have things visually organized, using colour and images as a result my paper notes books are littered with drawings and other visual cues that help me organize my thoughts. This is a tool that you could use in any subject area, and students could also share their learning by posting their infograph online or in the classroom.

Here are a couple of infographs I found online that you could use in a ELA classroom. 

Click for link to source

Click for link to source

It is easy to get started, and students should be able to learn quickly with some instruction and playing around. To create my first infograph I used Piktochart, you can create your own, or use one of their templates to get started.

Web based learning

This past week we had a presentation from Sophia Palahicky on Web Based Course Delivery in Manitoba. I have never taken a course online, however it is something I find interesting. The sense I got from everyone in class, is a general hesitation about the idea. It seems as though many people have had a bad experience with them in the past. I am sure that there have been improvements, and I feel like I can see the value in them, but I also feel that they can not completely replace the physical classroom.
As we have talked about before students are different and the way that we teach needs to be different, I feel like there may be a place for web based classes, my hesitation would be more so to commit to a completely virtual school. Web based classes would be useful for students such as athletes who need to travel often, students who want to accelerate their education, and students who need more time or need to re-do a course. 
This is still something I feel that I don't know much about, it makes me somewhat nervous to think that I may teach a web based course, but it is good to know that there are resources available for me to find out more information.

Sophia shared this video of the active learner to emphasis the how learning has changed.

Twitter

I have had a personal account on twitter for a while, which I do not use much, I follow friends and a few other people, but I do not tweet much. I have just started my own professional account where I follower other teachers, my classmates and other education related accounts. So far I have found that it is a great way to connect with other educators. Using twitter is still something I am learning about and getting into, but I can see myself continuing to use it in the future.

Using Twitter in creative ways in the classroom is also a way to get students to use a social media tool that most of them already use in an educational way.

For some reason I like adding videos to my blog posts, so here is an interesting video showing a year on twitter in 2013.

Check out my twitter account: @Ms_Check00

WHAT ARE YOU TEACHING THE WORLD?

I had a good sleep, the sun is shinning, and I started the morning with some yoga, which has inspired me today to put a little bit of positive energy into the world. One of the best ways to be inspired and feel good about yourself, is by listening to kid president. I feel that teachers and students could use a pep talk!

 

As teachers we must always remind ourselves to create a classroom the revolves around our students. Teaching our students through inquiry based learning is one of the best ways that we can create lifelong learners. It is also essential to create a welcoming classroom environment that is inclusive to all learners.

Thank you!!

 I would like to dedicate this video to all of my teachers/professors in the Education department at Brandon University, as well as the Cooperating teachers that I have worked with. You are all an inspiration to me and thank you for giving me the tools to become the best teacher that I can be. I would also like to send this out to my classmates, who I learn so much from everyday. There are going to be a lot of amazing teachers going out into the world in 2014.

This "internet" thing will never catch on...

We are half way done our classes, and things are really going to get busy. With the Career fair this past week, being near the end is starting to feel more real. This is both exciting and very stressful. I sometimes miss the days of being in first year Education where everything was new and exciting. I have no idea where I will be in the next year but I am excited to see what the future brings.
This final term I will be student teaching at Crocus Plains, teaching senior 1-4 Self Directed Learning. This will be a new experience and a totally different classroom dynamic. I am very excited to try something new. On fridays in this class my co-operating teaching has discussion time with the students, she usually starts out discussion with a youtube video. I am beginning to get prepared for my time there, and I am looking for videos that I can use to get discussion started with my students. 

Help!

I am hoping that my fellow classmates will help me out and give me some suggestions of good videos that I can use  to get discussion going! Please give me any suggestions in my comments below. I would appreciate the help!

Here is one video that could be interesting for discussion, a news report 1981 about the internet. It is amazing how much has changed in the past 33 years. Who knew this internet thing would ever catch on!

Internet for Educators

This last week we our class enjoyed a presentation from Dean Shareski.(@shareski) In the presentation we talked about how learning and teachering are different in 2014, and what it means for our schools.

There are so many things that we can do using technology in the classrooms, but there are also challenges that we foresee as a class, one of the main challenges is the fact that once we actually get a teaching job, there may not be the resources available for us to use all of the technology we have learned about. There is also some resistance by some teachers to accept that technology is something that we need to adopt. I can understand that if you are unfamiliar with this new literacy you will feel resistance, however I feel that we need to accept the importance of digital literacy in our society and becoming technologically literate is important as teachers. I also feel that we are responsible to provide a new literacy education for our students to prepare them for success. It is also a way for us to promote student engagement in our classrooms. 

Dean's Slideshare:

http://www.slideshare.net/shareski

Dean's Blog: 

http://k12onlineconference.org/?p=610

Digital Literacy Wiki

This past week in class we were assigned the tech task of collaborating as a class to create a Wiki on the topic of Digital Literacy. As a class we gathered together online each adding bits to create a complete resource for teaching Digital Literacy in the classroom. Like working on a large puzzle each of us research to fill in the gaps of our wiki. Although the idea of creating a website seems daunting, creating a wiki is extremely simple. Like most things involving technology, sometimes the best way to learn is to simply play around with it.  
For those who may not know what a wiki is, this common craft video gives a good explanation of the purpose and uses of a wiki are. 

In the classroom, creating a wiki is a great tool for group projects, whether small or whole class projects. The wiki will show who and when someone has added to the wiki. This is a great tool to teach student how to collaborate online and how to interact online in a positive educational way.

Interested in checking out our Wiki?

http://i4edwinter14.wikispaces.com

Digital Identity

Welcome to my new blog as a part of my course “Internet for Educators” at Brandon University.

This week in class talked about Digital Identity which is defined by techopidia as;

"an online or networked identity adopted or claimed in cyberspace by an individual, organization or electronic device. These users may also project more than one digital identity through multiple communities. In terms of digital identity management, key areas of concern are security and privacy." http://www.techopedia.com/definition/23915/digital-identity

Our digital self is an extension of who we are, and the digital footprint we create is another way to show who we are by what we choose to show the world, whether it is in the form of a blog, Twitter, Instagram account or Facebook. 

When considering my own digital Identity I am mindful of what I am putting out there for people to see. The main social networking sites I use are Facebook (which I keep on lock down), as well as twitter, and Istagram. I obviously also have a blog, although I find blogging difficult because I  find it difficult to believe that many people would want to read what I have to say. It is only in a situation where I am require to do so (such as for this class) that I would put so many of my thoughts out there, however it is something I wish to get better at.

What does Digital Identity mean for educators?

Even though my students will have grown up in a world where something such as a Digital Identity exists, it does not mean that they have an understanding of what it means. When posting something on the internet there can be the feeling of a shield or wall that separates us from what we say. We may be so bold as to say something that we may never say in person, good or bad. There is also desensitization in the sense that we cannot see the people we are interacting with. We do not always understand that although the words are not coming our of our mouths that they still have the same impact. If we had an understanding of what an Digital Identity is, and realized that our digital life is a part of our real life, would we better understand the damage that could be done? 

On a more positive note…

Which proper guidance there are many possibilities when teaching students about their Digital Identity to extend their learning, and connect them to a digital community.