School is back...in real life, how am I?

I was going to say "Out with the old, in with the new", but I'm not sure what this is? Such weird times that we're living in! 

It has been lovely seeing my students especially those that have returned to school because these are the students that I have not been able to connect with through our online learning sessions. One student commented that it was nice to see me in real life and another said Miss you are alive! haha (I'm sure he meant it as a compliment?)

Anyway, the systems we have in place are systems that I'm sure I'm not the only one finding challenging. Having to provide a negative covid test prior to school commencing even though I am fully vaccinated, staying within our bubbles and bubble areas, but especially wearing a mask while teaching, and having my learners also wear a mask, are just some of the things that's making this learning thing extra challenging.

I do understand the importance of wearing a mask, but I'm also finding it to be such a huge barrier to me being "back, in real life". Anyway, I read an email from Allright.org.nz who offered some tips to help me get through if things feel a bit out of control. I thought I'd share them here...

1. Accept that things are tough right now

2. Do the little things that give you a boost (like catching up with a mate or getting active outdoors)

3. Take some time to reflect upon the good stuff you're grateful for in the every day.

Getting with the program

It was inevitable that I needed to get with the program and force myself to learn what I could about teaching and learning online. I consider myself to be an "Early Majority", one who takes some time to adopt an innovation. It's not that I was skeptical, it's more that I needed to do my own research into how I was going to implement an online learning program that was going to be engaging for my learners. Still, I'm not sure if what I produced ended up being engaging 😅

As a new leader, I reflected on how I was going to support my team- two of whom are beginning teachers, to deliver an online learning program (their very first, my very second 😳). We decided that we were going to Meet with our own class in the morning, then each of our team members will host one afternoon session. The idea was that this will ease the load and pressure off our staff members, as well as give everyone an opportunity to learn and build off each others digital ideas.

I thought our sessions went well! Our beginning teachers are more digitially fluent than I am (something I may not have known if we hadn't shared the load), and they brought some new and refreshing activities that everyone including the teachers enjoyed participating in.

Our school whakatauki for this year is Tūngia te ururoa kia tupu whakaritorito te tutu o te harekeke, which translates to Set the overgrown bush alight, and the new flax shoots will spring up. This means that in order to change, we need to leave some ways behind in order to do things differently or in simpler terms (for me), get with the program and get on with it.

Which would you be?

A reason to smile

As I begin to reflect on the term that was, and start to plan for the term ahead, I smile. I smile because although I was not able to connect with every child in my class, I was able to reconnect with some. I smile because the learning online has been a lot of fun! And I smile because they smile:)

Today's learning

Today I learned about an app called ExplainEverything. I could see the potential in this program but I really need a lot more time to explore the app. I was able to explore the writing tools and insert a picture. I also started to record myself but haven't had the chance to look at the recording tools properly to see why I couldn't hear what I had recorded. Here is my attempted version of the task we had to complete today...

During our Create session, I was trying to do a screencast for my learners on how to create a polyline profile of ourselves. This took me a very long time and I didn't get very far (I only managed an outline of my face). I also felt like I was blabbering on unnecessarily so editing my screencastify will be another thing I'll need to learn about.

Class site

This week it was nice to check out some class sites and reflect on how my own class site is looking and working. My class site is building nicely, but there is still more work to do. I have enjoyed building my own class site and exploring the settings and tools. My students are starting to get used to looking at our class site to access their learning and some have shared that they have accessed the site at home. I appreciated the time we were given during our DFI session to personalize our site.

From looking at other class sites I have noticed that some teachers use Bitmoji instead of a photo of themselves and I'd like to do the same thing because I think it makes the site look more child-friendly. I have made my own Bitmoji on my cell phone and now I need to work out how to access this Bitmoji on my laptop because at the moment the Bitmoji on my laptop is not the one I created on my phone.

Something I look forward to exploring more is Hapara. I have appreciated learning about the Hapara hot tips and need to keep exploring it on my own to become more familiar and accustomed to using its service.

Sites & Sites

I can definitely see how creating a Site would make my teaching life way easier! I liked how we (as a group) first added websites, links, and other resources to a shared document, then we used those links on our own individual Site. I can see this working in an environment like what I work in because we plan collaboratively. I'm going to start planning this way immediately. 

Below is a screenshot of my Site that is about ANZAC. I liked how someone in my group shared that she had added pages that said Learn, Create, Share so I did the same on mine (that makes sense considering that is the kaupapa behind what we are learning)

I'm looking forward to completing this Site and having it ready for my tamariki.

 

Dealing with Data

Today's session has been a little overwhelming. I dunno if it's the session itself or if this cold weather is affecting my ability to think and process? Anyway, I still managed to get some learning in :) 

I really like the session on Spreadsheets because I've been using doc as my spreadsheet. Spreadsheet is a much easier way to collect and collate information and so I really need to keep practicing using it. At the moment I have a table in my documents of the amount of money students have paid towards their camp fees. I need to transfer that information onto a spreadsheet so that the magic of Spreadsheets can add everything for more, how cool is that! 

I kinda feel like an alien who has just arrived on planet Earth and is amazed at all the things I'm learning and seeing. 

 Here, I practiced putting data onto a spreadsheet then onto a table.

Google Slides

 Created a "How to" slide for my learners.

I'm also learning "how to" so we're all learning 😊

Media-Youtube

I created a Youtube channel today yay! I'm not really one to create a channel because I thought that creating a channel was for people who like to share things with others and I'm not the type of person who likes to share- I mean, I'm not the type of person who likes to share my life or interests online because that's not me. But anyway, I didn't think to create a channel for the purpose of my students' learning. 

A couple of years ago as a beginning teacher I wasn't quite prepared for the Treaty of Waitangi lesson that I had "planned" for my students. I found a Youtube clip online that I thought would be appropriate (after watching it for 5 seconds) because it had cartoon animations. About a minute into the clip there was numerous explicit language. How embarrassing! 

Now I can put all my pre watched Treaty of Waitangi clips into a playlist folder and have them already ready each year:)

Workflow

 Today was about organising my Gmail, changing the setting etc. I have never done this before because I have never felt the need to. I guess organising (taming my inbox) is a good way to manage my Gmail better. Setting up an email signature is something I don't use however I will start to do that from now and it'll save me from writing my name at the bottom of each email I send. I also didn't know that you could schedule your response to an email so yay I definitely will be using that as I am one of those people who write my emails late at night then wait until the morning to send.

I also need to get better at using my Calendar for its useful tools and organisational purposes. I'm looking forward to the Pyjama Party that I have been invited to.

Google Keep is a new tool. I felt the session on it was quick and so I do need to do my inquiry into Keep and see how that would help me with my planning and organisation.

Day 1 DFI

Today I learnt lots of things but a tool I found awesome is remove.bg - a website that removes the background from your image. How cool!

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  Here is a short reflection of my learning thus far...I learnt about the different tools that you can access within your doc such as Explore and Voice recording. I have used voice recording before but gave up because the computer was not correctly recognising what I was saying (but I didn't know that you needed to change the language to New Zealand). After changing the language to NZ it was then able to recognize me Yay! This is going to be very useful for my students particularly those who struggle to write.

  
  

  My digital capability is still at a beginner's level however I will continue to learn, create, share (and practice).