Reflection on November 5th, 2015

I can’t believe I am finishing up my second last week of classes!

I am definitely getting excited, as well as nervous for my block. I feel prepared but also quite unsure of what to expect. Today I chose to come to our optional tech class in order to feel more prepared for block and to finalize some of my learning before my Genius Hour Digital Portfolio is due next week.

As a learner, I feel I have grown significantly during my time in EDUC 8Y34, Teaching and Learning with Technology. Coming into this class I had very limited confidence in my technology abilities. I didn’t think I would incorporate any technology into my block. So far in my placement class, I have taught two lessons (three if you include my micro teaching with a few select students from my class!). I have been able to incorporate the use of the SMART Board into each of these lessons. I realize how fortunate I am that my placement teacher really promotes the use of technology and that it is economically feasible in my school. For these reasons I hope that as I enter block I will continue to incorporate technology to a greater extent, including various tools I have learned about in this technology class.

In terms of my Genius Hour Digital Portfolio, I have completed most of my blog posts and artefacts. With that being said, I still have my TED Talk to complete. I have created a vlog post before, but this seems a lot more intimidating! When I filmed my vlog post I had an outline of what I wanted to say  on a Word document below my webcam, and when I reviewed my video later I could tell that it was a bit scripted. It is my goal to make my TED Talk a lot more authentic and personable! I have written a script but I will make sure I don’t read directly from it (which was my plan before coming to class today!) I also hope to be able to break my TED Talk up and then edit it after, which is something I hadn’t thought was possible until I came to class and saw some examples of how other students did this.

Hopefully my TED Talk will be filmed and uploaded soon! 

The Best Part of Me Lesson Plan

Today in class, Briana, Carlin and I worked on a lesson plan for a grade three literacy class. This lesson was based around an amazing book titled, "The Best Part of Me."

Here is the lesson plan,

The first part of our lesson, the "Mind's On" is a YouTube video. This is a read aloud of the first few pages of the book The Best Part of Me.

For the main part of our lesson, the "Action" section, we had students create a PowToon explaining what they think is their favourtie part of them. They will then use Audacity to record themselves saying the words they have written.


As a consolidation, we will use Plickers to evaluate the students learning.

Reflection on October 22nd 2015

Today in class we completed a jigsaw activity in order to learn about various Web 2.0 Tools. The class was divided into four coloured groups and each group investigated 5 different tools. My group investigated how to use comic strips, such as ToonDoo, in order to make a comic strip about any topic. We then investigated Word Clouds, such as Wordle. There are various benefits of using a word cloud, such as helping students improve their vocabulary, it can be a really engaging introductory activity to get to know your students, or it can be used as a self-assessment tool when writing. The next tool we investigated was Photo Peach, which collects a series of photos and creates a slideshow presentation. Vimeo was investigated as a resource to create videos in the class and as a unique tool for storytelling. Finally, we looked at Coggle. This tool was similar to Popplet in that it makes mind maps. I found Coggle much easier to use and better laid out than Popplet as it was easier to break off an idea and show relationships. I can really see myself using this in my future classrooms.

In our coloured groups we investigated our five tools and discussed our ideas over a chat room. My peers in the chat room had great ideas for integrating these tools into both our genius hour projects, and our future classrooms. Our groups then jig sawed and broke up into numbered groups and we met with people from other coloured groups. We learned about all the tools each person had investigated. I learned about tons of tools, most of which I can no longer remember the name of. When I have time I plan to go back to the different documents, create one master post of the different resources with a quick blurb about each. I believe that this will be more beneficial in my future and will encourage me to actually incorporate the different technologies I learned about into my classroom.

After we were done with our jigsaw groups we went back to our computers and chose one of the tools to help us create a visual for our learning objectives for our genius hour project. I chose to use a cool program called Easel.ly. Although it took me quite a bit of time, I am really happy with the end result! I created a poster that had a mind map, outlining the essential parts of my genius hour project. It is now posted under My Learning Objective page (check it out here!)  

Reflection from October 8th, 2015

Here is my blog post from class on October 8th!

I originally posted it on the 8th, but of course, as it was my first ever vlog post, it didn't upload correctly! Hopefully now you are able to actually hear about my progress on my genius hour project!

Reflection on October 1st!

Today I spent a lot of time reading Ontario Curriculum Documents as well as the Ontario document, Shaping Our Schools, Shaping Our Future: Environmental Education in Ontario schools, which was released in 2007.

Reading this document allowed me to reflect on my own schooling, starting in elementary school, through high school, and expanding all the way up into my university career.

Looking at the current Ontario curriculum documents, many connections to outdoor education can be found. The 2007 document on Shaping Our Schools, Shaping Our Future states that, “within the current Ontario curriculum, some opportunities for environmental education are provided in a number of compulsory and optional subject areas and courses”(p.1). Environmental education is touched upon in science and technology, social studies, history, and geography. This means that in the elementary setting, there are opportunities for outdoor education to be integrated. Reflecting on my own schooling, in the younger grades, I remember spending some time outside, and learning about the environment. Despite this I believe that my teachers could have focused on this a lot more than they did.

In the 1990’s the Ontario curriculum was reorganized which resulted in the elimination of option courses in environmental science. In high school I did not have any courses that tried to integrate environmental education. In grades 11 and 12 at my high school I took an Earth and Space science as well as an environmental science, and I was in the minority. As a result of very few of these optional courses being offered and not much emphasis placed on these studies, very few students took these classes. Many people thought it was strange that I chose this route instead of biology or chemistry, which were deemed to be more important and more relevant sciences.

Coming to university, I chose to study education. Knowing this, I chose a teachable in geography, which is very relevant to outdoor education, but it isn’t actually outdoor education. I had never considered the idea of trying to get a teachable in outdoor education. According to the on Shaping Our Schools, Shaping Our Future document, “very few faculties of education offer environmental education as a teachable subject, or offer specialized programs in environmental studies for teacher candidates” (p.2) This further creates a generation of teachers who do not value environmental education, and who are not specialized in this topic area.

Through my research today I have further refined my ideas for how I can create an authentic outdoor education in my classroom. My research has demonstrated to me how important this topic is and I am excited to continue my research and creation of artifacts over the next few weeks. 

Reflection from class on September 24th

Beginning my placement in an elementary school has really shown me the value in learning technology for the 21^st century learners I will be teaching. I have started my placement in a grade 3 class at a brand new school that only opened this fall. Each classroom is equipped with a Smart Board, as well as my class has a full set of Netbook laptops!

I have only spent two full days in my classroom and already I can see how much the children love technology. Any lesson that incorporates the smart board or computers is really exciting for them. This past Wednesday during literacy, five different stations were set up. One station involved children listening to Robert Munsch books online, using the computers. The website that allows you hear these books can be found here! This was by far the most captivating, and sought after activity. Each child kept asking when it would be their turn to use the computers. During an afternoon geography lesson, an interactive map on the smartboard held every student’s attention, and having the chance to go up and use the touch screen encouraged children to participate. Many students who usually sit back and don’t raise their hands were eagerly awaiting their turn to be picked to go up and place a label on the map.

Through my observation I have realized the need for my teaching to incorporate technology in order to captivate my students. I am already thinking of ways to implement the different programs and sites I have learned about in my technology class. I think that using Powtoon, Google Slides, Google Draw, Ted Talks, or a QR code scanner would really enhance my lessons.

I have also spent a significant amount of time researching my genius hour question; can I introduce authentic outdoor education into an Ontario classroom without going on field trips?

Through an extensive search on Pinterest, I have found many different examples from teachers and educators who value outdoor education as much as I do! You can check out my new Pinterest board here! I have already complied over 50 different pins from various pinners. There seems to be a lot of people who creatively incorporate outdoor education into various subjects, including science, language, math and many others. In the coming weeks I hope to investigate Ontario documents and other official papers that may better guide my search according to the Ontario legislation. 

Found an awesome poem today while researching my genius hour project. I feel that it really reflects the main heart of my project! Check it out,

Foxworthy, J., & Bjorkman, S. (2009). Dirt on my Shirt. [Online Image]. Retrieved from http://harpercollinschildrens.tumblr.com/