Teaching As Inquiry 2020

2020 has been such an "atypical" year, and Senior Management at Hornby High have stated that there is no obligation to complete our Teaching As Inquiries (TAIs) this year, and we can carry it over to 2021.

However, I have already done the work as it largely relates to the work I did in and around the DFI course I completed in Term 3, so I have completed the documentation, which can be found here.

From Hornby to Hogwarts

Last week I had the pleasure of taking a small group of Year 7 students to the "Be Inspired" workshop hosted by Christ's College. This was the second year that I've taken students to this annual event and there are a few observations I feel are worth noting about our kids.

• Hornby kids are as happy to believe in make-believe as any kids. In the van on the way to Christ's College I told the students that last year we were lucky enough to see a group of "College" kids practicing for a game of quidditch. There was momentary silence in the van until one brave soul asked "For real, Mister?", to which I replied (deadpan) "For real. I can show you the photo when we get back to school". No-one has called me on it so far, so it's officially true.

Hornby Year 7 Students at Christ's College

• Despite their bravado, Hornby kids lack self confidence. A few of the kids who came with me were brimming with self confidence on the way to the event - after all, I had just told them that they were selected by their teachers as being our future leaders. However when surrounded by their peers from the "posh" schools (their words not mine) most of them crumbled. Seems it's fine to compete against the "posh schools" on the sports field, but something again to be accepted as their equals in a non-competitive environment.

• Respect is a value well practiced by Hornby students. Our students showed our core value of respect to their peers and the presenters at the workshop, and were a tribute to the school. I was very proud to see their acceptance of students who were different to them. They are also supportive of each other in a way you normally only see amongst siblings.

• Hornby kids are inquisitive about the world beyond theirs. Despite the vast differences between their reality and that of the students at Christ's College, they were quick to ask me and Christ's College students about the world of relative privilege of private school students. There was no jealousy, no judgement, and no awkwardness. Just questions about unfamiliar realities so that they could expand their understanding of a world that was beginning to expand for them.

• Hornby kids place too much value on money. Some of the students asked me if I would like to teach at Christ's College. I told them that there were some really good things about the school, including small class sizes and great facilities. However, I told them, I would miss working with kids like Hornby kids. "What if they offered to pay you more to work there?" they asked as a test. "I wouldn't change schools even if they offered to pay me double" I replied. "For real?" one of my own Wānanga class asked. "For real" I truthfully replied. I guess it's easy to place a high value on the things you don't have. We need to work on helping our kids to have a more balanced view of the value of money against other things of value.

  

  Hornby kids taking charge in a challenge.
  

• Hornby kids love celebrities as much as anyone.  The students found out from a Christ's College teacher that our Principal Robin Sutton used to teach at Christ's College. They asked me if this was true, and when I confirmed this news it seemed to elevate Mr Sutton to celebrity status with the students. To bring Robin back to mortal status I told them "Yes, but he worked for Hornby before that, so he was really only on loan". "Oh, fair enough then" one student replied.

• We take some things for granted. At Hornby we start meetings with karakia and we open important events with presentations by our kapa haka group. We often (although not often enough) bless food with karakia kai. We celebrate bi-culturalism. Christ's College could learn much from Hornby High School.

All in all I enjoyed the "Be Inspired" workshop. I came away inspired enough to write this post.

DFI Course - Epilogue

Exam Results

This is just a quick note to say that 8 days after taking the Google Certified Educator Level 1 Educator exam I received an email from Google saying:

Hi Terry,

Here are the results from your recent Google for Education certification exam:

Examination Successful

Congratulations! You have passed the Google Certified Educator Level 1 exam.

Badges

It also came with instructions on how to add a badge (like the one above) to my emails, blogs, sites etc. Now I didn't think that this sort of thing mattered to me, but actually, I worked pretty hard over the past 9 weeks, including watching hours of YouTube clips and completing numerous practice questions the weekend before the exam, so I've decided I am going to add the badge.

Thanks

My very genuine thanks go to Mark Maddren and his team for all the help they have given me over the past 9 weeks - especially with the technical glitches during the exam last Tuesday. I really enjoyed the DFI course and I wish all teaching staff had the opportunity to be part of this programme.

And Next?

Well, Rowena Clemence and I have already started talking about the Level 2 on-line course. Just not straight away.

DFI Course - Week 9

 Since Last Week

With the change of my teaching timetable at the beginning of this week (yeah, don't get me started about why we would change our timetables in the second-last week of the term!) I spent a lot of time over the week revamping my site to make it more accessible to my students and using more templates on Google Doc to help scaffold student reflections. I'm not finished yet (is anyone ever really), but I'm quite happy with what I've done so far.

I also spent quite a bit of time reviewing the material for Google's Level 1 Certified Educator Exam that we sat today. Speaking of which, our topic for this final session of the DFI Course was:

Revision

While "Revision" was the official topic this week:

(a)    it was too late for any actual revision for the exam; and

(b)    there was more discussed about Manaiakalani than there was about revision for the exam.

The specific sessions held this week covered:

• The Manaiakalani Pedagogy: Ubiquitous Learning
• Sitting the Certified Educator Exam (3 hours)
• Manaiakalani Opportunities

Ubiquitous Learning

I first heard the word "ubiquitous" when Hornby High first became part of the Manaiakalani Outreach that later became Uru Mānuka. At the time I thought it was one of those unnecessarily technical-sounding words like pedagogy, affordances and efficacy. Someone had described "ubiquitous" to me as meaning "any-where, any-when", and as I've gotten used to the Manaiakalani kaupapa I have actually embraced this definition. 

Today I learned a new way to define it: "Anytime, Anywhere, Any-pace (for Anyone)", and I like the "learning at your own pace" addition to this definition.

When she was presenting this session, Dorothy Burt challenged us to reflect on the following:

In light of (the) COVID 19 ... Lockdown and YOUR readiness for ubiquitous learning

• What are you proud of?
• What do you regret?
• What have you taken forward into the ‘new’ era of schooling?

After considering these questions, my responses to these questions are:

• Proud: I'm quite proud of the contribution I made to the Year 7/8 Working From Home site for Hornby High School - in particular the Maths Hurumanu (unit) I created called "Making Ends Meet". This was engaging, multi-modal and delivered in a ubiquitous manner.
• Regret: I wish it hadn't taken a pandemic to bring this change in my teaching method about.
• Taken forward: We all need to be ready for remote learning at any time if we go back into lockdown (God forbid). It shouldn't require a separate lesson-plan or a stand-alone Hurumanu, but rather simply a move to presentations by Google Meet with the planned Hurumanu continuing. That is, we need to plan all our teaching/learning to be ubiquitous.

Certified Educator Exam

So, three hours of our day was spent taking the on-line exam for Google's Educator Level 1 course. As with every exam of value, this was a stressful time for us all, especially with the unexpected technical issues some of us experienced. I was lucky enough to just finish in the time allotted (the timer actually ran out as I was writing the very last part of my last question).

As to whether I passed the exam, I guess I'll have to wait up to 14 days to find out. Philosophically, I know that my learning in the DFI is not dictated by my ability to pass an exam (a pass mark is 80%), but I really hope I have passed - if not I intend to resit the exam during the holidays. The Level 1 "qualification" will be, to me, a tangible outcome from the past 9 weeks that will reflect the depth of learning I have achieved over this time.

Conclusion

I have thoroughly enjoyed taking part of the DFI course, and I have learnt a lot from my participation. Taking time out of a busy teaching job to learn how to perform that job better has been a great use of my time, and I feel that every teacher in every Manaiakalani Outreach school should be given the same opportunity. Our students deserve it.

DFI Course - Week 8

Since Last Week

Last week I spent a lot of time developing a more efficient way to share data and documents for our Years 7 - 9 “Business & Enterprise” kete. In the past this has meant around 70-odd Google Docs all stored in one folder with the same name and multiple “shares” of these documents across a number of staff. This year it has been done in a combination of Google Sites, Slides, Hapara, Docs and hyperlinks.

I set this up for all three Kāhui and put a tracking system for all "business groups" across Year 7 - 9. I gave what I considered to be really clear instructions to my fellow Deans and I also included step by step instructions in writing for the students.

The students in my Kāhui have done really well by following the instructions and their business planning paperwork is progressing really well. However, I wish I could say the same for the other Kāhui, and unfortunately I don't have the time to "quality-check" the work of all students.

This Week: Computational Thinking

A copy of this week's agenda can be found here.

This weeks focus was on the new Digital Technologies Curriculum. The specific sessions held this week covered:

• The Manaiakalani Pedagogy: Empowered
• The Future of Tech / Moral Machines
• The Digital Technology Curriculum
• Registering for the Google Certification Exams
• Exploring Coding

Empowered

The first session this week was about the final piece of the Manaiakalani pedagogy: Empowered. I have never liked this word, as for me it has always had connotations of extremism - of protest marches and other radical action taken to achieve liberation, be it from racism, sexism or some other form of oppression. As a teacher I have always favoured the term agency as to me this is more about enabling student to take charge of their own learning - guiding them upward rather than thrusting forward. I know it's just words, but words are important.

And then Dorothy Burt pointed out the simple reason why Manaiakalani chose "Empowered" over "Agency" ... the negative connotations that many of our families have with "Agencies" (OT, Police, IRD etc.), and it all made sense. It is just words.

But behind the word choice is the intent, and the quote opposite from Pat Snedden sums it up nicely.

The Future of Tech / Moral Machines

We had a lot of discussion about the future of technology - from flying cars to artificial intelligence (AI).  We also discussed the need for intelligent machines to deal with decisions of morality. This discussion was important to me because one of the issues I struggled with as an accountant was the issue of business ethics. 

I remember being taught that companies were separate legal entities whose sole purpose was to increase the wealth of its shareholders. The struggle I had was this led me to conclude that in a capitalist society it was ok to create an artificial entity that didn't need to be bound by ethics or morality. What does this then say about new technology such as AI?

As for the need to include technology in our classrooms, we looked at a brilliant blog post from Matt Goodwin (a teacher at Pt England School in Auckland). Matt was reflecting on the issue of engaging his students remotely during Auckland's first lockdown, and he noted that rather than having a "captive audience" in the classroom he was now "competing for their attention with Fortnite and TikTok". Try doing that remotely, during lockdown, in the middle of a pandemic ... WITHOUT technology!

The Digital Technology Curriculum

From the beginning of 2020 the Ministry of Education expects that schools will be using the revised learning area of Digital Technology to provide students with even broader opportunities to learn in and about technology, informed by the new content around computational thinking and designing and developing digital outcomes.

In this session we looked in some detail at the two new areas to the technologies curriculum:

• Computational Thinking for Digital Technologies; and
• Designing and Developing Digital Outcomes.

What we as teachers need to remember is that computational thinking is not specifically about using computers, but rather it's about enabling students to express problems and formulate solutions in ways that a computer can be used to solve them.

Registering for the Google Certification Exams

During this session we registered for next week's three-hour exam. Suddenly it became real, so perhaps I need to spend a bit of time over the next week reviewing what we have covered over the past 8 weeks!

Exploring Coding

My first introduction to "coding" was in 1989 when I completed a 6-month course on BASIC programming at Otago Polytechnic. I have also learnt some reasonably sophisticated formulas in Excel and (by default) Google Sheets. 

In 2019 I completed a three-day course on coding at UC (where I learnt the essentials of coding, using tools like Scratch), and late last term I attended an in-house course on using Sphero.

When I look at the applications for these "new" coding tools I'm reminded of the justification we used to buy home computers in 1990. In 1990 we said that computers were great ways to store our recipes or our Christmas Card mailing lists, and in 2020 we are saying that coding is a great way to teach students how to complete Maths problems. I'm then reminded of the saying "Just because we can doesn't mean we should". I get that, as Matt Goodwin stressed, we need to compete with Fortnite and Tik Tok, and I understand the need to embrace new technology through the Digital Technology Curriculum. However, in 1990 we actually didn't need personal computers to store our recipes, and 30 years later I'm not convinced we necessarily need Scratch to teach Maths in an engaging way.

Conclusion

I'm normally a relatively early adopter of new ideas, but in this case I'm going to take a watching brief - I'm going to watch the technology developments with interest, but I don't think I'm going to jump onto the coding bandwagon just yet. 

However never say never, because it is worth noting that I bought my first PC in 1990, although to date I have never stored any recipes on any of my computers. Apart from my own really good recipe for Whisky Sour on my iPad ... and another one for Brandied Cherries.

DFI Course - Week 7

Since Last Week

In the past week I have built on my successful introduction to the world of “pick-a-path” last week and had even further success with using this to reinforce the components of a narrative (using Google Forms and Sheets).

I’ve also spend a lot of time working on a new-look websites, and using it more effectively. This included adding a photo carousel. I now intend to spend time creating and displaying more multi-modal elements in my website when we start a new Hurumanu class rotation in a couple of weeks.

This Week: Devices

A copy of this week's agenda can be found here.

This weeks focus was on using the devices that our students use in the classroom - chromebooks and iPads. The specific sessions held this week covered:

• Cybersmart
• Hapara Teacher Dashboard
• Life as a Chromebook User
• Using iPads / Explain Everything
• Using Screencastify
• Blogging Tips: Sidebar Gadgets

Cybersmart

This first session was dedicated to Manaiakalani's focus on Cybersmart, as opposed to cybersafe. Over time Manaiakalani has developed a suite of lessons for students and their whānau on making the most of their digital learning experience.

While the emphasis is more on educating "smart" learners it is reassuring to know that this is just the tip of the iceburg - the bit we see. What we often don't see is the "secure" below the waterline - and all the ways we ensure our learners (and teachers) keep safe in a digital world.

Hapara Teacher Dashboard

 

I knew quite a bit about what was covered in this session - things I picked up over the past few years out of necessity (unfortunately largely without any specific training). 

The big message that came out of this session for me was the reminder that the key role for Hapara is to remove the need for teachers to be tech geniuses so we can focus on our real areas of strength.

There was some discussion on the benefits of Hapara Workspaces as a means of allocating learning tasks to students, especially with the option of setting due dates for individual tasks. While this sounds like a very good way of sharing tasks and learning with students, I feel this is one step too far at the moment, as it requires another platform for students to have to use to access their learning. At this stage I'm sticking with my Google Site (and three clicks to access the learning).

Life as a Chromebook User

This session was designed in part to help us to develop empathy with our learners by getting us to "walk a mile in their shoes". By working on chromebooks and completing a "digital dig" I learnt quite a bit about the challenges my students face each day.

I have never been a great fan of shortcut keys (Ctrl+C, Ctrl+X and Ctrl+V are normally my limits), but I can see the very real benefits of using a wider range of shortcuts when using a chromebook.

One thing I have vowed to do, and that's to run the "digital dig" session with my students to make sure they all know the shortcuts available (or at least where to find them when they need them).

Using iPads / Explain Everything

In Manaiakalani schools we tend to use iPads in Years 1 - 3 classes, before "graduating" to chromebooks. The key tool used on iPads to promote learning with these students is the "Explain Everything" app.

As I don't have any aspirations of teaching this level (although never say "never"!), this session didn't hold much interest for me. However I remember with some fondness starting at Hornby High School in 2014, and discovering that we had inherited class-lots of iPads from the former Branston Intermediate School. I felt incredibly lucky, but really had no idea what to do with them. If only I had attended this session six years ago!

Using Screencastify

I have used Screencastify a few times with varying degrees of success. I can best describe this app as a tool for recording your screen in a video format. It is a really powerful tool for demonstrating to learners how to perform a particular task on their chromebooks. It also has great potential to be used to record a specific skill (e.g. a maths strategy) on a "digital whiteboard" in the same way that the Khan Academy does (click here to see an example). That video could then be stored on a teacher's Google Site for rewindable learning.

I spent quite a bit of time trying to identify a useful way to create a "digital whiteboard", and having rejected Google Slides and Google Docs I settled on Microsoft Whiteboard (a free app). I am planning on spending some time over the next few weeks developing some skills on this app, and using it in conjunction with screencastify to create videos to use in class and with small groups.

Blogging Tips: Sidebar Gadgets

This final session dealt with modifying our blog layouts by adding, modifying and deleting the gadgets on our blogs. I had already spent some time looking into this before I migrated to the Manaiakalani blog template, and I have made (admittedly minor) changes to the gadgets on this template. At some point I will undoubtedly have a play with gadgets on my blog, but I'm pretty happy with how it looks at the moment. When I get time I will go over some of the gadget options with my students as well.

Conclusion

There was a lot of "sandpit" time this week, which was really helpful as this gave me the time to try some new things and to get some of my ideas together. I'm conscious that next week is the final week prior to the Google Certified Educator Exam (which introduces its own pressures), but to be honest I'm more focused on the fact that I have less than 2 weeks before my new Hurumanu topic rotation happens, and I have a lot of changes to my websites and my teaching techniques to put in place before then.

I'd better get busy!

DFI Course - Week 6

 Since Last Week

My reflections on how things have gone over the past week were much simpler this time, because I had nothing that hadn't worked or that I needed help with. However I had quite a lot to report on that had worked well for me over the past week:

I have finally spent time creating a Pick-a-Path story using Google Form, using a "concatenate" formula in Google Sheet and displaying the students’ results on my site. 

Here is a sample of the writing some of the students created:

My next step is to use this to help students use the format of narratives to create their own Pick-a-Path in Google Forms (very exciting … if not for them, then certainly for me). 

I also used charts in Google Sheets a lot last week - preparing for the Statistical Inquiry my Hurumanu class is starting this week!

This Week: Enabling Access - Sites

A copy of this week's agenda can be found here.

This week's focus was on Enabling Access through Sites, with specific sessions on:

• Manaiakalani's Connected Kaupapa
• Evaluating Sites
• Developing / Redeveloping Our Sites

Connected 

Dorothy Burt spoke about the development of Manaiakalani and the "outreach" clusters - one of whicht Hornby became part of (later becoming known as Uru Mānuka). This all started as 12 schools and kura in Auckland connecting and collaborating, and is now a network of 11 clusters comprising a total of almost 90 schools and kura.

The Learn, Create, Share pedagogy and the Manaiakalani kaupapa provides a shared language so that we can collaborate and share our resources and ideas. The vehicle we use to keep connected is our blogs. A good example of this was the newsletters that were distributed during Level 4 lockdown - these newsletters highlighted individual blogs, and help to remind us that even when we are separated by distance we remained connect by purpose.

Dorothy also reminded us that implementing the Manaiakalani kaupapa requires all four of its elements: Visible, Empowered, Connected, and Ubiquitous.

Evaluating Each Others' Sites

We then spent time reviewing and critiquing each others' sites, and providing feedback to each other on how to make them more user-friendly. At first I found this exercise a bit daunting ... what did I have to offer my colleagues with my limited experience ... and what will they say about the structure and format of my site?

The Hurumanu site I collaborate on.

Once I got over myself I really enjoyed the whole process. First I was partnered up with Rowena Clemence from Hornby High, and I had a flash-back about five years to when Rowena helped me to develop my first website, and I realised how far I had come. It was great to now have Rowena critique my current site, especially given her role as e-Learning leader.

Developing / Redeveloping Our Sites

During my discussions with Rowena and others I had a bit of an "aha" moment: when I created my first website it was a class website where I managed the site for my students, including sharing their work online (this was before the students had their own blogs). Now my website should be a teacher website with the purpose of delivering my teaching/learning to my students. Different owner, different purpose, different format.

My Teaching Site

With that in mind I made a number of changes to my site, including personalising it more to make it my site not my students'. I also made navigation of the site a lot simpler (three clicks maximum), including making links to the Hurumanu site I collaborate on. To make it easier for students to navigate to the current week's work I reordered the work on the sites' main pages so that the latest work is at the top of the page (i.e. less scrolling).

Conclusion

I'm pretty happy with the make-over of my two sites and I'm also pretty confident that my students will find it easier to find the teaching and learning material on the sites. More importantly though, I now have a lot more clarity about why I have my sites in the first place, which will guide me when I make changes/developments with my sites in future.

DFI Course - Week 5

Since Last Week
My reflections on how things have gone over the past week are:

1. What has worked for me since the last time we met?
We are working on a Statistical Unit at the moment, and the Google Sheets skills developed last week helped me to streamline the lesson so that the students can present their findings more easily

2. What hasn't worked (or made sense)?
Actually things seem to be all good at the moment … I’m just trying to find time to incorporate pick-a-path into my lessons.

3. What do you need help with?
Nothing at the moment.

This Week: Collaborate - Sites

A copy of this week's agenda can be found here.

This week's focus was on Collaboration, with specific sessions on:

• Visible Teaching and Learning
• Multi-Modal Teaching and Learning
• Google Sites
• MultiText Databases

Visible Teaching and Learning

"Visible" is the first part of the four-part outer ring of Manaiakalani's 7 visible kaupapa. Some of the key messages from this session included:

• We use blogs and sites to ensure that our teaching and learning is visible. As a teacher I use my site to ensure that my students have ease of access to the learning from my lessons, and my students demonstrate their learning in their blogs.

• Teachers use Hapara to view our students' learning on their blogs. However, if the blog posts are not shared in the correct folders the learning is not visible to us.

• Teachers ensue that we acknowledge our learners' work by commenting on their blog posts, as this is how we close the communication cycle by providing visible feedback.

Multi-Modal Teaching and Learning

Engaging, or ‘hooking’ our learners into their learning is the first goal of the Manaiakalani programme, and we are working towards:

• Learners who are behaviourally engaged.
• Learners who become interested in and excited about their learning.
• Learners who  are actively involved in their learning.

Initially, the introduction of technology in the classroom is engaging in itself, due to the novelty of a new vehicle for the learning, but as the learners become more used to the technology and they become more discerning consumers, it takes something more to "hook" them into the learning. In fact, today's learners are bombarded with competing and increasingly appealing alternatives to our lessons (e.g. an endless supply of Youtube clips). That's where Multi-Modal Learning comes in.

Multi-Modal Learning can be best described as "an inclusive, differentiated approach to teaching in a digital learning environment". It's how we make our teaching sites appealing and interesting for our learners.

Google Sites

Linked to the subject of Multi-Modal Learning, one of our challenges this week was to create a website that contained a multi-modal page on a topic of interest from the multi-text data base (see below). This is a screen shot of my finished product:

The actual site can be found here. When I compare this with some of my current webpages I have to admit that I am a little disappointed with the way I have set up some of the pages of my current site. I need to spend some time upgrading my site to look a little more like my "test site" (above).

MultiText Databases

So I'm a bit old-school when I hear the expression "database", because I get flashbacks of working with "relational databases" like Microsoft Access ... I break out in a sweat, and I need to sit down until the shaking goes away. Today when we talk about "databases" what we actually mean is a table of data or hyperlinks, usually in a spreadsheet, and I was pleased to discover that this was what the presenters were talking about. 

This is a screenshot of the MultiText Database provided by the presenters.

Essentially, we were discussing the source of teaching and learning opportunities that can be used to make up our multi-modal learning. This is an excellent example of a collaborative teaching model that allow us as teachers to focus on the "how" of teaching rather than the "what".

Conclusion

I found this week's course very practical, as presentation is quite important to me (no, that isn't an admission of an OCD diagnosis). I have been thinking a lot about how best to structure my teaching site for the possibility of remote-learning should we be forced into another Level 3 or 4 COVID-19 lockdown. This week's session has given me a lot to think about, and a lot of tools to use to "hook" my learners into my lessons.

Perceptive readers (yes both of you) will have noticed that I have also migrated to the Manaiakalani template for my blog.  I believe this format is a better structure and makes my blog more engaging for my readers ... but what do you think?

DFI Course - Week 4

Since Last Week

My reflections of my development with all things Google over the past week using the three key questions are:

1. What has worked for me since the last time we met?

I used Google Drawing in the classroom this week, including the exercise “Working with Shapes, Texts and Images” with 90 kids and teaching students to incorporate remove.bg to create innovative digital art. I have also started to use voice typing with a headpiece.

2. What hasn’t worked (or made sense)?

Trying to get an attractive layout in blogger is often difficult and takes a lot of time to get a more appealing “magazine” type layout. Dorothy Burt's comment to me was that this can be sorted through the use of Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) which is beyond my current ability level or by paying someone with those skills to do this for me which is at the point where I lost interest!
Also, I often work at night at the dining table in my lounge and the TV sometimes contributes to my voice typing. I know this is a first world problem but it is worth working at to make sure that I get the most benefit from voice typing. Practice, practice, practice!

3. What do you need help with?

Nothing at this stage.

This Week - Dealing With Data

A copy of this week's agenda, along with links to presentations etc are here.

The main focus for this week's programme was "Dealing with Data" and this included sessions on:

• Manaiakalani's "Share"
• Google Forms (surveys/quizzes)
• Google Sheets (spreadsheets)
• My Maps
• Analysing data from student blogs

Share

This week we delved into the "Share" part of the "Learn, Create, Share" pedagogy, including looking at the concept of sharing throughout history. In the past I have thought of "Share" being the same as "publishing" ... where students display their very best work in a "finished" state.

This all changed for me a couple of years ago when I started to consider the prospect of a fully-digital, paperless learning environment where students are encouraged to create examples/evidence of re-windable learning and posting it in a location that is easily recovered. In essence: digital exercise books. 

This means that (contrary to my previous misconceptions) students should share their work/learning even if:

(a) it isn't finished

(b) it isn't all correct

(c) it isn't perfect.

This was supported in the session on "share" this week, including this slide where we discussed the notion that the only difference in sharing in the digital age is that we can/do share our work with the global community, but we don't share with the sole intention of making it available beyond the learner. 

Rowena Clemence (one of Hornby High's e-Learning Advisors and a fellow participant on the DFI Course) reinforced this at a staff briefing during the week.

Google Forms

This week we looked at Google Forms in some detail, and while I am reasonably familiar with this app there were a few tips and tricks I had not picked up yet, such as using the "Go to section based on answer" function. 

This is great for personalising questionnaires for students (e.g. when you have a composite class and you want to ask both year levels different questions).

Google Sheets

In a former life (pre-teaching) I was a Chartered Accountant employed in the health sector, and one of my most regularly-used tools was Excel spreadsheets. Since then I have transferred my skills in Excel to Google Sheets, where I regularly use advanced tools such as sort, filter, conditional formatting and pivot tables. 

Again, there were some tip and tricks that I wasn't aware of, including:

• easily freezing rows and column using the bars on the top right-hand cell header
• saving filters to use at later dates (i.e. rather than having to select a range of filters manually)
• moving graphs to "own sheet" for ease of editing
• embedding charts/graphs in blogs so that the data is live (i.e. the graph is updated as the data updates).

My Maps

My Maps is useful little app that enables users to create their own map using personalised locations on a map very similar to regular Google Maps. In the example below I have added my favourite South Island camping destinations, and My Maps enables me to calculate the time and distance between two locations (e.g. Home and Westport) and download directions to travel between these points (by car, walking or by public transport).

I wish this app was available to me in 2013 when I took a class of Year 7/8 students to Wellington for a week. Being able to identify walking routes around various Wellington destinations each day would have been brilliant, and would be a great way for students to share their camp/holiday in an interactive way.

Analysing Data from Student Blogs

As I showed under the heading for Google Sheets, we also spent time looking at how to analyse individual students' blogging over time. In the example below I created a table to show the number of discrete blog posts a particular Year 9 student posted since she started blogging in 2016.

Some interesting observations here are:

• the pattern of increase in November
• the peaks in December 2018 and January 2020 from the Summer Learning Journey
• the beginnings of a drop-off in March - May 2020 (caused by lockdown?)

Conclusion:

While there was a lot I already knew I was really pleased with the new skills I have developed this week. The timing of the Google Sheet session is brilliant, as I will be working with my Hurumanu class on Statistical Inquiries over the next few months, and this is a timely reminder on how to create charts/graphs easily in Google Sheets, including a few tips I wouldn't have been able to teach the class if I hadn't been at this session!

I'm also keen to introduce My Maps to my Wānanga class to see how easy this is for the different year levels to pick up.

DFI Course - Week 3

Since Last Week

As usual we were asked to reflect on three questions:

What has worked for me since the last time we met?

Using Google Calendar better - it now sends me reminders to my Apple watch so I never miss a class or a meeting. Also using Onetab successfully. It was good to practice Google Meet last week, especially if we need to work from home again.

What hasn’t worked (or made sense)?

I haven’t had/made time to practice Voice Typing or setting up Google Keep (I'm still using Notes in IOS).

What do you need help with?

Getting more familiar with Google Keep (I think I just need to set aside some more sandpit time).

This Week - Media

A banner in the Learning Commons
in the new Hornby High School (HHS)

A copy of this week's agenda can be found here.

The main focus of this week's programme was "Media", i.e. making life a bit easier for us and making us more efficient in a digital world. This included sessions on:

• Manaiakalani's "Create"
• Tips on using videos and streaming
• Youtube channels
• Google Drawing
• Google Slides

The Creative Excellence mural being
added at the tail end of HHS's rebuild

In this session we discussed the "Create" side of "Learn, Create, Share", including the value of learners being creative. Hornby High School's aspirational vision of being a "Centre of Creative Excellence" was also highlighted as part of this session.

I particularly like this quote from MaryAnn Kohl (an art educator and author) where she emphasises that creativity is about forming original ideas, and that it is about thinking, exploring, discovering and imagining.

Videos and Streaming

In this session we looked at a wide range of topics relating to videos and streaming, including settings, lighting, green-screen, the importance of using tripods, live streaming, and film festivals.

Youtube Channels

This session focused on the practice of using Youtube channels in the classroom - both by teachers and learners. The presenters emphasised the following points:

1. For learners, Google Drive is the default source to share videos from. Video can be embedded in a blog from Google Drive, where learners connect with their audience via blog comments. As administrators of these blogs teachers are able to monitor content and interactions through their email and Hapara Teacher Dashboard.

2. The blog is the default platform for our learners to share and connect with their audience. Manaiakalani recommends that all video content is shared publicly via class and individual blogs rather than via Youtube channels.

We then looked at how to embed a Youtube video in our blogs and how to create  a Youtube playlist.

Google Drawing

During this session we were introduced to some of the finer skills in successfully using Google Drawing, before we worked through some practice activities. I found this to be reasonably easy as the functionality of Google Drawing is very similar to creating drawings or flowcharts in Microsoft products (e.g. Word and Excel).

We were then given the task of creating an "About Me" sidebar image for our blogs. This is the results of my labours, which I have now added to my sidebar.

Google Slides

We were given some great tips on how to create some creative slides with SISOMO (SIght, SOund and MOtion) to draw attention and enable access to learning. This included "Pick a Path" literacy challenges (which I really must try) and creating stop-motion animation. One of my students spent a significant part of his lock-down time working on creating a 256-slide animation, and I know there are other students who would like to try this as well.

Conclusion

Again there was a lot that I was already familiar with this week, it was great to pick up on the finer details of these tools. This made the day very worthwhile, and I came home motivated to try a lot of the tasks and tools.

Mark Maddren gave me a tip to help me with my Voice Typing issues - to buy headphones with a built-in microphone, so on my way home I popped in to Noel Leemings and invested $40 on a cheap set and tried it out straight away. WHAT A DIFFERENCE!! It worked really well, and could be the game changer for my inaccurate, slow two-finger typing. Watch this space!

Create