Investigating Play-based Learning

Play based learning has been a relatively new concept for me this year. It's something I'm very interested in, however hadn't really looked into until recently, and to be perfectly honest, I've never been too sure I have my head around the idea. The times I have implemented what I believed to be 'Play Based Learning' have always made me slightly weary. It's been after lunch and maybe we've finished our mahi early. Or maybe it's a Friday afternoon and we all need a break from our more structured mahi. I've laid out the lego, the blocks, play money, cards, some mindfulness colouring, and maybe some other Numeracy equipment and let the kids go nuts. Is this really what it's all about? It didn't really feel right, but I knew the tamariki absolutely loved it and I did see some pretty awesome skills being developed - problem solving, team work, mediation, negotiating, reflecting, not to mention, inventing and innovating and some pretty fantastic story telling. All in a learning environment that was led completely by the tamariki.  

A quick google offers this definition: "Learning through play is a pedagogical approach where play is the valued mode of learning – where children can explore, experiment, discover, and solve problems in imaginative and playful ways. "

That makes sense to me and makes me think that perhaps what I have been doing hasn't been too far off the mark. I just feel like I was missing something... 

Today we were invited into a relatively new kura to observe their play based learning pedagogy in action. And what an eye opener it was! Some aspects were absolutely inspiring, and I'd love to see us implement in our kura. Other aspects were definitely food for thought if nothing else. 

Here's a run down of my understandings and things I found really interesting

• This kura sat down as a whole staff and investigated what they wanted play based learning to look like BEFORE they began implementing it. The WHY, HOW, and WHAT were at the centre of their thinking, which came from the Golden Circle approach from Simon Sinek. 
• They based their pedagogy on research and made links back to their school curriculum, and their values.
• All the above info, research, and thinking was displayed as a working document in the staffroom. It was impossible to miss it.
• In the learning spaces, the stations fell under headings (which could be curriculum based, key competencies...). They were Gross Motor, Cognitive, Fine Motor, Language, Emotional, Co-operative. I really liked this aspect. It showed thought had been given to stations.
• Stations were selected based on observations and conversations with the tamariki (so pulling out random equipment 5 minutes before is not ideal).
• A wall was dedicated to displaying this info for tamariki. Each child's name was laminated on a sticky card and they would select their station prior to beginning (I think there were 2 rotations back to back in each block). Tamariki could opt into which ever stations they liked, whenever, as often as they liked. Interesting. Is it ok to only do the same thing over and over again?
• Stations had a max. number of tamariki allowed ranging from 3 to 15.
• Play based learning programmes were implemented in 3 blocks - morning, mid morn, afternoon, with kai breaks in between. In that time, small groups were pulled for literacy, numeracy, topic areas. This was an eye opener and begged the question - how did they ensure curriculum coverage, not only of specifics within literacy and numeracy, but also science, social studies, the arts, PE, reo Māori?   
• There were a number of staff walking round monitoring the groups. What was their role? I didn't quite get this far but I wonder what ideas they had around questioning, encouraging, scaffolding etc..? 
• To be honest there were a number of groups where (from an outsider looking in) not much appeared to be happening. Lots of chat and fiddling with things, but not much experimenting, exploring and discovering seemed to be happening.

This was a wonderful opportunity for us to explore PBL and perhaps give us a starting point for our own journey at Hornby Primary School. I'd definitely like to see it in action in a few more other learning environments, perhaps a kura more similar to ours in terms of decile and socio-economic backgrounds of our community. 

I'm looking forward to seeing where our journey takes us.

Creating with ipads ~ PLD with Emma Planicka

Today could have been the first day of my holiday break.... but I decided instead to spend the day with a pretty awesome individual who's certainly given me a major skill boost in all things Seesaw and Apple over the past 4 years ~ The lovely Emma Planicka.

The importance of creativity in the classroom was our focus for the day. We began with a really cool warm up activity using Quickdraw with Google. You get 20 seconds to draw an object assigned to you. Very cool. I know some of my tamariki would really struggle with this, but what a novel way to shift thought patterns and shake up the ol' hinengaro.

Once again, as covered in our DFI course, Digital fluency is key! Tamariki need to know how to do the basics (take photos, unlock their ipad, hold the ipad correctly etc) before they can develop digital competency. Little and often from the very beginning of the year is the way to go and makes up-skilling so much easier later in the year.

Emma made reference to some of Sir Ken Robinson's ideas around creativity. In one of his most famous TED Talks, he shares the idea (among many fabulous thoughts) that creativity is as important as literacy and should be treated with the same respect. Also, that schools educate children away from creativity. Food for thought. After 17 years on the classroom, I've certainly seen a shift in the importance placed on creativity, particularly working within a Learn, Create, Share kura. I really like that these ideas were expressed long before the digitally savvy classrooms of todays schools. These ideas are just as relevant now as they were in an unplugged era. Emma then made a link to the SAMR model. When planning, she suggested we ask ourselves, "Where does my planning sit within this model?" Is there room for creativity? 

A quote that really appealed to me this morning linked both to Sir Ken's kōrero, and the SAMR model, "To learn is not to consume ideas, but to create, and re-create them." Paulo Freire, Brazilian Educator. 

We explored and created with some very cool apps.  

Cool tips and ideas...

• Build a digital kete on the wall. Fill it as the term goes by with apps we have learned how to use. Give students opportunity to decide which app they think best to use for a task! 
• Use Markup to play with photos. it's an easy way to get in some digital fluency skills. It's in the camera.
• Sketches School - 2 finger tap to undo, 2 finger tap and slide to redo! Use the scalpel to copy and paste (drag with 2 fingers to the right).
• In any app, if you want to open another smaller side app (for example, camera roll) - gently scroll up from the bottom, the select the app, hold, and drag to the side.  
• Share arrow = 'sharrow!'
• Make use of Accessibility features in Settings - use assistive touch to enable modelling on the Apple TV. Go to Settings, Control Centre, Accessibility Shortcuts (under More Controls). This puts it in the right corner drag down menu.
• Use 5 finger pinch to close down apps!
• Opening the search bar from the home page - swipe down form the middle. Will also show you the most recently used apps. 
• Chrome Music Lab - a fun and free app to create sounds. Can you save sounds?
• When tamariki accidentally split the keyboard, just use 2 fingers to slide it back together!
• Sharing from Garageband - Left hand menu, hold finger on your creation until menu drops down. Select share

Drawing using Markup

Playing with Sketches School & Keynote

Creating using Clips and Garageband

That's a wrap, folks!

We began the our final day with Dorothy and another insight into the Manaiakalani pedagogy. Today ~ Ubiquitous Learning. The word 'Ubiquitous' has certainly been a new word for me in these last few years. What does it mean? Put very simply - "present, appearing, or found everywhere." So then, what is ubiquitous learning? It's learning anywhere, anytime, anyplace, from anyone. Distance learning certainly fast tracked us on that journey! 

Ubiquitous learning goes hand in hand with Rewindable Learning. Another new-ish term for me. We talk a lot about this concept and the importance of it through a Learn, Create, Share lens. Again this is something I struggle to get my head around and I've chatted to a few colleagues over the years about it; particularly in the junior school. To be completely honest, I'm not sure I have a clear grasp on what rewindable learning should/could ideally look like in a junior setting... YET. I employ multi-modal learning opportunities (only in reading at present), 75% of our learning is accessible via our class site... is there more to it than that? 

We discussed the following points with Kelsey in our small bubbles - "Reflecting on the kaupapa of the Manaiakalani programme in light of Covid-19, and your readiness for rewindable learning... What are you most proud of? What do you regret? What have you taken forward into the 'new' era of learning?" 

My reflections on those questions and my own burning questions...

• I'm grateful to Covid-19 for throwing me head first into the deep end and pushing me to step outside of my digital-comfort zone. But what am I proud of...?
• If there was to be Lockdown: Season 2, I'd enjoy the opportunity to put my new skills into action. But otherwise, I have 'no regerts' at all around what we did in Season 1.  
• How much, and what aspects of learning should be rewindable? 
• What is the purpose of making it visible/rewindable if my Year 2 tamariki don't require access to that particular material on more than 1-2 occasions? 
• Even if they are accessing material on multiple occasions, why does it need to be all be through our site? 
• Unless we go in to Season 2, why does a junior child need to access learning from home? I would hate to think my cherubs were sitting in front of a device doing more mahi after school hours - although they are sitting in front of a device for far too long after school, and it's spent playing Fortnight or watching Tiktok. 
• Everything on my site is visible to whānau at home - How many would look at this at home with their tamaiti?  

I recall our staff sat down together and shared ideas around how our teaching would change post-lockdown back in May. I don't believe my teaching has changed at all as a result. Although I'm certainly ready for the next wave, should it hit. Everything was visible beforehand. What we did during lockdown was certainly not what I'd ideally do in the classroom, or outside of a pandemic, by any means. But that begs the question - am I missing something? To be continued I think....

So, the real fun began at 10am when I logged into the Google Level 1 Certification exam. For 3 hours straight I furiously clicked, copied, and pasted, and wracked my brain for any memories of how to use the plethora of Google apps that we'd spent 9 weeks prior learning about. I look forward to getting my results - which I was a bit disappointed to learn will take 14 days to process. Must say, it was an amazing feeling to click 'submit' at the end of it all. 

After lunch we had a 30 minute Slam presented by all the facilitators. This was to load us up with some last minute tips, tricks, and apps that hadn't been included during the previous weeks. Some good stuff in here! 

My goals going forward are...

• Use ScratchJR for pepeha - this looks like a really fun way to display pepeha and whakapapa. 
• Play round with a Google Forms - lost track of how long I've been saying that.
• Meet with the Learn, Create, Share team to discuss a plan forward for blog commenting.
• Take a moment to reflect, and look back over the past 9 posts. 
• Can I implement 1 new learning each week? Each fortnight? 

Ngā mihi nunui ki te whānau Manaiakalani! Special thanks to Kelsey for all your support! I look forward to moving forward with a bursting kete matauranga! 

Ngā manaakitanga. 

Nearly there!

Todays session was on Computational Thinking. 

Dorothy kicked off with some discussion around the word 'empower'. Manaiakalani is all about empowering learners and teachers. She discussed the idea of rangatiratanga, which means people taking back control of their world around them, in this case, the digital world. 

We need to check our understanding and that of our students and whānau of why we use digital learning tools. They're not 'just a tool.' If we see ipads and chromebooks as 'just a tool', then we may as well revert back to the trusty pencil. Digital tools transform the way we learn. "They enables students to enter and explore new learning opportunities, overcoming barriers of distance and time." (NZC, 2007).

We also discussed that which can dis-empower our learners in low decile schools. Access to money and resources, prior life and learning experiences, conversations with parents all contribute to empowerment. So if we look at tamariki who miss out on large chunks of that, we know that equity becomes an issue. Digital devices owned by the child allow for empowerment, not only for the child in terms of learning, but access to resources, empowerment for parents (getting a credit rating, bringing connectivity to the home etc). 

I always enjoy listening to Dorothy's morning kōrero and today was no exception. It was so uplifting to hear her addressing the ways we can help empower our students and whānau and get them taking back that control.

Next was a Chalk and Talk with Kerry on the new Hangarau Matihiko ~ Digitial Technologies Curriculum.

This new addition to our curriculum allows tamariki to tell their story. Their own voice can be heard. They can be directors and producers of their learning. We talk about being 'Digitally fluent' all the time, this means being able to decide when and why we would choose to use specific digital technologies. We can create our own digital technologies solutions. It underpins everything that follows.

The curriculum is broken down into 2 sections. 

I have struggled to get my head around what computational thinking really means, however found this helpful definition ~  It’s the process of breaking down a problem into simple enough steps. When children develop computational skills they are able to articulate a problem and think logically. It helps them to break down the issues and predict what may happen in the future. It’s helping them to explore cause and effect. Kerry broke it down even further and explained that teaching a child to cross the road is a really good example of an unplugged computational thinking activity. Eg, stop, look left, look right, look left again, make a decision...

After morning tea we had a Chalk 'n Talk from Vicki about prepping and registering for the exam next week. This will be Level 1 Google Certification (following an American exam system). Sounds like there is an exam just to get in to the exam! This is our opportunity to get a piece of paper that's recognised on an international level. It's not a reflection of our understandings of Manaiakalani pedagogy. It sounds extremely full on and I can't say I'm looking forward to it!     

We had the opportunity to play round with some coding activities after lunch. I tried to do a mihi maker using gamefroot however the wheel of death spinning round and around stopped me from entering the page. I will definitely try again as this looked like a really attractive and fun way to share pepeha and develop coding skills at the same time. EDIT: After chatting to a colleague, I found that Gamefroot would not be the best user-friendly app for my tamariki.

I also need to add in some functions here on my site to make sure I hit the requirements for this course. EDIT: preeeeeetty sure that's done!

I will be back to tidy up this page and add my coding creation later! Edit: Nope, that's it folks.

iPads, and Chromebooks, and Blogger, oh my!

 The focus today was all about using devices and being CyberSmart. 

We began with Fiona Grant who talked about being CyberSmart and how this looks within Manaiakalani. The term Cybersmart is all about empowering people. It's about creating successful digital citizens through intentional programmes that support that kaupapa. It's all about keeping our tamariki safe, and being smart and secure. It was a good reminder to check out the CyberSmart programme on the Manaiakalani site. There are term by term units of mahi to implement with the tamariki. Term 1: Smart Learners, Term 2: Smart Footprints, Term 3: Smart Relationships. I always begin the year with a strong focus, but have never looked beyond Term 2.  I also really liked the look of this programme by Google for another attractive option to share with the tamariki.  

Some interesting points to note/thoughts I have at this stage: 

•  For children to develop as digital citizens, they need to be making choices about what they want to share. What they are creating and sharing has value and can make an impact. So then, what are they proud of? What will their whānau be proud of? Our tamariki are posting what we tell them to post, there's little room for empowerment in this respect. 
• We used to tell tamariki - don't share anything personal. But actually, we want to empower them to make their own decisions. They can decide, "Is this information I'm happy and proud to say/share? What does it say about me and my digital footprint?" 
• How are we supporting our whānau to connect with their child's online learning and how to be CyberSmart? This is very timely for us at kura. At the moment we're running a blog commenting competition across the school for parents and whānau. On the whole it's failing horribly due to a number of factors. Poor visibility after the initial sales pitch, staff not pushing it with their children, parents just not wanting to comment! It's extremely frustrating. So many factors... where to begin? 
• The meaning of an 'authentic' audience - which we covered a few weeks back. This is an audience that CHOOSES to view/comment on what you are sharing. So here we are currently trying to beg parents to comment on their child's blog (and the majority still can't do that) for a period of 10 weeks. What happens after that? 
• Manaiakalani push the blog commenting format - Is it Positive, is it thoughtful, is it helpful? This is great however very intimidating for our parents and whānau. We just want them connecting, so we're encouraging them to give feedback as simple as, "Ka pai my boy!"  
• Do my tamariki need individual bogs? We're implementing a lot of the learn, create, share kaupapa I've picked up over the past 7 weeks, but 1 email address for the whole class is not cutting the mustard. This would mean I'd need more ipads so we could be 1:1 (smiling sweetly at you here, Gary). 

Manaiakalani have aligned the Principles of Te Tiriti o Waitangi ~ Partnership, Participation and Protection ~  to their kaupapa. These principles transcend time and generations and are relevant to a child developing their digital footprint. It's all about engagement through 1:1 ownership. Dorothy also touched on the BYOD kaupapa. Bring Your Own...Disaster?? Had a wee chuckle here. Different devices do not allow for equity and access.  

After this wee chalk 'n Talk we had 30minutes to play with a Chromebook. This was really helpful as we've been using our TA's Chromebook to allow us 1 more device to use in the classroom. Some really helpful shortcuts can be found HERE.

After second break we had a chance to focus on ipads which is very relevant to me. Lot's of discussion today was around tamariki having their own devices. This is something we're hopefully working on in my akomanga. We're currently on 15 ipads and 1 mac for 19 tamariki. Not too far off. Dorothy mentioned that a stylus is essential for fine motor coordination! We had time to pay around with Explain Everything after this chalk 'n talk session. It's been sometime since I've used it and I know my previous experience hasn't been overly user-friendly. Perhaps now I've had time to explore I'll feel more confident. As you'll hear in my kirata below, it's tricky juggling Seesaw and apps pushed by Manaiakalani. 

We also created a rauemi that would help us introduce the Kawa of Care kaupapa we implement with the tamariki. I really struggled with this... again due to our use of Seesaw in the junior school. I'd really love to hear from other junior teachers who feel that pull between Manaikalani and Seesaw! Here's a wee rauemi I made anyway. 

Goals for the week 

• Trial Google Forms. I've been saying that for 2 weeks.
• Re-introduce Explain Everything with the tamariki. Keep a positive attitude.
• Hassle the powers that be for 4 more ipads. 

Today was another full on day, and I certainly wasn't expecting anything less. Kelsey also taught us some great tip for Blogger which I'm definitely starting to get the hang of a little more. At this point I'm really struggling with some of the thoughts I shared earlier. Where to even begin? Am I over thinking it? Lots of discussion to be had, me thinks. Right now I'm off to enjoy the sun. 

Ngā mihi nunui ki a koutou, kua pānuitia āku whakaaro.  

Sprucing up your site

This week's session was all about Enabling Access and being connected. I was feeling really excited about this session as I know my site needs some serious reworking. 

Dorothy began by summarising the priorities of Manaiakalani during lockdown, which we know are top priorities at all times. 

1. Being connected. During lockdown we made sure we were checking in with our learners everyday. We were fostering well-being on a digital platform. We've had this point reiterated time and time again - maintaining positive relationships is, and always will be paramount! 

2. Ako. We were encouraged to back ourselves as teachers. We all know our learners. We already have those connections face to face, so connecting via hangout or whatever other digital means wasn't too far out of our comfort zone. Don't get flustered by all the other jazz in our inboxes (offers of other digital platforms). Know your plan forward and harness the tools we've worked with. 

In light of wave 2 up in Auckland, and the possibility of another out break down south (fingers crossed this doesn't happen!) we need to make sure kids know how to join a meeting, mute their mic etc...Would my tamariki remember how to do these things? 

Key taking from Dorothy's intro this morning - If you want to be connected with other people, you have to be willing to share. It needs to be a 2 way thing. 

Sites

Questions to pose when creating a site ~ How is this enabling accelerated learning for our tamariki? What is the role of the teacher, the nature of the assigned task (SAMR), the nature of the site that is accessed by the learner, wat is content, degree of student choice and collaboration. What is it that we are doing for kids, whānau, and for our own practice. How are we making sure the learners are empowered? Is the learning accessible when they're with us and when they're not?

What is the purpose of a learning site? It is one-stop hub for learning, and learning should be accessible everywhere, any time, any place.  Visual appeal is important - hook your audience! Use consistent colours, keep the layout simple. Only use 2 fonts! Again, make sure the kids can get to their learning in 3 clicks! 

Here's a recipe for success when it comes to creating a site... 

We were given the chance to take a good look at some sites within Manaiakalani and assess visual appeal and site functionality.  Then we were invited to analyse each others' sites in our bubbles. This was a very interesting activity and I wonder if it would be valuable to do within our staff. I actually think it would be very valuable, if we tread carefully and kia tūpare! 

Kelsey and Dorothy talked about the benefits of using Google Analytics to investigate people viewing our sites. We could look at where these views were coming from, and how often. Something to speak to Fusion about ...

Here is the feedback that came from my group ~ 

"I love that is in in te reo Māori. I liked seeing your planning on the site - Also how you were using it for notes etc so you don't have to go to different places. It would be great if your teacher place maybe had images to make it easier for students to follow. Adding the link to the cybersmart site as a link may also be worthwhile. I wonder if it could be a wee bit more personalised to the students eg photos of them or their drawings as buttons etc. "

Here were my goals from the day, based on the above, and from what I'd seen on other class sites.

1. Get rid of some of the backgrounds - far too busy! Keep it simple! 
2. Add in a teacher section - images of me, Raewyn, Christine... so whānau can put a face to the name and email addresses if suitable. 
3. Add images on the home page buttons so tamariki who struggle with reading know where they are going (why didn't I think of that 8 months ago??) 
4. Add in a Google Form - a check-in for tamariki to tell me how they're feeling - this would have been amazing during lockdown!  

Here is my Rūma 7 Site. There's lots of mahi still to be done, but getting there slowly nonetheless. Should be more than happy with it by December. 

Kupu Hou (new words) from today

Cybersmart - Ngā Tapuwae                Website Links - Kuputoro

Blogging Tips & Spam

We spent the last part of the afternoon talking about spam. There have always been procedures in place to deal with spam. Never, ever, ever click on a link. It might be something as simple as data numbers for their (who ever is leaving the messages) analytics, or it might be something more sinister. As soon as you click, they know your page is active and they've got you! Make sure you always mark spam, it trains Google to recognise spam in the future. Spambots tend to be aim towards older posts. Set moderation on posts older than 14 days. 

Today was another interesting day. It's nice to have time to put some of my new learning into practice. I'm looking forward to getting some feedback from my wee cherubs on Monday. 

Over and out.

A dry day at the office...

Developing Mathematical Inquiry ~ Session 3

Professional development certainly makes you appreciate what our children go through each day. Too much talking/death by slideshow can be painful and sends me straight to day-dream land. Today was certainly a full on day, with a lot to take in. I find this kaupapa really interesting, so there was no time for day dreaming! Keeping track of my thoughts here is a great way to stay focused. 

The jury is still out when it comes to DMIC at our kura. Here are my takings from the day...

Practise justification and argumentation 

88 / 4 = 44 / 2 + 44 / 2 

Look at the elements involved in solving the problem. In this case, there are 3. 

1. Understanding the meaning of the '='. Means, 'is the same as'.

2. BEDMAS - understanding the order of operations.

3. Knowing the divisor can not be halved, only the dividend can be divided.

When children are sharing their ideas, call a pause frequently and ask other groups to repeat, agree/disagree, ask a question...  

Justifying and Arguing Mathematically

What is the difference between an explanation and a justification? An explanation might be incorrect, there is room for error. A justification dives deeper and proves beyond doubt that the explanation is correct. 

Explicitly model ways to justify an explanation. Use 'because'.

Always call a pause after an explanation! 

Prepare students of justify and argue

Build the expectation that all children need to be able to prove with a why. Build resilience.  The whole group needs to function together.  Prepare collaborative responses. 

Stand back from groups - monitor. Ask yourself - if I have to go to that group, why am I? Ask a question that's going to stimulate thinking.

Pre-warning - make sure kids are clear with what they're going to share back to the group. "What will you say next? Then what? Then what?" Set them up for success! 

Encourage kids to unpack their thoughts. Can they use a visual representation? Can they explain it in another way? Can they number the steps in their process?

Strengthen students to respond the challenge

Explicitly use wait time. Encourage the use of so if, then, because.  Pre-warn, "I'm going to ask you to repeat just one idea." Know when the right time is to call on a child who might not usually contribute. If they're struggling with a response - "Do you want think time in order to revise your thinking?" Have a signal so a child knows when you're going to call on them.

What are the norms in the classroom? Have high expectations from the outset. "You will listen the first time so you don't need to ask for a repeat!"  

Good questions to ask 

• Can you convince us?
• How do you know it works?
• Why does it work like that?

Develop a generalisation

Big Idea - is like your Achievement Objective.

Generalisation - Success Criteria.  

Find your big idea, then look at what generalisations come out from that. 

Find teachable moments  - Know the difference between a misconception and a gap in foundations. Gaps can be parked and addressed as a group at a later time. I'm not going to use the words 'ability based groupings'...... but I just did. Misconceptions might be addressed at that moment.  

Think about the entry point of the task. Can each child enter at their own level? Low floor, high ceiling.  Is there a place for extension? Challenge more able learners to share in different way, eg. visual representation. If the task is solved too quickly, it's an issue with the task. 

Examples of questions - create a wall of questions. Add to one at a time, not all at once!

Developing Proficient Leaners

Attend to the culture

Choose high-level problematic tasks

Anticipate

Select and sequence

Allow student thinking to shape discussions

Plan for a connection

Intentionally lift the Status of the Tamariki

Point out the status of all kids, especially those who might not usually contribute. 

All kids need to see what 'smarts' they bring to their group.

Make the problems relevant to their lives (cultural context).

There are no passengers on the waka - everyone is paddling!

We make decisions about other people's ability on the basis of certain characteristics. Don't under estimate the impact of teacher body language/reaction to kids responses!

Conjecture ~ an opinion without sufficient proof. 

What does being smart mean? Ask the kids to tell you what they think!

- I'm good at asking questions?

- I never give up!

- I can explain my thinking?

My next steps

1. In planning - give more thought to relating the possible generalisations to the big idea

2. Refer to the framework more often.

3. Embed the norms - lift the status.

Fine-tuning

Our kaupapa this week is Collaborate ~ Sites

This week I'm onsite as we have a staff meeting on my usual day.  One thing is for sure - online sessions are definitely faster paced! It made a nice change to have more time to play, and explore a bit more thoroughly. It was funny to note how much more confident I am to ask questions when I'm in my safe bubble, rather than with 25 people I've never meet. I'm grateful I chose the online option. 

Visible learning

Again, Dorothy started us off with some words of wisdom and good reminders about best practice. So, visibility - can you see it or can you not? Visibility allows parents and whānau to be genuine partners in the learning process. We've kept so much of the learning journey hidden from children and whānau.  Break down those barriers to visibility! Dorothy talked about removing/limiting password barriers, share links, make files accessible!   If there's too many bubble wrap, barriers, steps etc... parents switch off, get locked out - more profoundly than in the past. Visibility also needs to be present between colleagues. Intentional use of technology to make learning visible is a game changer.

Dorothy explained to us that each kaiako in their kāhui ako had a professional blog. I wondered how this would go down at Hornby Primary! Maybe a goal for the future?

Multi-Modal Learning Tasks

Multi-modal always been a thing. Snail-mail, face book, you tube, phones, faxes, etc... As adults, we'd rather watch instructions than read them. The same can be said for our tamariki, surely? We have to compete with the bright lights and visual excitement from all the other digital exposure our kids get - gaming, tiktok etc.... so we need to make sure our hook is going to catch them and hold them for their learning!

There are 2 levels of engagement when using MM texts ~ Behavioural engagement and Cognitive engagement.  Behavioural engagement is the hook. It's getting the kids in the right mind-frame for learning.  The hook - it's all about window dressing! It needs to be a visual feast! Cognitive engagement is the deeper feature kinda stuff - the T shaped literacy, the cognitive demands. You can't have cognitive engagement until you have behavioural engagement! 

Some wise words from Chrissy Butler around Universal Design for Learning ~ Be careful we're not narrowing parameters. Create learning opportunities with lots of options for how to present. Otherwise we're doing the same thing we were doing pre-digital days, just with flasher equipment. Interesting point to note - when I'm planning activities, I set myself as the default. I plan activities in the way that I might like to do, or in a way I think the children might like. The teacher is not the default! There is no default! What engages one learning might not engage another. 

Something I'd like to try ~ scaffolded guides for kids to work through their MM tasks, eg colour in the circle when you've finished the task. This would be very cool if all my tamariki had email addresses!

Something that really excited me ~ in Slides - use the little blue camera on the top right side of the screen to record. The video is saved to your drive and automatically uploads to the page you are working on. Or use Online voice recorder (you will have to upload it to your drive to be able to insert it in to slides).

Click HERE  for some great MM learning programmes. Great time savers. I often forget (or maybe it's the anal retentiveness) that there's no need to reinvent the wheel.    

Google Sites

Some tips from Mark Maddren 

• Make sure kids can get where they need to go in 3 clicks or less!
• Create a new site each year so you have evidence of teaching practice.
• Buttons - get the kids to design their own!
• Use the immersive reader extension - tamariki can highlight text from a site, blow it up, highlight the nouns, verbs, etc...  

After morning tea we had the opportunity to play around with a new site. Mark suggested making a site rather than slides when creating a learning programme for tamariki. One benefit is that it's much easier to insert audio clips. I played around with my kaupapa plan on Tōku Tinana. I do prefer to use Slides when creating MM learning programmes, However I will definitely use Sites to link in new kaupapa from now on.   

Blogger Tips 

Our final part of the day was spent playing with our blog.

Make sure labels are used. It's a good way to link to your appraisal. Make sure you set the display to 'cloud' so that kaupapa you have written about more frequently are larger in size.  

Here's a game changer from Kelsey which was shared last week but I needed time to get my head around it.  Use this link to insert links into your blog post. 

<a href="insert URL here">Insert display text here</a>

Go to HTML view and past it in there. Add the link into the URL part, and the text in to the other section. So easy - Thanks Kelsey! 

Today was another full on day, but definitely got a bit more breathing space and time to reflect which was very handy. Looking forward to next sesison.

Ngā manaakitanga. 

It's all about making connections

Today's session was around tohatoha (share)

Once again, Dorothy had some wise words of wisdom to impart pretty early on in the session. Step aside from the teaching world for one moment and think about our own presence on social media. Social media is all about sharing. The digital world has made it normalised to share whatever we are doing, where ever we are! Instantly! Everywhere around us we're encouraged to connect with others, to broadcast ourselves, to share our lives. Our breakfast is not just for our viewing pleasure anymore. We, as individuals can't connect with someone if we can't share in some way with them. Think about that awkward conversation at dinner party with a person who just won't engage. We move away as quickly as we can and find someone else to make connections with. 

Sharing in the classroom is really no different. However, it is the purpose of sharing now has a bit more clarity. I always thought the sole purpose of sharing was to show parents and whānau (maybe a grandparent, or some stranger from the other side of the world) the amazing learning their tamaiti had been a part of.

The purpose is not for tamariki to connect with parents and whānau. It's a great side benefit, but there's way more to it. The purpose is to teach tamariki to to be confident and informed digital citizens. We want them to be cyber-smart, and we want their comments towards others to be positive, thoughtful, and helpful. I am curious about this ideology. I think about the keyboard warriors, the over-shares, the quite frightening and naive way we've become so flippant about sharing our lives with the world.  I wonder whether this focus on digital citizenship, cyber safety, and just plain ol' be-kind-or-keep-scrolling attitude will shine through in the near future. I hope so.

Dorothy also touched on the definition of an 'authentic' audience. These are people who CHOOSE to listen to you. That doesn't include the 250 tamariki sitting in assembly on Friday. Interesting. I see value in putting time aside for blog commenting in class. Tamariki are making a choice to visit their peers' posts. They are interested, not forced. We're currently in the middle of a blog commenting competition across our school. It's been absolutely wonderful to see the dramatic increase in whanāu choosing to comment on their child's blog, but on the other hand it's bitterly disheartening to know that those comments have only appeared due to lots of nagging from tamariki and promises of spot prizes.      

A nice reminder for me, and I think all classes in our kura was that traditional ways to share are still extremely valid. They are hugely important. This reminder really appealed to me, as it's easy to forget that there's still value in using a pen and a book. Digital learning is an addition not a complete replacement. 

Dorothy's final reminder was that Learn ~ Create ~ Share needn't be linear. Tamariki can share to finish their learning,  or they can share to start new learning. I thought this was an easy way to look at it.  

Todays focus...

Google Forms. 

I had fun playing round with this, but to be honest, it's not something I would use with my tamariki.

              

Google Maps 

The number 1 piece of information I took from this deep dive was that it's not going to be in the exam. I don't think this section was particularly relevant to my practice, however I would like to try and map out Marae around Aotearoa my tamariki mihi to, and I can see it would be very helpful mapping out an upcoming family holidays to Auckland if we're ever allowed back up there. 

A trick - Set 'default view' using 3 dots on the left rather than zooming in and out all the time. 

Google Sheets

This was the major focus for the day and was very helpful. I learned abit more about conditional formatting, which is exactly what I'd been needing to work on. Our task was to analyse our children's blog posts which I have shared below. I think my more confident tamariki could definitely do this themselves. It would make for a great pāngarau activity. 

Tips and tricks ...  

Use the thicker bars in the top left corner to lock in columns and/or rows when viewing lots of data

Resizing rows - Selecting all rows you need by clicking on the letter and moving across. Allows you to resize all rows in one hot. Click on first row, hold shift, hit last row and resize.  

Adding numbers - go to the box you want the total to go into. Go to signa key and click sum. Highlight the data you want to tally and hit enter.  

Increase or decrease decimal places for tidier numbers.

Drag handle (plus sign that appears when you hover on the small box at the bottom right of the cell) works downwards and across. 

Changing formats - 123 format and drop down arrow will change the format if you have mixed letters and numbers you want to tidy up. 

Use the filter function (looks like a funnel) to sort and filter by age, score, gender etc...

Conditional formatting was lots of fun! Use alternating colours to make it easier on the eye! The explore tool is down the bottom!

Once again, my brain was fried at the end of the day. However there was lots to take away, and I'm enjoying being a part of it all. 

Until next week!

Let the Creative Juices Flow

Today's session delved into Hanga (Create) and how we can use different media to do so. It was a very full on day and I definitely felt I needed some more bubble time before we went our seperate ways. I've learnt something about myself these last 3 sessions - I'm fast becoming the girl in everyones fifth form history class who won't stop asking annoying questions. Yep, and I'm fine with that!   

Prior to jumping on board the Manaiakalani waka I'd always kind of viewed my role as a Year 9 teacher as the one who imparts the knowledge. This is not to say I thought I was the 'expert' by any means, but I definitely thought it was my job to 'fill' my 29 wee 'vessels' with as much knowledge as I could in 1 year. Enough that could set them up nicely for secondary programmes and NCEA. Tick those boxes, Miss Jackson, and if you ignite some creativity and passion, then bonus point I suppose. I remember watching Sir Ken Robinson's TED talk - "Do Schools kill Creativity?" and thinking I got it. I thought I understood the importance and place of creativity in the classroom. Not really. Today's intro got me thinking about that clip once more, and how much deeper now my understanding is. I know that creators are not merely consumers and my role is to support creative thinking. I really like this statement Dorothy shared with us ~ creating is a purpose for learning. Not a by-product, not a 'if we have time' kinda deal.

Early in the morning Dorothy also shared with us a blog post by Robin Sutton (Principal of Hornby High School) and his reference to Alan November and the $1000 pencil. This means applying new tools to old ways of doing things. What a fantastic analogy. It's a little bit cringe-worthy to admit that 10 years ago I employed many $1000 pencils in my own classroom! I remember being really excited about the 2 ipads and mac-book that suddenly appeared in my room. What did we do with them? Typed stories and looked at augmented reality sites on rainy day lunch times. How engaging. Face palm.

The rest of the Day 3 was an absolute brain-frying experience. It was a little overwhelming as there was a lot of content that really appealed to me. 

Here are my key takings from the day...

Youtube

Make sure what I upload is Unlisted, and make sure the commenting is turned off.

Head to 'Studio Youtube' to change settings/content and comments/listing etc...

To make it a kids channel ~ Go to 'Channel' then 'Advanced Settings'.

To turn off commenting and make videos unlisted ~ 'Upload defaults'

One thing I never understood - The Channel is where you are uploading content to!

If I want to share a playlist - click in to the playlist, click on the 3 dots, then 'Playlist settings', 'Allow embedding', close the box, 'Share' playlist, grab the code. Easy.

One of our Deep Dives today was on Media

Satchi & Satchi advertising came up with SiSiMo - sight, sound, and motion. This concept is just as reevant in learning as it is in advertising. You have the be entertained at the same time as you're being informed!

By the way... When videoing - footage should aways be landscape.

Google Draw ~ Tanga Kūkara

To set page size ~ 'File', then 'Page set up' or 'customise'.

Use 'View' ~ Guides to add lines, quadrants etc for spacing.

You can crop to a shape! Use the drop down arrow next to crop tool.

Shift+click and drag - will ensure the shape stays perfect - use this in Slides too!

Download as a 'png'. This allows the background to be transparent!

Always stick to size small when embedding/publishing to the web.

Ata Kūkara ~ Google Slides

Use tweet length talk

A picture really is worth 1000 words! Use pictures!

Ditch the defaults, stop using the fancy formats and themes. K.I.S.S!

Keep fonts to a minimum

My WOW moment today was using Google Slides to make awesome animations/DLO's for kids to share. 

Slides

When we want to publish to the Web, Click on 'Embed', change slide size to small, auto-advance every 1 second, publish, ctrl+c, embed to site!   

From Seesaw you have to click on 'View Google Doc'. Then click 'Present'. This is a bit of a pain and won't look as cool as on blogger.

Using the 'Explore' function gives other template options!

Use the + on the left hand side to add slides instead of going to 'Slide'

For transitions - Click on the text box so that it is a 4 point arrow. Use left/right arrows to move in a straight line. I'll need to investigate how this looks on an ipad. 

If I want tamariki to watch a portion of a video I've inserted  - 'Insert', 'Video', choose where you will inset from. On the right hand side - select when you want the clip to begin and end. If the box disappears, click on 'Format option'

We had 30 minutes to 'Level up' and hone in on one of the areas we had looked at up until this point. I choose Slides, and got to play round with creating an animation. This will fit perfectly with our Kaupapa Māori at the moment - Ko Maui me te Rā ~ Maui and the Sun. I know the boys particularly will be really excited and I can't wait to show them some of the work from other tamariki in the cluster.

After lunch we carried on with Slides. We looked at how to use Slides to create numeracy DLO's. Our task was to create a town following set guidelines. We've been investigating 2D shapes at kura, so I can't wait to try this with them too - I know they will love it! 

Here's my play-time creation. 

 

Be prepared

Thoughts and Reflections from Week 2 Digital Fluency Intensive

This week we revisited the Girl Guide motto I learned many moons ago - Always be prepared. In this instance it was around making sure your face is presentable on the off chance your facilitators expect you to record a video to upload to your blog. Caught out big time. 

 

I was, however, prepared for the onslaught of information that I knew would be coming in thick and fast as we headed into Week 2. 

Dorothy again drove home the understanding that there is much room for schools to express their individual differences within the Manaiakalani pedagogy. She explained that the Manaiakalani cluster is an eclectic mix of schools, from state integrated, to private, to catholic, to some with numbers over 800 and others with under 100. Add to that a wide range in teaching experiences, from those beginning their teaching careers, to those nearing the end. The message I got from this was that it's accessible for everyone. All tamariki can benefit from this framework.  

The framework revolves around EFFECTIVE TEACHING and ACCELERATED LEARNING.

What then does this look like? 

Today we began with Ako (Learn).

We discussed the shift from the analogue to digital world and the need to make sure the tools and infrastructure are well set up and sound. I've worked in systems where this was not the case and it was extremely frustrating. We also discussed increasing teacher effectiveness ... which I'm developing right now by being on this intensive. I thought back to the 'on the bus' idea that I shared last week. I'm on the bus, I'm taking the steps necessary to grow my skill sets and thereby accelerate learning outcomes. 

Dorothy made a powerful comment at this point - If there's no pedagogy for learning, it's going to be a disaster. I'm fortunate to to be surrounded by effective practice at my kura. Play-based learning, PB4L, DMIC, Better Start Literacy, Numicon, incorporating HLP's, Teaching as Inquiry.... the list goes on.

Another interesting statement Dorothy made was that effective practise should be present regardless of where we are on our digital journey! I know this to be true, but all these wee reminders are important to revisit.

This quote and the equation underneath are so powerful for me, and a good reminder to check in now and then and reflect on practice and purpose. 

Today was once again very full on with tips and tricks. I've decided to list my favourites. One thing I've already learned is that my brain does not retain quite as much as it used to, even though I might like think otherwise. 

Google Meet

When sharing a screen - use Chrome tab when wanting to share videos or anything with sound.

Sound wont play if you're sharing a window or the whole screen. 

Google Keep

This was probably my favourite wow moment from the day.

When ripping text from a book/online source ~ On your phone, go into Keep, take a photo of text, add your title. This will go straight to your laptop. 

Click on the photo. Click on the 3 dots, select grab image text. Voila! 

Gmail

If you want to schedule emails to send later/another day (if you're writing late night emails) ~ Click the little arrow next to 'send'.

If you want to undo a sent email ~ (if you forget an attachment. Or send an email in the heat of the moment). Click on the cog, click on 'see all settings', click on 'undo send' drop down. The limit is only have 30 seconds! 

Taming your Tabs

Install the Toby Mini extension ~ Organise your browser tabs and access them quickly without having to open them up individually one by one.

Don't forget the right click function to sort/pin tabs!

After lunch we worked with a buddy and analysed a child's blog post. We talked about ~ What was behind the teaching post? What was the learner's response? Who responded to the post and how did this support the child's learning experience?

Here's my wee video analysing a post. Massive shout out to Kelsey for the warning to put some sort of face on, and brush my hair at the very least! Whai hoki, ngā mihi mahana ki a koe, Lily! He tamaiti koi koe, ki tāku nei whakaaro! Thank you Lily for your lovely blog post. 

Ngā mihi nui ki koutou e pānui ana i āku whakaaro. 

Hei ā tērā wiki! 

Diving straight into the deep end!

Thoughts and Reflections from Week 1 Digital Fluency Intensive

I've never been one for swimming. Water and I have never been friends outside of the obvious. When I was forced to learn to swim (at the tender age of 22 for an upcoming triathlon) I starting by dipping my toes in very tentatively, then sat on the edge for quite some time amping myself up for full entry. Painfully slow. If swimming could be used as an analogy for todays DFI session, I could say I dived straight into the deep end of an Olympic sized pool at 7.45am, and swam (Michael Whelps style) until 3pm, where-by my brain was completely fried and my brow-line hurt from being furrowed for 8 hours straight. 

I loved it!

One of the Manaiakalani philosophies that we've heard many times over, was shared again early on in the morning. We, as teachers, are harnessing the tools that put tamariki at the very centre of their learning. I thought about the first part of that statement and what it actually means. To 'harness' is to control and use the power of something in order to achieve something. Harnessing the tools... to me that means more than just 'using' the tools (digital devices). If I'm harnessing these digital tools, I need to be competent and confident in using them with my tamariki. I need to be educated in latest developments to help raise the academic achievement of my tamariki.  

I thought too about the second part of this statement and what it means to put tamariki at the centre of their learning. To me that means they are surrounded by the learning. Creating, directing, making sense of, innovating, and sharing the learning. It's all fluid. They're not just a cup waiting patiently to be filled. I think this aligns well with our school whakataukī (proverb), 'Ko te piko o te mahuri, tērā te tipu o te rākau'. This means the way in which a young sapling (child) is nurtured determines how the tree (child) will grow. This statement really resonates with me; I can empower a tamaiti to stand confidently as co-constructor of their learning,  I can guide them down a positive pathway towards adolescence and adulthood. Powerful stuff.

At the beginning of our small group session we were asked what our strengths and weaknesses are coming into this intensive. My strength would be being surrounded by some very competent, very tech-savvy professionals at Hornby Primary.  Although we all bring different strengths to the table, we're all prepared to sink in the time and the drive to make it work. We're all 'on the bus' as our Principal, Gary would say. It's easier to be excited and motivated to up-skill when those around you feel the same. If you're not feeling it, GET OFF THE BUS! My weakness can be summed up by that saying, "You don't know what you don't know" - and boy, did I realise today how much I don't (yet) know! 

Through out the day we had about 8 mini intensive sessions jam packed with tips and tricks. I learnt some brilliant Google Doc tricks using the Explore tool and for editing (I actually yelled with excitement when Dorothy Burt showed us how to colour code sub-headings at the touch of one button), and some tips to tidy up tabs and bookmarks. We Marie Kondo-ed our Drive folders, and played round using Docs to create a poster (my example below). There was so much new learning and great reminders that at this point it's still a bit of a jumbled up mess in my head. I needed a couple of hours at the end of the session to get some semblance of order in my head. However 3pm on a Friday is probably not the best time to expect that to happen! 

I'm really looking forward to getting back to kura and using some of the things we learned in Google Docs with my more confident learners, particularly around multi-modal reading activities.  It was encouraging to hear Dorothy say that 7 year olds could most certainly be using a lot of these skills in the classroom. 

Day 1 has certainly extended my own capabilities and I am really looking forward to seeing what Week 2 has to offer. 

Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou katoa.