Month: March 2020

I first made a Loom movie of highlighting the Digital Literacies and then went in and made another movie to talk and add the other two documents. Not the most efficient way, but I wanted to see if I could talk over a video. And it worked, other than I didn’t catch all of my ‘Hi’ at the beginning!

As for our project, this is my outline:

• Template for a “choose your own adventure” inquiry for learning and as a way to document inquiry. 
• Use different platforms like a ppt/slides, website, or google forms, or use one of these free platforms (https://www.freetech4teachers.com/2015/01/three-platforms-for-writing-choose-your.html?m=1) or anything else we can find.. 
• create an example (or examples using different platforms)  for students to work through and document the creation process (possibly through another platform like Adobe Spark)
• students can use the templates to document inquiry, particularly when they go off track and dead end and then have to come back to a previous point to head off in a new direction. 
• Teachers can use it to encourage inquiry (in math or another subject area) so students learn HOW to inquire.
• Hoping to make this scalable for K-12

I spent a week without my computer. Originally, it was supposed to be a digital disconnect for at least part of the time, but with the Covid-19 outbreak developing, we spent a fair amount of time reading articles online, which meant I kept a close eye on all emails, Twitter, and my Feedly articles. Therefore, I also tried to do what I could on the limited bandwidth available to continue being part of our online course. I did not expect the frustration level I experienced!

Yes, there are iPhone versions of Google Drive, Docs and Sheets, but they are difficult to manipulate through a tiny phone screen. A slow and intermittent wifi access made it even more irritating. I did get through to the notes Heidi took as well as the link to what was dealt with in class, but I was still unclear about assignment requirements and the details of what was discussed. Would a recording of the class have helped? Would everyone have contributed knowing they were being recorded? Or would a summary made by the instructor have helped? As I was writing this last thought, Dr. Verena Roberts, our instructor, uploaded a short summary — exactly what I was thinking about. (For our second class, she recorded the whole class and I expect that will make the experience better for those that missed. )

These experiences are similar to what our students may have accessing online courses — something that is becoming very real with the Covid-19 school closures and move to online learning. Not all students have access to a computer or even a good wifi signal. Even I, with my techie background knowledge, resilience and confidence wound up having difficulties with self motivation and regulation! By the time I accessed the Powerpoint and it refused to load properly, I just gave up and left it. Adding to the google sheet was a painful experience and I had to undo a number of times because of inadvertent entries or deletes. How can I expect even the most motivated and strong students to succeed if they do not have the correct tools when I am unable to power through the difficulties accessing?

So what did I learn? I go back to what I had to do in my early design/info pro teaching days: make sure every lesson has a backup lowtech plan. Each class or assignment has to be designed as though technology will not work in the moment and there are assorted possible solutions as well as a lowtech option. Phone calls and snail mail may still be the best option for some teacher/student interactions. It is going to mean a lot of extra time for educators in the regular teaching world to connect adequately to their students in the upcoming weeks. Hopefully they have a good relationship with their students so the communication lines stay open.

I wanted to try something new and not use a video or audio editing app but one where I could combine pictures and audio. In particular, I was looking for something easy enough for elementary students so that if I asked middle school or high school students to use it, none would find it  challenging. I researched digital storytelling resources and picked one that I have not used. Turned out, it had very limited options unless you paid for it. The next few I found were not even still available. A couple others were only available on an iPad or iPhone and after being a week without my computer, I just did NOT feel up to going there (more on that in another blog). The two best resources were from August, 2018 in Practical EdTech and September, 2018 in Tech & Learning. I decided on the Adobe Spark app and spent a couple of hours planning and creating to make a 2 minute video. Considering I usually spend a few hours writing and editing a blog, it was about what I expected.

(First pic was made possible by a random person who regularly feeds the zebra doves and was inspired by my school’s production of Mary Poppins.)