Reflection and Steps Forward

Reflection and Steps Forward

Today is my final day of professional development with the Manaiakalani facilitators.

It's a day full of expectations and goals to succeed.  I know that this level one exam will be intense (three hours) and it was!  I believe I did the preparation and revision but unfortunately I did not complete this exam.  Time management was my foe!

My personal thoughts on the exam content

I was told that time management is essential I still spent too much time on the eleven scenarios.  There was a lot of scenarios under 'Google Classroom' this was not covered in the Manaiakalani programme.  At school and in my role I do not use Google Classroom.  I did find it difficult flicking from tab to tab reading the instructions, for me personally this wasted time.

I did learn so many skills, knowledge and terminology.  When I commenced this professional development I didn't even know what a 'widget' or gadget was.

I was in a unique position to do this professional development in an on-line meet with teachers from many regions in New Zealand.  The ability to listen and learn with quality presenters was amazing!

Ubiquitous

Presenter: Dorothy Burt

The goal for Manaiakalani programme is rewindable learning.

Effective teachers cause learning and this was evident with students who participated in the 'Summer Learning Journal' and blogged throughout their summer break.  It is important to know that these young bloggers receive feedback through comments from the facilitators.  Data is collected and analysed. 

The evidence for the power of Ubiquitous learning is most clearly displayed in the Summer Learning Journey reports.

Young people learning over the Summer holidays with no teacher present.

Their Term 1 progress / achievement is carefully matched with a non-blogger - and the infographic displays the clear difference between the groups.

Overall I am proud of my participation and learning throughout this professional development.  I have made huge steps with my digital learning and I will keep on practising and refining my knowledge and skills.

Devices

Devices

The focus for this Manaiakalani professional development meet was devices.  Identifying the devices used and orienting my way around these devices. Throughout this professional development learning activities and presentations the Manaiakalani facilitators modelled and talked about 'kawa of care' the kaupapa of Manaiakalani - 'Learn, Create, Share.'

Being Cybersmart

Presenter: Fiona Grant

Fiona talked about empowering our learners so they can be connected and confident decisions makers.  The focus for all educations is to model positive language and encourage and expect our learners to use positive language in their digital communication.  Fiona stated that Google is focusing and modelling through their sites and presentation on how to have a positive digital footprint.

The Manaiakalani team have structure the cybersmart curriculum programme into three categories.  This programme is repeated every year.

Term 1: Smart Learners (Our LEARN term)

Term 2: Smart Footprint (Our CREATE term)

Term 3: Smart Relationships (Our SHARE term)

I have a link to Fiona's presentation which I would highly recommend as essential viewing for all educators.

Hapara      

Presentator: Dorothy Burt

Hapara was created by an amazingly clever Polish man Jan Zawadzki, he designed this programme specifically for the Manaiakalani programme.  The Hapara programme enables teachers to teach and monitor their students.  Teachers can monitor all students' learning, their blogs and how many people have blogged, cybersmart security notifying the teacher and leadership of students that are in sites not recommended or have attempted to go into unauthorized sites.

Here are some of the advantages of using this programme -

• Visible learning - access, manage and view learnerswork
• Create differential learning
• Keep learners safe online and focused
• Make data driven decisions

Chromebook and i-pad simulator 

Presenter: Gerald Vermeulen

With this presentation I had the opportunity to familiarize myself with using an ipad and chromebook.   Using the online simulators was an interesting and at times frustrating because the simulator was small and tricky to label the icons and keys.  I can definitely visual how a teacher could use it within a classroom, casting the screen and showing the students the keys and icons.

Here is a screenshot of taking a digital photo and using the digital drawing tools to draw an ipad.

Here is a link to Gerald's Manaiakalani ipad presentation, this also explains how junior teachers use the éxplain everything' digital programme.  This programme is interactive, screencasting whiteboard enabling both teacher and learner to create and share learning. There are also some examples of teachers designing learning for junior students.

Screencastify

Presenter: Maria Krausse

I was really excited to learn about screencastify as I can see so learning and sharing possibilities both for educators and within my role 'Learning Support Coordinator.'  

Here are the links to install screencastify and a guide on how to use screencastify.
I can see using this for shared stories, lessons, instructions and guides for educations, students and whanau.  the beautify of this programme is you can record, edit and share all your videos.  It is important that the basic screencastify only allows five minute videos - but on the positive it is a free download.  For a price you can get the screencastify extension that you have to pay but it has unlimited video recordings.  This programme makes the learning VISIBLE and REWINDABLE.

This is my first attempt using Screencastify to review a Manaiakalani resource titled 'Smart Teacher' and embedding the recording.

This is another way I presented my screencastify using the Google slides.

Blogging Tips

Presenter: Kerry Boyde-Preece

Kerry demonstrated how to go into the comment settings and how to be cybersmart with quality blog comments.  I must admit this presentation was very fast and I will need to revisit Kerry's presentation in order to use the tips and gain a greater understanding.

This is the link to blogging tips.

Phew another empowering and very interesting online professional development Google meet with the Manaiakalani facilitators.