My Map

 This morning we were working on My Maps. This is a map that I created about Tairawhiti Gisborne. It has many places you can visit including walks, restaurants and family activities.

DFI Week 3

 This morning we learned about the Create aspect of Manaiakalani. The conversation really resonated with me as I love the idea of facilitating opportunities for my students to be creative. I think my students will really benefit from being creative in the classroom. It made me think about how I can incorporate more creativity in my classroom. Allowing my students to use their hands to support their learning also fits into my Professional Learning Goal so it will interesting to see where I can take this. My biggest takeaway from this talk was that students should be creators of content, not just consumers.

At the moment I use Google slides for my own planning. I want to challenge myself to see if I can use Google slides more to create learning tasks not just for my own personal planning. This way I can embed them straight onto my Hub website and my students can find them easier. I liked looking at what students from different schools have created on Google Slides. Being able to see what they have achieved means I can try the same activities in my own hub. Below is a Pick-a-path that I created, it will be great to see my students give this a go as well!

Incorporating filmmaking into my hub would be a great asset for my student's learning. Being able to create films for various reasons including consolidating their learning. Just after lockdown last year (when we were at school but couldn't have large gatherings) we had some experience of using WeVideo to record assembly videos. It was great to see students come out of their shells to create videos. We have the space in our hub to create a studio so it will be interesting to see what we can achieve when we get the necessary tools. 

I have used Google Drawings in the past to complete art projects. It was great to learn about some extra tips that I didn't know about including downloading your drawing as .png so the background is transparent. Also seeing how you can copy the hex code of a colour to use across items or applications.

 

DFI Week 2

 Today we learnt about the Learn aspect of Manaiakalani. At our school, Learn looks like identifying where we need to raise student achievement and how we are going to make positive changes. We understand that every student has their own strengths and we ensure they are given many opportunities to develop these strengths. On the contrary, it also means we have opportunities to raise their achievement where necessary. 

I learnt about using Google Calendar and Google Meet to enhance my own capability as a professional. Attached is a recording of a Google Meet that I did with Cheryl today. It shows many aspects such as presenting my screen and also recording. Behind the scenes, I also created the meet from my calendar and learnt how to blur my background. As you can see it took me a bit of time to figure it out!

Organising tabs is a great way to be able to find what you need quicker. This is a tool that would be great to teach my learners as they quite often have a few tabs open at once. They also have certain websites that they use frequently. As intermediate students, they will be moving to high school soon and this will be essential for them as they begin to study and complete assignments. 

Google Keep is a tool that I want to use more in my personal and professional life. I will quite often think of ideas in my spare time so it will be great to be able to record these ideas on my phone then be able to access them on my laptop. I like the photo tool which enables you to take a photo and Google Keep will type up the information for you. I also want to use this app to be able to record Te Reo Māori that I have been using and have it available for me to use in and outside the classroom.

DFI Session 1- He Mātai Whakamuri

 Today we started by going over how Manaiakalani began. I found it interesting that it was created to raise student achievement in Tamaki. Learning about this meant that I can better understand why we have  Manaiakalani and why it is so important for our tamariki to be digitally fluent.

We then looked at various ways we can use Google Docs in our classroom. This has allowed me to feel more confident in using Google Docs in more ways than I have in the past. It will be great to be able to use the Table of Contents feature to my advantage so that I can direct a reader to a particular part of a Doc. I had no idea that this was possible so it will be a great tool to use in the near future.

Another feature I thought would be excellent in my learning environment is the voice-to-text feature. This will be incredibly helpful for some students in my hub to be able to use. Especially seeing how it can be used to help with independent reading tasks. This is a tool I will be able to adapt and use in my own hub. 

I created this infographic (attached) on Google Docs so that students in my Printmaking action week group will be able to easily access tutorials. This is an excellent tool that I can use for that group but also changing it to use in other curriculum areas. Creating an infographic means that I can also use it in my spare time when I do my own printmaking. I will be able to easily access the tutorials without having to search for them.

It was awesome being able to meet everyone today and I look forward to our new learning next week.

Nau mai, haere mai

Welcome to my professional learning blog.

This is a place where I can reflect on my Teaching as Inquiry goals

and how they link to the Education Council's

Our Code - Our Standards