Author Archives: chaifj

Feb 19 2019
4 Comments
322monday21

What do I put here?

If I am being honest, with being in University for the last 9 years straight, I have discovered so many resources and traded ideas with many incredible minds but the one thing I am yet to do, is to actually explore all of these things. I have books, websites, programs, and many other technologies that are sitting in my resource pile waiting to be explored once I finish school and have some time to myself…which will never happen. Whenever I am looking for something new to integrate into my teaching, I tend to google the exact idea and find the closest thing to what I want and attempt to use it only to go back to what I was doing before. When we began to look at the Technologist Module, I instantly became entranced with it.

Through eCampus Ontario, we have been provided with a way of linking the curriculum to technology rather being told that the curriculum drives the learning (which I have been constantly told). One of the ideas that stood out to me was the module has you interacting with ideas instead of just flooding you with information and then moving onto the next thing. It may take some people 30 min to get through the module and it may take others 3 hours. As well, it doesn’t just go right into bulk of things, it asks simple questions to help us figure out why we might be stuck.

The module explains the process of Design Thinking, which is a 5-step process used to tap into a designer’s toolkit to engage users in creating and experimenting with new ideas and then use feedback to improve upon those ideas. These 5 steps are: empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and connect.

Empathize: Understanding what the needs of our learners are. Identifying the challenges, setting aside our needs, asking if this challenge can be solved through the purposeful use of technology.

Define: Narrowing in and identifying the challenge based on what we have learned about our learners. Start small as it is more productive and yields better results, this is the key to the design step. A good challenge is one that:

  • Frames the challenge
  • Inspires
  • Informs
  • Captures
  • Helps

Ideate: Form and build features and characteristics of how technology could address your learners’ challenges. Asking yourself “How might I?” and generating a mind map to generate and link ideas.

Next is to select technology that will help build a creation to help address the challenges. We have been provided with two incredible tool resources in case we are uncertain of which one we want to use. Once we have found one, we must evaluate the tool using the SECTIONS Model by Anthony William Bates.

Prototype: Try out your technology and develop a prototype. Show it to your learners and find out what went well and what needs work. Create something small and show it off in order to get feedback. Follow these three steps for richer results:

  • Design
  • Share
  • Refine

Connect:  Think about how your tech fits into the curriculum and how to integrate it into the classroom. Map out and clarify how you will teach your students.

I hugely believe that this is an incredible resource that has been given to us and although at times, it will feel like a huge burden that consumes lots of time, we must take our time with this process. So long as we understand it well enough, it will allow us to truly integrate tech in a meaningful way. Please enjoy my Pikochart that I have created about the 5-step Design Thinking Process.

Oct 29 2018
2 Comments
322monday21

Hide Yo Kids, Hide Yo Wives, ClassDojo want to steal your privacy information

I chose to analyze the Privacy Concerns for ClassDojo and Other Tracking Apps for Schoolchildren article by Natasha Singer. Since I am not very good with keeping up to date using social media, I decided I would do a Twitter Rant. One of the things that stuck out the most to me was the fact that you cannot just go back and make edits to your tweets after the fact. I noticed this only when I realized that I did not add the #UWinDig tag after each tweet but with time, I will become more efficient at it. I don’t know about everyone else, but I am really enjoying the idea of exploring a new multimedia artifact and making an attempt to create something.

The article introduces an app called ClassDojo, which is an app that lets us track the behavior of our students by awarding or subtracting points based how we feel the students are conducting themselves. The app allows us to project it onto a smart board which shows the student’s cartoon avatars and the scores that they have achieved for the week. When we take away a point from a student, the app omits a rather disappointing sound whereas rewarding a point omits a positive sound. The app even allows teachers to send out notifications to parents whenever they would like to keep them in the loop.

When I think about this in my classroom experiences growing up, I think that having something like this would have been rather beneficial because it always seemed as if teachers were always trying to find ways to hold students responsible for their action while keeping track of it. As well, as a teacher I can see so many different ways to apply this in the classroom other than just the way it’s meant to be used. The capabilities of keeping parents informed about their children helps to bridge the gap between the crazy busy teacher and all of the parents wanting to know more information about how their child is doing.

However, some say that the app is being used without consideration of how the data being collected will be used later on. Some say that this type of classroom management method is out dated and that these apps are too subjective and might harm a student’s reputation by grouping them with the “wrong” kind of people. To me, I think that every type of technology is gathering some type of information and unless we want to go back to killing the environment by printing of more and more paper, then we have no choice but to use apps like these. As well, the company has put a statement in their Terms of Service that says they do not provide outside sources with the data collected. In regards to being out dated, I believe in the saying “work smart not hard” and so far, I have yet to be shown a more efficient way to teach students about being responsible for their action.

The last large concern that I am going to talk about is the thought that some teachers might not be getting permission from their schools or school boards to use these apps and how a parent either needs to have the teacher remove their student or email the company to have them removed. From my experiences thus far, I think that most schools have become aware of these types of apps and have either developed some way of vetting them or are in the process of developing ways. Yes, there are some places that do not track these things, but it seems like these are also the places who are stuck in the 1950s still.

Before reading this article, I would have found an app like this, and used it exactly how it would be suggested. I would probably have made little effort to come up with creative ways it can be used because of how terrible I am with taking something new and thinking outside the box or reading more into it through outside sources (youtube, blogs, reviews, etc.). As well, I never though to consider how the data might be used once collected or the effects that come after the fact. Thanks to this article, I have gathered a lot of ideas and information that I will carry forward.

Although there is a lot that can be done with this app and there are lots of concerns with it like the use of date collected, schools being more on top of tracking who’s using them, and how teachers are using them, I think that apps like these are allowing educators to become better organized and creative with their classroom management skills. I think that as long as we can continue to adjust and modify how we use them so that we can set goals for some students, motivate other to continue to progress, keep them on track or show progress, then I’m all for these apps.

You can either click on the hyperlink near the top, or scroll down to check out my Twitter Rant!

Cheers,

Jon

 

 

 

 

 

Sep 30 2018
4 Comments
322monday21

Breaking Free of Digital Ghosts

The article I chose to look at was “Digital Ghosts in the Modern Classroom” by Hinck, A (2018). http://hybridpedagogy.org/digital-ghosts-modern-classroom/

The Ashley Hinck begins writing about how students are interested in taking digital media classes because the want to learn to create media through, photoshop, HTML/CSS, and even personalized GIFs. However, what they are really looking for is to learn how to use drag-and-drop platforms to make what they’re looking for. These shortcut/template platforms have huge effects on students because similar to everything else in the classroom, there are blank spaces that the student copies information and pastes to. To me, this was often the case when using technology in the classroom. My teachers always gave us projects where we would just learn about how to create posters, presentations and such from programs what required us to just find information and paste it into the spaces. As a music teacher, I expect my students to use expression, and creativity when performing because music is about personal and group discovery and learning to bring out the beauty within. How can I as a teacher expect these things when I can’t do the same when using digital media.

As well, the article states that these shortcut/template websites and platforms are becoming the new “worksheets” and that we should be trying to get away from this and turn to technologies that promote openness and experimentation. The issue with these approaches is that students will draw from their previous experiences which happens to be the programs that are holding them back. We need to find a way to get students away from these programs from the get go so that these habits are never instilled in them.

On the other hand, when we look to these programs like HTML/CSS, Raspberry Pi, and Scratch, what we don’t realize is that these platforms don’t guarantee a finished product in the end. There is so much openness and exploration that students become very frustrated from working for long periods of time only to be met with error after error. Students are not comfortable with making mistakes and having to diagnose the problem by themselves but through trial and error and a little bit of patience, the struggles do eventually pay off. Digital media is a struggle and is full of the unknown, but allows more control over the final product.

Moving forward, we must learn from our mistakes and take the time to learn about these programs so that we can effectively teach our students. As well, we must lead the way and help guide/show them that mistakes are okay and that they must learn to try and try again until it works. If we can get to this point, out students will see that they can become great makers, creators, and speakers in the digital world.

Lastly, when I started this assignment, I decided I would look at a bunch of the recommended platforms to see which one I thought I could get fairly comfortable with before starting any of the reading/listening. When doing so, I found that Piktochart was really interesting and stuck out, especially because all I needed to do was to find a template and copy and paste my information into it… However, once I read the article, I had a moment where I laughed out loud because of how ironic it was. From here, I decided I would go and start with a completely blank page and see what I could come up with. This was an interesting time because I actually had about three other info graphics that I started only to change my idea and start a new one. I ended up with this one because I thought it worked well for what I was aiming for. There is a lot I would change but I am happy with where I ended up at with all the trial and error and I know now to try to get away from all of the copy and pasting.

– Jon Chaif

https://create.piktochart.com/output/32980414-new-piktochart