For my media reflection, I chose the Technologist Module. As future educators, we must create digital tools that fit the student’s skills and enhance their learning experience. The technologist module provides models that transform teaching into a creative and innovative manner. Since technology is an ever-growing invention with many drawbacks accompanying its system, as educators we must take into consideration how the selected tools will benefit or deter student learning. The “design thinking approach” is a beneficial tool because it aims to solve the students learning difficulties and redefine problems in a collaborative way. The core understanding of the tool is understanding your students. The tool reframes these problems in a human-centred way as the user is directly affected by the design. The approach follows a five-stage process that include empathize, define, ideate prototype, and connect.
I decided to make a slidedeck because I thought it would be fun to make. The only experience I had with a narrated slidedeck was when I took an online class in university, that was how my professor taught.As I was making my artifact, there were a lot of technological problems for me. I created my slideshow and did my voiceovers on MS PowerPoint. When recording the presentation, I was looking for a tool to help online, but I discovered that PowerPoint can record the slides. I though that this plarform was going to be a holy grail.
However, when it came to recording the whole presentation, the slides and audio would not match. The audio would either lag, play on a different slide, or won’t play at all. This took a lot of finessing to make it work. And just when I thought my video was complete, my laptop crashed and it did not save the video.
I could not get access to the video at all but I found my PowerPoint online using the office365 website. However, the audio went missing. At this point I want to throw my computer away and create a infographic instead. But I did not want to give up, so I rerecorded my audio. I used my phone for the audio, and I exported the PowerPoint into a movie and I used my sister’s mac to use iMovie and I created my narrated slidedeck. Overall, I though MS PowerPoint was going to be easy to navigate, it was a nightmare.
I decided to focus on the Collaborator module for this multimedia assignment. The purpose of this module is to outline the collaborator route of education, this being the utilization of a healthy PLN (personal learning network) to help educators create, connect, and collaborate to form well-established creations.
Sketchnote Full Size
For my first multimedia assignment, I decided to document my progress through the means of a twitter essay. This made for an interesting project as I was discussing the limitations of certain technologies in the classroom, yet the very means of conveying my content was limiting in itself.
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I was limited to a set amount of characters per post and was forced to paraphrase rather important criteria. It is for this reason that my second attempt at the multimedia assignment was by hand-drawing my own sketchnote, and I am pleased to confirm that I found this technology more fulfilling.
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In order for collaboration to occur, there must first be a complimentary agreement between two small ideas. In his video “Where Good Ideas Come From,” Steven Johnson refers to these small ideas independently as small hunches, the seed of great ideas that can take many years to develop. When two or more of these small hunches are pieced together — and often these hunches come from the minds of different individuals — a bigger creation is formed that is larger than either of the small hunches independently. For example, more often than not the modern musical is comprised of both the play’s book (the story itself including the scriptwriting, characters, and order of events), and the musical score (the written arrangement of the show’s musical numbers). Separately, one is a script and the other is notated music. When mashed together, they create musical theatre. My sketchnote depicts this concept of collaboration throughout.
Collab Tree
Like small hunches, trees take years to grow and fully sprout. This is why I decided to place a tree in the centre of my sketchnote; I call it the Collab Tree. At the tree’s base are a few images that depict early concepts: the seeds of creation. One of these images is a tiny, single lightbulb signalling the spark of an idea, another is a brain in mid-thought, likely developing that very idea, and the third is a series of gears grinding together much like a mind at work. As we move up the tree there are signs of collaboration: an image of a handshake, a series of puzzle pieces fitting into place with one another, and the combination of two lightbulbs that make twice as much light as the first. At the tree’s top is an even larger lightbulb symbolizing the end product of multiple collaborations: the great creation.
At the top of the page, I was sure to include “PLN,” an important tool for developing one’s professional growth. The “Understanding and Creating Profession Learning Networks” video on the ENGAGE tab of the module describes how PLNs extend personal resources and connections. PLNs are responsible for forming professional relationships between individuals… let’s say, individuals with their very own small hunches. How have PLNs evolved since the turn of the millennium? With the help of social media. This is why I chose to represent four major social media in the corners of my sketchnote.
Collaborations are very much like long journeys. Turtles are often associated as wise and slow-moving; this is why you can view so many in my work. Much like the Collab Tree, the turtles depict the process of a great idea. At the bottom, one turtle proclaims that he has an idea. The second turtle is shown to be feeding this idea while the trio featured next appears to be climbing the ranks by working together.
Turtle Power
The final turtle sits at the top of the big lightbulb, encouraging the first to “pass” on up his slow hunch. How is he doing so? With the help of technology, of course!
“Pass it on up!!!”
Threading the entire concept together is a series of paperclips that outline both the tree’s growth and the turtles’ journey. The paperclips rest atop the words “Create, Connect, Collaborate”: the three Cs for succcess.
Have you ever worked with others and thought to yourself afterwards, wow I would have never thought of that on my own? The insight and refection that can come from others experiences and education is truly valuable. Collaboration is a gateway that allows for this sharing of ideas, and professional growth and development. I have chosen to critically evaluate the Collaborator Module on the Ontario Extend website. In this module, we are introduced to the idea of collaboration by using technology tools, to develop intentional, global, interactive and engaging connections with others of our choosing. The way to accomplish this collaboration is to create a professional learning and teaching network, also known as a PLN. This PLN is a digital space where teachers learn from other’s ideas, opinions, connections, and references which ultimately fosters new views, enhanced understanding, growth and a sense of community.
In the overview section on the scenario page, the main objectives of the collaborator module are highlighted and include; exploring tactics to build PLN, approaches to engage and extend your PLN and ways to empower teachers to develop a PLN. For me this process will involve reflection of my goals, and purpose, looking at what individuals I want to engage with and why. In going through this process, I will effectively extend my professional connections, and experiment with digital tools such as Twitter, YouTube and Educators PLN, as suggested in this section.
In the “Explore: Why Collaborate?” section of the module we critically examine the why behind collaboration and look at the role of digital communities such as Twitter. In the video entitled “Where good ideas come from?” Steven Johnson talks about how we are all interested in creative, innovative and intrinsic work, however often ideas need time to develop, flourish and grow. Often these ideas lay latent, until ideas of others come together with “hunches”of our own, to formulate something new. This has been the cornerstone of innovation through the decades. Today we can research instantaneously all throughout the world and tap into our PLN to find the missing piece of the puzzle we seek.
When I reflect on all of the major science, chemistry and engineering advances that have been made over the last 100 years, I think about how much slower the process was, and how in comparison little connectivity and sharing of ideas took place before the internet. There may have been hunches, however the ability to bring them together, collaborate and build on them, took much longer, due to lack of connectivity and collaboration. Think about the works of Henry Ford as he built his first car, the works of Ernest-Rutherford as he constructed the model of atom, the works of Einstein and his theoretical physicist teachings, and the list would go on and on. How much closer would we be to curing cancer and tackling our environmental issues if scientists and researchers could connect globally with a developed specialized PLN, 75 years ago? Also imagine the time and resources saved by billions of researchers and collaborators!
Alec Couros in the Explore section of the module highlights the affordances of Twitter in relation to a PLN, and how through the ages Twitter has worked to transform collaborative online communication. He explains how educators are no longer “hoarding” their knowledge, but instead sharing relevant up to date perspectives and knowledge. This encapsulates a “growth mindset” practice for all, which should be what teacher’s aspire for, not only for their students but also for their colleagues.
As educators we have the responsibility to explore online learning communities, and incorporate multiple perspectives in our teaching and learning. Therefore having PLN members with varing opionions is vauable and insightful. Following new hashtags such as #edchat, #scichat as well as new people such as professors, and influential teachers, my associate teacher, teacher candidates within my disciple will help me to remain up to date. Thank you Bonnie for exposing me to the world of Twitter through this class. Since joining Twitter I now follow #Ontarioextend, #apchemistry, #chemchat, and #chemEd.
A PLN is a network you create, with people you wish to engage and share with or even just simply follow or “lurk” among, as Marc-Andre Lalande points out in his video. As a biology and chemistry teacher I have begun to create a PLN of educators, scholars, community officials, and influencers, who would actively engage in conversation about ways to combat global warming and explore genetic and drug research as well as help to develop teaching, learning and assessment aids.
These diverse topics are very personally relevant to me, and covered in the curriculum, so creating a PLN devised around my interests, passions, personal needs, ambitions and goals aligns with the purpose of a PLN. My goal is to gather new ideas, share, collaborate, build off of each other’s insights and contribute to building new ideas or expanding previous works. In my future school I would hope to be involved in the “Eco Team” and connecting with other schools, who have made impressive gains towards the implementation of the zero waste policy. I would also like to connect with other chemistry and biology labs teachers as it can be difficult to think of new exciting ways to teach the cirriculum and develop new labs.
Connectivism is one of the major theoretical frameworks that validates the use of PLNS. Here we recognize that learning is socially constructed, and involves the expansion and augmentation of others work and hence the adaptation of our own. Here the learner is seeking knowledge and constructing their own reality. In my placement, many of my students worked best, by constructing their knowledge with hands on activities, especially in the applied and locally developed classes. The learning idea of a constructivist as Piaget describes, is centered around learning being an active process where students construct information actively rather than receiving it passively. The Social Cognitive Theory, aligns to a greater extent with the development of a PLN, as knowledge is constructed by the interactions with others in a social world, through modeling, teaching self-efficacy and active co-construction.
It is important to follow the steps outlined in the Extend and Empower, module where it describes how to cultivate and map your PLN. To begin the cultivation process, it is important to find a professional group that aligns with your interests. Then going where your people are, being strategic, strengthening connections, limiting your follows and culls as well as looking critically at the identity you are creating, are al vital steps of the process. In cultivating my PLN having etiquette and creating an on-line identity are of utmost importance to me as an educator, as you never know who you will see at a conference or collaborate with in the future.
In mapping my PLN I had to think about my focus, which is science and chemistry education. I placed my science topics on the map (global warming, genetics, and drug advancements) and identified the nodes (names) of at least 5 individuals or industries I wish to network with. Then I identified their roles, weight of connection and tried to identify any relationships between nodes. Surprisingly there were connections between nodes that I had forgotten about, which made me think of potential collaborative research projects in the future for my students.
In the Extend module there is a Ted talk “Beward of the Online Filter Bubbles.” Here Eli Pariser describes invisible algorithmic editing of the web that occurs with online tools like Google and Facebook. This means that your inquiry results are personally tailored, and we are seeing only what the internet thinks you need to see, and is filtering out the rest. Because of this it is important to look critically at our internet searches, and make sure we are always looking for ways to understand the other side of the story. Adding people to our PLN who have opposing views is therefore of extreme value in the “era of the filter bubble.” I have successfully begun the process of cultivating my PLN through Twitter, and have seen many of the lesson plans, assessment strategies, science projects, conferences and media groups science educators are a part of.
I used Canva to make my final artifact. Canva would be a great educational tool as it allows for reflective and creative expression in a variety of forms including a poster, logo, video, presentation, flyer, card and info-graphic. Giving students choice in how they wish to apply what they have learned, is appealing to me as an educator, because not everyone can apply and display their knowledge in the same way. Plus adding the text, color and pictures adds to the meta-cognitive processing of the material, and its creativity thereby increases the likelihood that the material will really stick. Creative projects by design, always engage students in analytical, evaluative higher order thinking. These projects are not focused on supplying the right answer, rather they are concerned with extending and applying information to find solutions or develop new ideas, much like a PLN!
I decided to create a sketchnote that summarizes the key points of the collaborator module created by Ontario Extend. The collaborator module emphasizes the importance of connecting individuals who share a similar interest. It is essential that teachers build connections with others, ask and solve questions collaboratively, and strengthen their independent thoughts. This is possible and easily accessible by using technological tools.
I created a sketchnote because I enjoy the way they look. I like how you are not restricted to a specific template. I knew that this would be challenging for me since I am not a drawer, however, I was excited to see what the outcome would look like. The process of creating the sketchnote was very time-consuming. I first created a rough draft to make sure I knew all the ideas I wanted to incorporate. I then started to make the final copy by drawing a template that was later coloured in. Overall, I had a good experience creating the sketchnote. This would be something that I would share with my students in the future.
The first thing I drew was people communicating with each other. This emphasizes what collaboration is all about. People sharing their thoughts with others. Teachers being open to collaborating is key to developing a personal learning network (PLN).
Steven Johnson explains a concept where ideas take time to form and people are usually in a dormant state where their ideas are slowly processing. He calls this idea “slow hunch”. I’ve always felt that when two minds come together, there is a greater opportunity for something great to come from it. In my experience, I’ve always found it easier and faster to create something when you can share your thoughts with others. For this reason, I recreated the illustration that was shown in the video. I drew two people, each with their own ideas. When they come together, they are able to share their thoughts and build upon them to create something new. I drew a turtle with clocks around it to represent that creating important ideas is a timely process.
In my own experiences of teaching and learning, I would say that you are always needing to collaborate. You need to be able to bounce ideas off of each other. For example, when planning for a lesson, a teacher may seek assistance from others around them. With technology being a medium of communication, it becomes a much simpler task that can be done at any moment. When I am creating lessons, I almost always search the web to find creative ideas that other teachers are sharing. This greatly facilitates the overall process. I found it interesting listening to the “Using Twitter Effectively in Education” video because I had never really thought of the importance of hashtags in the learning community. There are hashtags devoted to helping teachers communicate with other teachers, such as #kinderchat, which is specialized for primary school teachers. This is something that I would like to further explore and utilize in the future.
Marc-andré Lalande explains that a PLN is a group of people you choose to interact with in order to learn from their questions and reflections. The people that you are associating with are connected to others, which ultimately leads to a large network of individuals. The primary goal is to learn from others and have others learn from you. In the sketchnote, I wrote out the acronym PLN and what it stands for. I thought this was important to incorporate as PLNs are the basis of collaboration. As a teacher, this would be a good thing to create since your personal development will be easily accessible.
Howard Rheingold provides steps on how professionals can build their PLN. He explains how they first need to explore multiple media such as blogs, Twitter, and Facebook. They then need to search to get a sense of the community surrounding the space of interest. They can then follow other activity streams and tune their network by choosing who is worth paying attention to and who is not. They need to feed their followers with valuable information and engage with them. When you have questions or responses, don’t hesitate to engage. I believe that these are important steps for teachers to follow when creating their own PLN, which is why I added these steps to the sketchnote.
Eli Pariser’s TED talk video describes invisible algorithmic editing as filter bubbles. These bubbles trap us in our own online universe that is tailored to our preferences and blocks us from information that could broaden our view on society. As teachers, we need to inform our students about these filter bobbles that occur in our online world. We need to teach students to be aware of them so that they can understand that there is a world that they may not be seeing. To represent these thoughts in the sketchnote, I drew bubbles that are surrounding individuals and preventing them from reaching each other. In reality, that is what these filter bubbles are doing; shielding people from a greater world of information and knowledge.
Mapping your PLN is an imperative process as it allows you to visually see your network. Using tools such as Coggle, Google Drawing, PowerPoint, etc. are great ways to create this. Some also offer collaborative value by allowing users to share their knowledge and creations with others, such as Coggle. In the sketchnote, I drew a map. This symbolizes mapping out your PLN to make connections from one place to another.
I believe that collaboration is an important aspect of teaching. As teachers, we must be constantly adapting to the latest technological platforms. Being able to communicate with others around the world who have insightful and useful information greatly helps to develop as a professional.
I decided to explore the Collaborator Module by Ontario Extend. This module is a resource intended for open education to share and spread knowledge. In order to share its main concepts, I decided to create a sketchnote that represents my understanding of it. At the top of my sketchnote, I wanted to highlight the word “collaboration”. Collaboration is the main focus of this module. I added arrows as connectors to represent the important points we need to have to achieve collaboration.
The Explore section of the module, focuses on the importance of collaboration and explains ways in which we can collaborate. It discusses how collaboration provides the opportunity for new ideas to appear and spread. When one idea lurking in someone’s mind can be shared with someone else who may have a slightly different idea, these ideas are able to converge and potentially develop into a larger “breakthrough” idea. This is where good ideas are made. Therefore, to ultimately share thoughts and ideas with others, we need to develop ways to connect with society. This can be done by creating online networks. To accomplish this, it is important to participate in digital communities for learning such as Twitter or by building your own personal learning network.
Keeping the Explore section in mind when creating my sketchnote, I decided to include a sketch of two individuals who are sharing an idea (represented by a lightbulb). This is meant to symbolize how it requires connections with other individuals in order to create breakthrough ideas.
Under the Engage section of the module, it discusses personal learning networks (PLNs). PLNs are organized around your own personal or professional learning interests. You decide who is included in your network and you choose how you would like to engage with them. Thus, every PLN is unique to the individual. PLNs are based on a theory of connectivism. This is the idea that when someone is knowledgeable it reflects how they have connected concepts and ideas over time. Someone gains this knowledge by forming networks and sharing ideas.
When designing this section in my sketchnote, I chose to include bolded letters “PLN” to turn the focus on this concept. Underneath, I chose to include what each letter stands for. “P” for personal, this is because PLNs are personalized to the individual. Attached to that, I included a sketch of a pair of eyes and dialogue bubbles. These represent how individuals can choose whether they want to be lurkers (check out what people are saying) or sharers (share and distribute information) within their PLN. As well, I chose to incorporate a puzzle under this section. This represents how knowledge is connected by different ideas that ultimately produce a deeper understanding of that subject.
Under the Extend section of the module, it describes how you can build your own PLN. Howard Rheingold provides 8 key steps to help you begin building your PLN: explore, search, follow, tune, feed, engage, inquire, and then respond. I chose to incorporate these points into my sketchnote because I believe these are easy to follow and would benefit someone who needs some direction when planning their PLN. This section of the module also cautions users to beware of getting trapped in their own online universe. They term this as getting stuck inside “filter bubbles”. Filter bubbles are created by invisible algorithmic editing that personally tailors your search results to your own interests. This prevents individuals from being exposed to new ideas and perspectives that can broaden their view of society and ultimately reduces the opportunity for collaboration. In my sketchnote, I incorporated a drawing of people trapped inside bubbles. This symbolizes how people can become stuck in their own online universe. The ghost located behind these bubbles symbolized how the algorithmic editing that occurs is invisible.
In the final section of the module, Empower, they want you to map your own PLN. By mapping your PLN, it allows you to reflect on your own learning network and determine ways in which you can improve it.
I enjoyed being able to explore this module and deepen my understanding of collaboration. Collaboration is an important aspect of learning and teaching. It’s how ideas are created and strengthened. As well, being able to create a sketchnote based on this module was a great learning curve for me. I have never created a sketchnote before. This enabled me to see the importance of imagery and symbols when representing concepts. Although, I did find some concepts challenging to represent in a picture form and thus, included some writing. I enjoyed how much creativity you can have while creating it. In the future, I would love to incorporate sketchnotes into my classroom, perhaps by including it into an assignment for my students.
For my second multimedia reflection artifact, I chose to create an original sketch note based on the Technologist module. This module is used to assist educators with the process of selecting, using and integrating technologies that will help support and enhance student learning. I have never created a sketch note before, however I do enjoy drawing and sketching and thought it would be a cool new opportunity to create one. I used a variety of fonts and graphics to help the reader with understanding the main ideas of the module, and giving them something interesting to look at while doing so. As this is a sketch note, I wanted to keep the amount of text I had on it to a minimum (keeping it to the main ideas) and use the space for related sketches instead. The title is in the biggest font in the middle of the page that can tell the reader the main topic of the entire sketch note at the start. My sketch note begins in the top left corner with “Access Your Digital Literacy”, and moves clockwise as you go along, with loopy arrows to keep the reader on track.
My sketch note on the Technologist module
The first step begins with accessing your digital literacy collection. The development process is ongoing and your library will continuously grow, but by understanding what they are, you understand the many abilities of using digital technologies and web-based tools, including ways to create and communicate information, that can help address specific learning challenges. I displayed this with examples of knowledge, technology and access cards in a brain on my sketch note.
“Access your digital literacy”
The next step is to identify a challenge with your learners. Understanding their point of view through empathizing with them and planning your materials based on them and their opinion can help you with identifying a challenge that can be addressed with technology. A key is to keep the focus on something small rather than something big, so once you have a challenge, you will want to narrow it down to define it. This is exhibited in my sketch note by someone climbing a mountain in the background (large focus challenge) with puzzle pieces and a lock in front of it (small focused challenges).
“Identify a challenge”
Once a challenge has been identified, a technology can be selected. Picking the right technology for your problem is a process that can be cleared by laying out your thoughts on what you need from your technology for your solution, and a good way to do this is using a mind map. My sketch note has a silhouette of a head with thoughts of a map with sticky notes on it to show the thinking process, and a hand reaching in a basket of options to show the selection process.
“Mind map and select a technology”
Prototyping comes after the selection process, and the creation of something tangible to see rather than just hearing about ideas (the “testing” stage) can enhance the richness of feedback received. On my sketch note, I represented the prototyping stage with a person at eye level of a table carefully constructing some type of abstract prototype, with a pencil and design book open next to him. There are voice sound lines above him to show the thoughts of feedback that will be received once it is built and shared to help refine it.
“Gain feedback, refine a prototype”
Once you have the product, connecting it with the curriculum is the next step. Educators have to keep the original learning goal in mind, understand and review that their technology is being used to address this, and sharing this information with the users to show them the link between the two. This is displayed on my sketch note with two hands, one with a piece of technology, the other with curriculum documents, being brought together with a connected wire explosion in between.
“Connect the technology to the curriculum”
Once this is all done, it is time to share the technology with your users. I have represented this on my sketch note with Santa Claus throwing presents around him. The last step is to reflect on the entire design-thinking approach that you took to generate this technology. This is shown on my sketch note with someone looking into a puddle on the ground, and seeing their reflection (a brain). The brain is something that was seen at the start of my sketch note and is used here to connect all the ideas together and signify the end of the process.
“Share the technology”“Reflect on the design-thinking approach”
All in all, with the world and technology evolving at a rapid pace, using this technologist module as a new way to address learning challenges gives innovative options for an educator. While this is still a fairly new concept, and may lack examples that can help with the understanding, I believe it provides a good basis of an approach for educators to go off of when exploring solutions with a technologist mindset. I think this is a great way to find new methods to address learning challenges. I believe the biggest focus when using this module is to not get caught up with something because it is new and shiny, but to make sure to relate to the main goal of helping the learning challenges.
GIF from giphy.com https://media.giphy.com/media/UWD6pyspC3nI5fXhdF/giphy.gif
Have you ever worked on a presentation or research paper but can’t seem to find the missing pieces to your idea? Guess what, there is a solution and that is Collaboration. Collaboration allows you to communicate and work together with others to share new ideas and solve problems. Through my infographic via Canva, I was able to summarize the Collaborator Module created by Ontario Extend. This module explains in four sections; Explore, Engage, Extend, Empower, how to effectively collaborate as an educator. In other words, “We are all in this together”.
The first section of the module is explore which explains the importance of collaboration. Steven Johnson shares his philosophy on good ideas in terms of “hunches”. A hunch is the starting of a good idea and it is through coming together that collectively you can find the missing piece needed to develop a great ideas. This can be compared to the saying “two heads are better than one”. As a beginning teacher, you enter into this new world and it can be very stressful and scary. However, I found that in collaborating, I was able to learn from other teachers experiences when it comes to discipline, organisation, flexibility, etc. I also found it very useful when designing a lesson, I was able to build upon others ideas instead of reinventing the wheel.
It is our job as educators to explore the different resources that we have to our disposable specifically the wide variety of information we can find online. This also means that unlike before, we now have the power to not only collaborate face-to-face but through social media and texts. Alec Couros explains the value of Twitter as a collaborative tool and the importance of familiarizing ourselves with the hashtags such as #EdChat, #SciChat to stay connect. As a first time Twitter user, the platform has been a valuable resource for me to expand my knowledge and communicate with other educators in my discipline. On numerous occasions, I have had the opportunity to see the papers my colleagues have written and read about their pedagogical journeys. In fact, I met a colleague when doing research in Costa Rica and through social media I am able to keep in contact with him and bounce ideas for future research.
A Personal Learning Network is a mean for connection with other educator via face-to-face communication or online. When creating a PLN you decide the who, what, when, where, why and how. To be more specific, you choose if you want to “lurk”; read others posts or “share”; express your thoughts and opinions. A benefit about a PLN is that the people who you connect with are also associated with other individuals with different knowledges and backgrounds. A PLN is also tailored to your personal interests. M. Lalande explains that his PLN is focused on development in education and therefore he has selectively chosen other individuals who discuss topics such a didactics, pedagogy and tech. When designing my PLN, I would include individuals who’s opinion I value. This would include members of my research lab, influential teachers and professors as well as fellow teacher candidates. I would also include members of the opposing view to ensure that my knowledge is not bias and one sided. I would focus on the topic of science and technology as well as student engagement. I would therefore choose to interact with individuals who have done biology lessons while incorporating the use of technology. I would also have the opportunity to learn from the experience of other teachers with regards to keeping students engaged during class.
Creating a Personal Learning Network takes time and work. Similarly, to teaching, you need to take the time to explore creative way to teach you students, engage with your students and strengthen your connections to build that student-teacher relationship. Howard Rheingold proposes an eight-step process which includes the following when cultivating your PLN: explore, search, follow, tune, feed, engage, inquire and respond. In summary, Rheingold suggests that we must start by getting a sense of the field we are working in and the experts of that area. Once we are informed, we can interact with others. The last couple steps are to both share our ideas, question others and respond to inquiries relating to our work.
In image displaying the filter bubble that surrounds us when we are online.
Eli Parser reminds us that the information we encounter online can be bias and tailored to our search history without our recollection. He warns us that when creating our PLN we need to “Beware of the Online Filter Bubbles” and keep in mind who we are engaging with. He suggests that we should not only connect with people who support our ideas and findings but search for information outside our discipline and opinions. When teaching, we must be aware that we bring biases to the table and that they can come out in our lessons. It is therefore important to have an open mind and provide students with a variety of sources so that the information they are receiving is not one-sided.
A gif demonstrating the power of maping your connections.
Lastly, the module reminds us about the importance of reflecting on our PLN, making improvements and mapping out our future connections. This parallels one of the many hats we wear as teachers. A good educator must reflect upon their lessons and looks to see what went well and what they can do to improve their lesson in the future. When reflecting on your PLN, it is important to identify the “nodes” on your diagram. In using tools like Google Drawing and Coggle you have the ability to visualize the names of the people you connect with, their role and the relationship you have with those nodes.
In conclusion, I think this module did an excellent job at introducing the idea of Personal Learning Networks. I believe that this skill is very valuable and could potentially be introduced in the careers course in high school so that students can start to create their PLNs. As educators, I think we need to take advantage of the connectivity we have online and share our ideas and resources to both improve and discover great ideas.
After reading the Technologist, I made a mind map to help summarize and organize the information. This module discusses the process that teachers should go through when they want to integrate technology into the classroom. As I read through the different parts, I felt that I would now know how to properly plan to integrate technology into the classroom. This guide helps take the guesswork away from know whether technology will be integrated successfully into a teachers lesson and helps restore the teachers confidence in their lesson plan. Educators will be able to implement technology to supplement student learning after reading this module.
Mind Map for the Technologist
I found that making the mind map really help me understand the information. Not only did I have to read all of the information, but the mind map caused me to have to find the key points and summarize the information into a few key points. I ended up drawing inspiration from sketch notes when designing my mind map. Since the module flows in steps, I decided to have my mind map direct the reader to follow the information in a specific order. I did this by including a guiding arrow in the background to show the reader to read the points in the clockwise direction. I also made the key idea clouds progressively change shades. I believe that this allows the reader to gain a better understanding of the order an educator should take when implementing technology into the classroom.
This module explains the steps needed to properly plan technology integration in the classroom. The first step is empathize, and this is where you need to evaluate the needs of the learners, and figure out what their needs are. The next step is define, which is a matter of finding what the challenge will be based on what you previously learned from the students. Once you figure out what the challenge is, you can move on to the ideate step. This is when the educator brainstorms ideas for what technology to use and how to implement it. The fourth step is prototype, which is where you need to do a test and see how it works. This is a great opportunity for feedback. Finally, the last step is connect. This is where the educator needs to make connections to the curriculum. A fun tech activity is only effective if the students learn what they are supposed to once finished. Following these five steps any educator should be able to successfully bring technology into the classroom.
In this post, I will be discussing the “Technologist Model” found on Ontario Extend. As future educators, we must aim to integrate tools that assist in our student’s learning and diminish their challenges and stress. The technologist tool provides educators with modules that allow them to advance their teaching and integrate technology in innovative ways.
For this multimedia reflection, I chose to create a twitter essay. I am not too familiar with social media outlets so this was a challenge I was ready to take on. In terms of difficulty, twitter was somewhat confusing, at first. However, I continued to explore my way through the web and it seemed pretty straightforward. This assignment pushed me out of my comfort zone because it encouraged me to express myself in a relevant and educational manner. At first, the thought of presenting oneself on a huge networking platform under trending hashtags was a bit intimidating, but as I continued, it became an insightful experience that allowed me to become more aware of my networking abilities. Just as the technologist module teaches, I was able to navigate through an unfamiliar digital data and acquaint myself with its tools and purposes.
Technology is a big component of modern education. As educators, we have to design and integrate technological tools that appeal to student learning and broaden their knowledge beyond the digital world. Not only is technology teaching students useful skills and keeping them engaged, but it also enhances the traditional way of teaching.
The “design thinking approach” is a process that seeks to understand the user and provide solutions to problems that may not be apparent at a glance. The process aims to provide a solution-based approach to solving problems and find technology that best suits the user’s abilities. This is one of the most useful models an educator could use in the classroom because it identifies one of the key components that many educators seem to lack in: empathy. By empathizing with student’s learning difficulties, the teacher gains a personal perspective about the student and challenge their assumptions of them which then allows them to find better solutions in improving their student’s learning. In order to understand our students, we must identify their problems and form a grasp of who they are as learners. By identifying the student’s challenges, the teacher can design thinking principles that inspire and motivate student learning.
One of the most effective processes is the SECTIONS model. It takes into account key components that influence technological tools which are students, ease of use, costs, teaching functions, interaction, organisational issues, networking, and security and privacy. When choosing new technology, the SECTIONS model is one practical way to approach decision-making about media and technologies for teaching.
After designing the digital tool, it is important to share one’s creation with colleagues and peers for a second revision. It is useful to gain a second input of one’s creation and work in a team collaboration to ask questions such as “what worked?” or “do you have any ideas for me to consider?” which are questions that encourage one to think “outside of the box” and consider oneself from the student’s perspective.
Overall, the technologist module is a very beneficial teaching process because it integrates a wide topic such as technology and narrows it down to specific models that approach decision-making about what technologies to teach. I, for one, see myself using the “design thinking approach” in my future technology-friendly English classroom.
For my multimedia reflection, I chose to create a sketchnote on the Collaborator module by Ontario Extend. Even though I have never made a sketchnote before, I thought it will be a good idea for this assignment since I consider myself a fairly good artist when it comes to drawing and sketching. The process of creating a sketchnote requires many hours of work and involves a lot of thinking, planning, and creativity. To begin, I watched a couple of Youtube videos to familiarize myself with sketchnoting and what makes a good sketchnote, then I started with my main centre piece idea of the globe and the shaking hands to represent worldwide collaboration. One challenge I experienced while working on my artifact was trying to visualize how all the sections, symbols, notes, and colors will come together at the end of the project.
I personally enjoyed creating a sketchnote because it kept my mind busy as I had to summarize information, make connections between notes and images and choosing the right colors and representations to make it visually appealing. My experience made me think of how helpful sketching noting could be for some students in the classroom as it helps keep their brains focused and engaged, make connections between concepts and images and remember information better.
Professional collaboration among educators is essential to ensure continuous improvement in the teaching practice that will lead to the main goal; student learning, and success. The collaborator module explores ways in which teachers can use technology to build learning networks and professional connections to generate and share ideas for better practice. The module introduces a concept called “Community of Practice” which is a group of people that share the same interest and passion, engage in regular discussions for the purpose of sharing valuable knowledge. Communities of practice can be formal and informal, it can be a book-club you are currently a member of.
Learning is a collective activity and being part of a learning group or network grants us access to useful teaching tools and unlimited resources. These networks are called “Personal Learning Networks”. PLN’s are networks designed for the purpose of learning, in which users/participants can connect with each other, build from each other’s ideas and expand. Users have total control over how much they want to participate and contribute. With the help of digital technology, these networks can connect professionals from all around the world and transform learning into an open space with no limitations and boundaries.
Prior to this course, I wasn’t aware of how I could use networks such as Twitter for professional learning purposes. Other professional users have so much to offer and are willing to share new ideas, methods, and strategies and we don’t know how beneficial this information can be until we get involved. The Collaborator module is a great tool for students who want to build and expand their practice by adding that little touch of technology. I think it is a really well-designed introduction that offers the bases of how we can learn to create PLNs and learn from them. I think a tool as such can be introduced earlier to students (high-school) so they can start thinking about ways they can use the net to grow and develop a sense of responsibility towards their own education.
