Day 4 DFI Manaiakalani

I’ve been using Google Sites for quite some time now. I'm planning on setting a goal to improve more creative aspects for my classroom site. Merely experimenting with the layout and button options on the site helped make my sites look more inviting and entertaining. 

Rather than describe everything I’ve worked on today, I would prefer to simply show you. Please see the links below. 

MultiModal: Holes, the Novel by Louis Sachar: Because Holes is such a long novel for level ⅞’s multimodal can be a useful aspect for the lower level learners. The site includes supplementary documentation that can aid lower level students with visuals. This can be directly related to the T literacy technique taught in the DFI Cohort Day 4 which focuses on a wider sense of reading with a specific focus area to promote cognitive participation amongst students.

 https://sites.google.com/glentaylor.school.nz/multitextdatabase/home

‘My Planning Site’: will focus on easy links & planning for each strand in the NZ curriculum. This is personally useful as a new teacher in New Zealand and will likely help me develop an arsenal of lesson plans & templates over the next couple of years. 

https://sites.google.com/glentaylor.school.nz/sandpitsite/home

Overall, a very productive day! Thank you once again to Gerhard and Dorothy for their patience with everyone!

Day 3 DFI Manaiakalani

Today we focused a bit more on the 'Create' portion of the Manaiakalani saying of "Learn, Create, Share." This included focusing on Youtube, Google Drawing & Google Slides.

Personally, I've never had the opportunity to create an animation of Google Slides. If I'm being honest, I wasn't necessarily willing to attempt it due to the time commitment but after practicing in the DFI today, I can see how it could be beneficial for my students. There are several variables that can be arranged to make this a fairly creative assignment and it could be utilized cross-curricular to ensure growth in different subjects along with digital knowledge growth. In other words - endless opportunities to say the least! I do believe I should have done something a little more productive during my 'Create' portion of the DFI today, but I was having such fun with this dinky animation, I decided to continue it. You can see the masterpiece down below.

Google Drawing was one of the applications that I found a little too complicated - similar to Google Hangouts. Despite this, I know many of my students know how to use the application so it's critical I learn & practice more down the road. For now, I would prefer to keep my artistic abilities (or lack thereof) limited to Google Slides. I can see how this application can prove beneficial for my students but as a new teacher, the time commitment is difficult to schedule.

              Though I'm a bit of a veteran when it comes to Youtube, I found it useful for learning to put together playlists with the settings adjusted for Education. This would also allow me to upload photos of the class and since the privacy settings are adjusted, students and subsequently myself would be safe.

Day 2 DFI Manaiakalani

• What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy?

Implementing more digital literacy cross-curricular. Particularly, the SLJ Summer program blogs were great examples of how teachers would support that Learn, Create, Share perspective that follows along with Bloom's Taxonomy through Manaiakalani. I thought this activity was particularly interesting with the student developing their own personal questions for Sir. Edmund Hillary.

• What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

- Personally, I struggle with organizational methods and on that note... closing down my computer on a regular basis. Usually, I have so many tabs open, it's not worth it for me to close down my computer no matter how slow it's going. The introduction to OneTab today is a bit of a game-changer when it comes to my organizing skills. On top of this, it allows saving all my tabs while my computer restarts rather than hoping Google Chrome would reboot with all my tabs.

• What did I learn that could be used with my learners? 

I found the Google Hangouts feature could be potentially useful with my students, especially on days when I'm away. This could also be fairly useful in their Manaiakalani Film Festival preparations.

Again, many of these digital apps & extensions can prove useful for students who are struggling in specific areas.

Ex: Using Google Keep for students who have trouble focusing to help them try to keep on task.

In case I'm not in class (such as every Friday), I can see Google Hangouts to be effective in any kind of consolidation circumstance while I'm away.

Having an assignment in mind and reviewing work from the week could be cast to the TV in my room and I can answer any questions from the assignments I left them for Fridays.

• What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow in my personal life?

Though I've used Google Calendars for years, I've always thought I was forced to have just one calendar for everything.

Learning that I was capable of having my work and life calendar's separate makes things a little easier when it comes to organizing events.

In terms of confidence, many of these applications will need practice. Particularly the Quicktime Player & Google Hangouts being utilized in unison.