Introducing Miss P.'s Technology

Hello again!

EDIT*

Long time no...type? I am excited to announce that my vision for the future has come to fruition in the form of 3 vlog posts published on Youtube (after a failed attempt at Google Classroom). If you are interested in learning some technological tips and tricks that you can use in the classroom, please visit my vlogs and check out my Youtube playlist. *

OR

You can watch them right here:

The "Why"

The purpose of my vlogs are to assist teachers who struggle with integrating technology into their classrooms or for teachers looking for fresh ideas to engage their 21st century learners. Technology can be overwhelming and frustrating but I think it is integral to effective instruction in the digital age. As indicated by Richardson (2012), The National Council of Teachers of English (NTCE) published a list of digital literacies indicative of the success of people in this technological era:

• Build relationships with others to pose and solve problems collaboratively and cross-culturally
• Design and share information for global communities to meet a variety of purposes
• Manage, analyze and synthesize multiple streams of information
• Create, critique, analyze and evaluate multimedia texts
• attend to the ethical responsibilities required by these complex environments

It is the responsibility of teachers to ensure that their students have had experience exploring and developing these digital literacies; therefore, technology must be incorporated authentically in our daily practice. According to the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) (2000), "Today’s classroom teachers must be prepared to provide technology-supported learning opportunities for their students…being prepared to use technology and knowing how that technology can support student learning must be integral skills in every teacher’s professional repertoire" (p.2). 

From my experience, it is not that teachers are unaware of the need to teach with/about technology, it is that they do not know how to effectively use said technology. I believe my vlogs will be a stepping stone in enabling these teachers to feel successful in exploring technology with their students. 

The reason behind my choice of content delivery has to do with the fact that teachers are extremely busy and from conversations I have had with my staff, it is apparent that they would be more inclined to watch content than read content. In terms of technology education, research tells us that online professional development's benefits are two-fold because students are learning the course content while unintentionally learning technological skills through accessing and engaging in the course content (Norton & Hathaway, 2015). Additionally, as stated by Bie, Liu, and Xu (2014), "[in] the new information age, information technology should also become an important driving force of the professional development of teachers. They are inseparable" (p.1957). If the goal is to foster digital literacy within our students, we must first learn to be technologically literate ourselves. 

Personal Learning Network

I have chosen to share my vlogs on Google Classroom via this blog and my _teachingtinyhumans_ Instagram account. I also approached the primary team at my school and asked if they would be interested in viewing the videos once they were complete. Overall, the response was positive from my co-workers and I even asked a friend to preview my vlogs before I posted them. The feedback I was given was that the tutorials were too long (believe it or not the ones you will see are actually the shortened versions). She also suggested adding the music and icons to break the videos up and make them more engaging for the audience. I took her advice to heart and after many edits, I came up with the final product posted on Google Classroom.

Challenges

Many unforeseen technological (and human) challenges came up throughout the creation of my final product. Camtasia, the application I used to film the videos, crashed multiple times and I lost all my content (multiple times) because I kept forgetting to save. To be fair, that is probably technology rule #1 so I should have known better. I also gained a newfound respect for vloggers... I found it so challenging to speak succinctly and would find myself going off on tangents even though I had a set of notes detailing what I had wanted to speak about. Can you say, "take two"? This realization changed the direction of my vlogs because I originally had wanted to create one vlog showcasing multiple technologies (e.g., SeeSaw, GoNoodle, Class Dojo, Scratch, and FreshGrade) all in one but I knew if I had gone through with that plan, one vlog would have ended up being over an hour long. 

Additionally, I had actually planned to film all the vlogs on my school computer because I wanted to show exactly how to use the SMART board, not just SMART Notebook. Unfortunately, any downloads such as Camtasia are unauthorized so this wasn't a possibility which is why at one point I had to manoeuvre my laptop around the room to demonstrate the functions of my document camera. The last, and WORST, challenge I came across was the discovery that Camtasia layers a watermark over videos that have been created via the free trial so all of my finished products have a large watermark across them. If the vlogs become popular and the staff at my school or other teachers show interest I will invest in buying the annual Camtasia package but for right now I am unwilling to spend the $334.66 CAN. I had used Camtasia years ago and the watermark had not been implemented at the time so I had no idea my videos would be watermarked until it was too late. 😭

More technological issues arose unbeknownst to me regarding Google Classroom. Unfortunately, the access code I previously provided was not allowing people to view what I had created. Despite my best efforts I couldn't seem to resolve the issue which is why I had to switch my sharing platform to YouTube.* I will be sharing the new link to my YouTube playlist with my staff at Primary Team meeting as well as with my Instagram followers.

Reflection

I am hoping that the vlogs I have created are actually useful for some teachers because I would like the opportunity to continue vlogging and exploring technological tools. I learned a lot just by playing with SMART Notebook and, as I stated in one of my vlogs, that is how I have taught myself most things to do with technology. I think the best way for people to become familiar with technology is to use it! Through creating vlogs I learned new things about SMART Notebook which I have already used with my students since filming. I also learned that I need to work on speaking more succinctly which is something I think I could improve on through creating more vlogs. Lastly, I regret not checking what my final product on Camtasia would look like but that was a learning moment for me and now I will know to always look for that in the future. 

Out of all the projects I have done since graduating with my B.Ed. I think this has been the most practical. I actually learned tools and techniques that I can apply directly to my work, while also identifying areas of improvement for myself in regards to communication. I am hopeful that this will continue to be a practical experience for me and I can take what I have learned from this course/project and carry it with me into developing my PLN and digital literacies.

Thank you for your time!

Take care,

Miss P. 💕

References

Bie, M., Liu, D. C., & Xu, Y. X. (2014). The use of information technology to promote professional development: Studies in teacher education. Applied Mechanics and Materials, 568-570, 1955-1958. doi:10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.568-570.1955 Link

International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE). (2000).

National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) for teachers. Retrieved from http://cnets.iste.org/teachers/

Norton, P., & Hathaway, D. (2015). Teachers' online experience: Is there A covert curriculum in online professional development? Journal of Technology and Teacher Education, 23(4), 509. Link

Richardson, W. (2012). Why School?: How Education Must Change When Learning and Information Are Everywhere [Kindle Single]. TED Conferences.