Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection- Week 4

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection- Week 4

I attended the Primary Teacher's Strike Day and therefore missed the bulk of the content that was presented.I read through the agenda and looked at all instructional slides etc. I read others' blog posts about the day and commented on them. These gave me some understanding of the content.

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

I continue to be fascinated with the potential of student blog posts to share their learning. The background learning behind each post is rich as students learn, research, create, organise their information into a presentation and put it together as a shared readable post. The sharing of fellow teachers in the same is also interesting. For both teacher and learner a blog tracks learning that can be shared to a wide, global audience as well as providing quality slide shows etc for a variety of audiences close to home.

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

Google Forms: These can be set up for assessment, surveys, story telling, and quizzes. The type of responses range from multi choice to number scales, from short to paragraph answers. There is much versatility in the class programme. We are only just getting our ipads set up so we will have to wait for that before using these forms. 

I created a simple form, as part of my SENCO role,  that will survey teachers about the role of the teacher-aide in their class, aligning it to the job descriptions. I then asked the principal what she thought of it and she suggested also using a similar form as a self assessment for teacher-aides. The two forms would gather different perspectives.  

I then created a form that would gather student voice from my 6 year olds. There had been bothers over the small amount of sport gear in our class and how we were sharing it. The form would allow them and me to evaluate how things were going in that area and present ideas for organising the gear better. Here is the link.
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdyZHomrYL58X1VbU9iKU6_qzqrJ0sQjsPYwrhD-kifEHvVjw/viewform?usp=pp_url

Pick a path stories: I  created a pick a path story outline template. I started using Forms, however I was blocked from continuing as one command was not working for the 'Match the answer to the section'. PS This was found in the lower 3 dots of a section. Thanks Donna Yates!
https://docs.google.com/drawings/d/1TXqZsj5mJggVtRN7WozD6H2QaGxgmQPTTO2W69Bo-P4/edit?usp=sharing

Google Maps: I worked my way through the tutorial about how to layer a map, use the information from a sheet, add markers, change the colour of markers, draw a line to measure distance. I like the way we can embed a link of a map into correspondence. Here is my link to my map I created.

Google Sheets: I have worked with various sheets, collating data across the school in a specific area, sorting and compiling charts from the data and embedding these into reports to the principal and BOT.  I have found these valuable for identifying trends in the data, identifying areas of strength and weakness and forming recommendations accordingly. Student confidentiality is paramount when sharing data and I am reluctant to share some on this post for that reason. My sheets learning has caused me to rethink how I collect SENCO data and through this learning I am designing new Google sheet workbooks that can be charted for my reports to the BOT and principal.

What did I learn that could be used with my learners or workflow in my personal life?

I could use maps to create a local map of where students live, where they went on holiday, how they travel to school, and create a treasure map! Sheets is a useful app. for constructing charts/graphs with even young students as part of statistics learning.  Forms have a wide number of possibilities both at school and in community groups.