Success is Relative

When I found out that I was transferring to the school I am currently at, I was told that my skill set (integration of technology and building relationships) was going to be a really good thing for the students at the school. With the end of the school year approaching fast, I have been reflecting on and processing what I was told.

I have always been a firm believer in meeting my students where they are at and helping them build and grow based on the skills and attitudes they demonstrate to me. No two classes are the same so why would I expect to engage in the same "recipe" I may have used with the last class? Every group helps me set a customized path for them and I have to say that I am really proud of where my students started this year and where they will end. Let me explain.

The school I work at has a large population of newcomers to Canada. In my classroom alone the majority of the class is made up of students that have not been in Canada very long. Just today I was looking around the room as the students were working and was fascinated with the cultural diversity. There are students in my class from Sudan, Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Isreal, to name a few locations. English is not their first language and as they are learning to speak, read, and write English they have been open to building positive relationships with me and their classmates and have been open to the use of technology to learn and demonstrate their learning.

Some of the things I have introduced them to has blown their minds. 3D printing, virtual reality, coding, Google Drive, and the use of audio/video are examples of things I have introduced them to for the experience and for them to consider as options to help them with their learning and their demonstration of learning.

The introduction and integration of the technology I have mentioned above has come differently than any other class I have worked with. My experience at this school has required me to teach in a way that I have never experienced before. It's hard to explain the shift but it was a necessary one. The student make up of the class in front of me is largely made up of ELLs, students with special needs, and "neurotypical" students. I have worked in a variety of schools in a variety of locations and none of my prior experiences come close to what I have been experiencing this school year. Having said that, it has been a special year and has been a good change for me for a variety of reasons.

My focus with this class was to build relationships and learn how to "reach" them so they would learn and achieve. The integration of tech took a backseat because It didn't feel like it was appropriate to engage in the way I have done so in the past. As I learned how to teach the students in my class this year, and built good relationships with them, I started to feel more comfortable taking risks with my learning which led me to start introducing them to learning that would require them to take risks. Together, we have been able to engage in some pretty awesome stuff. Those experiences have only strengthened relationships and led to more risk taking with our learning.

I had a moment late last week which has led me to this blog post. As I was conferencing with a few students, I looked up and saw the following:

1) students talking about the Father's Day gifts that the 3D printer was printing,
2) students working on a writing activity using Google Slides,
3) students discussing the YouTube video that we would create for our Math coach,
4) students speaking in English and their home languages as they worked on the items I mentioned above.

Success is relative. It looks different depending on your circumstances. I can say, with full confidence, that this group has found success this school year.

The Spark

A couple of weeks ago I emailed all the teachers at my school and asked if anyone had any interest in learning about 3D printing.

No one responded to the email. I was feeling low, but realized that we were in the middle of writing progress reports.

I decided that I would approach a few people and talk to them - face to face. Before I could get out of my classroom three staff members approached me about my email! I was feeling high again - ready to chat with and support teachers and students who want to bring their ideas to life with respect to their learning at school.

One of the grade 6 teachers decided to dive into 3D printing by allowing his students to spend some time playing with Tinkercad in order to familiarize themselves with the software they would be using. The next step involved providing them with an assignment to create a key-chain with specific dimensions. The teacher was a bit apprehensive but also quite excited about the process his students would enter into.

You can imagine how happy I was when two of his students came to my door late this week to ask if they could print their key-chains. They were excited to see the machine and how it worked. We loaded their stl files into Makerbot and hit print. They were mesmerized as the machine started to do its magic.

A few hours later they were holding their key-chains and amazed at how they had visualized what they wanted to create. They put their thoughts into action to get their ideas out of their heads - into a computer - and then finally into the palm of their hands.

The classroom teacher was full of excitement as he talked to his students about their key-chains. He talked to them about the success criteria attached to the assignment, asked them to reflect on it, and together we made notes about how the machine works and how to maximize what the technology can do and the connection to the design process.

I left school on Friday feeling good about the support I was able to provide the teacher and his students and look forward to what comes next with respect to their learning and bringing it to life with the 3D technology.

As I was pondering this blog post this morning, I received a message from one of the Grade 3 teachers asking about providing him support this coming week with the technology. Of course I said yes and can’t wait to see what his ideas are and how his students respond to the challenges that will be presented.

Sometimes, a spark is needed to get people to take a risk and try something new - something they are not comfortable/familiar with. When it comes to technology and its integration into the classroom I don’t necessarily need a spark, but I recognize that others do. These teachers have started their learning journey - I can’t wait to see and hear their students in action as they embark on the same risk taking that their teachers have undertaken.

Jumping into Deep Learning

Last year my students and I participated in a twitter chat about New Pedagogies for Deep Learning during their annual global event. It was such a great experience that I made it a priority point to participate in this years event. As I kept my eyes open for information about this years conference, I stumbled across this tweet from our 21st Century Learning Consultant, Ferdinand Krauss:

Ferdinand's tweet encouraged students and teachers to participate in this years NPDL deep learning task. He also attached the task and other important information:

Thanks to Ferdinand, I had everything I needed to get started with my students. The prompt involved students to think about "What the world needs now" and to share their ideas to develop global competencies in our school/town/city/nation. The students started by taking a look at the UN Sustainable Goals website. We decided that each student would research one of the sustainable goals and then share their knowledge/new learning using 1 google slide. Once the students finished their slide, they would share it with me and I put them all together into a single slide show.

At this point we seemed ready and excited to share our preparation for the global discussion. As a class, we had accumulated information about the sustainable goals and looked forward to applying some of our knowledge to talk about what we think the world needs right now. We tweeted out our work and responded to people who were following the #npdlworldneeds tag on twitter. 

People were seeing our work and tweeting about it and connecting with us. Things started to feel "real" for the students and they had a 'global' audience that could could interact with.

We were especially fortunate to connect with two educators from our school board who were in attendance at the NPDL conference in Vancouver - Kelly Roberts (WCDSB Research Coordinator) and Richard Setler (VP at St. Kateri Tekawitha). They provided us with prompts to consider and and even recorded a video for us while they were at the conference.

We responded to their video by creating a quick one of our own...

Within a week of returning from Vancouver, Richard and Kelly connected with our class via Google Hangout to share their experience and to continue to prompt the students to think deeper and to work on using the NPDL competencies to analyze situations and problem solve. 

Shortly after this hangout Richard reached out to us with a wonderful opportunity to work with a grade 1/2 class at his school.

The students were more than happy to oblige.

This new connection with Ms. V and her grade 1/2 students is proving to be an excellent learning opportunity. The grade 4/5 students are happy to help out the primary students and are challenging themselves with the questions/prompts coming from Richard and Ms. V. The discussions have been deep - allowing students to think about their perspectives and then explain their thinking. Students are respectfully challenging each others thoughts/opinions while they decide what information they want to provide the grade 1/2 students with. 

Having gone back and forth over Twitter, we are now working on bringing the students face to face in a Google Hangout. 

We are scheduled to meet with Ms. V's class early next week. The students are really looking forward to it. As their classroom teacher, I am quite impressed with the effort they are putting into this activity as I observe them work through it. Thanks to Richard and Ms. V, I am provided with the opportunity to assess my students with respect to the skill sets known as the 6C's (see below). My assessment will help me determine where my students are at with respect to the competencies and what my next steps will be to help my students attain the skills needed to excel in our complex world. 

Screen shot taken from http://npdl.global/

iPads in Action: Acquiring Knowledge

A short while ago my students learned about two spelling/word study apps and how to use them on the iPad and iPod Touch. As I was circulating the room observing and speaking with my students, one pair got my attention.

It wasn't their use of the technology that I gravitated towards - it was the support that one student was offering the other. As I was listening to them interact I managed to get the digital camera with the hope that I would catch some of what was happening on video. This is what I captured:

The one student reads the directions to the other, she tells him it's "ok", she reads him the options, she supports him, she also lets him use the iPad without simply doing it for him. The supportive and accommodating student bridges a gap for the other. If he were on his own he would have given up quite quickly and would have most likely challenged/disrupted this experience for the others in the room. What's worse is that he would have possibly connected the technology to his bad experience - leaving a bad taste in his mouth making him less likely to be excited to use the devices again. Obviously, that is not what I want - I want the touch technology integration to be a positive experience for all my students, particularly my students who often struggle. It was good for me to see a supportive student and a struggling student in order to acquire knowledge to inform my practice and our TLLP project.

My students and I are learning about the touch devices in action. They are learning how to use them to improve their achievement and I am learning how to integrate them into our school. We want to become "experts" in using these 'tools' so that we can improve our achievement and prepare to model the use of the devices with our autistic students who will start their journey using these devices in my classroom environment, with my awesome students.

Feel free to jump in and assist me in this process by providing me with your questions/comments!