EDED20491 AT1 Reflection 1.1
Applying social and ethical protocols and practices when using ICT: I should be totally ready and prepared for this - 9/10. Working for the Department of Defence has seriously increased my knowledge of this criteria. Everything that is posted to a website or on social media must be scrutinised for security, offensive remarks or information that might be detrimental to the organisation. I have stressed, to my own children, the importance of cyber safety and awareness of their on-line presence. I showed my eldest daughter what can happen in the dark web when you don't set your social media profiles to private. That scared the by Jingo out of her! If we are to employ the concepts of SAMR into our teaching practices, then we must embrace resources such as Weebly to help our students learn in new and invigorating ways. The Australian Curriculum states, that teachers must "Implement teaching strategies for using ICT to expand curriculum learning opportunities for students". acce.edu.au/sites/acce.edu.au/files/TTF%20-%20Graduate%20Teacher%20Standards%20-%20ICT%20Elaborations%20-%20200411.pdf Investigating with ICT: I have a lot of research experience and have reasonably advanced search skills, or so I thought until we had the library lecture at the Residential School, where I learnt so many new tricks. As part of my preparedness program, I will further investigate these strategies so that I WILL be ready for the classroom. I'll give myself a score of 8 for this category. Creating with ICT: I score a 7 here. I can design and modify a range of digital solutions, but there are so many to explore. Museum visitors hail from diverse backgrounds and knowledge levels, so I have created exhibitions and interpretation modes that are accessible to varied audiences. Budget restrictions and how technology is embraced by cohorts have an enormous impact on what we can use in an educational setting. I need to improve my own skills in developing apps and interactive technologies in order use ICT's effectively in the classroom. Managing and Operating ICT: I have worked for two State Governments and the Federal Government, so I understand about networking and the implications of changes made to material. I store my data in some thousand-and-one places, just in case... This category gets an 8. If I was to use Weebly in the classroom, I would become the page administrator to ensure the material posted was appropriate and avoid potential disasters such as having data overwritten. Communicating with ICT: an 8 for this one. Using digital resources and communicating with them can have its drawbacks. One challenge is to keep everything up-to-date and consistent across authors. Another problem is comprehension. Moodle, moodle, moodle - what do I doodle?? My biggest problem was trying to work out where on moodle I could find the requirements for this task. Complex tasks can become confusing if the technology used does not come with instructions. Unless, of course, the ambiguity is designed to be part of the learning process?
Emotional response leads to better learningEDED20491 AT1 Reflection 1.2Before attending Residential School, at the start of this course, I explored the e-learning tool of Moodle. I was excited by the concepts presented and the method of teaching using ICT. I have always valued ICT as a learning and teaching tool. I am a visual and emotional person, so learning in this manner is far more interesting to me than sitting in a lecture theatre taking copious notes.
Museum visitors expect to have some sort of visual or emotional experience when they enter a gallery. Objects presented without accompanying information hold no real meaning. If you write a basic label, then people know what the object is, but they find it hard to make a connection. As soon as you talk about the person who owned the object, the experience becomes more real. Adding media, such as video or soundscapes, creates a new level of interaction and the experience becomes more intense. Visitors are left with a lingering feeling that helps them recall the information that was presented. It is the same in a classroom. Providing an emotional connection to a subject will assist students with their learning process. They might talk with their peers about what they have just learnt, to maintain the emotions that they have just experienced, or possibly work through those emotions if they found the information confronting. My approach to teaching is akin to my approach to museum interpretation. I derive great personal pleasure from observing people interact with displays. If my students are engaged and respond well to my teaching methods, that would be wonderful. I do understand that history and HASS are not everyone’s cup of tea. Schools are not museums, but museum audiences are diverse, just like students. When one exhibition is less successful than another, I think about what I could have done differently or better. It will be the same with my teaching practices. I will endeavour to find the most creative pedagogy to illicit the best response from my students in each class. As educators, we must make sure to present information in an ethical manner. History becomes a minefield when trying to get the facts right. It is essential to provide information from reliable sources and it will be my job as a teacher to help students become discerning when conducting research. The internet is a wonderful research tool, but it is also fraught with dangers. What can I do to ensure the students are searching in the correct places and presenting appropriate information? One of the first things will be to explain the pitfalls of using Wikipedia! People learn in various ways – visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinaesthetic. My aim will be to present students with information in a creative manner, then point them in the directions where they can discover more. I will be encouraging them to find new sources of information. They could ask their grandparent questions, like an oral history task, to discover an alternative method of learning. I will need to adapt my pedagogy to be inclusive to assist various types of learners find the method that suits them the best. When learning becomes an enjoyable emotional experience, students will want to engage more, just as museum visitors will want to return. The enjoyment doesn’t have to be derived from feel-good emotions. Negative emotions (such as grief) can also have an impact – it is that ‘lingering’ feeling that encourages people to learn more. If I am an engaging teacher, that will help build positive relationships with the students. If I present information in an interactive manner that creates an emotional response, that will hopefully entice the students to attend each class with enthusiasm. Being able to retain information, because of the emotional connection, will enhance learning and improve academic performance. School then becomes a place that children want to visit, just like a museum visitor wants to return. Changing exhibitions, adopting technology and using it to convey meaning, are essential to the future of museums. Likewise, adapting pedagogy to suit the audience and using ICT in the classroom is essential to the future of education. Illustrations all Creative Commons Help meeeeeee-learning!EDED20491 AT1 Reflection 1.3Learning vs distance education certainly has its challenges. Navigating the e-learning tools seemed to be easy when I first looked at it. I soon realised there was much more to the program than flicking through some web pages. There is so much material to explore! Each page contains embedded videos or links to external sources. With varying locations to access assessment requirements, I became confused as to which category to click on and where to find my information. The weekly embedded reflections task has taken me 10 times longer than it should have, simply because I couldn’t discern what the actual requirements were. How many words should I use? The blogs need to be informative but should they be informal? AGHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!
It has taken me almost 2 weeks to get my head around the Moodle site. That is a LOT of wasted time. I have always been reluctant to ask for help, but I’m realising that is silly. If I am to get through this course successfully, I must collaborate with other students. My brain feels like is a mass of glug. Take a breath, lift my head, look around, go out into the garden (I haven’t seen the sun for a week) and take another deep breath. It might be time to reach out and phone a friend…
12 Comments
Toni Grant
14/3/2017 18:07:53
Wow Amanda,
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Amanda
23/4/2017 23:38:03
Thank you for being the first one to comment Toni! I really appreciate it :)
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Chantel
15/3/2017 08:35:38
WOW!!!!! I know who to come to for help!!! Amazing blog :-)
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Amanda
19/3/2017 15:36:40
Thank you Chantel. I'd be happy to collaborate. I'm not sure if I'm grasping the topics well yet, but I'm finding the layout part of blogging fun!
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Annette Sercombe
15/3/2017 10:41:30
Hi Amanda
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Amanda
19/3/2017 15:41:20
I'm glad you enjoyed my blogs Annette. The second round of reflections proved much more difficult as I found the topics more difficult to write about. It's not necessarily about how good the site looks, more about content and getting your message across. Visual tools help me in my thought process.
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Amanda
21/3/2017 10:32:38
Thank you Ella!
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amanda
20/3/2017 16:15:20
what can i say you have no worries,I am in awe of your talents.
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Amanda
21/3/2017 10:40:04
Thank you so much Amanda,
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Amanda
23/4/2017 23:36:00
Thanks Andrew,
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AuthorAmanda is a museum curator and pre-service teacher, learning how to integrate technology with education to design creative learning tools for secondary school students. Archives
May 2017
Topic 6: Growing your pedagogy
Embedded Task 3 Embedded Task 2 Reflections 4.1-4.3 Embedded Task 1 Reflections 3.1-3.3 Reflections 2.1-2.2 Refelections 1.1-1.3 Categories |