DFI Day 9 - EXAM DAY

 

So Day 9 of my DFI experience was EXAM DAY! All week I was hitting the notes and practicing when I could to revise as much of what I have learned over the past 8 weeks.  It has been a very long time since I have sat a 3 hour exam lol...... suffice to say I had got just a little worked up about it all :-)

I am pleased to report that I finished the exam with about 1/2 hour to spare and answered every question.  It was a challenge but I really enjoyed it.  Going over the scenarios was a way of remembering what I had learned and jogging the memory as you worked through them.

Thank you to my facilitator Vicky Archer who has been an amazing teacher and support person throughout this journey.  Not only is she a wonder of knowledge but a very very patient person too.  Being able to share ideas and listen to others in our little digital bubble was just great, and I loved how well we got to know each other and how much at ease we all were as the weeks went on.

I have a much better grasp on the Manaiakalani Kaupapa after listening to Dorothy each week introduce all the concepts and have a real appreciation on the impact this has had on our school, our teachers and our students learning.  Digital technology is ever-changing and Manaiakalani work so hard to keep everyone up with the latest info.

Upon reflection of the past 9 weeks, I was very sceptical about coming away from my office once a week and honestly thought I was way past the 'learning gag' however I am so pleased my Principal gave me the opportunity to be involved and I have gained a huge amount of knowledge, a new profound appreciation for our teachers and students and their online learning, and have met some really lovely people along the way.  My challenge to myself now, is to implement some of that new knowledge in my daily practice and to endeavour to keep up with my new Blog.   Watch this space......

I am now celebrating my new qualification earned My New DFI Badge - so proud of this and it was such fun earning it to.

Day 8 of my DFI Experience

Computational Thinking!  Wow.... so as we got into exploring the concepts of computational thinking I quickly came to realize that is some ways I am, and have been for a while a computational thinker :-)

Looking into the many aspects of this concept is really quite mind blowing especially to see what is available to our teachers as resources to implement great learning environments with their students. Not only on line but offline (unplugged).  This gets our students using 'Algorithms' i.e. step by step instructions on how to reach a desired outcome.  The scope in using this is huge. Developing digital minds in our students, and ourselves is imperative in this ever changing digital world of ours. I have high praise to all you teaches out there and how hard you work to get all these resources to be available to your students

The Future of Technology is pretty scary, especially looking at it from the 'moral' point of view and we played around with that concept in a deep dive with Maria, which gave us all a great deal of 'food for thought'.

Once again, it was neat to touch on the Manaiakalani Kaupapa and today it was around empowered learners and teachers. As always Dorothy was full off interesting and pertinent information for us to take on board

Vicki talked us through the steps of registering for our 'exam' next week and gave us a few tips. Thank you Vicki.

Last, but definitely not the least we looked at Coding, to be honest I think I will leave the teaching of our wonderful tamariki to the experts.....our awesome teachers...... this coding thing takes up way too much brain power lol.  We spent some time creating with code. I did not get too far into it but here is the start of my experiment with coding, which has huge room for improvement and maybe I will find some time to improve on it.  1st Coding effort

Day 7 DFI Experience

So we had some fun with an IPAD looking at just how CLEVER our students are.  We also spent some time on a Chromebook looking at how it functions.  My conclusion is our kids are just awesome to be able to work with these devices!

First attempt of Drawing on my whiteboard on an IPAD and first attempt at recording

We also spent some time learning how to screencastify, an interesting tool that I could see teachers and students benefiting from - a played around with this concept on some of our ncea credit information ​ 

We heard some more words of wisdom from Dorothy on the Teacher Hapara Dashboard and Fiona Grant shared her knowledge on the Manaiakalani Pedogogy around Cypersmart for our learners.

We then looked at the manaiakalani journey for chromebooks and how they worked to implement this concept in our schools. There was some very hard work from the manaiakalani team to get people onboard with the concept, not so much the students and their whanau but the outside world.

Day 6 DFI

Once again, another full on learning day again for Day 6 of my DFI experience.  I am really getting into this now. Feeling comfortable and confident with my awesome digital group and I thank them for sharing their knowledge and their feedback.

Today we spent most of our time on building/updating our Google Sites.  Last week, in Week 5 of DFI, was the first time I have looked at google sites.  Today I spent more time on my new google site and I am really pleased with how it is looking. Click here to see progress so far

Day 5 DFI - Collaborative Sites

So Day 5 was yet another awesome day of learning with the company of great like-minded people. My bubble group leader Vicki is just fantastic, so easy to listen to and to understand, thank you Vicki. Today we concentrated on setting up our own google site. Very daunting idea, I must say, for someone who is not one of you fantastic teachers however, with the good fortune of having Dorothy Burt all to myself for an hour, and her excellent insight and encouragement, I am quite pleased with my progress so far in setting up my google site. After looking at the shared resource from Dorothy on Tech Toolkit for Families I decided that Bay of Islands College should have a google site promoting cybersmart information for parents and their learners. Made some good progress and is now a work in progress with the input from our Principal. See link Thank you to the team of facilitators, you are always so willing to share your knowledge. I am looking forward to spending some time next week on two toolkits I have signed up for (never thought I would take part in these) and working on my new google site. For now I will take a well earned break from the computer screen and pop up to the school and catch up with what needs doing before the weekend. 

DFI Day 4 WOW

 Day 4 of my DFI experience proved to be full of learning as previous days.  The 'Connecting with Manaiakalani' topic today was 'Share' as part of the 'Learn, Create, Share' Motto. It is just amazing how the concept of sharing has exploded over the years and how the concept of sharing has changed. 

We covered Hapara Hot tips again and then we went into Google Forms.  This was just awesome, learning heaps of new stuff and sharing my creations on my blog was cool.

We also did a session on creating a google sheet for the purposes of data analysis. I have already shared some of my creations, which I really enjoyed making.

Google Maps was a cool session, learning new tips on making my own google maps

Day 4 DFI Blog Analysis First Attempt

Day 4 DFI Learning - My Google Map 1st attempt

Another animated google slide - having fun

Google Draw 1st Attempt

About Me Blog

Day 3 DFI Experience - Even more stuff learn :-)

Wow,  so day three of my DFI experience is now done and dusted.  So much interesting stuff to learn and getting to know some of my fellow DFIer's a little better.

Firstly we learned some new Hapara Hot Tips, I now have a teacher dashboard set up so I can navigate my way around all our awesome classrooms. 

It was awesome to hear Dorothy speak about the 'Create' concept of the Manaiakalani Pedagogy; Learn Create Share.  We all shared how we were able to connect with our creative side during the 'lockdown' period which just showed me that when forced to take some time out, we all have a great creative energy.

Dorothy shared with us how creative our young learners can become, showing us examples of the great stuff students create which in turn empowers their learning.

Our Deep Dive today was around Media. Looking at SISOMO (sight, sound and motion). I have had some great fun today looking at google draw, google slides and You Tube  Video

I found the google slides and incredibly interesting tool and I look forward to spending some quiet time learning my way around this. Google Draw was also a cool tool to look at.

Thank you to Makaore and then Nicola for sharing your awesome knowledge on Google slides.

You have already seen my first attempt at a google slidehow here on my blog and I look forward to trying this again. 

I look forward to taking some quiet time to reflect on all the learning today and to what wonderful things the team will be teaching us next week. Bring on Week 4

Playing with Animation in Google Slides

Day 2 of my DFI Experience

So Day 2 of my Manaiakalani DFI experience was just as mind boggling but full of lots more knowledge as Day 1.  I have got to know the great people in my digital bubble group, led by the awesome Vicki Archer, a bit better too.

Above is the video that I was clever enough to do (clever for a moment anyway) after setting up a google meet group with fellow DFI learner Lyn from Greymouth.  I presented in that google meet and then recorded Lyn and my discussion about what I was sharing. This is the actual student blog I chose to present and talk about with Lyn.  http://pslochiet.blogspot.com/2020/05/mothers-day-writing.html

It took some real concentration but I did feel a great sense of achievement once successful :-)

I have also managed to take another big lot of knowledge from our Chalk 'n Talk, Explore and Deep Dive sessions today. Some good tips around working with my Gmail, my calendar and trying to keep my tabs in some sort of manageable order...... lots to work on for the next week.

It was also very interesting to hear Dorothy speak about the Learn part of the Learn-Create-Share kaupapa. 

The Hapara Hot Tip was a good one and I now need to touch base with our IT facilitator in our school Kerry to give me access to Hapara so I can 'star' some of my favourite classes I would like to be a part of.

All in all, another information packed full day.  Thank you to my Principal Edith Painting-Davis for allowing me to do this course.

DFI Day one experiences

So today I spent the day learning some amazing stuff.  I started off very enthusiastic, dropped into a OMG this is so much to take in and then from there it was..... my brain is overloaded!!😅

However I got to join some other like minded people on a learning journey that I know I will gain some long lifetime skills from.

I now have a much better understanding of the Manaiakalani Education Trust, its origins, its success so far and more importantly its vision for digital learning in the future.

Dorothy, you are a wonder to listen to, thank you for sharing your knowledge today and I look forward to learning more from you in the next 9 weeks.  Vicki, my digital group guru, thank you for being so easy to connect with and for being such a patient teacher.

Unfortunately my brain is so overflowing I dont think I can pinpoint any one or two things that I have learnt but judging by the fogginess of the brain I have crammed it full of new stuff.

I look forward to next week with bated breath. See you all next week

Nau mai, haere mai ki tēnei taonga

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