Task 1: What’s in your bag?
Hello everyone! My name is Navid and I am a science and math teacher in Vancouver. I am currently enrolled in my 9th and 10th course in the MET program and will be graduating this spring. I am using my daily backpack that I use for work both during school hours and afterwards, hopefully showing insight to who I am as a person.
Laptop and Charger: The most important objects that I use every day for my profession as an educator are my laptop and its charger. Its importance in text and technology is that I use it to project the videos, powerpoints, and assignments while also using it when I can for PhET simulations. In my math classes I use it as a tool to project and complete questions by using it as a tablet. Although it was an affordable option for a device with nearly no memory space, it has lasted five years with me and has been thrown, crushed, soaked, and bent in every way yet continues to do its function, just a replacement charger once when the other one was too wet to function.
Water Bottle: The second most important part of my backpack is my water bottle. I have a 1.5L yeti bottle to keep me engaged and alert in class and afterwards, especially when coaching a practice or covering a Physical Education class.
Science Data Booklet: When I assist students they are often missing their data booklet with the periodic table, solubility charts, etc. This text-based resource is similar to their textbook, and allows them to refer back to a form of written authority, with myself providing guidance and for the students to add notes to this data booklet. Unfortunately my camera quality was poor but for the seven diatomic elements, HOFBrINCl, I have highlighted them as a reminder for students and insist they highlight them as well as they need to often be ingrained by the time they enter university.
Markers and Writing Utensils: I use these to teach on the board and when students are working on their own inquiry tasks or math problems. They allow me to highlight, communicate, and create solutions and assist students with their learning.
Wrist Straps: I often have time at lunch or before class to use the gym and go for a round of weightlifting. As one of my new passions it shows one of my interests in lifting and maintaining a balance with work and my health. The deodorant goes hand in hand after the subsequent shower.
Sunscreen: As a human anatomy teacher I often teach about health and the causes of cancer, who would I be if I did not take my own advice. I often take my students outside to teach them in an outdoor space or I walk to work when given the opportunity in spring, summer, and fall so I often have some sunscreen bottles at the bottom of my bag.
Tutoring Notebook: After school ends I tutor university students in chemistry and physics, I use my notebook for problems in tandem with the writing utensils to guide students for conceptual understanding.
Coaching binder and folder: Lastly I coach at my local high school the basketball team and several other teams, as we are currently in the winter season basketball is the sport hence I have my playbook in the red binder and my folder for stats sheets in the Spalding folder.
The key text technologies in my backpack are my laptop that I use to engage with the technological world and to teach my students, secondly is my science data booklet and lastly are my tutoring notebook and coaching binder and folder. I use these to teach either online but in the case of coaching I draw on the whiteboard for plays and where students should move, this communication requires less text and more on communicating concepts similar to math and physics lessons in the notebook. All of these show that I mostly communicate through written output, direct teaching, and demonstrations, and that language is not limited to just verbal or written language but can be used in symbols and shapes as well in my day to day life.
I believe the contents of my bag do ideally show my overall life and image I try to show as a professional hardworking educator and volunteer coach. My students know that I am strongly into weightlifting and I often help them with their workout plans during breaks in school. Likewise in my local district I am known as part of the basketball program and younger grades and parents sometimes define me as the basketball coach, although I like to think of myself as much more than just that. However my backpack only shows my public side, not my interests, books, and travels I do when I have time for myself.
Fifteen years ago my bag would have been slightly similar for school at least, still a laptop but a lot more binders and textbooks as I used to carry everything to and from home as I’d walk up and down the mountain for high school. But instead of weightlifting there would be a change of clothes and racquets in my bag instead, a cultural lunch as well of feta cheese, walnuts, parsley, and sangak.
If an archaeologist saw my bag they’d most likely think I had the wrong laptop with how archaic and slow it functions and be confused by the wrist straps. They may not even understand the plays in the basketball binder as the court and rules may have changed or been gone from existence. The water bottle would make the most sense but the sunscreen would most likely be baffling, as hopefully they have an easy treatment for cancer in the future or we would have a possible genetic mutation that would make UV radiation no longer harmful for any humans. They’d also find the science data booklet amusing as there may be dozens of new elements on the periodic table and much more information that is considered written authority, some pages may even have been discovered to be incorrect and changed accordingly as science is always about finding new or supporting evidence.
