My teaching career began in South Korea teaching young ESL learners in August of 2000. I had completed my Bachelor of Commerce with a Major in Accountancy and, after having worked for a few years, decided that this was not the right fit for me. Like most lost university grads I ended up in Asia teaching English. It became clear to me that teaching was my path, as it had been for my father and brother before me. After a quick and intense year back in Canada to get my teaching degree I returned to Korea to teach at an international school focused on early childhood learning. It was hear that I was generously put through my Montessori training. I spent three years there before moving to Istanbul, Turkey to teach for another year. I returned to Canada, but not to my home town of Montreal. Continuing my traveling adventures, I moved to Prince George, BC to teach a grade 4/5 class at a small Catholic Independent School. The following year I changed grades to the 6/7 class where I have remained for the last 6 years. All in all I’ve been teaching for 11 years now.
Two years ago I attended a conference at UBC and met some Master’s students enrolled in the MET program. It was at this conference that my eyes were opened to the teaching and learning opportunities of technology. Of course I had had the odd encounter with maverick teachers, who were incorporating technology in to their classes, and I had done some online learning myself but, being in a small independent school, I really was not exposed too much and I wanted to be. I applied to the MET program and was accepted for the January 2012 semester.
Early on I was extremely interested in the affordance of social media. I wanted to know how to use the technology my Net Geners students were using to educational advantages. As I explored these technologies, it became clear that social media tools were not going to be permitted for safety and security reasons at my school. Instead I have been trying to use what technology I have, document camera, projector and laptop, to my best advantage in the classroom. Doing online quiz as group challenges, watching TED talks and participating in live webcast when available.
Our board now has a new Superintendent who is forward thinking when it comes to technology and wants to increase it presence in our schools and classrooms. To this end I will be attending the Google Summit next month and I am on the iGeneration team, researching, consulting and evaluating technologies (ipad, Chromebooks, Surface tablets, laptops) for the administration to make decisions on purchases for our schools. ETEC 565A has come along at a timely fashion. Both Bates and Pooles (2003) SECTIONS model and Chickering and Gamson’s (1987) Seven Principles have tied in nicely with the iGeneration Guiding Principles model that in currently being developed to assess technologies for our schools. A new teacher platform is being launched in our board to better connect teachers and share resources over the vast distance of our Diocese. These models are also coming in to play and I begin to navigate this platform and provide feedback on its design.
My goals for ETEC 565 at this time to become more familiar and proficient with free, open source LMS that could safely be used within school culture. Cost weighs heavily our choices but can also lead to poor choices that are not the best fit for our goals and infrastructure. However, choosing wisely and developing, for example, an online Science unit or class collaboratively, that could be used and accessed by teachers within our board but that are geographically separated by over 900 kilometers in some cases, offers tremendous learning opportunities. Students and teachers would benefit from the knowledge of multiple educators working together to develop a comprehensive and engaging online learning environment. Projects could easily be shared and the course regularly improved.
What makes a great online learning environment though? How is made user friendly, appealing and engaging for young learners? How do I design one that is in keeping with the school culture and policies that currently do not allow the use of social media? These are the questions I will be seeking answers to. At this point I want to find a LMS with an easy user interface that allows multimedia but no student login. Students should not be able to post to the website at this time due to the policies currently in place, but I would like to have the option to change this in the future should policies change in the coming months or years. I would, however, like other grade 6/7 teachers to be able to login and make changes and additions. Again ease of use is necessary due to the vast range of abilities in staff and the inability to connect in person to provide technical assistance due to geographic distance.
Resources
Bates, A.W. & Poole, G. (2003). Chapter 4: a Framework for Selecting and Using Technology. In Effective Teaching with Technology in Higher Education: Foundations for Success. (pp. 77-105). San Francisco: Jossey Bass Publishers.
Berk, R. (2011). Presentation at the 26th annual ES Conference. No Teacher Left Behind: Teaching Strategies for the Net Generation, pp. 77-90 Unpublished manuscript.
Chickering, A.W. & Ehrmann, S.C. (1996). Implementing the Seven Principles: Technology as Lever. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 49(2), 3-6.
Chickering, A.W. & Gamson, Z.F. (1987). Seven Principles
for Good Practice in Undergraduate Education. American Association for Higher Education Bulletin, 39 (7), 3-7.
(unpublished) iGeneration Guiding Principles, Catholic Independent Schools (working draft)
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the Horizon, 9(5). Retrieved January 19, 2014, from http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf
Tapscott, D. (1998). Growing up Digital: The Rise of the Net Generation. Retrieved January 19th, 2014 from http://www.ncsu.edu/meridian/jan98/feat_6/digital.html