DFI Session 2: Workflow

We have just completed our second D.F.I session and it was another jam packed agenda. It is reassuring to know that all of our learning has rewindable slide decks etc that we can revisit to consolidate our learning or check up on things we may be unsure of.

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy?

- The main thing that stuck with me from this mornings focus around the 'LEARN' aspect of Manaiakalani was the reminder that we as teachers are constantly modelling to our students that we are still learners too. My collaborative teaching buddy and I have explained to our class that we are going to be away every Wednesday so that we can learn lots of new skills that we will then be able to come back and share with them. Our students were quite fascinated to think of us as 'the learners'. 

I took a screenshot of this part of the slide presentation as no matter how long you have been teaching I think it is vital to still remind ourselves of these actions...

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

- Google calendars is not currently utilised in our school but is something my collaborative teaching buddy and I have talked about introducing at some stage. My buddy and I currently use a shared calendar app but it makes sense to switch to google calendars as everything is linked in our G suite. As a whole staff we still have the big white board calendar of the term in our staffroom which most of the staff are comfortable with. However, I think we could be a lot more efficient by using google calendars. I think if we used 5-10 mins each staff meeting to gradually introduce how it works then we may be able to convert our staff members. Creating a google meet via calendars was new learning for me and I will continue to explore the various other functions. 

What did I learn that could be used with my learners?  

- I have not used google meets since last lockdown so it was really good to have a refresher and learn about the new functions. With the latest Covid situation, it is a timely reminder to also reintroduce google meets and our expectations/kaupapa around video chatting. 

 

* Todays task was to analyse a students blog post from lockdown and create a video recording via google meets discussing the following questions...

1. What was the teaching design behind this post?

2. What was the learner’s response ie the post content

3. Who responded to the post and how did this support the learning experience or contribute more to the learning of the child?

I have never used the recording function in google meets and I will be honest, I was way out of my comfort zone! Working out how to use the recording function was fine......just the actual recording myself was uncomfortable for me....but I survived! Below is the recording I created and learnt how to embed in my blog....

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow in my personal life?

- I learnt lots of handy tips for my organising my gmail and making it work more efficiently for me. I learnt how to set up two different signatures (a professional one and one to use with my students), created a 'unread first' section at the top of my inbox and am still experimenting with the use of email filters and whether or not these would be useful for me. 

- Google Keep is something I already use but only as a 'To Do' list with checkboxes for me and my collaborative teaching buddy. I learnt about lots of other functions, including the voice recording function available on the phone app which converts speech to text as well as saving a copy of the original audio. I also liked the tip about creating a google keep note with feedback comments that is accessible on the side bar when working on google docs. 

- The presentation about 'Taming the tabs" is something I will need to revisit when I have more time. Once we get our students up and running with their own blogs I can see that we will probably want to utilise one or more of the extensions that were discussed.