Day 8 Digital fluency

 Today we took a look into computational thinkning and how it could be relevant to our learning environment. There were a lot of really cool resources that we took a look into that I could use in my classroom and that would benefit the learners a lot. Some of the things I have been looking at setting up and using next year are Scratch and Tinkercad. These sites are interactive, fun and once I've had another tinker with them will be able to connect them to the students learning. As we are moving more and more towards a tech dominated society giving our students a headstart in learning about coding, problem solving and tech based learning is only going to be beneficial for their future.

For our create section today, I decided to use the Tinkcad resource to create a house. The tool was easy to understand and use, but at the same time it was fun and engaging. I can see a lot of potential for this app from creating a 3D representation of someones identity through their pepeha, or they could use this resource to create a presentation of their inquiry learning (we are looking into perspective this term, so I could see the relevance of looking at something from a different perspective. One side of a house compared to the other etc.). It could even be used for fun projects that will reinforce learning while becoming digitally competent.

Here is the house that I have created, however it is still a work in progress (I want to try create and add a tree in if that is even possible!!!

Day 6 Digital Fluency

 Today we took an in-depth look into Google sites and the sites we had already created. It was cool to see the different styles teachers had come up with to help navigate the sites, but also to make the sites visually appealing. This gave me a few ideas and I decided to make a personal site around having all my school mahi in one place. I've created the framework for my site and moving forward I will be aiming to finish my site off before the end of this year (if I manage to find some time to complete it). We also had a look into a class site that was already established (my teams Health and PE site). We were looking at the set up of the site, what was done well and how we could improve our site. After reviewing the site, I set a goal to make the site easier to navigate and improve the visuals on the site. To achieve this, I moved up our sub page tab (it was close to the bottom and wanted it to be one of the main points to the site), Changed the banner background (we didn't have a banner originally, so changed this to an image relevan tot our subject area) and made our first blog easier to understand while also pointing out the key pieces of information (I cut some of the not so important text out, moved some of the text to relevant positions, underlined, increased the size and made bold the words we really needed our viewers to see). 

Once I achieved my goal, I realised how such little changes can actually make a pretty big impact on the navigation of the site. It looks a little better, but the things our students really need to see and comprehend
are easier to find. Here is the finished product to my updated site!

Day 5 digital fluency

Today's focus around collaborative learning/planning/teaching had a few gems in it today!!! One thing that I will be taking away from today's lesson that will enhance my students' learning ability are the Multi-text data base and Multi-modal data base. 

Having these tools ready and available for the students will give them a lot more resources to help them learn and understand their learning a lot better!! Not relying on just one resource to establish their opinion will be extremely beneficial for the students. It will also be a valuable resource for those students who like to extend themselves, using a range of different media resources to extend their learning and mahi! 

Today we were creating a Google site. We used a range of resources in the planning stages of this. I particularly liked the jamboard resource for planning how our site will look before actually creating the site.  It made visualing the site a lot clearer, and it was a lot easier to place all my resources in an easy to understand order (to help with the navigation of my site). I'm going to try jamboard again in the future when planning my next google site (probably looking into next year). Eventually we did get to create a site as well, using the plan I created on jamboard this is what I came up with..... It is still a work in progress however, and I plan on using this site at the beginning of next year before moving into our inquiry learning!!!

Here is the link to my site!

Day 4 Digital fluency

Today's focus around the use of Google sheets was really good learning. I use sheets quite a bit in school and definitely knew I wasn't using Google sheets to its full potential. This is going improve my workflow a lot, not having to navigate around sheets just to find a few pieces of information (instead I'm going to use the filter option which will be A LOT quicker) is going to save a lot of time!!!! I'm also going to try and teach some of the tips I've learnt today to my students. We are just beginning an exercise log so learning how to do averages, sums, creating charts will be cool (so the students can actually view their progress and see the progression. Also will be cool if they notice any patterns that occur in their charts, but thats a lesson for the future now that I'm thinking about it!)

Some of the useful tips I learnt for navigating Google sheets are;

• Highlighting the columns (Shift+click), then adjusting the column size will automatically adjust all the columns highlighted to all be the same size (no need to adjust all of them manually anymore).

• There is an icon in the navigation bar that allows you to move the decimal placing for numbers in the cell.

• Conditional formatting is a great tool to use to sift through a lot of data very quickly (can also be used to highlight a lot of things quickly).

• The filter feature is similar to conditional formatting, but also can be used to put a focus on the students' data/learning you want to focus on without having all the additional data on screen.

• The number icon at the top is a great tool to format your writing and everything else to the way you  want it (not the computer automatically changing numbers for you)

• Publishing and using the embed code on your charts will allow your chart to update live (instead of using an image and having to replace that image to update the chart)

Below is what we created today. I've created a chart analysing a student's Blog. The chart shows how many times this student has posted on to their blog each month. It is based on seven years of Blog post (with each year being represented by a certain colout). Because I have embedded the chart I will be able to make an update live while using Google sheets. My challenge to you is to see what changes I make to my chart before DFI day 5!!! 

Day 3 Digital Fluency

Todays focus around media and its impact on learning/teaching was a really interesting topic. Learning some finer details around Youtube was an interesting session. Only just realising I had a Yourube channel with videos already uploaded on the channel was definitely a surprise this morning....

Some of the cool features I learnt to use more effectively were      

• How to use the playlist feature on Youtube to collate all the relevant videos I might need 
• Creating different channels wher eI can post different videos (for the subjects I teach)
• Turning off the comment feature on Youtube (only use videos for viewing purposes, not its commenting features)

I have already set up a simple playlist for the rules of games we regularily play (makes it easy for me to find, and I can share this playlist with students to refresh their memories on the rules, concepts etc.)

I am planning on setting up a fitness channel for my class. This is where I am aiming to regulairly post content around key exercises points, different kinds of workouts, nutrition, etc....   

For our creating component today, I created a Digital pepeha using Google slides. While doing this I learnt a couple of cool points to do with slides and how to navigate slides a little easier. 

• I learnt some shortcut keys (Ctrl+Shift+Up/Down arrows=Moving your layers forwards and backwards, Crtl+D=Duplicate what you are higlighting)  
• How to grab the embedding code off Google Slides (hopefully it is similar for other videos, Google apps as well)
• Using the explore feature to quickly have access to the internet without having to switch tabs (very handy when working on something and time could be a contraint)

I also had a look at the formatting features on Google slides, and can see how these can be used to make our slides look appealing. This is something I am going to show my students so they can work on their presentations.
  

This is the slide presentation I created for our create component today!!                                                             

Day 2 Digital Fluence

There was a lot of good learning for myself today, more around the little shortcuts I can use around the Google tools after they have been set up. I have hardly used Google meets, but knew a little about how to use it. Some of the useful things that I will start using in Google meets (while hopefully also teaching my students and other teachers how to use Google meets effectively as well) will be;

• You can control the chat, whether it’s available for use or not….

• The activities tab has a few different features (poll, breakout rooms)

• Captions underneath (could be used for students that are hard of hearing)

• Can control how people have access to the meet (whether they can come straight in or require admin to accept entry)

• Can kick students out by ending the call (when hanging up the call, not just leaving it), so students don’t linger behind or try to rejoin once the teacher has left.

For our create component today, we recorded a discussion around a students learning in their Blog post. It was a good reflection on what I've learnt around Google meets today, and getting the opportunity to apply some of the features of Google meets was pretty cool (I didn't do this in the recording, more like just had a haututu while I was waiting in the meet room).

Another valuable piece of learning I received today was around tab management. I am one of those people who have a whole screen filled with tabs, so learning to pin the main tabs (while also making them slightly more obvious that they are the important tabs) is going to make searching through all my tabs to find the correct resources a lot easier, making life in the classroom a lot easier as well. Some other notes I took away from the ‘TAB’ section of our learning today;

• Reading list, good for saving sites (things, documents readings) that you want to have access to later, for reading later on

• One tab, is good for getting all the sites/tabs that you will need for a lesson (has everything easily available for the future (will be way easier using this for all the programs in Challenge i.e one for Inquiry, one for Fitness etc…)

 

Day 1 of Digital Fluency intensive

Today I learnt a few tips and tricks around Google drive. I learnt how to improve some systems to easily navigating through Google drive, which will improve my workflow. The priority section was not really an area I looked at, but I am going to give the workspaces a go. It seems like a really easy and quick way to access files that I use daily. So I’m going to try and set a few up for the different areas I teach in. 

Google groups is another platform that I want to try and use with my learners. Having a platform that can easily share important information without missing anyone can be hugely beneficial for the learners. Also having a space where the information is easily and conveniently stored/accessible would be great for rewindable learning, plus finding information that could take a while to find.

Today I created an exercise table with  video links to key points around technique and images to easily identify which exercise the video is focusing on!! I was trying to use some of the tips and tricks we learnt today. There’s still a lot I can implement, however I am pretty happy with how my table turned out. Just a couple of tweaks and I think it will be up and pumping!!!

I'm looking forward to sharing some of the tips I've learnt with my colleagues!!!