Learning to Teach with Raquel

Learning Pod: # 1

Peers’ Names: Katherine Harris, Natalie Airlie, Fawzan Hussain, Amanda Beechey, Caelum Dudek and Mathew Terhune

Interactive Learning Resource Topic: Mindfulness & Wellbeing in Children

Identify components of the Interactive Learning Resource that might be missing (e.g., appropriate outcomes, alignment, interactivity, inclusivity, technology use and rationale, presentation, grammar, spelling, citations, etc.).

This is a very clear and organized Interactive Learning Resource. I enjoyed how this cite was layed out and showed the course outline for adults to follow along with. All videos and articles were clearly and correctly cited. All hyperlinks are functional. One think that leaves I think is missing is child friendly language. I think the outcomes are appropriate and relevant to the content, yet I wonder how this information would be presented to 5-8 year olds. I think that it would be beneficial to add learning outcomes in child-friendly language so that they can be shared directly with learners.

Provide a summary of The Interactive Learning Resource’s strengths and weaknesses. Draw out specific examples from your peers’ work to justify your feedback.

Strengths: Interactive food game – Having students take the time to apply their learning in a game format is an amazing strategy to motivate learners and increase their interest. Multi-media – Including graphics and videos to teach children meets a wide range of needs. It’s important when choosing a direct instruction method to think about how long kids will be expected to sit and listen, having a variety of sources is important. Weaknesses: Assessment – I feel that the summative assessment section is not very clear. From my understanding, there will be a summative assessment at the end of each unit but I feel like they need to be elaborated on again. It is described that the summative assessments would be similar to the formative assessments but I would like to know more about what that would look like. Timeline – reading through this plan I was constantly wondering what the expected timeline is for children to complete this work. Having worked with this age group, I believe that the amount of content presented would take a very longtime to cover with this age group so I am interested in how long this course would be expected to take.

Provide general, specific, and practical recommendations to your peers on how to improve their Interactive Learning Resource.

In all, you all should be very proud of the work you have accomplished so far with this project. I think that your work is organized, thorough, and brings awareness to very important subject matter. I would recommend referring to the BC curriculum specifically the Physical and Health Education curriculum to see what children will be taught at school if this is intended to be an out of school course as there are a lot of similar themes to play off of.

1. What kind of interaction would the video require from your students? Does it force them to respond in some way (inherent)?

This video doesn’t inherently force students to respond. I would describe this video as informational as it goes through the circle of courage of its principles yet, it doesn’t provide any opportunities for students to interact with it in any specific ways. As far as the video is laid out, all that would be needed from a student is to have them view the video.

2. In what way are they likely to respond to the video on their own, e.g., make notes, do an activity, or think about the topic (learner-generated)?

I think that this video is strong because it provides students with real life examples and an indigenous perspective (Dr Martin Brokenleg) on the Circle of Courage and what it looks like for children. There are titles, text and graphics that appear throughout the video that would help students engage with the video which invites learners to take notes. Otherwise, all activities would need to be teacher-generated. 

3. What activity could you suggest that they do after they have watched the video (designed)? What type of knowledge or skill would that activity help develop? What medium or technology would students use to do the activity?

After the video I think it would be valuable to have students reflect on the video and discuss what they connected with. I would say that this video would be good as either an introduction or summary of the Circle of Courage. If I were to use it as an introduction, I would have students take notes on the video and have a discussion about their main takeaways. I would prompt discussion by asking students to share a time when their needs weren’t met and then decide ways that the situation could have been handled with the Circle of Courage in mind. If I were to have students watch this in summary, I would have them watch the video to review the concept of the circle of courage as a whole and have them share what the Circle of Courage means to them moving forward. By having my students making personal connections and sharing their plans to connect with the content in the future, my students will be able to decide what this course meant to them and apply it to their lives directly. Both of these discussions could happen in person or virtually through Zoom.

4. How would students get feedback on the activity that you set? What medium or technology would they and/or you use for getting and giving feedback on their activity?

These activities would not require too much feedback as it would be intended to be a quick introduction and/or summary of the course, however it would be a great opportunity for verbal feedback. With the introduction activity, I would gauge prior knowledge through discussion and check for understanding based on the points/connections they make through discussion and either correct them or validate them verbally. As for using the video in summary, I would incorporate this discussion in a greater reflection upon the whole course where students can choose what resonated with them and explain their main takeaways from the course, either in the form of a written reflection or audio recording. In response to their reflections I would provide written feedback, most likely digitally by email or other preferred contact method providing suggestions on how to further apply their learning.

Choose one (or more) of your planned learning activities from your Blueprint and identify any barriers to student success. How can you alter or adjust your current plan to reduce those barriers?

For this post I am going to be identifying the barriers to student success for our learning activity teaching the principle of Mastery from the Circle of Courage. 

Currently, this task consists of participants being given a description of a student and needing to write a paragraph identifying what mastery in the classroom may look like for that student. Groups of 2-3 will work together to discuss and compare the differences of Mastery between students. They will then share their ideas with the larger group and write them on post-it notes for the medicine wheel. 

Reflecting upon this task and considering the needs of different learners that may participate in this course, I see a few ways for this task to be modified. Firstly, it’s not necessary for the participants to write a paragraph identifying what mastery would look like. It would be just as effective to have participants simply reflect and take notes down on points they would like to cover when moving onto the group work. Moreover, if participants have difficulty writing, they are more than welcome to use assistive technology and speech to text features. 

Another way to adjust this learning activity could be for people who are new to teaching and have less experience working in the classroom. I think if there are a variety of experience levels in the group, this activity would be a good opportunity for peer mentorship. We could begin by pairing experienced educators with less experienced educators and having them work together for the first part of the activity. 

In all, when I think of inclusive education, I think of flexibility. No matter how thoroughly you plan an activity, without meeting the participants and gauging their abilities and needs. In my opinion, what makes a good educator is someone knowledgeable of different possible needs when planning, but at the same time, someone prepared to adjust their plans at the drop of a hat in order to meet the needs of their learners.

I would say that I have an interesting relationship with direct instruction. Direct instruction consists of a teacher standing in front of the classroom lecturing to students about the content. Unlike inquiry-based learning, like my friend Noah discussed in his blog post, direct instruction is content-centered and requires teachers to take full control of the learning environment and decide what is learned and how it is learned. Thinking and discussing direct instruction is very  interesting to me as I find it to be the approach that was frequently used with me throughout my education journey as a student; however, in University education courses I have frequently been taught to move away from direct instruction. When I think about direct instruction versus inquiry-based or experiential learning, I often connect to the BC curriculum and the difference between teaching content and curricular competencies. On the one hand, the content you teach is valuable knowledge that has been deemed necessary for all citizens to know, yet on the other hand, curricular competencies outline skills specific to each subject matter that all citizens should acquire and be able to apply to their lives. Though both of these elements of the curriculum are important, as teachers, we are asked to assess our students based on the curricular competencies, which I agree with. I believe that teachers should lead with approaches like experiential and inquiry-based learning and support it with direct instruction. With that being said, though there is a time and place for direct instruction, I believe that for the most part teachers should try to move away  from direct instruction and move towards more student-centered approaches. 

In relation to my project and the Circle of Courage, I feel that direct instruction fails to meet all four of the values of Belonging, Mastery, Independence, and Generosity. By having the teacher stand and lecture to students, children have no time to connect with others, apply their learning, learning in ways specific to them or help the greater community. As I said though there are benefits to direct instruction, for example, in my lessons I always like to begin with addressing a learning objective so that students are clear on what is being taught; there is a time and place with this instructional approach and I find that it should always be  paired with other approaches (Hollingsworth & Ybarra, 2009).

Resources

Hollingsworth, J., & Ybarra, S. (2009). Explicit direct instruction (EDI) the power of the well-crafted, well-taught lesson. Corwin.

Based on your reading, would you consider your current instruction style more behavioralist, cognitivist, or constructivist? Elaborate with your specific mindset and examples.

Based on my reading I would consider my current instruction style more constructivist. Having just completed my BEd, I have come across these theories throughout my studies, however, I find it very interesting to have the chance to read about them again and be able to  pull from my own experiences teaching and observing teachers over the past few years. I remember always being drawn to the constructivist theory of learning. One of my pet peeves as an educator is having conversations with people and hearing that they never learned anything useful in school. Due to this common complaint, I have made it a goal of mine to integrate experiential learning into my day-to-day teachings to ensure that each of my students is given the  chance to connect with the content and develop the curricular competencies.

Something that attracts me to the constructivist view, is the interconnectedness. When my students walk into my classroom, I want my students to know that they are respected and valued as human beings, and that I am just as eager to learn from them as I hope they are to learn from me. I understand that each child has a unique perspective and set of experiences, and I believe that the classroom should be a space to share and learn from each other. With that said, I demonstrate these constructivist views all throughout my instruction. For example, in my last practicum, I had my students complete a math project to demonstrate their understanding of fractions concepts we explored together in five ways of their choosing. With this I had students, connecting fractions to their personal interests, creating art, writing stories, and filming videos. This sparked joy in my students and made this learning make sense to them in their own ways. The presentation of choice and freedom challenged my students to think critically about what they had learned and show it back to me in a way that was meaningful to them which I found very powerful. Beyond that example, I find constructivism in my instruction with things as simple as leaving room for discussion and activating prior knowledge, to more complicated endeavours like taking my class out into the community on field trips. 

Hi, my name is Raquel Levy! I am a recent graduate of the BEd program here at Uvic and am currently TTOCing in SD61. I am taking this class as part of my TQS category upgrade as a teacher and to complete the EdTech certificate. When I am not in the classroom,  I enjoy spending time with my friends, being active outdoors (always open to good hike suggestions) and going back to the mainland to visit my family! I look forward to spending my time in this course connecting with you all, furthering my understanding of EdTech, and expanding my personal learning network.

Please enjoy and share this “Choose your own adventure” using Youtube lesson plan that I made with my friends Georgette Sumners and Noah Forbes!

Here is a link to the lesson plan: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1hFusk8F3r5Xkrui0Jp1TWAwAz0v09mOjwOUWQ0bvK0w/edit?usp=sharing

What is Tiktok?

Tiktok is a short-form video style Social Media website. It is a place where people of all ages from all around the world can connect and enjoy each other’s content. New trends are constantly being created that provide creators with fun and engaging ways to interact with others on the platform. Tiktok has been a concern among parents and users as the data collected from the app has been affiliated with the Chinese government, however, after a possible ban in 2020 Trust and Safety policies have been put into place. Overall, Tiktok is a fun and interactive Social Media platform that has caught the attention of everyone from children to major corporations alike and I personally enjoy spending time on the app.

How could I use it as a professional?

Tiktok provides yet another way to connect with and engage my students. From music/dance to life hacks to lesson plans, Tiktok has it all. I can easily see myself creating activities were I ask my students to create Tiktoks (or Tiktok type videos) about things that they are personally interested in. Not only is there possibilities for endless cross-curricular instruction, but it is also a bunch of fun!

How can I find people on Tiktok to become part of my PLN (Professional Learning Network)?

I find that the easiest way to connect with people/communities on the app is through hash tags. You can search for creators based on your location or your areas of interest. Here are a few of my favorites:

#teachersoftiktok

#teachertok

#classroommanagement

#firstyearteacher