Personal Reflection
“Networking” by punQtum is licensed under CC BY 2.0
The coronavirus is creating a catalyst in implementing distance learning opportunities through technology for both educators and learners. We are fortunate to have a distance education program that helps support a model of distance education in which someone like myself, a high school classroom teacher, can find alternative ways of engaging with students. With uncertainty in the air of the possibility of not returning into the classroom after spring break, it makes sense to start thinking of how one can prepare for an alternative learning environment conducted from home. At the present time, my digital storytelling project idea is on my own journey on how I can create a learning community from home.
I presently have five courses, but decided to focus my journey in preparation for my Life Science 11 course. For synchronous communication, I am considering the use of Zoom as I like the hands-up feature and the ease of use in creating break-out rooms for students to communicate with each other. Notably, the University of Victoria on their website has gone with Blackboard Collaborate for professors to continue with their instruction, which has similar features. It goes to show there are multiple alternative for video conference software at an educator’s disposal.
Colleagues in the master’s course have also considered asynchronous communication through video casts, podcasts, Flipgrid for student output activities and Kahoot as a tool in formative assessment. As well, setting up a website that brings all of the links and resources together sets up a foundation for students to start. Google Classroom appears to be a strong option, and am fortunate to have a colleague who has created a flipped classroom with the use of this software. It appears that digital content is easy to upload and share with students. However, my colleague did suggest to use avatars, or pseudonyms for student identity to meet the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FOIPOP) guidelines set by the B.C. Ministry of Education.
Group Project Reflection
Currently, we are deciding on how to integrate all of our own digital stories under one roof, and how we will make it easy for others to navigate through our stories. Our overall theme is in creating “How to videos” on creating digital online learning experiences. We are communicating on how to coordinate through the social media app called Slack, and using Trello as our platform for organizing tasks. The initial phase of brainstorming took place through a shared Google Docs. It allows all members to read, reflect, and contribute ideas on the direction to take. Presently, we have been using our Google Docs much more than Trello. It will be interesting to see which software tools are going to be used or discarded. Tomorrow we plan to use the video conference platform called Blue Jeans Network for recording our brainstorming session. This will be our second session conferencing together. Our first session was approximately thirty minutes, but I feel it was very productive as it gave multiple perspectives on some of the problems we were facing, such as how to present content to the audience, our overall theme for digital storytelling, and setting up goals with dates in place to collaborate in the future. With that last note about the future, I am looking forward to seeing our ideas build into something more concrete.
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