Technology Teaching Tidbits

When giving feedback it is often too easy to say something superficial with no purpose to it such "This is cool" or "Great job" but this feedback has no purpose of support for learners or peers. During my teacher training I have developed an greater variety of feedback and feed forward, feedback being purposeful and direct such as "I like how you have..." or "Something that went well was..." and then the feed forward giving the recipient possible next steps that can be used to improve or adjust their presentation. In the case of the feedback I was given, it allowed me to recognise the strengths of my task and reflect on the weaknesses, it also allows me to consider how I will change my activity to make it more effective. My group were delayed posting their how to tasks online however, once they did I took time to look at their own how to tasks and comment on them giving them what I thought was supportive feedback and feed forward. This fir...

How often do you find yourself inundated with questions or learners wanting to show you their work or tell you something? How often do they come to you as a task is due with it uncompleted because they didn't understand but forgot to ask questions? What if you could open the door to change that without jamming your inbox with emails from learners? As I have been reflecting on my learning throughout the school year I started to consider how I could use technology in a more innovative way to open up channels of communication that I have yet to observe. One way I thought of was to create a google form where learners could submit questions or ideas no matter where they are. Instead of a learners needing to remember a question or comment they can post it as they think of it and I can address the learner's comment when I can. This means if a question or idea arises while the learner is at home or on holiday they can post them and get a response. It also means if you are busy with...

Link to Padlet During my training this year I was lucky enough to be introduced to and experiment with Padlet which is a whole class collaborative brainstorming tool. These kinds of tools allow for live whole class collaboration will all learners participating rather than just those who have their hands up or are chosen. In this example We had made Oobleck the week before and during a writing time we created adjectives and similies and shared them on the padlet. I had the document up on the projector meaning that as learners were writing they were able to see both their own work and that of their peer's as it was occurring. The padlet allows learners to access the collaborative work again later to support their learning as these adjectives and smilies were then used in creative writing about Oobleck. This kind of tool engaged even my most unengaged learners as they were all given the opportunity to contribute and it was anonymous meaning learners were able to contribute as mu...

It's funny to think about the assumptions we make regarding a learner's knowledge around using devices. Too often we give instructions for them to use specific specific symbols or buttons without considering if they know how to do that. Instead of jumping ahead and expecting them to know the basics can we find a way to check their skills? Previously I have discussed using Google forms as a form of assessment so can we not use this to check for gaps in the basic knowledge a learner needs to be successful while using devices? While I was thinking about this I began to brainstorm what learners need to know to use technological tools. As well as the basics like knowing the location of letters and common symbols there is the need for other tools such as enter, space, shift, caps lock and their relationship with these. Then I began to think about other common tools like copy, cut, paste, download, opening a new document and changing the settings on these. The list seems to go on s...