Check out my summary of Learning video!

Hi everyone and welcome to my edtc 3oo final summary of learning. 

I started this class with a little bit of different lesne than the average student. I have been working as a remote learning teacher for almost two whole years now with my division. Here is a class picture of me and my remote learning students. 

This course was delivered on my FAVORITE platform Zoom, where I could learn from the comfort of my own home. Contrary to many beliefs, I LOVE learning from home!

Throughout the course, we used Twitter as a way to communicate and share ideas. This was great professional learning network for us and we were even able to aparticapte in Saks ed chat, something that I hope to continue to participate in throughout my education career. I really enjoyed the professional development and the ability to see what others in the province were feeling and thinking about education at the same time as me ! 

This course started off with a whole bunch of essential questions that we would be exploring. First off, I had to find something that I am passionate about and want to learn more about. I knew that I liked plants, and I have this monstrosity of an aloe vera plant, and somehow, some way I had the idea to try and make soap with my aloe vera plant. What a learning experience that was! 

Throughout the semester, I recorded videos for my learning project, learned how to use both iMove and Inshot, spent time almost daily on twitter. I tweeted about resources, and edited videos and I created high quality content for my blog!

The hardest part of the course was creating an e-portfolio in order to post my reflective blogging pieces and to document my learning project. I am not going to lie, creating an online blog was a hard task for me, but it was worth the effort and perseverance I had to collect! Using wordpress, I created Karlee Scott’s Education Learning blog and that’s when the fun started! 

The SAMR mode was very interesting to me and I was able to make many connections with the model. Currently, as a remote learning teacher, I use technology at all four levels of the model, but I can definitely see that there is a time and place for technology in the classroom. For example, read alouds are sooo much better when the teachers and students in a classroom are able to experience it, but this year I have had to do most of my read alouds off of other sources because of the sheer volume in the space I am in. As i move back into the classroom, I hope to navigate and incorporate technology in my classroom that is transformational for my students’ learning! 

When we looked at Ribble nine elements, I was able to make many connections to the grade six curriculum and the nine elements. It was during the learning of the nine elements that I decided and realized the benefit of creating a class blog next year for my students. These nine elements will be the forefront of my teaching in this regard. The curriculum lends itself to these nine elements in so many ways that I hope to integrate them into a variety of subject areas next year.

Shortly after, we started talking abou cybersleuthing. I feel like I have already been a cyber sleuth for many years now and that the FBI should have already scouted me out,but this was also an interesting perspective. It is so important as professionals (even those outside of teaching) to realize what people see about them on the internet. As soon as I see innaportirapte comments or hurtful things on my social media, the first thing I do is cyber sleuth. What could and would happen to a professional if they got caught writing nasty things online? What would I think if I saw my doctor writing inappropriate stuff online? Probably I would switch doctors. I cybersleuthed my sister for our blog posts, and unfortunately came up with no deep dark secrets, contrary to my FBI level skills. 

The final topic of discussion that really sparked my interest was when we talked about fake news. I know that I have people in my life that believe merely everything they see on the internet. Part of the reason that they have these belief systems is because I believe they lack digital fluency. They grew up without technology, and sometimes they do not understand that Buzzfeed, Wikipedia and TikTok have little regulations about what is actually posted on these sites. I think that if we can, again expose students to these opportunities and ideas, they will be informed and able to make their own decisions before spreading misinformation on the internet. 

My key takeaways from this course are based on three ideas, knowledge, relationships and exploration. Students need knowledge to make their own judgments, assumptions about what they see and do on the internet. Second, the more knowledge students have about how to use a variety of social media platforms. Students also need to know how to build effective and appropriate relationships both online and offline. Teaching students build relationships within themselves and with others is the key to a good decision making process. The last key element is exploration. Students need to have the chance to explore new opportunities. They need to learn how to explore social media and they need the chance to explore their own values and ideas about the world. We are entering into a generation of young people that will always have access to information and media at their fingertips. Restricting students access to these will only prolong their opportunities to learn, make mistakes and grow.

For the grace of this post, I have decided to incorporate the broad areas of learning in connection to digital literacy. Throughout my university career, we studied the broad areas of learning multiple times. Just a few short years into my career, I saw them resurface. On the very front of our report cards, we comment and rate something called FASA (Factors Affecting Student Achievement). The broad areas are: building lifelong learners, building a sense of self and community, and finally building engaged citizens. Check out this link to find it, but also check out this quick snapshot from the Saskatchewan Curriculum.

If you have been paying attention at all to my posts since the beginning of class, you will know that there are one million connections we can make to these learning areas and digital literacy. You can check out my post here about my connections to the curriculum and Ribble’s nine elements of digital citizenship. I think that digital literacy and digital citizenship go hand in hand when working with young adults and students and developing an understanding of their presence online. I am going to dive into each of the broad areas of learning and connect the curriculum, with supporting evidence from outside, reliable sources!

First off, building lifelong learners literally speaks to digital literacy. Students need to develop the skills and understandings of how to learn with valuable and relevant information. Most of the information we gather as human beings comes in a digital sense. This comes first, with teaching students to look at the world (with a focus online) with a critical pair of glasses. It is getting harder and harder to identity fake news, and as we see here, students are not going to be born with a sixth sense of verifying fake news, it needs to be taught: “we need to be able to apply web-specific knowledge, such as understanding the implicit biases of various news sites or knowing which fact-checking sites are trustworthy.” (Couros, Hildebradt 2018). It is not going to “pop out” like it has for some of us that have grown with the technology, information and misinformation is going to get harder and harder to differentiate, and developing those lifelong learning skills will (hopefully) keep them from believing everything they see, read and hear on the internet.

Second of all, we want students to build a sense of self and community. I personally, can’t imagine a better way to teach a group of 28 sixth graders this than using an online forum and world, which is what I plan on doing next year. Early in the year, we have to develop a solid understanding of where, why, what and how we can get information to share with each other. How can I be sure that this is going to happen? Using the four moves highlighted on this website allows for students to make sure that their information is valid and worthwhile to share with others! Even creating a visual for the classroom would allow for students to develop autonomy in their own critical thinking skills for themselves and their community!

Finally, we are looking to build engaged citizen. Engaged citizens are more likely to share real information, having meaningful ideas and perspectives to share and contribute to a more positive society. Engaged citizens will recognize fake news, fake accounts and attempt to shut these ideas down. Engaged citizens are more likely to overwhelm your feed with REAL news and this is what we want. We want people and students to be active on social media, because as we have learned the more fluent students (or people in general) are with any resource, the more effective and intelligent they will be about their choices regarding the resource. Education and exposure is key.

Students need to create and collaborate in safe, effective online environments that provide them with the most learning and development of critical thinking skills.

YAY! Lucky me. I get to creep and dig deep into my sister, Kiera as a cyber sleuth. Cyber sleuthing is almost like a hobby to me, but I have never creeped my sister, because I hope that she would let me follow or “friend” me quite quickly after creating an account.

With a quick google search, I have found not much about her. I found this photo of her, as she wrapped up her interning at Arcola Community School. This is always a good sign, she has a great picture of her in a professional environment. I had to be sure to search Kiera Brennan, Regina in order to even find evidence of the REAL Kiera Brennan that I was searching.

What does a social media friend see? First off, her snapchat friends 10/10 know she has a cat named Katniss. This is one difference we have because I am definitely a #dogmom. Her Facebook friends see that she enjoys adventures with her boyfriend, who appears to be off Facebook, and some of her highlighted photos include pictures of her and I at my wedding. She also seems to be affiliated with Sherwood Golf Course in some way, which I know is where she works as a summer job.

Her instagram also boasts of her adventures with her boyfriend, but she has a whopping 9 posts, so that limits what you can learn from her.

Overall, did not find any dirt on my sister, she’s as clean as whistle.

Right now, I teach young students online. We are in fairly protected environment on Google Classroom, in our fairly safe Google Meet. (Fairly). I have had, at times random names want to join my google meets, and I have always denied them. In saying that, anything is truly possible.

Next year I will be in grade six, and those kids will have all the technology and social media a person can have. They will try to find me on Tiktok, try to find out how many followers I have on Instagram, and they will be googling my name. What will come up? Hopefully I appear as a good digital citizen, but will they?

I am just starting to map out my year next year. I have been browsing through all grades, and I have found MANY opportunities for digital citizenship to be addressed and integrated.

Health Curriculum

First off, and most predictable, outcomes in the health curriculum are yelling with opportunities. First off, USC6.1, USC6.2, USC6.5 and USC6.6 all connect to developing a positive sense of self and others in a a variety of environments. When looking at the online environment, developing health relationships is JUST as important as developing a healthy relationship with family and friends! These outcomes directly tie to four of the nine elements that Mike Ribble discusses. First off, digital communication and collaboration –essentially, how can students actively and appropriately talk and discuss with one another using technology. Second, digital etiquette relates back to the perspectives that students need to know how to interact with students in the online environment, just like they need to on the playground, in extra-curricular activities and in the classroom. Third, is digital fluency. By giving students the opportunities to learn more in the classroom, the more likely they are able to use and question the information that they are receiving and giving on social media. That leads to the final element related to the health curriculum is the rights and responsibilities that students have when using technology as a tool. Finally, the health curriculum has many ties to the idea of digital health and welfare to protect the integrity and well-being of the users on a variety of websites, application and programs.

ELA Curriculum

Starting to look into the ELA curriculum, I started to ponder how some of these elements can leak into and be integrated into the ELA curriculum. First, off, digital law comes to mind, as students typically have to share the sources that support their written work. This connects to outcomes CC6.1 and CC6.4.

When looking at the speaking, listening and reading related outcomes, I think back to the digital etiquette and developing a sense of digital literacy and building a sense of communication and collaboration.

Career Curriculum

Finally, another great connection that I made was through the career education outcomes. All of the career education outcomes, that can be found here can be related to the some of the nine elements. First off, many careers rely on newer generations to have digital literacy. Even further, many careers expect their employees to create a solid and professional digital footprint. Employers (especially now), expect their employees to be able to communicate, collaborate and build within an online environment. Building a sense of privacy and law is also a key stakeholder in many different corporations.

Connecting multiple curriculums together provides students with a more authentic approach. If even more time was spend, creating a plethora of connections, students would be given multiple opportunities to explore and dabble with each of the nine elements. I think that it would even be a worthwhile tool to have the nine elements hung up in our classrooms to be sure that students are aware of and able to explore these elements on a daily basis. I made this small poster to the left to hopefully have up in my classroom some day soon!