LIBE 477 Vision Blog Post #2 Self Awareness Creates Effective Leaders

 

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Rationale

The topic of conversation as of late amongst my peers is the culture of mask wearing. 

It comes down to empathy and consideration of others over personal freedoms.  How do

We communicate this?  I have come to the conclusion that you cannot teach empathy 

with a flick of a wand. Similarly, knowing one’s own personality, feelings, desires, and 

motivations is Not always innate.  Self awareness skills need to be cultivated over time

and explicitly Taught.  Eurich, a psychologist and business coach states that “ Research 

suggests that when we see ourselves clearly, we are more confident and more creative.

We make sounder decisions, build stronger relationships, and communicate more 

effectively” (Eurich, 2018).  As we help mold 21st century learners, we need to find ways 

to make lasting impressions that will follow them beyond their current learning

environment and adapt and connect it to their future endeavours. Peels school board in 

Ontario have created a vision document and 3 year plan for creating a 21st century

learning commons. Tony pontes, director of the school board, commits to "inspiring 

student success through the implementation of innovative instructional practices, 

reliable technology and strong technical support, and equity of access for all.

Together, we continue to create learning environments where modern learners are

inspired to learn, collaborate, create and connect with the world" (Pontes, 2018). He

succinctly describes what all of us envision in our classrooms and learning commons.

image from peelschools.org

Further Development of the Vision:

Developing Self Awareness Through MyBlueprint, a Digital Portfolio

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Learner Considerations: Who's Lookin'?

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image from leaderinme.org

who is a part of a student's learning network? Their teachers, parents, families, and 

peers.  A child's learning network is vast and all their stakeholders would find value to 

see what they are learning and HOW they are learning.  Teachers that would be 

interested in pursuing digital portfolios within grade groups, the school, the district, 

and globally would also be potential audiences.  For me, I need to see an app or 

program, and have someone show me and vet it if I were to try it out.  Knowing that 

there is someone I can communicate, ask questions, show my progress and get feedback 

makes a program more desirable to use.  At school, I never would have tried Daily 5 or 

words their way, if I didn't know many of the staff were using it.  I had that safety net 

if I was trouble shooting.  Personally, just starting a blog was daunting.  I began with 

one blog format and had extreme difficulty.  I then started a new avenue, and if two 

colleagues from the program didn't reach out to me and help me step by step, I wouldn't 

have continued with this choice either. You don't become a wizard at things overnight.

Potential Audience for Artifact

There are many resources available from MyBlueprint's website:

https://myblueprint.ca/about on how to get started - supporting the teacher.  However, 

when planning a journal, typing a reflection or preparing materials to publish in their 

student portfolio, there needs to be some background knowledge and reasoning, lesson 

planning that should go on; a blended model approach.  

I plan on preparing some beginning lesson plans to support using the "About Me" section 

of My Blueprint.  I initially planned on teaching metacognitive skills as well, but with 

time constraints and access to technology, I bit off a bit more than I could chew.  I 

appreciate the Blended learning approach to the digital portfolio because I have more 

formative assessment opportunities to evaluate how their self-awareness skills have 

progressed.  as well, because students are also just learning how to navigate using a 

tech device and typing, as well as having very few minutes of the day, it may not be 

thoroughly capturing their reflections.  This coursework is for a librarianship diploma 

and it just seems right to be including possible literature to support digital learning.

Preparing My Artifact: Lesson Plans to Get Started 

on MyBluePrint

https://app.myblueprint.ca/start

There are many links and tutorials for educators to get started on myblueprint from 

the company itself.  However, there isn't a HOW to actually teach each of the elements 

of reflection, journalling, and resources to make it meaningful, like templates for 

drafts and picture books (I'm gearing my lesson plans for primary).  I have been able to 

make progress through the "About Me" section of My Blueprint with my Grade 3s and 

they 100% enjoy it.  They are even beginning to notice what comes easy to them, like 

creating an avatar, persevering through technical difficulties, and what has been 

challenging like I want to say more, but I can't type fast enough.  As we learn together, 

I have been keeping mental notes of how I could revise the delivery of certain sections 

of my blueprint, how a book here, or a writing draft there could have strengthened the 

class' productivity.  This made me think of how I would have really appreciated more of 

a teacher's manual of how to get started, not the technical aspect, but the teaching 

aspect.

I plan to make introductory lesson plans by using pageshttps://www.apple.com/ca/pages/

                                           image from support.apple.com

I am continuing my professional development with apps and digital programs, and pages 

is one that I have yet to use.  I like how it is visual, you can record audio and pictures, 

and is editable for others.  Because the district uses apple products, it will be 

streamlined and teachers will not have to worry about downloading adobe, Vimeo 

extensions, etc.  I am really looking forward to creating a working document that can 

drum up discussion, collaboration, and utility.

My vision for the future continues to be that of one where my classroom or SLLC is a 

place of community, collaboration, and engaged learning.  I strongly feel by reflecting 

and becoming more explicitly aware of their learning process via digital portfolios 

alongside a blended model of traditional teaching approaches and technology will help 

facilitate 21st century skills like critical thinking, creativity, leadership, and digital 

literacy.  Time to start a'brewing!

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Works cited

BluePrint, M. (n.d.). My Blueprint. Retrieved November 20, 2020, from https://myblueprint.ca/about

Board, P. (n.d.). Empowering Modern Learners. Retrieved November 20, 2020, from https://www.peelschools.org/aboutus/21stcentury/Pages/default.aspx

Eurich, T. (2020, November 01). What Self-Awareness Really Is (and How to Cultivate It). Retrieved November 19, 2020, from https://hbr.org/2018/01/what-self-awareness-really-is-and-how-to-cultivate-it

Pages - Apple (CA). (n.d.). Retrieved November 21, 2020, from https://www.apple.com/ca/pages/

LIBE 477 Module 10: Vision of the Future EYES on the world, FEET on the ground

Eyes on the World, Feet on the Ground

Earlier in the year, I decided it was time to have my philosophy, mission, vision statements, and core values set out in writing.  With continuous professional development and learning, these principles will be fluid and change over time.

                    

At present, I do see a classroom of engaged and inclusive learners, and I am continuing to work out on how to create a more collaborative environment that is viable during Covid times.  Learning progress is moving much slower due to less physical collaboration (small group/pair work).  Students just aren't "getting it" when they are having to trouble shoot alone.

 What will the 21st Century Classroom look like?

The 21st century classroom I envision will always involve ways to facilitate critical thinking, collaboration, communication, and creativity.

I have been very fortunate to be in a school where students have the ability to have a device available to them.  We have loaner iPad carts and COWS.  I have collaborated with my cohort teacher to have a class set of iPads every other week, while still having a half set available to me all the time.  As the students have their own One Drive account, they are able to save and access any pertinent work throughout their school career in the district.  In our SLLC, we have many loose parts and STEM materials available.  Earlier in the year, we had keva planks and I individually bagged planks for students to work on challenges. Students will be working on making traditional Sto:lo tools out of recyclable materials, so this will be a nice introduction to some of the loose parts available in our SLLC.

image from kevaplanks.com

    Design Considerations for Final Vision 

I have been catching myself doing this a lot.  While students are working, I will ask them "Why are we doing this?".  Yes, I am prepared for the disappointment.  My grade 3 students often do not know why they are working on assignments at school.  The pleasers will give you an answer like "to make my brain grow/learn" and it is true, but how?  I would like to explore the explicit process of learning for individual students, reflecting on this process in a documented way, as well as have students learn more about themselves, what drives their engagement and motivation.  In a way, I would like to help facilitate their working philosophy, mission, and vision statements for their own learning.  

I still intend on using MyBlueprint, a digital portfolio program designed for the B.C. Curriculum's core competencies in mind.  The program is vast and complex, but I will focusing on the "About Me" section.  Then move on to School competencies like communication thinking, and personal/social goals as well as their personal goals.

Who is my target audience?

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At the moment, the target audiences are students, their families, and the other grade 3 teachers I am collaborating with.  In the future, I would hope this exploration can support other teachers that are wanting to use digital portfolios for teaching self-awareness and metacognitive skills.

Potential Ideas

I have been catching myself doing this a lot.  While students are working, I will ask them "Why are we doing this?".  Yes, I am prepared for the disappointment.  My grade 3 students often do not know why they are working on assignments at school.  The pleasers will give you an answer like "to make my brain grow/learn" and it is true, but how?  I would like to explore the explicit process of learning for individual students, reflecting on this process in a documented way, as well as have students learn more about themselves, what drives their engagement and motivation.

image from Amazon.ca

https://www.amazon.ca/Handbook-Digital-Learning-K-12-Schools/dp/3319338064

Hourigan and Quinn have compiled timely articles that focus on learning in the digital classroom in their book entitled "Handbook On Digital Learning".  Some interesting articles and chapters discuss narrated photographs with multimodal opportunities with digital tools, personalised learning with information technology, and discoveries from an Irish pilot project using EUFolio, a classrom ePortfolio.  If you are a UBC student, this text is available for PDF download (See below in "works cited" for link).

Assessment Ideas

Students have completed a self-assessment questionnaire using emojis. I plan on using it in June to compare their responses.  This is where I am having some challenges on finding evidence of growth for students and will be using my PLM (other grade 3 teachers and MBP leads in the district) to strengthen this area. Formative assessments, using exit slips, class discussions, and small group or one-to-one check-ins have been some ways I have brainstormed to support this.  For the next collaboration meeting, I am hoping to get a bank of guiding questions that can give us more insight to the value of explicit teaching of self-awareness and metacognitive skills.

Digital Artifact ideas

My vision for the future would be to have students in my classroom use a digital portfolio like MBP to map their learning throughout the year, reflect on their growth, and set goals for future grades - see the bigger picture beyond the grade 3 classroom.  After working out the bugs, I would definitely like to have a series of lesson plans, alongside quality literature (We have been BIG on read alouds this year and I would like to incorporate this) available for teachers with sample student work.  We often do this in collaboration in our grade groups where we set a goal (organizing writing/using specialized vocabulary etc.) and work together to implement the collaborated activity/mini-lesson together.  Then we set aside some time to compare work, develop a rubric, what we would think is emerging, developing, and proficient using examples, and revise as needed for the following term.

Final Considerations

How does exploring MBP self-awareness tools help students have their eyes on the world and feet on the ground?  Our progress with the program will be on a bi-weekly time schedule, so this gives students time to input, discuss with their peers,  respond to teacher feedback (teachers are able to respond with stickers, text, video, audio), and meaningfully reflect will all the resources visually organized in their portfolio.  As for eyes on the world, students are also able to explore career possibilities within the program and correlate how their learning now may affect their learning in the future.

Works Cited

MyBlueprint.ca. (n.d.). Retrieved November 9, 2020, from https://myblueprint.ca/

Common Sense Media. (2020, April 01). Introduction to the 4 Cs. Retrieved November 14, 2020, from https://www.commonsense.org/education/videos/introduction-to-the-4-cs

Marcus-Quinn, A., & Hourigan, T. (Eds.). (2017). Handbook on digital learning for k-12 schools. Switzerland: SPRINGER from https://link-springer-com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/book/10.1007%2F978-3-319-33808-8#about

Shelby County Schools. "Inside the 21st Century Classroom." YouTube, 14 Nov. 2020, https://youtu.be/zcvcLuVtXU8

THINK DIFFERENT - LIBE 477 Module 9 Summarizing and Discussing Phase 2 Topics and Interests

 "THINK DIFFERENT"

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There is no amount of independent internet surfing that can garner as much quality resources, input, and further professional development than what I was able to gain from reading my peers' blogs.  Here we have global colleagues that have similar goals for their students, identical topics being explored, and interpretations that are viable to use in next week's classroom/learning commons lessons.  PLNs are vital to positive progress towards focused paths of learning and my own magical journey to becoming a 21st century learner.  

Here are some key takeaways for the past blog post topics:

★ Fostering Reading Cultures

Many of us follow similar pathways to supporting students' growth in reading and writing: Daily 5, Adrienne Gear texts, and often use technology to enhance the literacy experience at school and gain support from home.  I would be interested in checking out studenttreasures.com next time I attempt a large writing piece.  Usually we just photocopy our good work and put it into plastic sleeves, but this will give students more of a feel of what publishing would be like.

★ Developing My Own ICT Skills

image from Bitmoji

"Slow and steady wins the race."  That would perfectly summarize my progress with ICT skills.  I usually prefer to take on 1 or 2 programs/apps a year to learn.  The past 6 months I have taken on Microsoft Teams, My BluePrint, iMovie, YouTube, GoogleMeet, SeeSaw, and creating a blog.  Taking a page out of my lesson plans, I feel like I am developing a growth mindset with learning, making mistakes, relearning, and persevering.

image from Bitmoji

One subject area that I have avoided is music.  Usually we had a music specialist for our prep coverage but for the past two years we have not.  I had grand plans to utilize the dusty xylophones at our school, but they were missing keys and enough instruments for all students.  As well, I did not even know where to start!  This year, I came out of my comfort zone, thanks to this coursework and Tuesday meets.  For our virtual Remembrance Day ceremony, I took the risk of practicing a special song (I am very tone deaf), recording using voice memo and played an instrumental version on the projector mirrored from my iPad, and uploaded their artwork as part of an iMovie that I linked to a YouTube account I made.  It may not seem a lot for any of you tech-minded educators, but I feel like I checked something off on my bucket list.  I am really proud for my Grade 3 students as this was something new for them as well and collaborated together.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muGLxaXsdn0&feature=youtu.be

★ Ongoing Professional Development

image from Bitmoji

I promise to try harder.  This is my mantra when I begin to plan for future 21st century endeavours.  For me, trying new things is not engaging, unless I am failing and succeeding with at least one other person.  I took the jump to librarianship for this exact reason.  Of course, I am passionate about Learning Commons and literacy, but doing the coursework with a colleague has also added to my PLN.  She has delayed taking more courses, but it has opened up the opportunity for me to connect with our TL at present, as she too, is pursuing a librarianship degree.  Then there is making connections with my brother who is a computer software designer, and being able to ask him questions he could answer in a heartbeat to save me surfing for hours.  This may sound like collaboration and building my PLN, but this is where exploring ongoing professional development has led me.  

★ World Libraries/Mobile Devices

I want to be "in the know" with what is happening, in terms of bringing literacy be it physical or digital, into the hands of all children, beyond our continent by frequently visiting websites like:

https://www.worldreader.org/ and https://onebillion.org/

I have been at the same elementary school for 15 years, which has been most of my career.  So, having a class set of iPads, laptops, document cameras, projectors, Apple TVs, teacher Apple laptops/iPads, Smartboards, green screens, etc. is the norm here.  It is not say, I am not aware, but I am definitely moving towards being more educated on what is happening in developing countries, the creative ways students are receiving access to technology, and how the world is helping every child receive equitable educational resources.

This particular topic really resonated with me because my eyes were opened during remote learning when families were trying to navigate technology with varying abilities, devices (or lack thereof), wifi service, and truly, patience.  Some parents were still traumatized by the whole experience and were not willing to do a virtual conference this fall.  Unfortunately these experiences are not even comparable to what is lacking in developing countries around the world.

image from Bitmoji

Works Cited

Helping Readers Build a Better World. (2020, November 05). Retrieved November 08, 2020, from https://www.worldreader.org/

One billion children reading starts now. (n.d.). Retrieved November 08, 2020, from https://onebillion.org/

Student Publishing - Free Book Publishing. (2020, November 04). Retrieved November 07, 2020, from https://studentreasures.com/