new to teaching but old to the love of learning

Author: kirbyjarvis (Page 2 of 9)

A new chapter in this journey

Being overdramatic as usual and reminiscing on past summer courses (Unsplash by Mick Haupt)

I began this blog in 2019… three years ago, in my first year and first semester of my Bachelor of Education degree. Today I sit at a Starbucks in View Royal where I just finished day 12 of full-time TTOC-ing in the Greater Victoria school district (Sd61). Now you may be confused by why a person who just graduated and who has a full-time job is already back at UVIC taking another course… I’ll give you three reasons:

1. $$$ I am working towards my salary upgrade which will require me to have an additional year of coursework up my sleeves

2. Although I am working full time TTOC-ing, and also working part-time as a PARTY LEADER at a kids salon, APPARENTLY I feel still unfulfilled in my extracurriculars so here I am escaping boredom

3. I am in complete denial about the thought of being an “adult” and a “graduate” by taking this summer class it feels as if I am still a UVIC student, and that makes me feel safe and comforted

So here I am, it is the summer of 2022 and I am taking EDCI 335, Learning Design. I should probably get back on track with why I am sitting in Starbucks in the first place writing this blog post…

An introduction to me:

My name is Kirby, I am a recent graduate of the University of Victoria Bachelor of elementary education program, full-time substitute teacher, and part-time student (taking this singular course). A lot of changes have been happing over the past month in my life, I have obviously began legit money-making teaching but another big change has been that this is my first summer I am spending in Victoria (EEEEEKKKK but also WAHHHHH). I am a born and raised island girl from a small town called Black Creek, which is located about 3.5 hours up island. If this had not been such a monumental year in my life (graduating) you would find me working at my past summer job as a kayak instructor, where I would already be tan from working outside all day. HOWEVER, here I am in Victoria, making my own meals, driving my own car, living in an illegal basement suite in a townhouse of 4 other people crying but THRIVING. Honestly that quote pretty much sums up the current situation of my life…

Crying but thriving

Kirby Jarvis 2022

To be completely honest, I am not the kind of person who enjoys big changes, but with everything that is going on, I can say with integrity that the thing that is making me the most upset is missing my cats at home… not too bad for someone who just started a new career. Speaking of my career, it is a dream. I have been struggling with the whole waiting game for years, the jumping through hoops of taking course after course after course. I know I know I know, I needed to learn the practice before I could do the practicing, but when I am in the classroom it has always just made sense to me. I remember at the end of my TTOC interview and my principal asked the final un-graded question along the lines of “is there anything else you would like to say about yourself and you as a teacher that wasn’t listed in the questions” I honest to god straight up said “I just need for them to know how happy I am in the classroom” and so I saw my principal write down “happy” and the next day I got the job. Teaching makes sense to me, working with children is something that I find enjoyable, something that comes easy to me. I know this is the right world for me and I am so excited to see where my career leads me.

I am looking forward to connecting with everyone through our blogging and through our online weekly zoom meetings!

Unsplash by Chris Montgomery

Genius hour lesson plan

Created by Leona Ngan and Kirby Jarvis 

Link to presentation video: Current Events Twitter Ed.

Link to Google Slides presentation: Current Events Twitter Ed.

Link to the full lesson plan: Current Events Twitter Ed.

HANDOUTS AND RESOURCES
VIDEOS 
REFERENCES

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2016). Core competencies. https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/competencies

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2016).  https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/ 

What makes a real good and real professional TikTok?

As a past (and now present) TikTok-viewer, audience engagement is huge. When only given 15-60 seconds to persuade someone/make them laugh/tell a story the creator must provide the viewer with visuals, audio, and information that encourages them to keep watching. Part of this audience engagement happens in the first 5 seconds of the video (the hook), this is the time the viewer will decide to either continue viewing or scroll to the next video. What makes a professional TikTok different from a “just for fun” one, is how you choose to present and share your information/visual/self in your video. You must know the audience you’re hoping to reach and display your content in a way that will be responded to positively. Finally, a professional TikTok should be multimodal and contain various modes to ​​convey meaning, demonstrate, explain or represent the given information.

Cyberbullying Lesson Plan

Created by Leona Ngan and Kirby Jarvis

Link to the original lesson plan “Our Digital Citizenship Pledge” from Common Sense Media: Original Lesson Plan

To view our adapted lesson plan, please click here

Handouts and Resources

Written Explanation Highlighting Changes

For this assignment, we chose to adapt the lesson “Our Digital Citizenship Pledge” from the online educational resource Common Sense Media. We were inspired by this lesson’s focus and intersection between community and digital citizenship. Additionally, we recognized the potential to integrate the concepts of empathy and being an active participant through the creation of community norms as well as answer the inquiry question “What do powerful digital bystanders do? Say?”

While beginning the revising process, our goal was to adapt the lesson to increase student engagement, student interaction with peers, and connection with the BC curriculum in a way that aligns with constructivist teaching philosophy. To begin, we analyzed the structure of the lesson and adapted the existing sequence of activities. Originally, the introduction to the lesson, Community Circle, was teacher-directed. We adapted this means of instruction to a community circle format to facilitate a more open exchange and sharing of ideas rather than a traditional question and answer session. 

Following the community circle activity, we adapted the community norms portion of the lesson by revamping the lesson template. As the original template included digital applications that appeared dated, we changed “video sites” to “social media” and exchanged “Vimeo” for “Tiktok” to increase the relativity of the materials for students. We also chose to adjust the language worded in the template to be positive and promote wanted behaviour versus unwanted and inappropriate actions. 

To address the topic of being a powerful bystander, we created a model representing strategies for responding to unmet community norms. We did this through the addition of the RADAR activity into the lesson plan and slides. The acronym RADAR, which stands for Re-think, Adult, Document, Assess, Reflect, helps students think critically about their own and others online behaviours in a way that is both empathetic and contextually relevant. In the RADAR activity, students are shown scenarios of unmet community norms and in the reflection period students share and learn about empathetic responses they can make as powerful bystanders. To make this portion of the lesson more concrete and practical we created a student handout as an accompanying visual of the learning.

For the digital citizenship poster portion of the lesson, we chose to move it from the closure to the body of our lesson as it flowed better with our newly rearranged plan. We decided to adapt the format of the poster to be digital so we could share the document beyond the classroom as well as have the capability to edit, demonstrating how norms can change and be updated as we learn and go through new experiences and contexts. 

As a whole-class cumulative activity to end the lesson, we decided to add a class video pledge. This video’s purpose is to act as a visual binding contract that has the potential to be shared and distributed.  

We opted to adapt the lesson components in order to include relevant teaching strategies. To create a lesson that was more meaningful for a teacher to implement and relevant to the current BC curriculum, we chose to incorporate the core competencies, revise the lesson learning objectives and goals, and include additional key questions and notes to support the inquiry question “What do powerful digital bystander do? Say?” and guide instruction. For example, in the group poster section of the lesson, we connected the objectives of this activity to the core competencies “critical reflective thinking” and “personal and social awareness and responsibility” by highlighting the ever-changing digital landscape and realities of being a member of a digital world.

References

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2016). Applied design, skills, and technology. https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/adst/3/core 

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2016). English language arts. https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/curriculum/english-language-arts/3/core 

British Columbia Ministry of Education. (2016). Core competencies. https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/competencies 

Common Sense Media. (n.d.). Our digital citizenship pledge.https://www.commonsense.org/education/digital-citizenship/lesson/our-digital-citizenship-pledge

Tikity Tokity

TikTok… where to even begin? I became a member of the social networking app during the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic back in January of 2019 (wow that seems crazy to say). Two years ago I too found myself as Langwitches states “in a stage of lurking, observing, curating and finding my way around” the app, these actions led to me deleting the platform from my smartphone due to over-exhaustion of the content. I find myself now three months “sober” of TikTok, re-downloading the app to meet the needs of assignments, and already feeling the craving of what the app offers for mental stimulation. To be very honest, once this class comes to an end I will probably have to once again delete the app from my phone to maintain a somewhat appropriate level of daily screen time, however for now I am enjoying the app’s comfort once again.

I have noticed that now using the app as an educational tool has changed my habits in the sense that I don’t feel the need to scroll aimlessly anymore. After reading through the various blogs and informational sites about TikTok it has broadened my views of what the app is and how it impacts our world. So what is it? Obviously it is a social media platform, truth be told I am still beyond confused about the whole Musical.ly app and the cross over it went to become the now TikTok but that is not the most important mystery to currently solve. LangWitches gave me a few ideas for how to truly define what the app is. In a sense like the blog TikTok states, its content reminds me a little bit of the TV show America’s Funniest Home Videos. Although my reasoning is slightly different from the blog’s it follows their vision of what the app is. The TV show America’s Funniest Home Videos is a series of videos shared from a diversity of backgrounds that exhibit day to day life of people all over the world simply living. TikTok “is like a documentation of our world” (LangWitches). It shows us the lives of people we have never met, whom we have no conception of other than the short 15-60 video of them we are watching. We get to view creators who have lived and are living completely different (or maybe the same) lives than we will ever know. We are exposed to and are given a glimpse of a world that is not our own yet we are now a part of. TikTok is not just a social media app and anyone who says to a kid, adult, ANYONE the older than time saying “stop wasting your time and start living” while they are using the app needs to understand that this is the reality of life and they are living in it.

Skipping ahead, how can TikTok be used as a professional? I am going to take this question and assume that it is referring to my profession of being an early elementary educator. Beginning from evidence taken from the readings, TikTok is an app that promotes creativity, collaboration, sharing of ideas, and connecting with other members of the platform. Notice how all four of those things all relate to key goals of student learning and classroom goals? Using TikTok as a digital tool in the classroom is just another method of showing our students how to utilize technology to learn more about their interests and the world around them. Being a teacher in the 21st century requires us to stay up-to-date in the technology that our students are interested in and using (as Misskirbyjarvis stated). This is because in order to teach meaningfully we need to stay “relevant to their lives and appeal to their intelligence and experience” nicely worded by The White Hatter. As an educator, simply scrolling through the dance challenges, gags, and story times may not be the most educational use of our time and resources, however, the beauty of the app is that we can adjust our search engine and what we choose to watch in order to fuel our teaching.

To conclude, you are on TikTok observing, creating, living, etc., how do you find the community that you belong to? How do you use an app to build your PLN? How do you find the people that intrigue you? Excite you? Share commonalities to you that you thought couldn’t possibly exist in the world you are in? You scroll. You comment. You like. You follow. And you don’t be ashamed of who you are, what you’re passionate about, and what you enjoy learning. It is so easy to find like-minded people and groups on TikTok, the app itself is set to even show you content that it believes you will enjoy based on its algorithm set up. For any professional, by observing or creating you’re able to reach and connect with individuals working in the same line as you. From there you can further connect through commenting, duetting, or liking their video and then further find their other online platforms (Instagram, Facebook, Blogs) where you can further create professional and personal relationships.

I apologize to all who have read and lived through this slightly emotional and disorganized thought chain. However, I also take back that apology because no one should ever have to apologize for shamelessly sharing their wonders in the hopes to enlighten others.

Powerful Blogs in Elementary Education

*Photo taken from 3rd Grade Thoughts

Stephanie Van Horn is the author of the teaching blog 3rd Grade Thoughts which is a fantastic educational resource for teachers hoping or currently teaching in the lower to mid-elementary range. Stephanie’s blog consists of a smorgasbord of classroom management tips, ways to keep students interested and engaged in class. Her teaching philosophy is centred around students’ wellness and child-centered learning which can be found evident in her free resources for teachers including anchor charts, lesson plans, and tutorials.

*Photo taken from Miss Kindergarten

Hadar Hartstein is the voice and teacher behind Miss Kindergarten where she devotes her blog to share a multitude of resources for teachers who work in the field of early elementary education. Her passion is in creating and sharing engaging kindergarten activities that are neatly organized on her colourful blog under the headers math, reading, phonics, seasonal, crafts, and centres. Miss Kindergarten offers teachers materials, tips, tricks, and techniques to get their kindergarten class started!

*Photo taken from Ladybug’s Teacher Files

Kristen is the organizational genius who can be thanked for her creation of the Ladybug’s Teacher Files blog. On her blog, you can see her passion for sharing her knowledge of time-saving tips and organizational hacks shine in her tutorials, lesson plans, and free personal resources. She also is a bit of a math wiz and uses her interventionist strategies to provide her followers with suggestions for meaningful, engaging, and interactive math lessons. Kristen believes that the greatest gift she can give to her students and fellow educators is the gift of saved time through her organizational tips.

PowerPoint Summary of Topic 4

As one of my projects to show evidence of my learning, I decided to make a PowerPoint summary of the final topic, sharing resources & practicing open learning. To create this learning reflection, I read the three readings given to us in our topic resources and compiled a set of keynotes I found most useful/intriguing throughout the three articles. In doing so, throughout these readings, I was able to critically reflect on the importance of open research and open data in an educational setting. I was also able to practice my digital literacy in using a program I am not comfortable with (Microsoft PowerPoint). In doing so, I can take the knowledge I learned from creating this presentation to and use this program to aid in my lessons and teaching resources in an open and online learning environment.

Blog Revision Topic 2

As one of my additions to my digital portfolio, I decided to delve a bit deeper into topic two, and the history and context of K-12 distributed and open learning. I am choosing to do an edited copy of my blog from this portion of the unit, where I will add in more personal detail, more research, and take advice from both my peers and my professor to adjust my already completed blog. 
(everything in bold has been revamped)

Individual blog post #2: How would you describe the historical and theoretical trends in k-12 online and distributed learning? What did you already know, what do you know now based on the course readings and activities, what do you hope to learn?

The readings, topic notes, and webinar for topic 2 “Historical & theoretical context of K-12 online & open learning in Canada” gave me a new perspective on how far online learning & open learning has come in Canada and also how far it needs to go. Before taking notes and annotating with my peers, my knowledge I realize for this type of learning was very scattered and somewhat incorrect. If anything, before this topic, the closest I got to learning more about online learning and the benefits and difficulties it brings for both the student and the teacher was through watching my two elementary school teacher parents convert over to an online platform.

When the Covid-19 pandemic made its impact on schools and teachers, I was able to witness the negative thoughts and beliefs that occurred when everything turned to online and distributed learning. For myself, as a learner, it was the first time I had ever had to take an online class, and I was immediately shocked by the different ways my teachers responded to the situation. A few of my teachers continued with their original plan for finishing lessons and projects of the year without any alterations made.  One of my teachers emailed us the next day saying the rest of the projects and classwork was canceled and that they would not be even attempting online learning. Finally, one of my teachers thought that an appropriate decision would be to make mini-projects and assignments equivalent to the amount of workload we would be doing, pretty much doubling our actual graded assignments. As noted by my tone, these three solutions all had their flaws and prove how ignorant the world was (pre-pandemic) to online and distributed learning.
My parents took the situation in a similar sense but with their own touches. My dad (a 2/3 teacher) took the route of continuing everything he had planned for the rest of the year and automatically ended up being incredibly frustrated that the plans did not end up working in an online environment. My mom, however, I believe, took the route that the rest of the world’s educators should have. Instead of giving up because of the difficulties of technology, or trying to continue her usual classroom material, she decided that it was her turn not to let technology control her. She learned how to create a website, offered individual lessons/meetings with her students in and out of classroom times, learned every secret that Zoom has, and overall she is now in a love (versus hate) relationship with online teaching.

One of the most crucial pieces of information I learned was how “new” and “ill-researched” this topic is. Delving into the readings the very first thought made by me was how it took over 20 years for any form of a re-examination of formal research to be conducted on these topics. My theoretical thinking for this reasoning is that: The dramatic evolution of technological resources and hardware over the past decade has brought vast advancements compared to the course of the past 20 years which is why a new examination of online learning was needed.

During the course readings I learned a lot about Canada and how it finances its e-learning education, and needless to say I was surprised at times. Compared to the rest of the world Canada ranks quite high amongst the nations of the world in the category of “educational spending per capita” (Barbour, M & Labonte, R, 2018, p. 601). However, each province and territory is responsible for funding, creating curriculum, and managing their educational programs meaning there is no national funding, policy, or governing (I never understood the point of having 13 different curriculums). According to this article and my fellow peer Leona Ngan, the provincial/territorial funding is distributed equally amongst private and public schools on “per-student funding based on enrollment” (Barbour, M & Labonte, R, 2018, p. 601) regardless of the external/independent funding that these schools may be getting elsewhere (Ngan, L, 2020).

Historical trends in k-12 online and distributed learning:

1919: Correspondence school opens in Canada, British Columbia

1945-95: First virtual school is established in Canada. Avon Maitland Distance Education Centre in Ontario

1995-96: First virtual school to offer multiple courses opens. Electronic Distance Education Network in Ontario

1995-99: Several K-12 online learning programs are developed and operated in Alberta

2008-12: Distance education and online learning flourishes in all 13 provinces and territories

2013: CANeLearng national non-profit is launched to “provide leadership that champions student success by supporting organizations and educators involved in online and blended learning through networking, collaboration, and research opportunities”

2015-16: Of the 5.1 million students enrolled in education programs in Canada 5.7% of the population was enrolled in e-learning

2017: Francophone K-12 eLearning community is established

2018: Every Canadian province and territory has some form of online distance learning

(Barbour, M & Labonte, R, 2018, p. 602-611)

Personal thoughts of online and distributed learning:
This is a hard and broad statement to explain my thoughts about. In a general conclusion, I would have to say that online and distributed learning are still in their trial and error stages when it comes to them being implemented into education. Like things that are in trials, there are parts to them that you are on board for, then there are parts that you wish you could figure out how to fix. For me, the parts of online and distributed learning that I am 100% on board for are:
  • The positive part about this type of schooling is that it allows everyone regardless of their health or physical ability to attend school
  • It creates a solution to moving away for children who wish to stay in the same school/district
  • For older students, it gives them the chance to have flexible schedules so they can work while attending school
  • Again, as far as flexibility, it allows students to take courses or classes that may not be offered in a time that works in their face-to-face schedules
  • From my experience, online and distributed learning increased my interaction with the teacher or professor of the course. I felt more comfortable emailing them and asking questions
However, even with all these positive factors that come out of online and distributed learning, there are still parts that I feel need to be more recognized and rethought:
  • The technology that is needed to create and participate in online learning is not accessible in every household and to every learner creating a clear divide in which students can participate in this type of learning
  • Student motivation also creates a problem where teachers are not able to physically assist children in the completion of their learning and students end up getting behind in their work which can lead to anxiety
  • Equity amongst students and their family households. There are inequalities in both what families can afford as far as resources for school, and then, there are inequalities for the amount of help and assistance families can give to their children in completing their work
I realize after completing this portion of the revised blog (my personal thought and opinions) that our world of education, the world that includes new teachers with new pedagogies, the professionals, the administrators, the governors, the researches, the psychologist may be ready for online and open learning, however, most of the students, parents and current teachers are not. Online and open-learning are two incredible and groundbreaking systems of education. However, there needs to be more trials, more research, and more communication between all of the people who make up the education world until these concepts will be fully functional and approved by all parties.

Theoretical trends in k-12 online and distributed learning:

(Edgar, D, 2012, p. 5)

References:

Barbour, M & Labonte, R. (2018) An Overview of eLearning Organizations and Practices in Canada. ​In R. Ferdig & K. Kennedy (Eds.), Handbook of research on K-12 online and blended learning (pp. 600-616). Pittsburgh, PA: Carnegie Mellon University ETC Press.

Bates, T. (2014). Learning Theories and Online Learning. [Blog post]. Retrieved fromhttps://www.tonybates.ca/2014/07/29/learning-theories -and-online-learning/​.

Edgar, D. (2012). Learning Theories and Historical Events Affecting Instructional Design in Education: Recitation Literacy Toward Extraction Literacy Practices. SAGE Open, 2(4), 1-9,  https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244012462707

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