March 26

Final Project – 2 of 4

Photo by: Dan Callahan via Flickr.com

Digital Citizenship is a hot topic right now, particularly when we look at more and more schools  integrating technology.  I know recently my school division has made a point of ensuring all teachers are integrating some Digital Citizenship Curriculum into their long-range plans.  I make it a priority to start my year with an in depth unit around Digital Citizenship.  This unit includes what Digital Citizenship means, what it looks like, and how to be an active Digital Citizen.  This is all great, but being a Digital Citizen does not mean that we are creating students who are necessarily empowered to become digital leaders, because I believe there is a difference.

As I mentioned in my last post, the intention for my final project is to create a Responsible-Use Policy unique to parents, students, and teachers.  In conjunction with two other teachers in this course, our hope is to train, empower, and educate all of the stakeholders involved in this project.  My portion is specific to students.  Currently our school division has students, or parents, sign an Acceptable Use Policy at the beginning of each school year.  Teachers are then tasked with delivering this curriculum.  Our division has done a great job of developing a program entitled “Digital Samaritans” where we take some of our religion education program and team it with some digital citizenship teachings.  I feel these units do a good job, but not a great job at preparing our students for the digital world.  As mentioned before, my goal is not only only educate my students on Digital Citizenship, but to also empower them to make positive choices when working online and in the digital world.  I hope to accomplish this by giving students real-world experience utilizing digital tools and social media outlets.  Students need the opportunity to practice in a safe monitored environment where they can make mistakes and learn from them safely.  This allows students to gain confidence and an understanding of why their behaviour is so important in the digital world.  Students are bound to make mistakes, and we need give them an environment where their mistakes are opportunities to grow.

This is certainly no small feat!

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I am actually feeling a little overwhelmed by my undertaking, however I believe it will be incredibly useful and important!  I am looking for some input:

  • What are some of your ideas on how best to encourage students to become digital leaders, rather than simply being consumers of digital tools? 
  • How have you empowered your students to make positive choices and set an example for others online? 
  • Have you come across any tools to help support your venture?  

I am always looking for new ideas and tools that can best support my students in their digital learning experience!  I look forward to hearing your ideas and hoping to include them into my proposed Digital Leadership Student Learning Program!  Wish me luck!

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March 18

Final Project – Starting Point

How many of you have looked at the “Acceptable Use Policy” your school division has in place?  How closely have you read the policy to see what it includes?  Prior to this course, I admit I did a brief skim to see what I was signing off on, and I signed my name on the line.  Once I was prompted to come up with a proposal to make a change, I decided to take a look at the Regina Catholic School Division’s policy.

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Upon review it became apparent that this policy is used as an umbrella to address not only student’s acceptable use, but parents are asked to sign off, and teachers are also asked to sign this same policy.  How is it that each have the same stipulations?  Each should have their own policy to not only empower them, but also to outline the requirements for each should each party choose to partake in technology-based activities.

You may be wondering how I came up with this idea.  In January I was lucky to partake in a skype meeting where Jennifer Casa-Todd was our special guest.  She narrowed in on not shying away from technology, despite the risks, but rather teaching students to become Digital Leaders.  She emphasizes empowering students and allowing them to be responsible for their actions online.  Recently you may have seen schools, and even school divisions claim they are “banning devices” from their schools because of the risks and potential of dangerous situations.  Why are we running from technology integration?  Are we not responsible for teaching and preparing our students with skills and training they require to be successful?  Well, ensuring they are responsible Digital Citizens will not only prepare them for life after graduation, but it is giving them the skills they need to succeed in the digital age now!

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The focus of my particular assignment in this project is developing a “Responsible-Use” policy for students.  I was incredibly excited to see the resources and readings offered to us in Unit 5 of this course.  It was mentioned we can “vet” these resources for our project and I am thrilled to have these available as they will be incredibly useful to ensure my ideas align with the Ministry of Education and our STF guidelines.

Besides simply coming up with a page or two of policy, I also intend to create a program that will support empowering students to be responsible citizens online and make responsible choices.  Digital Citizenship is great, but creating students who are Digital Leaders who encourage others to follow their leadership will create a school community who follows the guidelines of a good digital citizen not because they fear the consequences, but because they understand that it makes for a better digital world!  We want to empower our students to make good choices not because they HAVE to but because they WANT to.  This is the difference between fear-driven decision, and power-driven decisions.

Well, that is my starting point.  I am going to continue to consult Jennifer Casa-Todd and her model, while referring to Alec Couros’ Digital Citizenship recommendations and aligning it all with the STF and the Framework outlined by the Ministry of Education.  Finally I am going to check out some Acceptable-Use and Responsible-Use policies that have already been created to help me form my proposed model.  I will continue to update you as my plan continues to take shape!

As always, I am completely open to your ideas and suggestions!  Please feel free to drop me a comment and let me know any thoughts or feedback you have that could help me out!

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March 17

Unit 5 – Provincial Level: Aspects of Edtech Leadership

Educational Technology is still relatively new and the concepts surrounding the documents we were asked to read and review this week are still foreign to so many educators and administrators today.  I have to say I am happy to read these documents as I was not aware these even existed!  For the past few years I have been immersed in integrating technology into my classroom.  I have been teaching my students Digital Citizenship lessons; however, I had no idea there was a framework created by the ministry that outlined the responsibilities of the ministry, school division, and advisory groups.  I was also interested to read the outcomes and indicators presented in the framework.  Why is it educators are not made aware of these documents?

As a teacher I have been interested to see when technology integrated outcomes would make their way into our curricular learning outcomes.  This document suggests they are not too far away.  I have often wanted to introduce my students to new learning opportunities and teach them some technological skills, such as coding, and I struggle to find where I can integrate it into our existing curriculum.  I know best practice dictates a teacher is to look at outcomes and choose activities or learning opportunities to support those outcomes.  However, there are times where learning opportunities arise and, as a teacher, I know my students would learn from these opportunities but they are not justified as they do not fit into the neat box that is our Curriculum.  Teachers are encouraged to teach students 21st century skills, but even my Digital Citizenship program is grasping at fitting into the pre-existing curricular outcomes.  How long do you think it will take until we see some of these edtech outcomes integrated into our current cross-curricular learning outcomes?

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“Digital citizenship education is not intended to be a stand-alone unit, course or lesson, rather it is best learned and understood when taught in context through supported online practice and real-life examples and experiences.” 

Government of Saskatchewan: Digital Citizenship in Saskatchewan Schools

The Digital Citizenship Policy Planning Document will serve as a terrific resource for my final assignment in this course.  I am working on revamping the existing acceptable use policy outlined by my current school division to include more of a responsible use policy.  The Digital Citizenship Policy Planning Document provides suggestions for not only how to teach digital citizenship to students in Kindergarten through grade 12, but also provides ideas for creating a digital citizenship policy, which differs from many existing Acceptable-Use Policies (AUPs).  The differences between these two documents are outlined in the graphic provided on page 13.

Taken from Government of Saskatchewan: Digital Citizenship in Saskatchewan Schools (page 13)

It is my intent to provide a document where students are empowered to become digital leaders where they see opportunities to grow and develop their digital literacy and citizenship skills.  We need to create an environment where our students take responsibilities for their actions and behaviours online and are held accountable for their actions.  We are preparing our students for the real world and students need to understand they will not always have someone ‘policing’ their behaviours online, so they need to learn to be responsible and these habits can begin at school.

The final document we were asked to read was the STF Social Justice document.  This document outlines the definitions and beliefs surrounding social justice, social inclusion, equity, and systemic barriers.  When considering issues surround Edtech, we need to always consider the “Digital Divide” in that not all of our students have access to these technologies at home and therefore the expectation that all students will be able to work on technology-rooted assignments as homework, needs to be taken into consideration.  Some of us are incredibly privileged and tend to take that for granted when we assume that all of our students can afford, have access, or have experience with these different technologies.  Reflecting on this document, I believe it is important for educators to regularly check-in and consider some of the barriers our students and families may be facing and how we can advocate and provide opportunities to overcome these obstacles.

In creating a student Responsible-Use Policy I hope to not only empower students to be stronger digital citizens and leaders, but to also help them to be aware of the inequity that exists in our global technological world.  In doing so, it is hoped students will be less likely to take their technological advancements for granted and treat it with respect.  Being a digital citizen is more than just learning how to behave properly online, it is about acknowledging the opportunities is also allows you.

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March 1

Unit 4 – Division/Alliance Level

Being a Connected Educator…Technology within a Division

I was enthused to see you interviewed Bart Cote this week.  I have discussed how being a Connected Educator has impacted my teaching pedagogy and the integration of technology within my classroom in many of my blog posts this term.  The Connected Educator program has completely revolutionized my educational teaching experience.  Learning about why we use technology and how to implement it in a meaningful way has enhanced my own beliefs surrounding education.

Because I was part of the original Connected Educator group, I have taken on several different mentorship roles and also the Tech. leadership role within the school and the division because of my experience with the program.  I have encouraged reluctant teachers to “dip their toes” into the SAMR pool and try some new tools to enhance their student learning.  Our division has done so many great things and taken on so many initiatives that focus on pedagogy and providing a variety of teacher professional development opportunities to train educators on how to best utilize technology within their classroom.

As Bart mentioned, the application process to get into the Connected Educator program is not an easy one.  A teacher is expected to review and reflect on their current practice and pedagogy as it relates to technology in the classroom.  We are asked to complete several self-evaluations including evidence of our attempts (both successful and not) to integrate technology into the classroom.  This process can be quite daunting and intimidating for teachers, however it ensures those who are dedicated to this process are those who apply.  I remember when I first had to evaluate myself on the SAMR model!  I was completely overwhelmed and needed a lot of reassurance and encouragement from my “Tech Coach”.  A Tech coach is an individual who is assigned to your school to support teacher’s tech integration.  These people are amazing and super supportive.  It was through her initial mentorship that I began to build confidence and recognize how my current teaching strategies align with those within the SAMR model.  Though I appreciated the SAMR video provided in this week’s lecture, the following video was the made the most sense to me in the beginning.

The swimming pool analogy that Bart was mentioning in his discussion makes the most sense to me.  When a person is swimming, you cannot alway stay in the deep end, or else you will tire out.  We need to take advantage of the entire swimming pool.  This will ensure students are getting the most out of their technological experience.  SAMR is not about ensuring we are always Redefining what we are doing,

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but rather that we are taking advantage of it when it makes sense in our classroom.  Just the other day I was working with a teacher that was new to the Connected Educator program.  I assured her that we would certainly be diving into the deep end together, however I would be her floatie and keep her head above water!  The pool analogy definitely makes sense!

But, what does this have to do with technological leadership in the division level?  Well being familiar with not only the SAMR model, but also the ISTE standards has ensured  that I am using technology in a meaningful way.  Being a Connected Educator has ensured I am well-versed in these areas and therefore can support my fellow staff members as well.  For those of you that are not familiar with them, the ISTE standards provide guidelines for integrating technology within the 21st century classroom.  They challenge the teacher to re-think her teaching practices and re-work her own teaching pedagogy to include more global ways to teaching students.  There are also ISTE standards for students that can be used to empower students and create an environment that is student-driven.

This short video will give you a good insight into what the standards and and how they can be used in your classroom.

The video and discussion surrounding what the Sun West School Division is doing is absolutely remarkable and ties nicely into the ISTE standards.  The Sun West School Division, however, uses their own acronym: PeBL.  This model is impressive.  Seeing the students take their learning into their own hands and a division taking the concept of personalized learning and marrying it with digital integration just makes sense.  The problem so many teachers face with personalized learning is how to get around to all the different groups and monitor student

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progress.  From what I can see from these resources, it appears a lot is put onto the students to track, mentor each other, and follow their learning outcomes independently.  I do not doubt there is a lot of scaffolding that takes place, however the learning outcomes and student engagement improvement would be well worth it!  Students take great pride in learning for themselves and taking their learning into their own hands.  I know from the few inquiry-based assignments I have attempted, the pride and effort students showcase through their work is proof enough to demonstrate the importance of these types of learning opportunities.  I would love to visit this school division and see first-hand how these strategies are implemented and how the students manage it all.

During the podcast with Dr. Guy Tetrault, he mentioned an elderly lady finally completing her grade twelve through his online distance learning program.  Previously this would not have been attainable, however technology has granted this to happen.  I have experienced students reaching learning goals with the aid of technology.  Students creating stories with dictation software or reading grade level texts with reading software allows students the opportunity to overcome obstacles that previously held them back.  We are now able to use technology to narrow the learning gap of so many people, because of the advancements it offers.

After looking at the images from this week’s assignment, I was drawn to Image 1.  I remember seeing this graphic when I read George Couros’Innovator’s Mindset“.  Being in a classroom with technology does not mean that you suddenly have a very expensive pencil.  It is not about using tools to replace the previous tools you were using.  Technology is about flattening the walls and bringing new opportunities to your students.  As this table clearly illustrates, it is about empowering students, just like the Sun West School Division does.  Sure the tools can make learning a lot of fun and can add new aspects to your teaching and learning, however you need to take your technology integration to a level where students are not only creating, but collaborating and connecting with the world around them.

How can you use technology to enhance your students’ learning outcomes?  How can technology aid your students critical and creative thinking skills?

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