Accelerated Literacy Learning

This year offered Emma and I the opportunity to review our entry to school literacy programme and the effectiveness of it in preparation for moving into Year 2. 

This has been a valuable experience as it supported us in developing our online planning so that we could better meet the needs of our shared learners.

Together we have built our skills and capacity to do this and are now transferring these skills across our HUB. 

We are now asking questions about the most effective way to track assessment using Google Tools and this is a next step for 2020. 
Manaiakalani have provided me with the skills and knowledge to carryout some of the development and the knowledge and ability to discover how to do what I don't know.

               It is all about efficiency for time and effectiveness for progress!

DFI- Google Exam ACHIEVED!

Google Exam Achieved!!

The tension was real ... 2nd time round and panic had set in!!

Boy ... success tastes sweet!

DFI- Collaborative Sites ... Collaborating Life!

Working Smarter / Living Smarter

Using digital technologies to smarten up the way I live and interact with teaching and learning will not only make my life smarter yet the learning more real and connected for the learners and their families.

The class web-page is the beginning of this for my new entrant room as it is a way of sharing the learning for home and school, making it visible for the families and rewindable for the learners. I have created for the first time an assembly page under Term 1 to make the running of the presentation to the school smoother yet sharing it with families earlier would mean the children can practice at home during the week so they are better prepared!

Multi-modal Literacy's - Design ... window dressing ... making the learning inviting ... with the support of Hapara you can give the children focused browsing time where their screens are locked for a selected amount of time so they can only work with the desired work.

 There are so many supports to keep our students safe and to make learning achievable and connectable. The focus on Ipads today introduced the many ways for new learners to record, review and share their thinking with others. 

Explain Everything is the next new skill for our classroom. I look forward to introducing this to our class as I feel it will add value to their thinking and learning and is very shareable for our families. 

We are currently accessing apps on our IPads to support us with letter formation, numeral recognition, subertising and now we will use the Makaiakalani philosophy of CREATE and SHARE.
It is a fabulous feeling to be at a place where technology is supporting me!!

DFI - The Final Frontier - Week Nine

Revision

Today was all about reviewing the distance traveled after Nine INTENSIVE weeks of ICT learning. The Manaiakalani kaupapa of making learning visible, rewindable and equitable has certainly been reflected for me in the past few weeks as I have built up to taking on an exam.

I was able to use the skills that this DFI has taught me to view youtube, rewind skills taught in prior focuses and to save information all in readiness to sit the Google Level One exam! While not achieving the exam this time I am certainly close enough to had a resit in 14 days time. The challenge was real and my efforts stellar!!

I have learnt that learning is never ending and with the support of GOOGLE and a network of colleagues every challenge is achievable ... if not at first most certainly soon after!!

I learnt that the struggle is where the learning takes place and it is through the struggle that we achieve. It has been too long since I was last challenged in the way that I expect my learners to be challenged and this was a good feeling and a timely reminder how good ... no great ... achieving feels after the struggle!!

The skills I have learnt in applying the different tools and apps to assist me in keeping order in a busy life have been invaluable. Thanks to a fantastic SMART phone support, advice, planning, assessment and lists is never far away. Sharing across many devices and with teaching colleagues life is certainly much SMARTER!
 These pictures are a reflection from last weeks learning where I introduced my class of 5 year olds to CODING UNPLUGGED! Such fun ... I could see so many curriculum skills being covered as well as collaboration and communication. The list of learning skills was endless!!

A HUGE thank you to our fabulously patient and knowledgeable facilitators Maria, Amie, Step and Herman. Meeting new faces and learning partners has also been a highlight of the DFI experience!!

Computational Thinking ... Where will it take ME?

My Digital Journey

Magic Moments at 

Gisborne Mindlab

Getting my head around the new 'Digital Technology Curriculum' for me is a NOW step. Fortunately we have supported PLD through Cognition. 

Listening to Dorothy share with us today of the challenges of equity across our communities is such an eye opener every time. The positives today is thanks to being able to connect digitally we are able to keep our communities connected no matter where they be!

Digital devices are so much more than a tool! They are windows to the world!! Keyboards to collaboration and connection!

The Mindlab

What a fabulous space The Mindlab is to work in. Great to revisit and reconnect. This time round I feel much more digitally proficient and the new learning shared made so much more sense!! I was able to listen to and learn new skills and then adapt them to suit my age group so look our Room 7 Makauri School ... we will be learning to code!!

Playing KAHOOT! was a real heart pounder ... not a good thought when the Google Level One exam is 3 hours of STRESS!!!

Practicing Coding with real live ROBOTS. To achieve this successfully with 5yr olds I would tape the grid on the floor, provide left and right arrows to assist with not knowing left and right while they are learning this. We will explore coding using our Duplo blocks too.

'Lightbot' is an app for the ipad to teach children the beginning of programming. Great for covering the Mathematical terms for left,  right, 1/4 turn and 1/2 turn.

Such fun collaborating with a friend ... risk taking and applying new skills is so much easier!!

My first steps to begin the learning of coding is introduce the concept through materials in our room. Creating a grid on the carpet and one on the wall are places I am going to start ... watch this space as I will post pictures of our progress!!

Booking times with The Mindlab for our class is the plan for Term 3 !!

A great step to wean me from Manaiakalani and to keep my skills rolling!!

Next Week ... Google Level One Certification time!!

DFI - Connecting with Each Other

Connecting with Each Other

Today my skills with google drawings increased as has my understanding of and ability ... you will notice this wee gem I created on google drawings has been added to this blog. Manaiakalani's kaupapa is all about empowering, challenging and added value to our personal and professional lives digitally and now after 3 sessions I am beginning to feel a little more accomplished!

Thanks to the assistance of a passionate blogging colleague I am also acquiring the skills to begin personalising my blog which I am now becoming more connected to.

I am beginning to add to my google slides skills in which I am creating my digital pepeha. I have added this below so you can see I am very basic at this stage. The great thing about everything connecting is that as I work on impact for my Digital Pepeha in drive it will also update here ... now isn't that clever!!



My challenge that I am continuing to solve is how best to communicate with my families and the purpose of BLOGGING!!
Til next week team...

DFI - My Inbox is Clean!

My Inbox is Clean!!

Done and dusted thanks to GOOGLE! I have finally cleared my inbox and my gmail is as fresh as a daisy!

Photo Credit: Joanne Mador 2014