A Bid Adieu to Tech Class

Wow this has been a crazy, stressful and fast 10 weeks of classes but we did it, we all survived! Our final Tech class was today and it was definitely bittersweet; I am excited to start Block #1 tomorrow, however I am also sad that we will not have the chance to enhance our technological knowledge and skills in class with a tech expert! I will have to do some exploring and self-taught lessons on cool new technology I find that I want to integrate into my future classroom. This course has taught me so much...where do I begin!?

First of all, this class gave me confidence to explore new technology that I would not have been brave enough to do beforehand. Prior to this course, I would have Googled endlessly on instructions and step-by-steps on how to work a tool, but I have grown and moved past this...yay! For example I downloaded SmartNotebook because my Associate Teacher has a SmartBoard in the classroom and uses it daily. After I downloaded it, I immediately started playing around. When I started making my lessons on there, I was finding out so many cool things you can do, and I was surprised at how fast I was learning! I made an awesome first lesson with this technology, and I am so excited to continue using it and becoming more proficient. This provides me with great insights into my own practice- giving students the flexibility to explore new tools while you are there to scaffold them through problems is very important. Although students are more tech-savvy than I was as a kid, they still need time to explore and be comfortable and confident with tools before they use them for school purposes such as using PowToon as a presentation. Allowing them to explore on their own is so important, so that they can see what the tool has to offer and how they can adapt it for their own purpose, for example, a science experiment or a social studies presentation.

Another example is when I realized that I did not like the design of my blog, it was too cookie cutter and I wanted to personalize it...but I had no idea how. I was stuck staring at my plain, grey blog for 10 weeks not knowing what to do. I slowly started poking around my blog and creating an image in my head of what I wanted my blog to look like. I started to work away, made many mistakes, and sooner than I realized it, I had totally changed my blog; I added in a HTML bio, created a header, added it to my blog, centred it, changed titles, changed fonts, changed colours, added tabs and created labels. Wow! I never would have thought I could do that. I believe that this Tech class gave me the skills, knowledge, and confidence to do what I did. As I mentioned before, I was doing things that I would not have done before this class! I was so happy with myself, my blog and my progress in this class! I wanted to share it with the world!! I still have so many ideas for my blog that I will continue to work on it and update it now that I know how to do some basic things and have the confidence to do it!

As a result of this course, my feelings towards integrating technology in the classroom are now mostly positive! I say 'mostly' because I now know that I am capable of doing it, but the part I struggle with, is how do you find the time to make it purposeful for the students with all the other requirements we have to fulfill? Now that I think about this question, it will probably be something that I will understand and execute further when I have my own classroom. I will be able to try things out, and if they do not work, I will change it up so it fits better with my class...adaptability is one of the best traits a teacher can have!

I believe that what I took from this course was not every piece of knowledge and every skill set that I need to be a successful 21st century educator who can integrate technology flawlessly, but that now I have a set of tools, a set of foundational knowledge and confidence that will help me in any situation. For example, problem solving, exploring new tools, and being able to troubleshoot on my own are some skills that are transferable to any context.

Overall, I believe that I was successful in this course. But what is success? A lot of the times you see this picture and you think to yourself, "yeah, I'm going to take the successful road...I am smart, I will plan, I will follow these steps, and as a result, I will be successful" but then, when you hit one ounce of failure, you give up, because you are no longer on the road to success.

Potter, C. (2012, November 27). Crossroads: Success or Failure. [photograph].
Retrieved from  www.ccPixs.com & https://www.flickr.com/photos/86530412@N02/8226451812

However, I see success and failure as the exact same road. You must take the road that works for you, and on this road, there will be bumps, there will be setbacks, it will get messy and you will fail...but all of this leads you to success. I believe that all my setbacks in this course, all the bumps I hit and all the messes I made lead me to be successful and provide me with valuable experiences that will be adaptable in any situation I find myself in. Therefore, I believe the picture below. I want my students to know this and for them to know it, I will have to embody it. Thanks so much for following along with my technological journey...it does not end here! 

QuotesImages. (n.d.). Success quotes 21 [image].
Retrieved from http://imagesquotes.xyz/f/success-quotes-21-1304

Final Genius Hour Progress

Words & Sentences from: Vicars, W. (n.d.). ASL: 1 Lessson: 2. Retrieved from http://www.lifeprint.com/index.htm *

My final progress video! These past weeks have gone by so incredibly fast. It seems like just yesterday I was trying to grapple with the idea of learning American Sign Language. Overall, I think that I did very well with learning a new language, even though it took me a while to find the right resource and get into the groove of learning!

Over the weeks, making the videos became somewhat easier. As you can see in this last video, for the sentences I was having a hard time remembering, I was saying the words to myself. I realized that this also helps convey my message because some people who are deaf can also read lips, it also helps me add emotion to what I am signing. When I am signing I often forget that I need to use my facial expressions and body language. These two aspects are just as important to the actual signs themselves in ASL. Since I am focusing so much on getting the signs right, I am losing the other aspects. However, this is something that will come with time and practice! I added bloopers to this last video because I realized that it is important to let people know that everyone makes mistakes, and that my success with learning a new language did not come with ease!

My Ted Style Talk will be coming out soon that consolidates my Genius Hour research. It will provide more information about how my research went as well as reflections about my experience!

*Note: the purpose of this video is to demonstrate my progress of learning American Sign Language, not to serve as a lesson for learning ASL. Visit  ASL University to view the lessons that I learned from.