Blog post 1: The contemporary learner and teacher


I certainly believe that neurologically, new stimuli enacts an emotional response to the brain. If new information is not interesting, the brain will filter it out quickly. In the context of learning experiences, I believe materials and activities must be engaging for the learner to willingly participate, apply information and remember what they have learnt.

I am both feeling positive and daunted with engaging with this unit. I am aware that 21st century learners are exposed to and live through digital consumption, more so than previous generations. First and foremost, they are technology users. This may be concerning as I am only knowledgeable of basic technologies to incorporate into lessons (PowerPoints, YouTube clips, online quizzes and learning modules (EdPerfect)).   

I am looking forward to engrossing myself in new ways to deliver content to English and Media Arts classrooms. During this unit, I want to reflect on my current knowledge of creative pedagogy and explore how my views can change. As a teacher, it is important that I consider the great diversity in modern classrooms (inclusivity and differentiation), consider that social media can be a form of research for students (can also be used as an engagement tool), consider the relationship between fast-paced learning (scaffolding) and images/videos, and consider the generations’ interest in working collaboratively.

I think that ICT is a great resource for engagement in the classroom. Learners today are very digitally apt as they are digitally exposed to various media. In a way, they are learning through different digital channels compared to the classroom which can be beneficial to a teacher/challenging.



The challenge I currently face is the necessity of incorporating ICTs into every lesson. Does every lesson need to incorporate ICTs or could they be incorporated to a lesser extent? What extent is appropriate? What happens when technology fails?

I have had both positive and negative experiences with ICT in the classroom so far. Students are easily engaged with ICT as they can shift away from physical media (book & pen) and focus on digital media that they know how to deconstruct rapidly. In a way, I have found it challenging to incorporate ICTs into classrooms where student do not have access to computers/laptops. Teaching and learning has been very different in this sense. I think laptops can have a positive impact, yet are extremely distractive for learners. I think it is crucial to have back-up activities planned in a media arts classroom as technology can fail us – as experienced on my previous prac.  

 

 


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Reflection 1: Web Spaces

Image
  Online spaces are a useful tool to engage students in different metacognitive processes. Importantly, these spaces are favoured for their user-centred design and collaboration between teacher-learner, teacher-parent/carer and learner-learner. I have had the chance to experience this mode of teaching through Google Classroom and Microsoft Teams , however, have explored other new web spaces such as Bloomz and Edublogs . Edublogs   I can see Edublogs being a valuable resource as an English teacher to make writing activities/tasks more engaging. Furthermore, I think the blog would work great in conjunction with Google Classrooms. Edublogs can be used as a space to share work, progress on work and comment on peers’ work . Teachers can also privately/publicly comment on posts and provide feedback. In addition to written uploads, students possess the power to upload audio and video.   Note: the free version of Edublog has a max storage capacity of 1GB per class b...
Read more

Reflection 3: Presentations

Image
 Canva is a presentation tool I have recently been exploring to benefit myself as a teacher and students as learners. From my experience, in almost all instances, a teacher will use a presentation tool such as PowerPoint or Google Slides to present weekly content on a whiteboard while they teach. Similarly, students will commonly use PowerPoint to present their culminated portfolios or present narrated assessment. In these cases, presentations are used to educate, narrate and persuade simultaneously. The great thing about these technologies is the ability to embed media such as images, video and audio to make them more engaging and support their purpose. Other benefits of this technology is the ability to access information instantaneously if shared by the teacher. As a teacher, I would find it beneficial to upload weekly presentations into a shared space in case students have been absent from the classroom or need to revise content. I would also see the benefits in using present...
Read more