Google Drawings: Creating Info-Graphics

I love Google Draw! I think it is one of the most underused google apps in the Google Apps for Education suite.

In the below screencast I will show you how you can use Google draw to create fast and easy to create info-graphics that could be used as a teacher tool or even a follow up task for the children in your class. Check it out and let me know how you use this cool technique in the classroom!

DFI Presenting: Otaki....Remotely!

Today I had the wonderful pleasure of presenting to our Otaki whanau in the Kapiti Coast. This time I did it as way of a Google Hangout, which was quite the experience! It is a weird feeling talking away to your computer, looking at some faces, hearing nothing but your own voice (because of wearing headphones) and not sure if you're connecting with your audience.

As always I enjoyed working with Vicki and her team. They are an awesome bunch who are passionate about their teachers and learners, who they serve. I am always left so inspired working with these guys and learning from their expertise in Te Reo Māori!

Some key thoughts from this session:

• what policies and procedures do you need to have place to be able to 'go live' in the classroom
• what CAN you live stream and what SHOULD you live stream?
• what should you stream via delayed coverage?

Google Spreadsheets: Data Analysis Using VLOOKUP

I thought it would be worthwhile reposting this as it relates to what I'm working on this year.
A few years ago as part of my inquiry into teaching I had been looking into ways I could better use assessment to inform my next teaching steps, especially to jump on opportunities sooner. However, when ever I got anywhere near formative data it was spread out across a range of different places -
e-asTTle, NZCER, etc. I needed an easy way to collect this data. Aha! Use a spreadsheet someone told me. However this meant doing hours of copy and paste from other spreadsheets to then have it collated in mine!

This lead me to look at using some of the features of spreadsheets. By using a simple VLOOKUP formula I have been able to set up each sheet to go looking for data for me. There is no more need to copy and paste a whole lot of information anymore!

Check out the below screencast of me explaining the setup of a spreadsheet and how this has streamlined my data gathering and analysis.

DFI Presenting: Northland

Today I went to the beautiful paradise of Taipa in the Bay of Islands to help Kerry with the Northland Digital Fluency Intensive. I travel up to this part of the country often to holiday with my family in Coopers Beach - so this was a very nice change to the normality of Auckland!

Kerry is doing an awesome job leading this DFI course and is very blessed to have Vanessa working with her to deliver content. I thought that they worked well as a team.

I had the pleasure of not only delivering the deep dive into How To: Live Stream but also to present the Manaiakalani connect portion of the day - Create: Manaiakalani Pedagogy for DFI 2019. A couple of key points and ideas that struck a cord with the teachers in Taipa were:

1. It's all about the hook - a significant driver for engagement has been the intentional use of modern technologies to enable creativity.
2. We want out children to be creators of content - not just stealing/borrowing work that has been made from the internet.
3. This quote was hugely impactful and was a perfect conversation starter: “Give the pupils something to do, not something to learn; and the doing is of such a nature as to demand thinking; learning naturally results.” John Dewey
4. Site, Sound & Motion: how can we better use this as a teacher tool to help our children engage with learning?
5. If our children create they can then share...and by sharing they are now connecting with a real audience who can learn from the post, comment and help develop the thinking of our children.

Click photo to see entire Create Presentation.
Attribution: Dorothy Burt & Manaiakalani Team

Google Apps for Education - Tips for Efficiency

In light of what I'm trying to achieve with my blog this year I thought that I would repost a presentation that I created with Dave Winter. This presentation to help make your use of the Google Suite more efficient.
Tips include:

• Shortcuts for making a copy of a google doc
• Using quick view instead of opening a doc
• Shift Z... it is your friend
• Create a shortcut to search drive
• Create table of contents....then a document outline
• Many others!

My Inquiry for 2019 - Digital Literacy

How to use digital affordances to stream line my work flow as a teacher.

Here at Pt England School we talk a lot about making use of the affordances that the technology that we have at our fingertips provides us to better enhance the learning for our kids. Our challenge always is to make sure we are designing learning in such a way that would be impossible when only using pencil and paper. In other words how far can we push out the waka?

I think we do a good job of this. Our teachers work hard on this and are always developing new and improved ways to deliver and teach content to their children in exciting ways that is taking full advantage of the technology at their disposal. However, I wonder if in their own work that they are missing out on some key advantages that come with being digital.

Are teachers fully making use of the affordances that technology offers in their day to day work? This could include data gathering and analysis, planning, organising of their calendars, use of Google apps, etc.

This year I want to inquire into 'How to use digital affordances to stream line my work flow as a teacher'. I would love for my blog to be a place where I can share ideas for stream lining a teacher's work flow by introducing and teaching new or improved ways of doing things - digitally.

Pt England School Vision for 2019 - Russell Burt

This is where we're heading and what we're focusing on this year:



Russell shared what the major focus of 2019 is going to be for us this year. Some key statements or ideas that stuck out to me from what Russell shared this morning was:

• We need excellence for every child from every walk of life. Every kid deserves the best no matter their past or present. This starts with me!
• We mustn't reach only for equity but liberation!
• We get the teaching and learning right when we:
• deliver the curriculum REALLY well
• use 'Learn, Create, Share'
• visible
• high expectations
• What does our planning look like? Is it good enough to produce equity of excellence
• creative integration in planning for learning
• Cultural responsiveness - is this happening in my day to day at PES?
• What do we need to standardise?