Reflection 1: Jesse Miller
Hearing the information about a man at Heathrow airport writing to one of his friends on snapchat that he had a bomb in his bag. Which then led to two fighter jets on the wings forcing the plane into an emergency landing because they were able to see what he said was extremely shocking but not completely surprising. Snapchat has truly become one of the biggest forms of communication among youth. Most likely due to the fact that all the messages disappear after a certain amount of time and can never be seen again by the sending. This led me to think more about the overall harm that Snapchat causes among youth in today’s society. Snapchat can be harmful for youth because it encourages a fast-paced, image-driven culture that often pressures young people to present a filtered or exaggerated version of themselves. Constant streaks and notifications can also contribute to anxiety, distraction, and unhealthy screen habits, making it harder for youth to focus on school, sleep, or real-life relationships. Additionally, because content is fleeting, harmful behaviour like cyberbullying or sharing inappropriate images can happen quickly and be difficult for adults to monitor
Reflection 2: Rich McCue
I thought that Rich’s presentation was very interesting. He had the class play around with googles Gemini or google photo magic eraser. He spoke about how these tools could be used in a classroom setting which had me thinking of some of the positive ways AI like this could be presented in the classroom.Google Gemini can be a very useful tool in the classroom because it can support students with personalized, real-time learning assistance. Its ability to generate explanations, summarize information, and create examples can help learners understand complex topics at their own pace. Teachers can also use Gemini to design lessons, create practice questions, or differentiate instruction for students with varying needs. This frees teachers to focus more on discussion and hands-on learning. However, it’s important that students use it moderation, seeing it as a guide rather than a shortcut to ensure it enhances the learning of students rather than replaces it.
Reflection 3: Cari Wilson
Cari who is the vice principal of technology and innovation shared her perspective with the class on Artificial Intelligence in the classroom. I thought that a lot of her views were very interesting. I thought her point was that students that rely on artificial intelligence or use it very often may not be able to think intelligently. As well as her having us think of a wish, a wonder , and a worry about AI was a really great way to get me thinking about the impact that AI has on students.
A wish:My wish is that AI continues to grow in ways that genuinely support people—making
learning easier, solving real-world problems, and helping us work more creatively.
A wonder: I wonder how AI will shape future classrooms and careers, and whether it will open new opportunities we haven’t even imagined yet
A worry: I worry about how quickly AI is evolving and whether society can keep up with issues like privacy, fairness, and responsible use. Balancing these hopes and concerns feels important as we move forward with this powerful technology.
Reflection 4: Trevor MacKenzie 10 Characteristics of the inquiry Classroom
I thought that Trevor’s resource about the 10 characteristics of the inquiry classroom was a great resource for new teachers. I think that it covers some of the topics that come to mind when i think of what makes up a good teacher like nurturing student passions and talent but then also highlights things like deepening the understanding to go beyond memorizing facts and content that i dont always think about.That one specifically stuck with me, growing up i tried to memorize everything I could around myself whether it be for school or for fun. But memorising things was not actually teaching myself a skill or retaining important knowledge. As a future teacher I aspire to teach students meaningful information that will force them to use their critical thinking skills more than anything!
Reflection 5: Gamification and gamification in my L2P class
For our group project that was assigned in this class our group chose to talk about gamification and the positive and negative effects of it within a class. Growing up I did not have much experience with gamification, it was more traditional learning done by simple writing assignments. Upon coming into my L2P which is a grade 1 french immersion class i was not seeing much gamification being used at such a young age. One day, I had the opportunity to go into a grade 5 class during their math block. All the students were assigned to do was play math games. At first I was a bit apprehensive of how they could spend an entire block only playing games in grade 5 and how they were going to learn anything. After seeing how the teacher ran the class I was in awe. There were different stations all focusing on a different math aspect such as division, multiplication or subtraction. I have never seen a group of students so engaged in an activity before, they were extremely competitive with one another and they worked in a points system based on how many questions they were able to get correct. This really gave students the drive to try harder in a subject many students lack in or fall behind in.
Reflection 6: Overall reflection
For my last reflection I chose to do a reflection on the course itself. I really enjoyed taking this class, at first when we were assigned our time table this is one of the classes I was more nervous about. I have a hard time using technology as there was no chromebook / ipad in my high school. We only had old desktops that were frequently broken. I was sure I was not going to enjoy a class that was based around technology as I thought I would not succeed doing something like that. But in turn I beyond enjoy taking this course. I found that all those thoughts of being scared of using technology and platforms I was not familiar with was part of the learning process. Presenting our projects and hearing that making those simple mistakes was perfectly okay and a way for us to learn from each other was extremely comforting for someone who was feeling nervous about this course. I also really enjoy having a blog running. I felt like it was definitely something that helped me be accountable to keep up with the topic that i chose but as well i just enjoyed writing my posts and adding them to my space.
Before proceeding with this first blog post, we expect you to consider your privacy preferences carefully and that you have considered the following options:
- Do you want to be online vs. offline?
- Do you want to use your name (or part thereof) vs. a pseudonym (e.g., West Coast Teacher)?
- Do you want to have your blog public vs. private? (Note, you can set individual blog posts private or password protected or have an entire blog set to private)
- Have you considered whether you are posting within or outside of Canada? This blog on opened.ca is hosted within Canada. That said, any public blog posts can have its content aggregated/curated onto social networks outside of Canada.
First tasks you might explore with your new blog:
- Go into its admin panel found by adding /wp-admin at the end of your blog’s URL
- Add new category or tags to organize your blog posts – found under “Posts” (but do not remove the pre-existing “EdTech” category or sub-categories, Free Inquiry and EdTech Inquiry). We have also pre-loaded the Teacher Education competencies as categories should you wish to use them to document your learning. If you would like to add more course categories, please do so (e.g., add EDCI 306A with no space for Music Ed, etc.)
- See if your blog posts are appearing on the course website (you must have the course categories assigned to a post first and have provided your instructor with your blog URL)
- Add pages
- Embed images or set featured images and embed video in blog posts and pages (can be your own media or that found on the internet, but consider free or creative commons licensed works)
- Under Appearance,
- Select your preferred website theme and customize to your preferences (New title, etc.)
- Customize menus & navigation
- Use widgets to customize blog content and features
- Delete this starter post (or switch it to draft status if you want to keep for reference)
Do consider creating categories for each course that you take should you wish to document your learning (or from professional learning activities outside of formal courses). Keep note, however, that you may wish to use the course topic as the category as opposed to the course number as those outside of your program would not be familiar with the number (e.g., we use “EdTech” instead of “edci336).
Lastly, as always, be aware of the FIPPA as it relates to privacy and share only those names/images that you have consent to use or are otherwise public figures. When in doubt, ask us.
Please also review the resources from our course website for getting started with blogging:
- WordPress resources
- Using RSS feeds to read blog posts from your networks (e.g., Feedly)
- Privacy resources
- Copyright resources
- Finding images you can use
