Mr. Stokes and three of his students presented to executive members of the school board and to school trustees during an Education Committee Meeting. Mr. Stokes reflects below on his teaching approach while he uses technology and choice to deepen student engagement and learning. Also attached are video clips from the student presentations durng the meeting where they too reflected on their learning.

As part of my professional growth over the past few years, I have been exploring ways in which new technology can be used to augment and amplify the learning that takes place in my class. In January 2019, I was asked to present to the District’s Education Committee on how technology has enhanced learning in my program.  I enlisted some of my students to help me with the presentation.

A little background:

This journey is never the smoothest path, as the road is rich with learning opportunities and unknown-unknowns that we must face as we come to them.  Patience is a virtue when integrating technology.  The students are willing to grapple with these struggles in order to use technology to capture or express their learning. This shows to me that it is meaningful to them, and that they have bought in to the system.  

Parents are also finding the need for patience.  As we open up our classes and communicate our learning digitally, there are many new platforms and procedures being thrust toward the parents – and they get much less support with this than the students do!

            Teachers and support staff also find challenges with the technology.  As an avid, early adopter, I don’t mind feeling like I’m “building the plane while flying.”  Many staff members are less comfortable than I am with these platforms, and we must recognize the importance of time when undertaking these innovative explorations.

The Big Idea:

• Student Choice provided by technology allows for authentic reflections of abilities and allows room for personalization and creativity
  
  • Sometimes it is as simple as capturing the ethereal learning that occurs with math manipulatives and documenting that digitally
  • Other students elect to video tape themselves, or others use dictation software to record their speaking as text
  • Many students push themselves to find new creative ways to communicate learning

The Student’s Top 3 ways Technology has Enhanced Learning:

#3) Technology creates an extension of the classroom

“With the online discussions, I feel that we can express our thinking in an effective way with our peers.  Often, we are still thinking about class, and the discussions are an easy way to engage with our classmates and share these thoughts from home.  This encourages more collaboration between me and my peers.

Thanks to technology, I have "online storage" where I can safely store my work without having to worry about it getting lost or forgotten at home.   Having digital work saved in our Assignments or OneDrive makes them easier to find and access, and also easier to share.”

#2) The Assignment Page

“Thanks to the option of looking back at my previous assignments, I'm able to look at my strengths and weaknesses and know where my abilities lay.

Technology not only allows Mr. Stokes to provide productive comments which take my work to the next level, but I also feel that checking my assessment and comments on the online assignments has helped me to easily know what I am doing well and where my next steps are.  I can easily go back and review this while working on the next assignment.  Also, having all our assignments and assessment in one place makes it easier to recognize our own growth and to see the results of all our efforts.”

#1) Greater Confidence and Fun

“The luxury of working at home has given me greater confidence in stating my own opinion and ideas, which offers new insight and perspective to our discussions.  Offering a different perspective can be hard while sitting in class.  The online discussions give me a place to feel confident in sharing a different idea.

Technology has also helped shine the spotlight on my own work by providing me with the unlimited freedom for how I express my learning, which allows my work to reach its full potential.

Working from home is quieter and more peaceful than working at school.  The Portal allows us to use interactive multimedia at home. Mr. Stokes can share links to different digital resources, and this allows us to work on these exciting projects from home.”

The Teacher’s So What:

• Notices and announcements can be posted digitally and there are less lost papers
  
  • No one has ever told me they forgot their digital assignment at home.  And if they started a draft, then I can see their progress at a mouse click.
  • The criteria are always there.  No late Sunday nights with parents freaking out at their child about the last-minute assignment and the fact that the criteria is in a desk or locker at school.  The criteria are there, and all stakeholders can access it.  Parents can also see the due dates in order to help manage the scheduling – particularly useful for the kids with executive functioning issues
• My assessment is more thorough, contextualized, and is visible to the parents
  
  • I can type way faster than I can write, so there is a real economy of time
  • I am able to copy/paste a section of student text to comment on, or I can directly tie my assessment to a specific place in their work
  • I don’t have to ‘mark-up’ their finished product, but my assessment will also never be separated from the product
  • Parents don’t have to take the child’s word for it, my words of assessment are there for everyone to see and discuss.  This helps deepen the conversation about achievement and success at home, and allows both the child and parent to be more empowered in the learning process.
• The way technology elevates our learning is that it allows us to not only show what the students know, but also they ways in which they know it, and the ways in which they are comfortable communicating this understanding.

My Professional Learning:

• What we can see is that with the ability to create or simply capture our learning with technology, the students choose personally meaningful ways of communicating understanding, and they also take their next steps in learning in other ways.  The students choose their communication method of choice and build or refine skills in ways that give them ownership of both the content and the method. Technology has allowed me to really personalize the learning by providing such a broad range of ways to express understanding.

Adam Stokes

Grade 6/7 Classroom Teacher

BFA, BEd, MEd (in progress)