Johanna’s Presentation
I found Johanna’s presentation incredibly helpful as a nervous teacher candidate going into my first practicum. It was very reassuring to hear from someone who has been in my position before, and can give us tips and tricks to remember. I’ve heard it before that your practicum is the best time to make mistakes, but it was nice to hear her first hand experience. I particularly liked her advice on how she completely bombed a science lesson on her practicum, so she scrapped it halfway through and did something else. Its good to hear this kind of advice because I would likely try and persevere and keep going through the lesson even if it was failing.
I also enjoyed how Johanna had examples from multiple grade levels since she has such a wide range of experience. This is especially helpful since my practicum is in grade 8 and I do not have a lot of experience with that age range. I also feel like a lot of the lessons in our pedagogy classes have been very focused on the younger grades so far. In this regard it was very helpful to hear about older grade levels from Johanna.
I felt Johanna made some excellent points about using technology to help students who are still coming out of their shell. She really opened up our eyes to the potential technology has in the classroom and how it can be used as a creative outlet for students and get them engaged and eager to learn. I know that one of my classmates had a question about screen time and I completely agree with her answer about just finding a good balance.
I really enjoyed Johanna’s presentation and I am very grateful that we were given the opportunity to listen to her especially so close to the start of our practicums. I am still pretty nervous for my practicum, but Johanna’s talk has also gotten me excited for all the fun things that can be done.
Fresh Grades and Android Science Journal
I think that the fresh grades app is a great idea in theory. However, I do think that some of my classmates brought up that in their experience teachers had used it but parents did not look at it. This is a valid point, but at the same time just because some parents don’t use it doesn’t mean that other parents won’t find it extremely helpful. I think it might just depend on your class and the parents to decide how much time you want to devote to it. However, I also think that it is really cool that your account doesn’t go away and you can still view your child’s work even a few years later. A quick look into the website for SD61 shows they have a page explaining how to use fresh grade for parents which I think is a great resource. I’ve attached the page here.
The android science journal was very interesting and I think would be very useful in the classroom. It has the potential to be very useful for many topics in science and even for a science inquiry. Relating back to Johanna’s talk I think that students could get really creative with and explore all kinds of things. I’m hoping I can find some kind of way to use it on my practicum perhaps as I especially think my grade 8’s will enjoy getting to use technology in class. What immediately came to mind for me was to use the app to measure how loud my dog’s bark is, and I can see how this app would be great for students to play around with in this way on their own time at home. This app could also be useful for supporting an experiment or larger ongoing project within science class.
