Take a minute to think about where you use assistive technology in your day-to-day life. Do you use closed captioning when you watch TV? Do you take advantage of the word prediction on Google Docs? Is the text on your phone zoomed in so it’s easier to see? Do you utilize the voice-to-text option to send messages?

Assistive Technology  is identified by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (2004) as being “Any item, piece of equipment or product system, whether acquired
commercially off the shelf, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve the functional capabilities of children with disabilities.”

Saskatchewan Schools use The Adaptive Dimension for Saskatchewan K-12 Students to ensure that we are practicing inclusion of students with all abilities and exceptionalities. A great way to include all learners is by using assistive technology. After listening to this week’s presentation, I really started to think about how I use assistive tech in my own classroom.

Let’s start with low-tech devices. Areej Ahmed tells us that low-tech devices are low-priced equipment that costs less than high-tech; it is also simply designed and requires limited training.

Immediately, I think of my beloved wobble stools and rockers in the classroom. They do require limited training (how they are meant to be used) and have a huge impact on my students who are diagnosed with ADHD. It is almost always my first go to when I move to a new school and into a new classroom. I find this has such a huge impact on my students and their ability to focus and pay attention in class. The challenge with these tools is that they are expensive. A rocker could easily benefit every student in my classroom… and many students want a rocker, but we don’t have the budget to make that happen.

Another wonderful low-tech tool that I like to use in my classroom are resistance bands. I like to tie them around two legs of my student’s desk so that they can bounce their feet on them. Unfortunately this can sometimes cause them to snap so I need to make sure to teach how to properly use them first. Resistance bands are also wonderful for body breaks… some of my more active students will walk down to the student support room to do some exercises as a great body break when they are struggling to focus in class!

There are so many other low-tech assistive tools that I use, but I will finish off with these Loop Earplugs. I am blessed to work in a school with families that can afford to purchase items such as this to support their child. I suggested these to a student who, due to a medical reason, is very sensitive to noise – you can imagine the struggle with that in a very rambunctious group of 27 students. I am a friend of this student’s mother, and I sent her the link to these earplugs and asked if she had heard of them. This particular student now wears these throughout the day to reduce excessive sound, and finds them very helpful in phys. ed and other noisy environments! A more affordable alternative to this would be the larger noise-cancelling headphones… the issue I’ve found with these in middle years is that students don’t want to wear them because they are noticeable, and we all know that pre-teens just want to fit in. The downfall of the loops is that they are quite pricey ($70+) and can only be used by one student since they fit inside the ear like earbuds. They are also extremely easy to lose.

I also employ many different high-tech devices, which Areej Ahmed describes as being “… more complicated and cost more. They also require training or guidance from the user, such as adaptive equipment, voice recognition software, or word prediction software (Johnston & Watson, 2007).”

The first one that I hadn’t really thought about as an assistive tool (because I’m so used to it) until this week’s class is my microphone. To be honest, I have always worn it because it saves my voice and I learned on it a lot while wearing a mask during the pandemic years.  This system is so beneficial for so many reasons! It allows ALL students to hear my voice, which immediately leads to better focus and understanding. It also helps my students with who require an SLP to hear me enunciate my words. Additionally, as already mentioned, it saves my voice and allows me sto speak at a normal volume instead of yelling to project my voice through the entire classroom. A downfall here is that since moving to my new school, we do not have the same system that I used at my last school (Lightspeed Redcat). It was very expensive (upwards of $1500), and as such my previous school is not open to sending it over for me to use for this school year. We are using a much cheaper alternative, but I am not finding it nearly as effective or easy to use as the previous one.

The second high-tech device I will touch on is this middle-years calculator (TI-15). I love this tool for my grade 5-7 students because it allows them to keep up to their peers and still have an understanding of the processes going on. For example, I have a particular student who has always struggled with math. They don’t want to ask for help to draw attention to themselves because in the past they have been teased for being “dumb.” This calculator allows them to reduce or add and subtract fractions, round decimal numbers, and use the order of operations along with everyone else. At first, they were hesitant to give it a try just incase other students saw them using an assistive tool. I send a practice book home for them to work through with parents and they saw that it can take a lot of that mental load out of the assignments, allowing them to see the process and understand the concepts. The biggest downside with this calculator is that the student sees it as a negative – which is why I encourage them to do the question first, and use it to check answers instead.

The next high-tech assistive tool I’ll talk about is voice-to-text using something like Google Read&Write. This was actually a tool that my class shared with me a number of years ago. My initial thought was that it would be great for students to listen back to their writing to see if they can catch any awkward-sounding sentences, but at the time the reading wasn’t quite smooth enough for that. So I taught my students how to use it as a voice-to-text tool. In theory, it is amazing, but honestly I have found it nearly impossible to find a space quiet enough for a student to use it effectively. The kids also find that they aren’t enunciating words clearly enough for it to understand what they are trying to say. One thing I do like with voice-to-text options is using it to spell words that you are unsure of. Even writing this blog post, I have my Google search handy so I can just tap the microphone to check my spelling.

Okay, finally I have a new one that I just discovered 2 days ago. MagicSchoolAI is a tool that I’ve been very excited about. I’ll admit, they totally suckered me in when they offered the paid version for free – I used my PD funds to get myself a year subscription to it shortly after. I heard they were going to release a student-centered AI tool called MagicStudent and immediately joined the wait list. On Friday, I got an email that I was now able to access this tool, and there are so many possibilities! One in particular that I enjoy is the ability to speak to any historical figure or literary character in history. I would be able to open JUST this option on students’ chromebooks, and they can type in the name of a particular scientist or historical figure we are learning about and ask them questions! Immediately I wanted to run to school and start trying it out with my students… but then I remembered something that was mentioned in our Productivity Suites presentation…

What kind of data is being collected here?

So, I slowed my roll and decided to do some more digging. I found the Student Data Policy and the Privacy Policy on the website, and will be sure to comb throught it and try to get additional opinions before giving access to my students.

With the evolution of the Web, there are so many new and exciting tools coming out that appear to have huge benefits for student learning. My job as an educator is to properly vet these tools and ensure that they are safe and beneficial for my students. If you have read through the Student Data Policy, I’m very curious to hear your take on it!

Thanks for reading

The late educator Joe Bower wrote, “Assessment is not a spreadsheet, it’s a conversation.” Unfortunately, however, assessment often feels a lot less like a conversation than like a series of “objective” numbers and scores. As we heard in the presentation tonight, assessment technologies can sometimes exacerbate this issue, prioritizing types of assessment that have traditionally lent themselves to technology (e.g., multiple choice, scantron, etc.). As assessment technologies become increasingly prevalent in the classroom, how can we ensure that these tools are used to support “good” assessment practices that support high levels of student learning and thinking and that address the potential negative cultural and social effects that can accompany the use of these tools? Where possible, make connections to tonight’s student presentation as well as the readings provided by the group.

I have only been teaching now for six years. In those six years, I have already learned so much about assessment. I have learned how to manage different assessment tools, what works best for myself, students and parents and how to use assessment in ways that actually benefit everyone.

A huge change for me happened this past year. I have taught grade one for the first five years of my career, and finally got the Pre-K position that I was hoping for! One of the biggest changes in doing so, is assessment. Assessment looks so different than what it did for other “mainstream” classrooms. In Pre-K, our assessment is focused on the child as a whole (opikinawasowin- raising a child together). We assess based on the strengths’ of the child in their relationships/identity, movement and growth, wonder and curiosity, and knowledge and wisdom. Most of the children’s learning and knowledge happens through play! So, my assessment is taking pictures. I take many photos throughout the day and post them to their learning story on Edsby. From here, parents can not only see what their child is doing throughout the day, but also see them interacting with peers, creating new art, or exploring using their fine motor skills. I find this form of assessment to be WAY more beneficial than your typical form of assessment (adding an assignment, giving them a “ME,” “BE,” etc.) I find that seeing a photo of the child with the outcome/indicator attached is easily understood by all parents (including our EAL families), the teacher and the student. My 3 and 4 year old’s can go home and explain to their parents what they did and what they learned by looking at the photo that was shared online. We also focus largely on family engagement in Pre-K. We have multiple “family days” per year, as well as home visits and conferences, and this on it’s own is a form of assessment. Just as Joe Bower stated, “[a]ssessment is not a spreadsheet, it’s a conversation,” and I have multiple conversations with parents and students on a daily basis in this form of assessment. However, I feel like this form of assessment can be hard for some parents to understand, because we were all brought up thinking of assessment as a spreadsheet, grades and scantrons (at least, that is how I thought when I thought of “assessment.”) So, I always have to sit down with parents and go over how we “mark” in Pre-K so that they have an understanding.

Technology makes this kind of assessment possible! Even 10 years ago, I could not share what I do now with parents. We could not communicate the way we do now. It was actually just this past year, that the new Pre-K assessment tool came out. We are now able to take pictures, attach the outcome/indicator, add in the student’s voice/words and make a teacher comment! Technology has made assessment easier, more convenient and beneficial for student learning, but also for our families. It sounds crazy, but my 3 year old’s can even take their own photos of their learning so that they can be involved with the assessment process. Now, imagine if every teacher could use technology to their advantage. Imagine if assessment was not a “scary” thing and imagine if everyone thought of it as a “conversation,” such as what Bower suggests…

“Assessment is not a spreadsheet, it’s a conversation.”

–  Joe Bower

Boy, do I wish that I had heard this simple description of assessment before I entered the field. Or maybe I did, but I was so bogged down and stressed out that I never put it into practice as a new teacher.

If I were to ask my students what assessment is, they would tell me that it is a grade or a mark… as in the familiar questions, “Is this for marks? Will this be graded? What do I need to do to get an EU on the next test?” When I think about what assessment is to me, however, it is a way to see if a student has a grasp on a particular outcome taken from the curriculum.

Çekiç & Bakla recognize that there are two forms of assessment that are used in education: summative assessment and formative assessment.

They say that summative assessment “… refers to the practice of assessing learning at the end of the learning process, usually for making decisions regarding success or failure.”

Furthermore, Çekiç & Bakla describe formative assessment as the monitoring of students’ performance in order to pinpoint incomplete or missing knowledge/skills and to try to fill these gaps.

For this blog post, I’m going to focus on summative assessment, and how it can be more of a conversation than spreadsheet, with the help of technology. 

I was scrolling on Pinterest over the February break when I came across this revision sheet from Scaffolded Math.

This school year, I have always allowed students to take assignments or tests back, fix their corrections, and hand them back in to me to have another look at or to re grade them. This revision sheet looked like an even better way to do that, because there is a spot for students to explain why their new answer is correct, and even why they made the mistake in the first place.

Naturally, I stapled it to the back of our last unit test. When I returned tests back to students, I explained that they needed to take it home to show parents, and that the revision sheet was there if they wanted to fix their mistakes. I told them that the “Explain” boxes were there so that they can tell me WHY they got the question wrong, and how they corrected that error.

I was thrilled to see what happened next! Students took their tests home and figured out exactly what went wrong with the mistakes that were made. They were able to find the error, figure out WHY they made that error, and explain it to me. It felt more like a cognitive approach (focus on the mental process and problem solving), or even a constructivist approach (feedback to continue learning) to assessment.

Why haven’t I done this before? TIME. This is the first year in a while that I have felt I could set aside the time to do a second check of the assessments and update scores… although it didn’t take very long at all. What I wish is that the feedback could have been more immediate for a true constructivist approach…

Photo by Alexandra_Koch on Pixabay

So what about online assessment? Maybe that could help with the immediate feedback dilemma.

I like to think that I can use the immediate feedback from online assessment to drive my instruction in the right direction (more of a formative assessment tool). The other day, I started math off with a round of 99math, focusing on rounding decimals, and found that my students weren’t yet comfortable with that concept. We spent the rest of that class reviewing how to round decimals, and everyone finished with some drill-and-practice that I was able to quickly and easily assign with 99math.

To use online assessment in a summative manner, I am interested in the idea of using AI to correct spelling and grammar on student essays, so that I can put more of my time into the content and structure of their writing. This would allow me to get through those 27 essays a lot quicker than I have been so that students can get feedback sooner and then go back to make those changes. I’m going to try to do that before the end of this school year.

Now, for someone who is feeling overwhelmed by all of the assessment options and has no idea where to start… what can you do? As Alonzo et al explains, we can use online tools and social media to enhance those conversations… using it as a tool for students to grow and develop their ideas by interacting not just with their teacher, but with each other.

What would happen if we replaced the word “assessment” with the word “conversation” as Bower describes? Keeping in mind that to have a conversation is to have a back-and-forth between two or more people, and not just one person delivering words to another person.

Something to think about…

 If you have access, watch The Social Dilemma on Netflix and comment on how Web 2.0 (the social web) has influenced our lives in positive and negative ways and how this might implicate (or has implicated) our schools and society

Well…that was scary. I just finished watching “The Social Dilemma” on Netflix and it honestly made me want to delete my social media. I know…WAY easier said than done. Why? Because it is the “drug” that I am addicted to. I never put much thought into any of this before. However, when you do, it is really freaky! Every single thing we do online is tracked. In the show, they made a comment about how when you are on Facebook, you are dealing with “someone” who knows every little thing about you, and you know nothing about them. We could be sitting beside our friend and log onto Facebook at the same time, and see two completely different “worlds.” Why? Because our devices and internet track us and our uses. It calculates our interests and our next move. The craziest part about all of this is how rich these internet companies are! How do they make their money? Off of us of course! They make their money by creating this strong drug that we are all, in some way or another, completely addicted to.

So, how in the world is this a positive thing? Well, first of all. Web 2.0 has allowed us to connect with people from all over the world. We connect with friends, followers, family members on a daily basis. We share photos, news, recipes, etc. This gives us a voice. We can collaborate through blogs, Facebook, etc., (literally what we are doing right now!). I can share my own ideas with people. I can share photos. I can look at other people’s ideas to gain understanding. At the touch of a few buttons, we can have our questions answered for us instantly. I can find news articles, updates on the weather/road conditions. With another few clicks, I could plan my next vacation. I can educate myself on whatever I choose. Web 2.0 has drastically changed all of our worlds…and yes, in all of these positive ways. Our students use Web 2.0 to research and answer the questions they may have. They communicate and collaborate with each other online. Web 2.0 has changed all of our lives in all of these positive ways! But, as we know, there is a flip side as well. Let’s dig into the negatives…

I think the first “negative” of this whole this has already been mentioned…we are literally being tracked and stalked in everything that we do online. Anything we look up, anything we start to type, even how many seconds we look at a certain photo for. This was mind blowing to me! “You’re easily manipulated” by Facebook and other apps like Instagram. “We aren’t actually being constructive individuals.” Why? Because you are only seeing what you want to see. YOU pick your friends. YOU pick your followers. YOU pick what you are interested in. The documentary then goes on to explain how this creates this false sense and reality that everyone agrees with you and thinks the same. Yet, we all have different “realities” online. How does this affect our students and schools? Well, as I mentioned above, our students can easily access the internet. They can have their questions answered at the click of a button and easily do research on different topics. However, I now see just how easily fake news is spread. Especially since we are all seeing different “news” articles and it is all based on what we want to believe and see as individuals. Obviously, the privacy of our students is a priority. But, how can we protect them from this “drug” if we cannot even protect ourselves? Lastly, Web 2.0 makes communication easy! Students can share ideas, thoughts and photos with each other online. This also makes bullying a huge issue. Cyberbullying is more of an issue now than ever before. How can we put a stop to this? How can we protect our students’ mental health, privacy and ultimately, protect them from this “drug?”

 “The web influences people’s way of thinking, doing and being, and people influence the development and content of the web.  The evolution of the web from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 and now to Web 3.0 can be used as a metaphor of how education should also be evolving, as a movement from Education 1.0 toward that of Education 3.0.  The Web, Internet, Social Media, and the evolving, emerging technologies have created a perfect storm or convergence of resources, tools, open and free information access.” (Jackie Gerstein)

If there is one thing we learned from Monday’s presentation on Web 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0, it’s that the web seems to be changing at a pace that is mind-boggling to comprehend. The first website launched the year I was born, and we are now seeing Artificial Intelligence make its way into our lives. It really makes me wonder if perhaps the millenial generation is seeing more rapid changes in technology than ever before…

With these swift changes in the Web, we also see swift changes in Education happening before our very eyes.

Before we get too far into impacts on today’s education, let’s quickly review the evolution of the web from Web 1.0 to Web 3.0.

Web 1.0 and Education 1.0

John Terra describes Web 1.0 as being “…designed to help people better find information… This web version is sometimes called ‘the read-only Web’ because it lacks the necessary forms, visuals, controls, and interactivity we enjoy on today’s Internet.” In my research for this presentation, I learned that the web was created to allow for scientists to share data across the world. The whole purpose was for free sharing of information.

Now, Jackie Gerstein makes an interesting comparison between each verison of the Web and the evolution of Education. Education 1.0, like Web 1.0, is also about the access of information. Like Web 1.0, teachers were seen as the gatekeepers of information, and would share this information with students. The students, in turn, receive, respond, and regurgitate that information.

This can easily be compared to a behaviourist approach to education. The learners are seen as having no unique characteristics, and their role is to take in the knowledge given by the teacher.

Web 2.0 and Education 2.0

We saw Web 2.0 emerge early in the 2000s. Heather Hall describes Web 2.0 as “…the second generation of the World Wide Web. It focuses on the web as a platform and offers more opportunities for collaboration, functionality, various applications, and user-generated content.” This is often referred to as “the social web,” as we now saw two-way communication.

Jackie Gerstein compares Web 2.0 to Education 2.0. In this “wave” of education, we see learners “communicating, connecting, and collaborating.”

Sydney compared Web 2.0 and Education 2.0 to the constructivist approach. She shared that we can see Education 2.0 in things like project-based learning, inquiry learning, shared blogs, and global learning projects.

Web 3.0 and Education 3.0

Shyamli Jha describes Web 3.0 as being “the concept of the next generation of web, in which most users will be connected via a decentralized network and have access to their own date.” Brianne further explained that in this phase of the internet, users own their own information… meaning that they can choose what can be done with that information. There seems to be more autonomy happening with this version of the web.

Jackie Gerstein tells us that Education 3.0 is “… self-determined, interest-based learning where problem-solving, innovation and creativity drive education.” She explains that Education 3.0 is all about connectors, creators, and constructivists.

Brianne further broke this down by telling the group that these 3 C’s are all nouns for self-determined learners. In this wave of education we are seeing the learners becoming the authors of their learning experiences.

What Impact does the Shift to Web 3.0 Have on Education?

So… now that that’s out of the way… what does impact does this latest shift have on education? In the blog post Education 3.0: Altering Round Peg in Round Hole Education, I read that many educators are reluctant to utlizie Web 3.0 in their classrooms. I myself can relate to this… thinking that I don’t have the time, resources, or the know how. I’ve also become accustomed to the way that I’ve been teaching for the last year, and am not ready to make any changes to that.

But the author of this blog (Jackie Gerstein) explains that this mindset is the result of Education 1.0.  Educators have developed a fixed mindset when it comes to the way that we are teaching, and I myself am guilty of this as well. We are hesitant to enter into the unknown. The problem with this is that we need to keep in mind what is best for the student.

Gerstein goes on in her blog to ask the reader, “Do you want to be a whittler or a dream-facilitator?” At the end of the day, we need to find the fine balance between teaching curricular outcomes while also allowing students to take charge of their own learning. Maybe this can be done through passion projects with the use of technology, maybe this can be done by using AI tools to relate these outcomes to things that our students are passionate about. At the end of the day, our job is to do what we can to ensure that the students are put first.

Teachers who are advantaged by Web 3.0 would be those who are newer to the profession and have been honing their craft during the shift from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0. Those who began teaching during the early days of Web 1.0 likely struggled to incorporate tech in their teaching, and this would have become even more difficult as we shifted to online/blended learning during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Students who will be advantaged by Web 3.0 will likely be the same as those who were advantaged by the previous two versions of the web – students who have access to devices and internet both at home and at school. They will have prior knowledge and be able to complete assignments with ease, compared to those who are not as familiar with the web.

This graphic speaks a lot to me. It reminds me that we don’t need to change everything we are doing as we see the impact of Web 3.0 on education. I like to try new things and have my students help me along the way — maybe something new will be a hit, or maybe it will just be a little bit of time lost in the day. We, as educators need to be willing to make these changes (maybe not all at once) and practice what we preach, which is having a growth mindset.

Photo by Tumisu on Pixabay

We are now midway through the semester, and you have both used and been introduced to a variety of tools. 1 ) Thinking of your own context, what tools for online and blended learning seem most useful/relevant and why? 2) If you currently teach in an online/remote/distance setting, how have you/might you bring these tools into your current context, and how has your experience been impacted by the online or distance format? OR If you do NOT teach in an online/remote/distance setting, how would you feel about teaching with these tools in an online or distance education class, and how would your current context be impacted if you were to shift to an online/distance format vs. face to face? Where possible, make connections to tonight’s student presentation as well as the readings provided by the group.

I found this week’s discussion very interesting, especially because I did not realize how many others felt the same way as I do when it comes to online learning and/or teaching. One of the main things that I have discovered throughout this course so far (and something that I have mentioned before), is that there are benefits and downfalls to everything when it comes to technology and using it in the classroom.

Thinking back to the peak of COVID days (2020-2021 ish), our division used Zoom and Google Classroom to not only communicate with students, but to also teach them lessons. I found these platforms as the most useful/beneficial while teaching online/remote, because Zoom is fairly easy to navigate as a teacher. I was able to see my kids’ smiling faces, and they could see mine (which at this strange time, was very important!) As some of you already know, I am a primary teacher (PreK-grade 1). When everyone was making plans to teach over these platforms, and teaching others how to use them, I do not think much thought was put into primary teachers or their students/ unique situations. I say this, because our students are between the ages of 4-6 years old. They do not have their own devices, they do not know how to access these platforms without their parents helping them (and lots of the time, their parents were still learning too), AND I think the biggest downfall is that these kiddos need face-to-face interaction in these formative and important years of their life. These are their first years at school. There was a LOT of pressure on us, or at least that is how I felt. I tried to plan fun, engaging and beneficial lessons, but often times it seemed impossible and it just was not the same as in-person learning. I had to re-learn how to teach, and all I can say is “thank goodness” that I was not a first-year teacher at this time. It would have been so stressful to navigate how to teach, while all the experienced teachers/mentors around you are also having to re-learn how to teach in an online setting. What a mess! On the other hand though, and going back to benefits of online learning tools, what would we have done 10-15 years ago if the COVID outbreak happened then? How would school have looked? How would we have taught or connected with our students and families? Technology has come a long way, and continues to grow and benefit us as teachers and students.

While in our breakout spaces from the last presentation, some of us were chatting about this. I realized that others feel the same way! We know that technology can benefit us in so many ways! We can see teachers using educational technology in the classroom settings to benefit their students, keep lessons engaging, as communication tools, the list goes on and on. I have also personally learned about how to navigate different platforms, such as Microsoft Teams, and Jamboard (tech doesn’t seem so scary anymore-haha!) However, some of us (especially middle years-high school teachers), are seeing a decline in students’ education. Some teachers see their high schoolers attend class, not knowing how to write or read. This, in my opinion, is a problem that does need to be addressed. I believe that there needs to be a balance of technology, and basic life skills such as reading and writing involved as well. Even as a PreK teacher, I see my 3 and 4 year old’s coming in, and not being able to complete simple fine motor tasks. These tasks include putting beads on a string, cutting, colouring with a crayon or using tongs to pick up items. Is this related to the overuse of technology at home? Is this what our future will be? Is this to be blamed solely on tech? Where do we go from here?