Providing Opportunities for Online Colloboration is Important in Online and Blended Courses 😊

Building a sense of community and belonging is important in both online and in-person classrooms. Teaching is a profession that is rooted in communication and fostering relationships with one another. Furthermore, it is these two key concepts that are fundamental to building a sense of classroom community. More importantly, “establishing community helps a group of learners bond and work together [which] is particularly important in online courses given the potential for students to feel isolated and alone” (6 Strategies for Building Community in Online Courses, Barkley).

 

In a blended classroom setting, teachers are fortunate because we have time with our students in class and face-to-face to work on establishing a strong classroom community that can then trickle into the online component of our blended course. Educators take time in planning well-thought-out lessons and hand-picking activities that will not only let them meet curricular objectives but also help students connect while strengthening the classroom community. Lessons and activities are well-organized and have a purpose. Teachers provide opportunities for meaningful discussions to take place where students can ask for clarification, learn from one another, interact with each other, and further their learning. Moreover, Bates emphasizes that “discussions need to be well organized by the teacher, and the teacher needs to provide the necessary support to enable the development of ideas and the construction of new knowledge for the students” (Teaching in a Digital Age). Additionally, Bates references appropriate technology, clear guidelines for student online behaviour, student orientation/preparation, clear goals, appropriate topics, appropriate “tone”/requirements for discussions, monitoring/responding accordingly, and instructor presence as principles that can lead to successful online discussions.

 

For my blended course prototype, I thought long and hard about what I could provide for my kiddos to engage in building online interactions and discussions. Grade 2 and Grade 3 students are not always the most fluent and capable of expressing themselves in French. The language and lack of vocabulary can make online interactions (writing activities) a daunting task for some students. At this grade level in French Immersion, it is much easier at times, and given the content, to express themselves orally rather than in writing. For this reason, I chose to incorporate weekly Flip activities for my students to encourage online interactions/discussions. I enjoy Flip as a tool to organize, facilitate, and monitor discussions with my students for various reasons that coordinate with Bates’ principles for successful online discussions. For starters, I love that I can provide my prompt through a video as well as in writing; the video option works really well for my students that might be struggling with reading/writing because they can just listen to me read and explain the weekly prompt (it also works well if I want to provide examples). When preparing the prompt, I can make sure I have picked relevant/appropriate topics and I can make sure that I have explained the requirements for these online interactions with my students. Students can comment on classmates’ posts/submissions and provide little reactions in the form of an “Emoji” if they are not able to write a response; I can also comment on students’ submissions and provide feedback. Moreover, I need to approve all posts and comments before they become visible on our class forum which allows me to monitor our discussions and respond accordingly. I believe Flip to be an excellent tool to use with our younger students that allows them to build an online presence as well as an online classroom community in a safe and structured environment.

Accessibility and Equity in Online and Bended Courses

Following this week’s lecture, I started reflecting on the topic of accessibility and equity in online and blended courses. Bates mentions that student demographics, accessibility, and differences in how students learn should be considered when choosing media and technology to use with our students (Teaching in a Digital Age). Furthermore, Bates states that “of all the criteria in determining choice of technology, [access] is perhaps the most discriminating” (Teaching in a Digital Age). It is incredibly difficult to ensure students have the same tools at home to access different learning materials online. Educators are not able to confirm if all students have access to the internet, computer, or tablet at home to view online content and we honestly can not demand our students have all these appropriate tools to access online content when we are not fully aware of the restrictions that may prohibit their accessibility. “Another important factor to consider is access for students with disabilities. This [could be for example] providing textual or audio options for deaf and visually impaired students” (Teaching in a Digital Age).

 

In any learning context, I believe it is imperative that we take the time to get to know our students and thus become aware of their instructional and educational needs. Each student is unique with their own set of needs and preferences to help them achieve success within the classroom. It is important for educators to get to know their students so that they can identify what they need to be able to complete a variety of tasks – especially when we are wanting to integrate technology into their learning repertoire. By talking with families or students we might be able to determine if they require any additional information, tools, or guidance to partake in online and blended classroom initiatives. In these types of interactions, we might come to find out that perhaps some of our families do not have technology at home that their child could access to complete components from an online or blended course; we could then approach the school and explore the possibility of letting some families borrow some technology so their child can partake in an online or blended learning initiative. It is also through these discussions that a teacher might find out their student has a hearing difficulty and could start planning to use subtitles or voice typing programs to include in online lessons so that all students can follow along. Moreover, we also discussed instances where our students’ religious or cultural beliefs might impede them from partaking in online or blended classroom initiatives which prompted many of us to consider what would be the optimal way to proceed; the majority of us agreed that we would not ask families to use any tool that went against their religious or cultural beliefs and that given this type of situation, we would find alternate solutions for students to complete the course work such as providing a paper copy of PowerPoint Presentations and printing off hard copies of activities for these students.

 

I feel that there are indeed some aspects of my blended course that considers accessibility for all my students. As I mentioned in my previous posts, I have included pre-recorded lessons that contain content in French and translations in English for my second-language learners to follow along. Additionally, I have included PowerPoint slides to go along with my pre-recorded lessons for there to be a visual component as well to help students follow along which is essential in any language course. However, there are areas where I can tweak a few things to make it more accessible to students. Following our lecture, I contemplated including some tools to help students with auditory disabilities where I could perhaps add subtitles to my pre-recorded lessons or use some type of “Speech-to-text” program. For example, when uploading videos to YouTube, there is an option to add subtitles in various languages and it will even provide graphs of the most commonly spoken languages in the world; the “Accessibility Toolkit” is a great resource to use for additional information, tools, and tips. Chris Hawkins’ article “The best dictation software in 2023” provides different “Speech-to-text” apps that are available as well. What I plan to do before starting my blended course with my students in the fall is to get to know them and discuss their needs before I start assigning modules. I will provide them with detailed walkthroughs of every program/app we plan to use for our blended course. I plan to also set some time aside with each student individually so we can address their questions or concerns before we start our blended course and I will be contacting families as well as asking them to communicate any needs they might have before we begin. These interactions with students and their families will be a key component to ensuring our blended course runs smoothly and that the students get the most out of this instructional initiative.

Blog #5: Accessible and Equitable go Hand in Hand

Reflecting on tonight’s discussion of accessibility and equity in the context of your own course. How accessible is it? Are there any issues related to accessibility and equity that you need to address? What other ethical/social considerations might be relevant?

As I reflect on class tonight, I continue to ask myself and others, how are you providing accessible and equitable learning experiences? What does this look like? What does it involve? It is clear that there are many different ways, based upon who you are teaching, what accessible and equitable learning might look like. But at the end of the day, all learners must have an opportunity to access learning.

Students in a classroom, receiving an equitable education

During class, I was asked what I currently do in my own classroom and it has occurred to me that although I do some things, I am not doing enough when it comes to ensuring learning is accessible to all. Here are a few things I am currently doing in my own classroom now:

  1. Google Read & Write - an extension on Google Chrome, where students can listen to any text and respond, using a microphone. To ensure all students have access to this, I ensure all computers have the extension ready to go at the beginning of the year, every student has headphones with a microphone and of course, we practice using it daily, for students to become confident and competent with it. However, during class, it was brought to my attention how this extension can become overwhelming due to all the different features and buttons it has. Luckily for me, we only focus on 3 buttons to listen, respond, and pause if one might need. Due to this, I am going to try a suggested tool in the fall called Read Aloud, which has fewer features, to ensure my learners do not feel overwhelmed when trying to complete their tasks at hand.
  2. Secondly, some learners have an enlarged keyboard or a computer mouse they can use, to help with fine motor skills and have letters enlarged to help them to write and complete tasks.
  3. iPad with the app Proloquo2go - giving my students access to a way to communicate with speech disorders.
  4. Google Classroom - all materials are provided on this LMS, where students can access any materials. It is labeled very simplistically, so students can see exactly what they need to do that day and can complete the task.
  5. Social stories - Help students with different expectations, social cues, responsibilities, safety, and well-being. Students have one at school and one at home, where they read daily. When creating these, I ensure to create them with the student and use pictures of that particular student, so they see themselves within the story.
  6. Involving the parents and guardians - this is the biggest thing I have learned, is involving the parents to see what their child needs. We are no experts and the family knows the child best. Ask the child. Ask the parents. This is a way to ensure they have access to an equitable education. For example, one year I taught a student who got migraines with certain colours and text, and therefore, all text needed to be enlarged and on a blue sheet of paper. If I had not met with the partners first, I would not have known that this student needed this to ensure he had an opportunity to learn.

Moving forward, I want to continue to provide an accessible and equitable learning experience for all. I know I have more to do but I am going to continue to find tools and techniques to ensure everyone has an opportunity to access their education. An app I will use in the future is called, Seeing AI and this app can read any text (whether in the room or on a sheet of paper). This will not only help students who have difficulties reading but also help students with social stories, as we go around the school and take pictures. Further, I have come to realize my weekly blogs are not that accessible and a goal moving forward, will be to ensure I am providing captions, subtitles within videos, enlarged text, and labeling my blog more thoroughly. I will be a flexible educator, as I believe, like Dr. Philippa Cater, that is the way to ensure students have an equitable access to education.

People demonstrating the differences between equality, accommodation and accessibility.

At the end of the day to have an accessible and equitable education goes hand in hand. You cannot have one without the other. Every person deserves an opportunity to access education and this will vary from person to person. It is vital to build relationships, ask questions and be prepared to fail and be challenged. We are no experts but we are there to provide an equitable, accessible education for all. Let’s start today!

How else can I ensure to provide an equitable and accessible education for all?

Taking my lesson in French on sentence structure and making it interactive for my kiddos with Lumi! 😊

This has been quite the informative week in EC&I 834! It has been so much fun creating all my material and setting up my module to use with my students in the fall! It is always so refreshing to take the information we cover in class and apply it to our teaching which is what I focussed on doing this week when I got to explore Lumi to later on incorporate into my module with the hope that it would help engage my students with their online grammar lesson in French.

My first module focuses on sentence structure. Seeing as my kiddos will be in Grade 2 and Grade 3, we are focussing on proper sentence composition. We are also concentrating on identifying the subject (le sujet), the verb (le verbe), and the object (le complément) in sentences. Like with most lessons in a French Immersion classroom, exposure to different vocabulary is key to widening our students’ database in French, and we are always translating and providing new vocabulary throughout our lessons when we can.

As I mentioned in my course profile to ensure consistency throughout the school year each of my modules will have the following:

  • PowerPoint Presentation of the new concept
  • Pre-recorded lesson of PowerPoint Presentation in French (with English translation included to help all students understand/follow along)
  • Both interactive and paper worksheets/workbooks (to be completed at home or in school if needing extra help/time)
  • Boom Cards
  • Quizlet or Quizizz activities
  • Flip video
  • Formal evaluation – Quiz (summative assessment) to be completed in class as a whole group.

The first thing I proceeded to do when setting up my module, was take the PowerPoint presentation for my lesson and I recorded a video of the slides. This video provided lots of translation throughout its entirety to make sure my students would be able to follow along when accessing it from home. I used Screencastify to record this video and it was very user-friendly while also making it easy to “export” my video. I did feel like the video was a bit long and worried if it would be able to keep my students engaged (especially when they will most likely be working from home without me around to “help them focus” haha).

I then went on to take my pre-recorded lesson and make it interactive with Lumi. In my opinion, Lumi was the perfect tool to help me insert pauses throughout my video and have my students review different concepts at precise times throughout the lesson. I explored a few of the different interactive activities and selected a true and false question, a multiple-choice question, and a summary task to include in my presentation. I also went on to create two different Quizizzes for this lesson and added two different links to the interactive video that takes students straight to our mini quiz. It was pretty easy to use but I do wish we had more options to add audio to prompts/interactive activities (if anyone knows how or has figured this out, please let me know 😊). I did have to play around with inserting my interactive activities correctly and at precise moments throughout the lesson; I would hope that as I get more comfortable using this tool, I will not need as much time adding the interactive activities correctly.

From that point on, I went on to prepare worksheets on Google Slides that students could submit back to me for review and went to select BOOM cards that I would also include in my module. I also prepared a video that walks students through both the Google Slide worksheets and BOOM cards activity where I translate a good chunk of the content for students to help them complete these assignments. Additionally, I provided one extra Quizizz for students who were wanting some extra practice.

I also created a Flip prompt/activity to go along with this module where I ask students to come up with a few of their own sentences, write them out at home, and then record themselves sharing their sentences with me. I emphasized that when they share each sentence with me, they need to also identify the subject, the verb, and the object in the sentence. This not only helps the kids review what they learned but also provides them with the opportunity to practice speaking in French. I do plan on using the kiddos’ Flip responses as a formative assessment to track their progress.

Lastly, once I had all my material prepped and ready to go, I went into my Google Classroom and set up the module for my students. I wrote up a prompt that provided instructions – this was done in English for parents to understand what to do in case they are helping their child. Adding the activities to Google Classroom was quick and efficient; we are able to add different media, videos, and links to our assignments in Google Classroom which makes it easy for the kids to locate all the activities and have access to them in one place.

Moreover, I think it is important to consider that younger students will need help gaining access to their Google accounts and log-in information. More precisely, teachers will need to walk their students through step by step all the different activities and components of their blended course before allowing them to have access. In previous years, I have set up times for whole-group instruction to take place when I am introducing a new tool, application, or website. I like to project my computer screen on the whiteboard and have students follow along on either an iPad on Chromebook depending on what is available for them to use. For example, when we started using Kahoots, we practiced how to type in the correct address in the URL bar, insert class code correctly, choose names properly, and submit answers correctly. With any new tool – especially relating to technology – it is essential to walk children through all the steps to access and use it correctly. I anticipate setting a couple of weeks aside where I walk my students through Google Classroom, BOOM cards, Quizlet, Quizizz, and Flip so we can do a couple of practice activities together before starting our modules for our blended course. Additionally, at the beginning of each module, I will be explaining all the activities so the kids know how to access all their resources on Google Classroom and feel confident completing the assignments for me from home.

Here is the link to my interactive lesson “La structure de la phrase” (sentence structure). I am excited to see what everyone else has set up!

AP 2D Art: 2D Composition Fundamentals

This module is created to provide students with composition fundamentals in 2Dimensional art. Artists use different techniques in their composition to direct viewers eyes and makes the artwork interesting. In this module students will develop a working definition of 2-dimensional art, composition, and techniques of composition. Students will create 2-dimensional art using collage techniques. Students will develop their knowledge and skills and create a 2-dimensional artwork for their Advance Placement course.
Learning Objectives:
At the end of the module, students will:

  1. Investigate materials, processes and ideas used in 2-dimensional art.
  2. Develop knowledge and skills. What is 2-dimensional art? How can artists use techniques to create 2-dimensional art interesting and can attract viewer’s attention?
  3. Create a 2-dimensional art using collage and document artist’s processes.
  4. Present an individual digital submission and be able to provide a critical response to other student’s artwork.

Learning Materials

  1. Lectures and videos via Zoom.
  2. Watch video on the fundamentals of 2Dimentional art. 2D Composition Fundamentals
  3. Assessment
  4. Student’s Screencast video on materials, processes, and final artwork.
  5. Summary of Learning
  6. Art Critique

Course Profile: Let’s Mix in the Math

A topic to create a module on? Go no further, we are embarking on a mathematical unit adding two-digit by two-digit numbers, utilizing Google Classroom. My unique group of students helped me to immediately come to my decision as they have diverse needs, with mild intellectual disabilities. Within my group of students, only being 10 students, they need specialized learning experiences that are tailored to their needs and need to build upon basic mathematical skills. For this blending learning course, I chose to focus on N2.2 within the Saskatchewan Curriculum, as the outcome focuses on 2-digit by 2-digit addition; focusing on place value and adding from right to left. This is an essential unit for my students, as they struggle immensely with numbers up to 100 and this would allow my students to dive in deep through different learning activities to understand these skills to a greater degree.

Bates stated the need for knowing your learners to meet their needs, in order to have successful learning experiences. Knowing that I know blended learning is suitable to their needs and allows them the opportunity to have an equitable learning experience. Each of my students has their own SETT device (Chromebook), from the division, where they get their own computer to have for their entire time in school. However, the main limitation to the students' own Chromebooks is they can only stay at school and students do not always have access to technology at home. So although some learners miss more school days than others, it is important to modify and adapt lessons to each student's needs as they are mainly learning within their school days.

Learning Environment

There are various opportunities and limitations to the learners, facilitators, domain and discipline, learning technologies, and access/cost, within the blended classroom. Although it is very flexible for the students to work and creates independent learners with access to one-on-one support, open discussions within small groups and partners, and access to technology daily, there will inevitably always be limitations to this. Limitations include some students not being as familiar with some platforms, especially Google Read & Write, as this is a main component in completing work due to my student’s abilities and fine motor skills. It will be important at the beginning of the year to focus on these specific platforms to ensure all students have the opportunity for a fair education with support. Further, other limitations include attendance issues but students not having access to technology at home and therefore, they will need assignments assigned to them one day at a time, so they do not feel too overwhelmed when they return to school and have multiple missed assignments displaying on Google Classroom. Finally, the teacher only sees this group of 10 students for half the day and therefore, working on these skills and learning experiences is limited. Students need to have a structured morning and therefore, through a blended classroom, this is made possible.

Objective

Focusing on N2.2 - Demonstrate understanding of addition (limited to 1 and 2-digit numerals) with answers to 100, students will have opportunities to create, model, and use strategies to solve addition problems.

Instructional Approach

Students will have opportunities for on and offline learning activities. Students will participate in daily rotations where there will be a timer for each rotation for the day. The rotation will be displayed on the board and before beginning rotations, students will have opportunities to understand how rotations work and what their job is within each of them. This is important to create flow from rotation to rotation and develop independence and responsibility skills. From there, students will have rotations where they will have small group activities, meet with the teacher, independent learning tasks, and lastly, technology. Through these, students are able to have open discussions, learn from each other, and have support throughout the entire learning process. Students will have instant feedback and check-ins with the teacher, daily. Within the classroom, this is lots of repetition and practice through different platforms, activities, interactions, and independent activities. Students will have frequent formative assessments for the teacher to see where they are at and summative assessments to see how the students did with the overall learning tasks.

Assessments

Examples of formative assessments will include online activities completion (teacher is able to check progress of students activity on Prodigy & Mathletics), Quizizz, small group discussions, observing, check-ins, Google Forms, Lumi, and Blooket. Summative assessments will be flashcards (keeping a running record), small one-on-one assessments with student/teacher (verbal and visual responses), and Google Forms, when applicable.

Educational Technologies

Educational platforms that will be used, will be the following:

Pre-planning

Focusing on outcome N2.2, objective d) Generalize and apply strategies for adding 1 and 2-digit numbers (with answers to 100). Students will have opportunities to complete learning activities on and offline. Offline, students will have various board/card games and modeling activities with manipulative and interactive whiteboard sessions with their teacher. Online, students will watch Lumi videos (created with YouTube) to watch videos and check in with their learning along the way. Further, they will play Mathletics and Prodigy, which are designed to have learning experiences based on where the student is at. Further, students will participate in various Blookets, Quizizz, and Google Forms. Through each of these activities, the teacher can provide feedback, check-ins, and see where the students are at.

There is still lots to do but I am excited for the challenge! I am prepared to create a flexible learning experience for my students, as Irvine discusses, which means providing choice and encouraging my students to see themselves within the learning process. Now, let's get learning!!

Please see my ADDIE Template here!

How else can I ensure my learners are heard and seen within the learning tasks?

Advanced Placement 2D Art and Design: A Course Profile

Art is not about pretty things, it’s about who we are, what happened to us and how our lives are affected.

Elizabeth Broun

Northern Saskatchewan communities has always been a source of fascination and inspiration for me. The land, the trees, the lakes, the light, and the people inspire me to look at life in positive and bright perspectives. It has been four years since I left La Loche, I still think about the place. It continues to inspire my art. This inspiration moved me to do something in return.. to give back and to show my gratitude to the land and the people.

I thought about many ways how to show my gratitude. I think that helping Dene students make art and show their talents would be beneficial. This online and blended art education course for high school students answers the need to earn credit in their postsecondary while they are still in high school.

Advanced Placement in Visual Art Education

It provides means for developing and maintaining physical, mental, emotional, and social well-being of students. There is a need for rich, wide array, differentiated resources and instruction to develop skills in art. It provides opportunities to learn and use of natural and indigenous materials in visual art. It will showcase talents and skills, and use of indigenous resources in art. Students in Northern communities face different social and economic issues that hinder learning, like lack of resources, transportation problems, and family issues.

ADDIE Template

This course is designed for High school students needing credits for Advance Placement (AP) who are not able to attend a regular secondary program (i.e. pregnancy, physical and psychological health reasons, economic, etc.). Advanced Placement course is a college level course developed by AP Program. Interested students earn one semester introductory college course in 2-D art and design. There is no prerequisite course which makes it accessible to anyone. However, there will be AP exams administered once a year.

Learning Environment

There are opportunities and limitations based on the following perspectives of the learners, facilitators, the domain and discipline, learning technologies, access and cost. The program is flexible in different aspects like time. Students have access to a wide range of learning activities and materials.  Although, students need to work independently, there are also opportunities for personalized and collaborative learning. In this course, students will develop self-discipline and motivation. There are limitations that students must take into consideration. They need to consider technological requirements and accessibility. There may by limited hands-on and practical experience. Since it is an online course, there is a potential isolation. Students may feel alone and isolated.

As the AP teacher, there are opportunities that I can take advantage of. The program offers enhanced accessibility, flexibility in content delivery, increased student engagement, and personalized learning experience. There are also limitations like limited non-verbal cues, technical difficulties, reduced social interaction, self-motivation and discipline.

In the domain and discipline, the following opportunities are possible: access to a wide range of learning resources, flexible learning schedules, and collaborative learning opportunities. lack of immediate feedback. Limitations like limited face-to-face interaction, and limited practical hands-on experience. In learning technologies, opportunities like flexibility and accessibility, interactive and engaging content, personalized learning, collaborative learning experience, and access to global resources. However, there may be some limitations may ensue like technical challenges, lack of social interaction, self-discipline and time management, limited hands-on practical experience, and digital literacy requirement.

Access and cost is another that needs attention. The program provides opportunities for global access of information and learning, flexible schedule, diverse course options, and it is cost saving. The students need to consider technological requirements, digital literacy, limited hands-on learning, and reduced social interaction.

Design

Course Objectives and Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, learners will be able to:

• Develop 2D skills through materials and processes: graphic design, photography, collage, printmaking, fashion illustration, and others.

• Create artwork that reflects learned knowledge, skills and own ideas

• Skills:

Investigation – materials, processes, ideas of artists and designers used

Communication – own ideas about works of art and design

Practice, experiment, revisit ideas as you create your own work

Instructional Approach

Learning experiences or activities

• lectures , inquiry-based learning, simulations using screencast lectures and demos

Assessment:

Formative: observation or art making processes during synchronous and asynchronous activities

AP art examination – once a year

Major Platform

List the LMS and/or other educational technologies that will be used.

Advanced Placement College Board

ZOOM

Google Arts and Culture

Kahoot

Mentimeter

Educational Technologies

List the ways that the platform and other educational technologies will be used to support student learning.

individual and group conferencing

Online studio work

Artwork presentation and feedback activities

Course Design

Course design pre-planning
Learning objectiveAssessmentLearning material
Investigate materials, processes, and ideas.Individual Art work in 2D Focus on the materials used, processes, and investigation of ideas.Lectures, videos
Make art and DesignIndividual Art work  Focus on skills, use of materials, and design techniquesLectures and videos Digital images
Present Art and DesignIndividual art works in 2D Digital submissionOnline and individual digital submission
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Introduction

Hello. I am Lourdes Ghazal. I currently teach elementary school overseas. I lived and worked in Africa for more than a decade before moving to Canada. I was in La Loche, SK before moving to Kuwait in 2017. I am a registered nurse back in The Philippines and used to work in health facilities. I joined education later in my life and loved the change. As an educator, I welcome change. I view it as a path to tomorrow’s world. I admire those who light the paths, the trailblazers. I adapt to new ideas and practices which I think beneficial for teaching and learning. Technology is always a concept that will scare me, but I am willing to learn and use it for the benefits that it offers. I think communicating with parents through emails and sending electronic assignments to students is my very first encounter with online learning. Before that, I was also receiving and sending back assignments to my instructors in my undergraduate courses at the University of Regina.
“Victory comes from finding opportunities in problems.” Sun Tzu ” A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.
The pandemic brought remarkable advancement in technology and it impacted education as we all witnessed it. I remained in Kuwait for almost two years without any hint of what will happen in the future. With too much time on my hand, I decided to start my graduate studies. Since then, I started to use online learning technologies. I learned to use the university’s learning management system (LMS) and other online applications. Some of those technologies were not easy to use at the beginning. I have encountered difficulties especially learning to use those technologies. Another important aspect of challenges was the limitation imposed on the use of internet in my host country, Kuwait. Countless sites and web pages that were assigned to visit in my courses were restricted in the country. Fortunately, my graduate instructors were helpful and accommodating when I communicated my difficulties.
At the same time, our school transitioned to online learning. Teachers, students, and parents needed to learn and adapt to technology. We have encountered plenty of challenges which we all learned eventually. The learning curve was stiff for everyone. At that time, we all had no choice but to adapt and go with the flow of change. The first year back to face-to-face learning was equally hard. Everyone at school needed to adjust and re-learn skills in learning in the classroom.
It was indeed a trying time for all. However, we emerged victorious because we learned new knowledge and skills. Those knowledge and skills were not futile because we continued to use them today. We can easily switch to online if needs arise without disrupting teaching and learning. Technology will continue to evolve and we are ready to learn them, use them, and adapt them to our fast changing lives.

LUMI = Learning, Understanding, Math (while) Interactive

Oh, you want an interactive video that incorporates engagement and learning into one? Then off to Lumi, we go!

Lumi allowed me to create an interactive video where my students will be able to stop along the way and answer questions in relation to the content they are learning. It provides different interactive activities and tests their knowledge. Students will be prompted to answer questions along the way, as the video will stop for them and give them time to answer.

For my course module, I will be using Google Classroom, where students will be focusing on 2-digit by 2-digit addition. There are many different learners within my room, with different needs, and therefore, they all have their own SETT (Student, Environment, Tasks, & Tools) devices. This makes learning accessible for all, as they have headphones and devices that they can plug into learning. Seeing as I have a blended classroom, students will be placed into rotations, that will be timed, where they will have different opportunities to use technology, interact with classmates, do independent work, and meet with their teacher.

Students will focus on building basic mathematical skills, through 2-digit by 2-digit learning activities. On Google Classroom, students will have access to this Lumi video, that focuses on how to properly add, where to start, where to place the numbers in a place value chart, and how to carry numbers. Students will be able to see different examples and be able to input their ideas directly into the video. The best part is, is it marks right away and allows for simple spelling mistakes, that do not hinder the students' progress/mark. This allows all learners to have an equitable learning experience that does not focus on spelling within their mathematical lesson.

After students complete the 2 Digit by 2 Digit Lumi, they will then be sent to a Google Form (which will be linked within the Google Classroom assignment), that will direct them to a formative assessment. On this formative assessment, students will have the opportunities to solve various questions, which will allow me to check in and see where they are at with 2-digit by 2-digit addition. Further, students will be encouraged to rewatch the video to answer questions as needed and can use Google Read & Write, to listen to the questions, if they struggle with reading.

Throughout this addition module, students will have opportunities to practice their mathematical skills through games online such as Prodigy and Mathletics. After students complete the learning videos and formative tasks, they will then be prompted to play these games online until the timer goes off. The best part is, is that these mathematical websites test the students' knowledge and allow them to play at the level at which they are.

Throughout the different rotations, students will have opportunities to create their own interactive videos with classmates, play cards and board games, flashcards, whiteboard interactive lessons, and other various learning activities. Although they will establish a routine with daily rotations, their learning activities will vary from day to day and so will who they work with. I think it is important for flexibility and allowing students to interact with different peers to focus on not only learning but problem-solving as well.

I am excited to embark on this 2-digit by 2-digit addition module for my students and I will be incorporating it in the fall.

What suggestions do you have for me? What else could I incorporate into my rotations?