I cannot believe that this is my final post for EDTC 300! This course and the community have been absolutely incredible, and I’ve had more fun with this class than any other one. Throughout this course, I feel I have learned some vital knowledge about navigating and teaching technology. From learning about cyberbullying to trying out AI, I’ve become a bit of a tech-wiz!
Summary of Learning:
Below is the video to my summary of learning, where I breakdown everything I learned throughout the semester.
Thank you for the wonderful semester!
Learning the basics of ASL has been incredible. I decided to learn ASL because of my work with inclusion. Not only do I work at inclusive summer camps, but I also helped out as a high school student in our Functionally Integrated Program (FIP) as a credit and have just applied to return to the school as a substitute EA. I have worked with many children who could have benefitted from having someone know ASL, and I even worked with one student who was just starting to learn the alphabet! That was when I first took an interest in ASL, but this project got me kick-started!
ChatGPT
I started by asking it simple questions. I’m a cheer coach so I asked it to “Design a cheerleading warm-up for 6-8 year-olds.” It gave me back a warm-up that it said would focus on developing coordination, flexibility, and strength. With my coaching experience, and years of teaching under my belt, I looked through the routine carefully, picking out what parts I would use and what I wouldn’t. It gave some simple starter stretches, a three minute jog, cheer chants, jumping jacks, partner stretch, a small dance with arm positions, and a cool down, all in all resulting in a 26 minute warm up. Here’s what I thought:
Now let’s look at ChatGPT in a classroom setting. I automatically think of students using it to get easy answers. But what more can you use it for? I decided to think about lesson plans. My mom is always complaining about making lesson plans, especially on days when she has to make one for a sub that’s suitable for easy individual work. I decided to ask ChatGPT to “Create a lesson plan for teaching a grade 2 math class about multiplying.” It gave me a 45 minute lesson plan consisting of introducing the term, finding real-life examples, explaining repeated addition, hands-on practice (using counters, white boards, etc.), problem-solving questions, and independent practice. As I looked through, I thought that the lesson plan was set up extremely well, and had good examples that I remember doing when I was younger, like using counters and arranging them in certain rows. In this area, I think teachers could benefit greatly from using AI to assist in lesson plans when they’re on a time crunch. However, it should not replace actual planning, since there are always requirements that AI won’t account for unless you express it, and even still it can get mixed up.