Hello everyone, my name is Danica Finlay and I am from a small town called Vanguard which is situated on Treaty 4 land in the south west corner of Saskatchewan. Growing up I was raised by my loving parents along side my older brother and younger sister. From the time I was little I have always enjoyed the process of learning and experiencing the “aha” moments I feel when I acquire a new skill or begin to understand a new concept. If you would like to know more about myself, my education journey, and my beliefs, please feel free to explore my website and visit the About Me tab.
I am very excited to have the opportunity to take part in this spring EDTC 300 course and learn alongside my fellow peers. One thing I have always wanted to do is begin an online blog, but I never knew how to get started. A blog that has inspired me is called Teach Me Style by Holly Horvath. This lady is a grade 1 & 2 teacher from Regina Saskatchewan and blogs about lifestyle, fashion, family and more! The way she runs her blogs are very professional and engaging. If you are interested in checking her out, I would highly recommend!
To be honest, I am very nervous beginning this blog as I do not feel confident with technology. Are you as a reader feeling the nerves of beginning a blog as well?
When thinking about my own education technology experiences, I feel very limited. This being said, I was provided the opportunity to participate in an Early Childhood Education class where I learned how to create a Bitmoji classroom and learning invitations using google slides! This was a valuable learning experience that I know will be implemented within future teachings.
As I have previously mentioned I really enjoy learning and I know that I have lots to do in this class, which is exciting! My hope is that I create a fun/engaging blog and twitter feed for readers to visit and take interest with as I embark on a path of learning the true values that the world of technology has to offer. Please follow my twitter account @danica_finlay as I will be sure to share different resources that I come across within the next couple months. I am also excited to see what everyone else in my EDTC class has to share 🙂
On that note, I am off to explore the tech world to discover what fun activity/skill I can develop and share with you throughout the remainder of this spring term!
Take care,
Danica
Hi Danica,
Thank you for your thoughtful post! I am so excited for this course as I too struggle with technology which I feel is essential for teachers. I am glad you found a blog to help inspire you through this journey, I also am constantly looking at other teachers’ blogs for inspiration and for my own personal learning to help develop my teaching philosophy to inspire me to think about how I would like my future classroom to look like!
In answering your question… YES! I am super nervous about blogging! In fact, as someone who has faced challenges with technology all their life, this is a super scary class for me to take. I was recommended this class by a former student actually who thought this would be a great way for me to help build my teaching community for when I begin my pre-internship as well as become more comfortable with different forms of technology that I can use in my future classroom.
I have already faced many challenges with my WordPress blog which I am still trying to work out and hope that we can all work together to help teach each other more about technology and help each other with our blogs!
Lastly, I LOVE your virtual classroom! Thank you for sharing! I am interested in learning how to do that myself as I have noticed a few blogs using bitmoji’s and virtual classrooms to amp up their blogging sites and I have been jealous as that is something I would be interested in learning how to do for my blog as well! It is also a great idea for teachers to make lessons fun and engaging in the elementary schools so thanks for sharing!
I look forward to learning more from you and joining you on this journey through Educational Technology.
Cheers,
Noelle
Hi Noelle,
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment. I am so sorry for responding this late in the semester! I am finding that there is lots to learn about blogging, but I am starting to feel more comfortable with it and would like to continue after this course has ended. I hope that this class has aloud you to become more comfortable with technology as well and that it has become less scary for you. As for the Bitmoji Classroom, I would highly recommend downloading the bitmoji google chrome extension! Then, if you would like, I would recommend checking out tutorials on YouTube! The following is a suggestion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-P_WdQWPc8
Take care,
Danica
Danica, thanks so much for sharing a bit about yourself! I too am not fantastic with technology and as so, I’m a little apprehensive about blogging as well. Your first blog post appears to be a success, hopefully you find some joy in each one you write from here on out! What are you most excited to learn about in this class?
Hi Dayle. I apologize for the late response. I was really looking forward to learning about different resources that can be used in the classroom. Going into this class I didn’t know a whole lot about technology besides the basics.
I feel that this class has definitely taught me so much and I can’t wait to implement my new learnings with students