I believe collaboration and conversation should be at the heart of any class, and I felt that heart in EDTC300! Collaborative efforts expand our personal perspectives by inviting new ideas and considerations. Throughout the course, I had the opportunity to collaborate and learn from my fellow pre-service teachers. All our learnings and interactions were for our professional development, growth and expansion of our professional learning networks. Exploring new technologies and interacting with media like blog posts, tweets, comments, replies, and break-out room discussions felt inviting and organic. Most of us were constantly learning new skills between our learning projects, building our Eportfolios and exploring topics of digital literacy, digital citizenship and digital identity. In this learning community, there was a mutual understanding to uplift and help each other out! I contributed to the learning of others in different formats, and the primary way I kept track of my contributions was on a spreadsheet.
Blog comments
Another way I contributed to the learning of others was through commenting on various blog posts! I enjoyed reading and keeping up with the learning projects the most because it is fun to see everyone excited about learning and practicing a new skill. I made a point to comment on any further questions, valuable information, or anecdotes that would validate my peers! Further, I kept within the 3-5 comments per week range.
My Own Blog
I would say my blog and e-portfolio contributed to the learning of others. In one of our earlier classes, I volunteered for the class to go through my blog and get feedback so people knew what the expectations were, where I had missteps, what could be improved, etc. Further, I gave my posts a lot of thought and attention. I always wanted to provide informative and personally driven posts representing my perspective. Keeping my posts on time with our given due dates allowed the most amount of time for my peers to comment. I believe my learning project on teaching my puppy, Jazz, how to walk is beneficial to my classmates because many people have dogs but do not know where to start with loose-leash training (just like myself before this class!)
I had so much fun on Twitter this semester, interacting, sharing and conversing with everyone. Twitter was probably my primary form of assisting the learning of others. I say this because I shared many of my go-to resources and apps I know from personal use serve me well. I also loved replying to and reading articles shared by others to expand and enhance my professional learning network. The students who are Educational Assistants and have more experience in the classroom opened my eyes to some new technologies, and I hope they found what I had to say and share just as valuable. I also really enjoyed participating in the #SaskEdChat early in the semester and looking forward to seeing more Twitter chats to join in. Going into my internship, I feel I need all the help I can get!
Here is a Screencastify rundown of my Twitter experience:
Discord
Discord was not a space where I interacted. However, I did lurk through it at times to ensure my peers, and I were on the right track. Generally, I did not have many questions or concerns and therefore forgot about Discord. I am glad to see others used the space!
Summary of Learning
Last, I want to touch on my Summary of Learning Project I did with my classmate, Madison. We had an enjoyable time compiling our learnings from the semester together, and I was delighted to see we both had very different takeaways from this class. Completing this project together really contributed to each other’s learning because it felt like a productive conversation between two lifelong learners, the kind of learning I will take any day over trying to do it all alone!
Throughout the class, I learned not to be shy and just ask for help because the truth is most people love lending a helping hand, and it benefits all parties in the long run! #CollaborationForTheWin