Reflection 3.1: Assessment 1 - Embedded Task 1

It is time to draw a line in the sand, or a few letters anyway. The past three weeks have been technologically hectic, with constant thoughts of blogs, wikis, posts and comments…anyone want to comment! 

Source: webloggerz.com

Being a unit requirement to use such platforms, I have chosen Blogger, providing me an opportunity to demonstrate my creativity through my perception of a user friendly interface, albeit nervously. However, most importantly knowledge gained during the last three weeks provides a platform upon which to build my ICT capacity and contribute to improving student outcomes through increased digital pedagogies.

Within a relatively short time, although hours appear to vanish, of firstly creating and now exploring within my Blog, I have been able to change the layout to a preferred appearance and post reflections utilising a range of media. Viewing my preview drafts I increasingly feel satisfied with my efforts, and clicking that Publish button is getting easier. I have adjusted dimensions of field boxes and recently inserted a footer image, although I feel it distracts from blog content. I will undoubtedly change my layout, as through  increasing familiarity with this technology, and viewing student cohort blogs and websites I see a range of styles being utilised. I feel the choice of formats and styles offered by Blogger provides a benefit to design content and format suitable across all years encompassing secondary schooling.

Within my blog postings I have been able to display common media such as images and videos from a variety of sources, through both hyperlinks and installed media. One should be aware of image size and video duration contributes to storage limits, therefore use of hyperlink as recommended for video media content in conjunction with copyright requirements provided by National Copyright Unit (Smartcopying, 2016) I have followed.

The toolbar is very simple in layout and function, although I write my posts within word.doc initially to ensure work is saved, I fear seeing incorrect address or unable to connect error messages. One tool I have trialed and applied throughout my blog is the jump break feature. Being able to reduce the amount of displayed text and or content at a determined point can contribute to an uncluttered appearance and aid readers to navigate the home page. 

As a teaching platform to encourage student engagement I feel Blogger can accommodate this very well. I feel the privacy setting are comprehensive to restrict unwanted content and maintain viewing integrity of student assessment contributions. Bloggers administration and privacy settings can be configured at the most restrictive end to read only content with a sole author/administrator. Method of delivering content in this application would align with SAMR model as Substitution, and as lower order thing against Blooms revised taxonomy. Content is being delivered to develop knowledge and understanding.

Source: Common Sense Media

If I configure Blogger to allow member only comments, and through assigning working groups of students’ membership, students can conduct individual research against a topic and reply to an issued stimulus question or other assessable task. Students can utilise and contribute to this blog format as evidence of research and for assessment submission purposes. In this function I could create multiple assessment items to cater for diversification of students and provide formative assessment individually or as groups, with a range of options for moderating comments putting my mind at ease. I am excited about this level of duplication and ease of modifying assessment pieces, therefore increasing teacher efficiency. Use of Blogger in this way would see student learning elevated to Modification level of the SAMR model, through applying research and evidence along with performing analysis and peer collaboration. I feel this style of learning and engagement merges with my adopted teaching method of Experiential Learning as described by Kolb, Kolb, Passarelli, and Sharma (2014).

For another example using ICT to provide transformation learning experiences (Puentedura, 2017), whilst promoting higher-order thinking click here.

My recent exposure to this technology has been insightful, and I can increasingly see how ICT can provide improvement to learner outcomes through alignment of revised Blooms taxonomy and the SAMR model by Dr. Ruben Puentedura.


References:

Kolb, A., Kolb, D., Passarelli, A., & Sharma, G. (2014). On becoming an experiential educator: the educator role profile. Simulation & Gaming, 45(2), 204-234. Retrieved from: http://learningfromexperience.com

National Copyright Unit. (2017). Using YouTube. Retrieved from http://www.smartcopying.edu.au/

Puentedura, R. (2017) Impact of the SAMR model. Retrieved from https://www.commonsensemedia.org