Week 6 - My Classroom Site

Connected pedagogy and connected learning. 

Human nature has depended and evolved on the basis of people working together, building relationships, and connecting. I believe this is the same for learning as well. Many moons ago, the most interaction that schools had with each other was the odd sports game or competition. Now, with the revolution of the digital world, we have hugely improved our ability to connect with not only other schools, but our colleagues within our school as well.  Not too long ago I was struggling for ideas around our inquiry topic, it wasn't until I visited a colleagues classroom site that I was able to critically think and plan. It sparked my thinking and really helped me to plan for the following weeks ahead. This connectedness helps us to feel empowered in the work that we do. We see and feel the value of our practise because it is visible and appreciated by others too. Which reminds me that I need to visit other class sites more often. 

My classroom site

My classroom site unfortunately had been untouched since the very start of term 1. On a teacher only day I created the bare bones, or structure of my classroom site. But today I was able to dedicate the time to update it, input value content and also practise the digital fluency skills around sites as well. 

I can really see the power in these sites and I understand the importance of them and the power that they have (see last blog post for more details). But my biggest challenge and hurdle around class sites is time. Time is the most valuable classroom currency in my opinion. Many many teachers are often struggling to find the time to do all the tasks that are needed. Were planning, assessing, teaching, collaborating, and learning PLD too. For me, I really struggle to find the time. Today was a lovely but also rare opportunity because we were given time. We had some of this precious time to find the content and then upload it to our site. I personally believe that I managed to get quite a lot done on my inquiry section of my site in that time. I worked really efficiently and tried to get as much done as I could. With all of that in mind, I still haven't put anything on for reading, writing, maths, celebrations, or classroom organisations. If anyone has some tips, or ways that they manage their time for their classroom site please do share them with me! If there is a work smarter not harder method out there for this I am all for it! 

 

Above is a picture of my inquiry page on my site. The above being the before, and the bottom is the after. I promise you there is lot more content than just a changed picture! Most of the content is further down the page. Click on the link here to check it out! I focused today on my inquiry so please don't be shy to check it out! 

(The learn page is where all the good stuff is).