Skills + Knowledge = Confidence + Vision

As a fulltime classroom teacher with two children of my own the juggle and struggle for work/life/study balance is real. What gives me hope and feeds my motivation to complete my subjects each semester is the practical skills and strategies I learn as well as the breadth of knowledge I gain.

This semester ETL523 opened my eyes to the complexities of Digital Citizenship education.

“How can we as educators protect our students from the dangers, without exposing them to these self-same dangers?”

This was a question that had plagued me before embarking on this course. Through my reading and interactions with other students, my colleagues and the online community of ISTE (“Home – ISTE Connect”, 2021) I have found an answer to that question. We must give our students the skills to make sound, positive choices when in the digital environment (Mattson, 2017). As teachers we must model and explicitly teacher how to navigate the digital environment, just like we do when teaching students how to interact on the playground and classroom (Mattson, 2017).

Assignment 2 has left me with another set of skills that will no doubt leave me in good stead in my future career. The process of researching and creating an Environmental Scan report has allowed me to practice skills that I can now transfer to different projects within my institution. I now have the confidence to work within committees and taskforces to help my school create a positive vision for future Digital Learning Environment projects, which is so important to the chances of such projects being integrated into a school’s learning programs (Kopcha, 2012).

The second assignment also bought into sharp contrast the fact that institutions and education departments need to have a clear and developed vision for Digital Learning Environment implementation (Kopcha, 2012). If institutions and departments have a clear plan going forward, teachers are more likely to positively engage in the implementation process. I will take this knowledge back to my current school and help create a clear vision for both the short and long term.

ETL523 has given me the support and knowledge to effectively teach my students about Digital Citizenship. It has allowed me to practice and implement report researching and writing skills and lastly it has given me the confidence to enter the conversation about my students’ best interests in the Digital Learning Environments and Digital Citizenship Education knowing that I have the knowledge of research to state my opinion and thoughts.

One of the biggest takeaways I have from this subject came from our Subject coordinator, Karen Malbon in our first online class meeting;

“It’s okay to lurk, maybe like a little, repost another professionals tweet”.

Karen was speaking about the different tools teachers can use to create professional social networks and how to start to connect with other professionals. This simple sentence took the pressure off the need to ‘actively’ interact on every social media platform and has allowed me to slowly develop my professional social network online.

Lastly I thoroughly enjoyed interacting with and using the many interactive online tools available. Thinglink (“Create unique experiences with interactive images, videos & 360° media — ThingLink”, 2021) is a versatile tool I look forward to mastering and using within my own classroom and school environment.

Looking to the future I hope to develop an evidence based Digital Citizenship program for my Year 6 students and look forward to actively participating in the Learning Technologies Committee at my current school. ETL523 has given me the skills and confidence to positively influence my students learning experience.

References

Create unique experiences with interactive images, videos & 360° media — ThingLink. Thinglink.com. (2021). Retrieved 1 April 2021, from https://www.thinglink.com/.

Home – ISTE Connect. Connect.iste.org. (2021). Retrieved 14 May 2021, from https://connect.iste.org/home.

Kopcha, T. (2012). Teachers’ perceptions of the barriers to technology integration and practices with technology under situated professional development. Computers & Education, 59(4), 1109-1121. Retrieved 9 May 2021, from https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2012.05.014

Mattson, K. (2017). Digital citizenship in action (1st ed.). International Society for Technology in Education.