Mary L's Teacher Ed Portfolio

Category: EdTech Inquiry

Musing on the inquiry process

October 25, 2019 / / 2 Comments

Three little felt sculptures I made for the season.

Is this working? What would it take for it to work?

I feel a bit stalled out on the inquiry process in this “edtech” course, to be honest. Maybe it’s because I haven’t had a coffee today. Or maybe it’s something about the design and how I interact with it. In our observation course, to provide a comparison, we have a single inquiry project, and scaffolding in terms of weekly or every-two-weeks assignment deadlines. So far, they have been: submit an idea; submit a proposal with inquiry questions; submit an annotated bibliography of minimum 5 sources related to your inquiry. The next will be a set of interviews about our topics. Having the process broken down into chunks has definitely helped me.

In this course, the inquiry process is a lot more open. The edtech inquiry (for me: podcasting and the classroom) has no scaffolding except a presentation at the end, and that will only be 7 minutes. I have been thinking about podcasts more than usual, and have self-assigned a couple of blog posts to share out some thinking, but the reality is that my inquiry will be light. As for my free inquiry (felting!), the process has had a rise and fall. I was excited at the beginning because I thought I chose strong questions, and actually used a PSII resource to make them. But I do note that the PSII resources include a teacher role, mainly to keep the learner accountable and advancing. In my professional life, I really notice the value of regular meetings, just to keep me and my coworkers on track, because we are accountable to each other if nothing else.

If I go back to the PSII resource, and move on to “Step 2”, I see: Engage in research (books, internet, discussion, reflection, mini-project, lab…) that will better inform the inquiry. I have been doing mini-projects in felting – the hearts and then the fall sculptures above. I suppose I could proceed to doing some research for books about felting and about fibre arts among First Nations in this region. I could talk to my art instructor and ask if she knows about felting used in K-12 classrooms. Admittedly, I’ve mentioned both of these already, and have them on my Trello board. The issue is that both feel more like academic work. There is resistance, and pushing through might benefit me, but I don’t particularly feel like prioritizing them, without feeling accountable to anyone. Maybe this is a sign to keep the free inquiry more fun? Musings…

 

History of podcasting

October 8, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Photo by Alex Blăjan on Unsplash

Key points

Instead of trying to write a comprehensive summary, I’m just going to give you some takeaway points based on a little research I just did into the history of podcasting. You’re welcome.

  • The term podcasting = iPod + broadcasting.
  • 2004 is widely recognized as the first year of podcasting.
  • The precursors to podcasting were radio on the internet and “audioblogging”, in which people were trying to share audio files in a regularly updated way.
  • RSS stands for Real Simple Syndication (and another thing, but ignore that); it’s an automated way to pull updated information, like new podcasts, from websites, so that you don’t have to go looking. It was an important tech development for the creation of podcasting.
  • There’s been a rise and fall in company dominance related to podcasts.
  • The first podcasts and precursors to podcasts seem to have been about technology; it took a minute before they became the domains of all the other fields of life and interest.
  • Podcasting is not regulated the way radio is, which is why the content can be pretty much anything.
  • Podcasting is still governed by copyright law.
  • Some people have made it huge in podcasting, like comedian Marc Maron, who famously interviewed Barack Obama on his podcast WTF.
  • There is talk about the beginning of the “Era of Big Podcasting” in which podcasting culture might become less independent and niche, and more corporate and centralized (with Apple be the central company).

Multimodal, ooh la la

Sources

https://computer.howstuffworks.com/internet/basics/podcasting4.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_podcasting
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS
https://internationalpodcastday.com/podcasting-history/
https://www.vulture.com/2019/09/podcasting-history-three-eras.html

Reasons to be… into podcasts

October 3, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Ed Miliband, British MP and co-host of the podcast Reasons to Be Cheerful

“Guardian of the interests of future generations”

I was biking to campus one morning this week, listening to the podcast Reasons to Be Cheerful, and I got a little teary. The episode was about future generations being represented in governmental decisions, and the challenges of short-term planning due to electoral cycles versus the long-term planning that society really needs. Anyway, I learned that Wales has a Commissioner position for just this. There is actually a person charged with being the “guardian of the interests of future generations,” as she described it. Her job is to question decisions, including budget decisions, based on long-term costs and benefits. A recent highway build was canceled, due to her intervention. Just knowing that this position exists made me tear up. It’s so obvious (as many Indigenous people might remind me), and yet obvious does not always make it into reality.

The connection to podcasts: unplanned encounters

I also thought, as I got off the bike, about this magic of podcasts – that they can introduce us to things we would never even know to look for. I only listen to the podcast because a British acquaintance recommended it. I didn’t know anything about the hosts, one of whom is Ed Miliband. Turns out he is the former leader of the UK Labour Party. I love that even as an MP now, he makes times to do a weekly podcast, in which he and Geoff Lloyds “talk to smart thinkers from around the world”. So cool.

An author on democracy wrote that for society to support a real democracy, there need to be: 1) unplanned encounters and 2) common experiences. If I remember correctly, he meant both unplanned encounters between people, like “Hey, neighbour!” or “Hey, fellow human who is joining me in public space and willing to connect on something!”, and unplanned encounters between people and information, i.e. learning about things you didn’t go looking for. Otherwise we end up in the death spirals of echo chambers, basically.

In short, I like that podcasts introduce me to things I would never even know to go looking for, by kind of easing me in with a familiar format and host, and providing enough context and depth that I can actually integrate the new thing.

p.s. Ed Miliband seems like a really nice guy, so I don’t think he would mind me using that photo of him. I got it through searching on Google with the “advanced settings” set to filter shareable content only. Here are a bunch more awkward photos from the same source.

Ooh, podcasts

September 24, 2019 / / 0 Comments

Photo by Mohammad Metri on Unsplash

Why podcasts?

As with choosing felting for my free inquiry,  choosing podcasts for my education/technology inquiry took some time. I was also interested in news sources in the classroom (how do students access news? do teachers use tech to introduce news items?) and how tech is used throughout the school in the youth climate strike movement (to make posters, to share information, etc.). Part of any creative or academic work, though, involves making choices, and specifically making choices around scope. I think that exploring podcasts in the secondary school classroom has the right amount of scope.

I listen to podcasts at least every week, for information or for pleasure, and I already have some questions brewing. Which brings me to…

What are my initial questions about podcasts in relation to education?

Drawing again on this resource from Pacific School of Inquiry and Innovation, here are some initial questions, based on my curiousity and interest:

  • How do we define ‘podcast’?
  • How are teachers already using podcasts in secondary school classrooms?
  • How are young people engaging with podcasts?
  • Where do I see possibilities for using podcasts to support students in line with the BC curriculum?

Where to next?

I think my first step is answering that first question. It will likely lead me down a little rabbit hole into the history of podcasts and the relationship of podcasts to radio. I welcome it all! I might also slip in questions to teachers and young people to start answering the next two questions, if I remember.

Bonus reflections on the process of inquiry-based learning and using an e-portfolio

  • Choosing topics has been really hard for me. I have a lot of ideas for possible inquiries, and questions about whether I should delve into them here or in other classes. I think I could have used more scaffolding, or more 1:1 support from my instructor. On the other hand, maybe the struggle is part of the process.
  • Getting started in intimidating, but once I do it, I feel good. Seriously. I feel much better with these first couple of posts done.
  • I think I need a page for resources. For example, Unsplash is awesome for free, no-attribution-required photos (so good that I included an attribution above anyway!) I’d like to put that resources somewhere. Ditto for the PSII inquiry-based learning fillable guide.
  • Digital stuff feels messy. Maybe it’s because I am getting old? Having instructors using Coursespaces, Google Classroom, AND websites, all in different places, feels a bit much. Having to hunt for resources or course outlines is annoying. Just finding my own website took a while this afternoon, before I remembered that I had saved the link in an email draft. Ugh. Transition, learning, figuring out systems. Plus, September, “the fragile season.”

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