Week 32 - Changes in My Practices

CISC 8100 APPLIED PRACTICE IN CONTEXT

Assessment 2

DUE ON THE 21 NOVEMBER 2017 – Extension Approved

Identify and critically evaluate the context of your practice

 

Week 32 - Changes in My Practices

The end – what a ride!  I have to say at times I have been ham strung because I have had such a hideous year health wise but I have learnt more than I could ever begin to share in this blog.  I have been quite disparaging about PLD of late as I have not found very much available that has enabled me to further develop my skills and inspire me.  Mindlab has been fabulous from this perspective, I have learnt so many valuable and exciting things since participating in this learning opportunity. 

I have been extremely grateful for the transferrable nature of the learning in that I have been able to utilise a huge proportion of what I have learnt in my own school environment and have been able to share aspects with other staff.  I have loved the digital technology and the leadership focus Mindlab has provided.  I truly believe leading your own learning is so valuable and I have loved the way in which Mindlab has delivered this.

I believe my own teaching has gained some new skills and attitudes which has impacted positively on the Practising Teacher Criteria (PTC):

Criteria 4:  Demonstrate commitment to ongoing professional learning and development of professional personal practice.

The importance of research has firmly come back to the fore of what I need to be doing to stay connected to learning myself and for my own leadership practices.  I am committed to learning and researching so that I am able to offer the best possible learning environment and experience for our students and Mindlab has firmly reinforced the need to continue like this no matter what.  In the end if we are not informed by theory when utilising tools it demeans the tool and we are better if we have both.

Criteria 7:  Promote a collaborative, inclusive, and supportive learning environment.

My knowledge base of digital learning tools and of the related theories has been hugely enhanced by my work with Mindlab.  As a result I have been able to implement so many aspects of what I have learnt during my year with Mindlab.  Many of these I have now got my students using for themselves which has been such a breakthrough.  In particular we all love Scratch, Kahoot, Screencastify, iMovie and so much more.  For the firast time I have felt our students are finally using technology to do things they have never done before which is the best motivation ever.  Now that gamification has joined my thinking I am excited where we might take that forward for the purposes of learning in the future.

Blogging has been something I have always wanted to do and I tried before but not as successfully.  Now that Mindlab has facilitated this for me as part of my learning I now feel this is something I would like to continue to do and to extend to my students equally.  21^st century learning has been on my radar for some time and I have worked tirelessly to try to be appropriate for our students of now as we are already 17% into the 21^st century so all the excuses and lack of readiness can no longer be used to excuse ignoring this.  I am committed beyond words and Mindlab has been hugely successful in assisting me with this vocation.