Session One: Core Business

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy?

I have been very fortunate to have been on the Manaiakalani journey for about 5-6 years so it was good to refresh my knowledge and understanding around the history of Manaiakalani and reflect on how far we have all come since the beginning (no matter at what stage you became involved). When I reflect on what we were doing at my school 5-6 years ago when we began with 2 digital (single cell) classes with 1 to 1 devices and look at where we are now in a brand new purpose built modern learning space, it is mind blowing to see our growth as a school and as individual teachers (with amazing growth mindsets).

We have been perfectly equiped for online learning in the nationwide lockdown as what we do on site is pretty much the same as what we are doing from home. When I talk to many of my friends who are teaching at other schools (in high decile areas) what we are able to offer due to our involvement with Manaiakalani is phenomenal. Our students are benefiting hugely and we are able to offer support to staff to ensure our online learning is successful for all.

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

Although much of the content was revision for me personally it was good to learn a few new tips and skills today. The Deep Dive session that Dorothy facilitated on Google Groups was new learning for me and I have already been working on it in our breaks today. I also gained some new tips on organising my Drive.

What did I learn that could be used with my learners?

I love the tip from Dorothy on getting the students to name their document with their initials before the document name so that when I have lots of tabs open you can easily see whose document each one is.

Another tip I will teach my students is to paste without formatting. This will be very helpful when they are copying and pasting their writing from their Google Document template onto their blog and it ends up going right across their screen (and I need to fix it). This will save me a lot of time!

I will also teach my students to use the Voice Typing tool - for both writing and for reading fluency. I didn't know until today that there was an English - New Zealand voice option.

What did I learn that could improve my confidence, capability or workflow in my personal life?

I am the Club Secretary for our local rugby club. One time saver I have learnt today is that I am going to create Google Groups for sending out emails to the whole committee group and executive committee group. This will be a great time saver. Although I use Google Drive for meeting agenda and minutes, I had never really thought about what aspects of Google that I use at school could be transferred to use in my role as Club Secretary. I am still working on encouraging the other committee members to up skill themselves. I have been very impressed with our ability to move with the times and have online meetings during the lockdown via Skype and Zoom.

Something I created today on a Google Document. I want to mention that Google Documents would not be my first choice for creating something like a poster, newsletter, infographic or CV. I would prefer to use Google Drawing, Google Slides, Google Sites or Canva. (Also impossible to share Google Documents on a blog post unless by screenshot.)