This is a great summary of your Cohort 21 experience. I appreciate your dedication to the theme of communication as your action plan focus. What would you say was the most-favoured tool by your students? Is it the same for you?

I love that one of your key learning moments with your action plan as well as your ‘take-away’ from…Read more

This is an exciting read! The summary of the journey you’ve undertaken with this class illustrates your dedication to expanding their mindset for inquiry as well as making their thinking explicit. These students will take these key skills with them into their courses next year and this experience will help them to continue growing as…Read more

Congratulations on a successful action plan! You’ve identified a need in your classroom and piloted a tool that could fill the gap. You’ve considered the student perspective, encouraged everyone to embrace the unknown and try something new, and engaged in a learning experience together. This is a great example of modelling a…Read more

I think you should definitely present at a GAFE Summit and I would think that any experience and advice you have to…Read more

Thanks for your thoughts! I agree that reflection is where we can gather the evidence of what our students are learning — about themselves and their skills as well as fostering an ability to self-identify areas of growth and next steps.

We’ve started in the direction of a paired down version of SLC’s with our middle school for…Read more

This is a great blog post. Your honesty in sharing your thoughts and reflections on all of the demands that teachers shoulder inside and outside the classroom is a key part of working to make education the best that it can be for our students. I agree that it is a work in progress and there is room for growth in many key areas! I…Read more

This is a great post on a topic that applies to more of us than we may wish to admit….even if we don’t teach Visual Art! Getting students to buy in to those routines and components of the classroom environment that enable time for all of those other amazing & awesome experiences is a challenge, regardless of grade or subject area.…Read more

Thanks for your ongoing support and encouragement! I enjoyed viewing your Blogfolio journey and I appreciate your focus on the growth mindset as a key element in the “how am I getting better” part of the learning process. I agree that this is central to the plan. It will be a part of our program moving forward next year — we were…Read more

Congratulations! This is an interesting and inspiring blog post outlining your action plan!. I love that you have purposefully chosen to give the power of choice to your students and together you are all engaged in this learning journey… wherever it takes you! I truly believe that this is an example of how teachers can…Read more

I agree that the conversations and collaboration are a key part of the Cohort 21 experience! I am thankful for meeting so many engaged educators who are working to make a difference in how technology and teaching takes place at their schools.

In terms of motivating students, it seems that the technology and creativity pieces have…Read more

Glad to hear you are making progress with all of the ideas that swirl after each F2F session — there is so much food for thought! I’d love to chat further about the standards based grading and the portfolio piece. In terms of my action plan, I’m working with learning skills as my standards as the scope of these tools fit the pilot…Read more

Thanks for our great conversation at the 3rd face 2 face session. Your thoughts and suggestions were truly helpful! The e-portfolios are underway in Grades 5-8 and the girls are loving the technology piece in the program. They are amazing at adapting and growing with a new tech tool and it is wonderful to see their engagement. I was…Read more

Thanks for your feedback. We are using Google Sites as our e-portfolio platform. We began by creating a template in partnership with the teachers and then we shared that to the students via. Hapara. The girls have the ability to give their e-portfolio a personal feel through selecting their own theme and creating their “Who am I”…Read more

Since our F2F session at Mars a few weeks ago, I’ve been thinking about how my action plan can be refined and refocused.  I had many opportunities to engage in meaningful conversations that helped me to revise […]

Thanks for your reply! I have indeed been thinking and I have an updated action plan blog post in progress — hoping to post it tonight! Looking forward to hearing your thoughts….
Christina

It’s time to level up on how I use technology in my classes. This call to action was inspired by our second Cohort 21 F2F session where we learned about different technology integration models. After this […]

I was eager to read your blog post as I am working on implementing e-portfolios with the middle school teaching team this year. Thank you for your honest reflection as well as your ideas on how to make it a fun part of the learning and reflection process. I can’t wait to bring the idea of a ‘portfolio party’ back to my colleagues…Read more

I am truly looking forward to our next session. See you then!
Christina

Thanks for your thoughtful reply! I agree that the word yet can imply an ending or destination in the learning experience. I see it a bit differently. As part of the conversation about ‘yet’, I openly talk with my students about being a life-long learner — what that means, looks like, and feels like. I share that this is who I am as…Read more