So lets begin on this weeks session based on Multimodality. The experiences today were great as I got to analyse how technology can enhance teaching and learning within your very own classroom! At first I had some confusion over what multimodality actually meant. In today’s session, I recently discovered that multimodality is when two or more semiotic systems are combined. A lot of knowledge and understanding had to go in to this session as there was new terminology such as semiotic systems.

In total there are five main semiotic systems which we use, these are known as :

• Linguistic
• Visual
• Audio
• Gestural
• Spatial

The session today allowed me to understand in great depth that these five main semiotic systems can create Multimodality when they are combined with another.

Multimodality can benefit teachers greatly within a classroom environment. Multimodality benefits teachers when they are presenting infront of pupils and this links in with Beauchamps view as teachers are able to use multimodality to put forward different types of strategies to help children learn new things but in order to do so it is important for the teacher to know themselves how multimodality works and how it can be put into place within the classroom (Beauchamp,2012,p100). This statement is why I decided to do Digital Technologies as my optional module as I wanted to have the opportunity to analyse how technology can be such an important factor within a classroom.

We especially put focus on to the ActivInspire whiteboards which are placed in nearly every classroom. These boards allow teachers to bring their lessons alive and allow pupils the opportunity to get involved and interact with their own learning. ActivInspire allows teachers to create more personalised and engaging lesson plans as pupils are keen to use the whiteboards to enhance their own learning. They allow pupils to be involved in hands on learning as they are getting involved with the whiteboards allowing them to learn whilst practising their understanding of how the whiteboards can enhance their current lesson and make it more engaging (Prandstatter,2014).

Unfortunately, I was unable to be at this session so I was automatically at a disadvantage from the rest of the students as I never got the opportunity to work ActivInspire. However, I downloaded it from home and was able to have a look at the features which where present and how they all worked. ActiveInspire is a create form of technology as it has endless amounts of features which teachers can benefit from on a daily basis.

They have features such as :

• Add annotations
• Highlight texts
• Save your slides
• Show pictures or videos
• Label images

When doing some online research of ActivInspire I discovered how incredible they are in terms with helping children get a better understanding of their learning. There are endless amounts of excellent features within ActivInspire but what I really loved the most about this programme was that it allowed teachers to save the work they had done in class just like a powerpoint or a word document and this really linked with Patricia Deubel’s idea that pupils are benefiting from this as if they are absent from that lesson or they aren’t grasping it straight away, the teacher is then able to either go back to the slide that she saved or print it out for the pupil to allow their learning to continue with the rest of the class (Deubel,2010).

I hope to continue learning about Multimodality and how it all can be present within a contemporary classroom. I am keen to further understand how ActivInspire will help the pupils in my class therefore I am keen to keep practising with my ActivInspire at home and continue to develop new things and learn how I can I can improve my future lessons.

REFERENCE LIST

Beauchamp, G. (2012) ICT in the Primary School: From Pedagogy to Practice. Pearson.

Deubel, P. (2010) Interactive whiteboards: truths and consequences.[Online] Available:https://thejournal.com/Articles/2010/08/04/Interactive-Whiteboards-Truths-and-Consequences.aspx?Page=1 [Accessed : 22 January 2019]

Prandstatter, J. (2014) Interactive Displays in Early Years Classes. [Online]Available: http://connectlearningtoday.com/interactive-displays-early-years-classes/ [Accessed:28 January 2019]

Now we are on week 2 and today’s sessions was all based on the use of programmable toys within a classroom environment. In today’s society, our classrooms are very much contemporary and programmable toys allows pupils to gain an understanding of how programming can come in to place in the young workforce ( Janka, 2008). Within the session, we used the programmable toys named “Bee-Bot” and these  allowed myself to notice how they can be used in a classroom environment for cross-curricular activities and how you can make it all link together by programming.

While  in primary education, Bee-Bot was used quite often and was used mostly in mathematical activities. This links with National Council for Teachers Education view on the use of programmable toys as from my own experience Bee-Bot was something that I really loved doing in class and the whole class was involved in programming the toy which was a great thing because the teacher found a way to make sure that there was no specific person or group excluded from the activity (NCTE,2012).

Bee-Bot has many benefits to it that will impact how our classrooms will continue to be contemporary. There are many benefits such as :

• Interactive responsive learning
• Problem solving skills are developed
• the learners have full control of the toys
• cross- curricular links

As the session continued, we were given the task to create our own Bee-Bot map that developed learning from a technology point of view and also from another curricular subject. Working alongside my small group, we decided to make a map based on how to use money to buy items within a supermarket. We wanted to make sure that we could make our map suitable for all learners, so we made sure that the map was able to be equipped for all learning levels.

We decided  to make our map like this as we thought that supermarkets and money was a very well used topic within first level learning. Supermarkets are used quite often as a chance of role play within the classroom and also to allow pupils to understand how money works and how to use it. Our basic Bee-Bot map was made by creating four squares by four squares of 15cm. We then decided which items would be more beneficial and understandable for pupils within first level learning. The yellow shopping lists indicates which items we would like the pupils to pick up and where we like them to programme  Bee-Bot to go. The little baskets at the bottom of the map was for the pupils to evaluate if they have summed up all their money properly and inside the baskets are receipts for pupils to check if they are correct.

When linking with Curriculum for Excellence, we focused on 2 main experiences and outcomes which we thought linked best with our own Bee-Bot map. These were :

• MNU 1-09a ~ I can use money to pay for items and work out what change I should receive
• TCH 1-05a ~ I can demonstrate a range of basic problem solving skills by building simple programmes to carry out a given task using an appropriate language.

When experimenting with the toy, I agree with Lydon’s discussion about how pupils can physically get involved with the programmable toy and touch it by pressing down the buttons to make it work (Lydon,2008). This is very valid view as pupils are fully in control of their learning and they are doing something which is easy and fun to use. One weakness I am hoping to overcome in the upcoming weeks is to remember to clear the Bee-Bot programme in order for it to work as if you do not erase the pattern from the toy it will continue to repeat the same pattern as before.

I hope to continue to find ways in how to involve programmable toys within education in order to expand the pupils learning and teach them things they have possibly not experienced before relating to programmable toys.

Reference List 

Janka, P. (2008) Using a Programmable Toy at Preschool Age: Why and How? [Online]Available: http://www.terecop.eu/downloads/simbar2008/pekarova.pdf [Accessed: 17 January 2019].

Lydon, A. (2008) Robots in Early Education. [Online]Available:https://oponoa-programmeertalen.wikispaces.com/file/view/BeeBot_article.pdf.  [Accessed: 17 January 2019]

National Council For Teaching Education (2012) Floor Robots – focus on literacy and numeracy(primary) [online] Available:https://www.pdsttechnologyineducation.ie/en/Training/ICT-in-Classroom-PDFs/ICT-in-the-Classroom-PDFs/Floor-Robots-focus-on-literacy-and-numeracy-Primary-13-06.pdf. [Accessed: 20 January 2019].

Hi, I am excited to be starting this new blog all about my experiences and improvements throughout the digital technologies module. At first I was  bit apprehensive as to what the course would actually be about however after today’s session I feel a lot more relieved and excited for the weeks ahead. Digital technologies was an optional module for me and I chose it because it was something I had never thought on doing before and I wanted to identify my areas of strengths and weaknesses that I would need to improve on in order to take them into the classroom. When referring to digital technology key topics such as programmable toys for example, there are some topics which I have some experiences in but there are also some fresh ones which I am keen to start developing on.

As a whole, digital technology is described as a term which digital applications and resources use in order to do certain tasks such as find a website in which your topic is based upon and then analyse the reliability of the source and how effective it would be for our learning for example. As a teacher it is important that I am able to gather the knowledge on how to do certain aspects of digital technologies such as this in order to be able to demonstrate it to pupils in the future to enhance their learning.

In this generation, digital technology is practically at the center of every day life. Within Scotland, the government are keen to improve the use of digital technologies within our schools.  The government have emphasised how digital technology can slightly impact a pupils education. They have 4 main objectives revolving around digital technologies. One key objective they have is to improve access to technology within the class. In my opinion I think the government are keen on placing such a big emphasis on technology within schools because they want to make every child equal at school and by using technology within class time it allows those pupils from a poorer background to have the same opportunity as everyone else by having a chance to use technology which they may or may not have had the chance to use or have at home (Scottish Government, 2016).

It is important that throughout these 12 weeks I am able to reflect upon my weaknesses when using digital technology and focus on some new improvements on how I can change these weaknesses into strengths to use within the classroom. I am also looking forward to starting something totally out of my comfort zone and become a learner myself. I hope you will continue to follow my journey throughout these 12 weeks and see how well i have developed!

References

Scottish Government (2016) Enhancing Teaching and Learning through the use of Digital Technologies: A Digital Learning and Teaching Strategy for Scotland. [Online] Available: https://beta.-gov.scot/publications/enhancing-learning-teaching-through-use-digital-technologies/ [Accessed: 10 January 2019].