It’s genuinely hard to believe more than a year has passed since I started my Onboarding training with Michigan Virtual.
As part of the iEducator webinars, we created videos to talk about the stories of this first year: I guess I’ll stop talking and let it speak for itself.
I enjoy lots of things about the online teaching environment. I love talking to my students, I love seeing their skills grow and watching as they make creative things I would never have even thought of. I like reading their papers (most of the time) and seeing what cool meanings they pull out of the movies in Film Studies.
But my hands-down favorite is making google slides. It’s like a collage, but my fingers don’t get sticky!
I have a lot of fun making my announcement and resource slides. When it comes time to make one, maybe on Thursday for the upcoming weekly announcement, or when I see a problem cropping up and want to give some extra instruction and resources, I get excited. I like to settle into my cushy desk chair with a cup of tea and some Nature Box Vanilla Bean Wafers (my actual kryptonite) and get to work.
(Note: The black widescreen bars are created by the embed tool here on edublogs, the actual dimensions of these slides are the backgrounds. This doesn’t happen in blackboard.)
I’ve had some questions in the past about how I build my announcements, and I’m going to break it down.
First of all, an Ode to Google Slides:
I like to use google slides for a few different reasons: they are always editable, unlike a static image file, meaning that I can go into slides and change something with deleting and re-uploading files in blackboard; they can host links, like the resubmission policy one above; you can embed videos and other content right into them easily; and they’re super customizable.
I know the allure of programs like Canva and Piktochart: I love, love, love that they include galleries of graphics that match. I love that so much! If I want to use an arrow in one part of a graphic and an envelope in another, I won’t end up with one cartoony orange thing and one stark black one, which is a problem that I will spend a full hour on google images trying to find a solution to. I just can’t abide it.
When I do use Canva, though, I still pop it into a google slide and embed that in blackboard. That way, when I notice a dumb typo or mistake, I don’t have to delete and re-upload on BB. I just swap out the file in Slides.
And now, since I have another packet of Vanilla Bean Wafers, a comprehensive how to Google Slide on building the slide, finding and implementing transparent gifs, and some fun resources! (So meta.)
I recommend full screen!
My PLN is something I’ve been curating since long before I knew the term for it. It’s a lot of different groups, chats, and friends from different spheres.
The cool thing about being in a smaller discipline is that I was very close with my entire graduating class from Michigan State in my degree. There were fewer than a dozen of us, and only 5 that went on to student teach together, so we knew each other very well. (Hey Lauren Graham)
Getting together twice a week or more our senior year, and each Friday during our internships, was such a valuable time to trade and workshop ideas; share resources; and generally support one another.
It’s been weird to move from that sort of structure to the online environment, where our meet-ups are online and our sharing is down through social media, but it’s no less a valuable experience! I love collaborating and sharing through twitter, instagram, facebook, pinterest, google…so many places.
As a first year teacher, I haven’t submitted all that much to my PLN yet. I’ve been more of a “lurker,” absorbing and learning and trying to get my feet on the ground.
That’s pretty typical of me: I’m often more comfortable listening and absorbing and jotting things down to brew in my mind for the near future: it’s how I’ve always operated in learning environments. However, through the weekly webinars we do here at Michigan Virtual I have felt like I bring something valuable to the table, and I’ve shared what I know–it’s always heartening to feel like I’ve got something helpful others would be interested in!
I’m looking forward to building my expertise and continuing to grow as an educator, and sharing more and more.