So, it is the last week of #ETMOOC and we have been talking about digital citizenship.  
How do we teach it? Model it?  etc...

And here is what I have been thinking about...I know we have to discuss what not to do with our students.  I do feel obliged to do that, I know I should say no online bullying, be careful, watch what you share, etc.  But, honestly, I don't really want to do that.  

I am not a negative person and I don't like focussing on life's don't lists.  I would much rather focus on the happier side of things.  I'd rather talk about the wonderful things we can do with social media, with our blogs and with the power of the internet.  And I want to focus on the positive behaviours and focus on what my students can do, should do, and will do! That is the discussion I want to have!  That is what I want them to brainstorm and share with the rest of the class, that is what I really think we ought to be focussed on!

Mother Theresa once said, "I will never attend an anti-war rally; if you have a peace rally, invite me".

I feel that same attitude can be applied to digital citizenship...I don't want to focus on the anti side of anything, I would rather focus on positive digital citizenship and gets students thinking and talking about the meaningful things we can do online...that gets me so much more excited than rambling on about what not to do.

What do you think?  Do we need to go through the consequences of negative behaviour?  Can we spend a little time on it and then focus more of our attention on the being good citizens.  

I would love to hear from you all about this!

Every couple of weeks, we get a new topic with #etmooc a recent one was about the meaning behind the buzz words like digital literacy, media literacy...you know what I mean...

I thought a lot about it...what does it mean to me?  And is it important?  And why?

And I realized that my whole transformation as an educator is because of my digital literacy.  Two years ago I began a quest to improve as an educator.  I wanted to take my teaching to the next level.  I thought that meant integrating technology and so that is what I aimed to do...I was going to be a fabulous teacher because I was going to do all kinds of awesome, techy things with my class!  I signed up for twitter, registered for the ITDA program at SFU and started this blog.  And amazing things happened.  I became more digitally literate, but more importantly, I met all of YOU -- I became a connected educator. 

And so, I think what I have come to realize, is that it is not digital literacy that makes us better and stronger educators (people?) but it is the amazing connections that we can now make because of our digital literacy that is really more important.  

Thoughts?

I have been playing  (yes, playing, I think playtime is so important and necessary with new technology) with Digital Storytelling since I first got an iPad.  But my experience really changed after I heard Dean Shareski talk about the 60 one second movie.  Well my colleagues and I loved this idea and we got right on to playing with our iPads and making our own sample movies.   Making a movie myself was very important...at our school we talk a lot about the importance of going where we want out students to go!  My Thanksgiving 60 second movie is below. 

Our students then created their own 60 second iMovies.  The challenge: Tell the story of School in 60 seconds (thank you to our prinicipal, Antonio Vendramin, for leading this with the grade 6s while the teachers went to camp with the 7s).  The results were fantastic!  The kids told a story using short video clips.

We have also told the story of Healthy Living, using the Learning Outcome: "Describes the benefits of being physically active on attaining and maintaining a balanced, healthy lifestyle" (BC Prescribed Learning Outcome) as our inspiration.  Again, students used the 1 second clip type of iMovie to tell their stories.

And last week, in time for Valentine's Day, we told our stories through music by creating Friendship Music Parodies.  Our inspiration was the learning outcome, "identifies characteristics of healthy relationships" (BC Prescribed Learning Outcome) and of course Valentine's Day too.  

Well, we certainly discovered that this type of storytelling (music video) was very difficult!  Students had to:

-choose a song
-rewrite the lyrics so that they were about healthy friendships and relationships-storyboard the song, thinking about how they were going to make the video images consistent with the new lyrics and the music
-film the story 
-sing their parody version of the song and layer over their video
-edit and add in friendship quotes as they saw fit

Students love storytelling.  Next up for us, telling stories using book creator with our little buddies.  We did this last year and they loved it!  

And then I am looking forward to trying out some new ways of digital storytelling!  Obviously you can see what types I am most comfortable with, but thanks to #etmooc, I am learning about so many more methods!  More to come soon...

Last week I had a fascinating conversation with Ben Wilkoff and Sheri Edwards about the rewording of PLN from Personal Learning Network to Personal Learning Neighbourhood.  And it really struck a chord with me (see blog about that here).  Well, since that conversation, Ben and I had another conversation about Mr. Rogers and the power of a neighbourhood and Ben suggested we put together a little PLN/#etmooc theme song.  The recording of our duet is below and the lyrics to the song are below that.

For me, the making of the song was really a metaphor of the song's sentiment.  We are celebrating meaningful and professional connections by connecting and collaborating with each other.

It is one of the nicest things I have participated in online. 
Thank you all for being a part of my Personal Learning Neighbourhood.

On the "Connect in the Middle" wiki, Sheri has taken some of the #ETMOOC prompts and encouraged us to blog about:

• How important is connected learning? Why?
• Is it possible for our classrooms to support this kind of learning? If so, how?

I think connected learning is so important.  And not just for my students, but for me as well.  As an educator, my practice began to transform when I became connected and started joining "neighbourhoods" of learners and educators.  Hang out in these neighbourhoods long enough and you can't NOT start to reflect on your own practise, start questioning education and make changes/improvements in your classroom. 

And if it works for us, then it should work for our students too?  I believe so.  My students are always excited when they get a comment on their blog from a student in another school.  They loved being a part of the Global Read Aloud, and they keep reminding me that we have to connect with Mr. Hong's class again! Connections are HUGE.  To all of us.

Thank you all for connecting to me and for being in my neighbourhood.