Sonya's Teaching Blog

Students these days live in a digital world. They learn, play and communicate using computers and technology in ever changing and evolving ways. Unfortunately, many of us tasked with teaching children to safely and ethically navigate this digital world, including parents and teachers, were not raised with the use of these same technologies. So how are we to teach digital literacy if we ourselves are still, in many cases, learning these skills ourselves? Thankfully, there are many tools and lesson plans available for teachers and parents out there. Below, I have rounded up a few useful links and lessons for those wanting to help educate kids on how to navigate the digital world. If you're just looking for ready-made lessons, the most thorough and recommended ready-to-use resource I found was a program called My World . This tutorial set gives students tasks using tools they are likely familiar with - such as a search engine and a social media site - to help them navigate differ...

I have always loved to read a wide variety of books. I equally enjoyed the YA fiction pulled out of the library, the "intellectual" books given out as required reading, and the random novels in my mother's bookshelf. However, I am well aware that not all young people share this interest. Those of us who have worked in a Secondary School Environment can imagine the following scenario all too well: A grade 10 student comes into the library weary because he has to submit an intended reading list and goals for the year. The teacher is excited about his/her new syllabus and is making attempts to slowly integrate more choice in reading in combination with the required novels assigned.  The only novels he has ever finished, reluctantly, have been the ones that were required reading in class. He dislikes reading and the idea of finishing one novel let alone a pre-determined list for the year is overwhelming. He is thinking of dropping the class. How do we take this situation...

Reading Girl Code: Gaming, Going Viral and Getting It Done  was accidentally appropriate on my part, as May 11 was National  Girls Learning Code Day . This book was written by Sophie Houser and Andrea Gonzales and tells the true story of how they spent a summer learning to code with a  Girls Who Code  camp in New York City, created a game together as a final project, and experienced their game, Tampon Run , going viral and taking their lives by storm (the game was not working for me when I tried, but there is now a version for iOS included in the link). Girl Code  cover care of Goodreads . There were a lot of things I loved about this book. I love that it was a book written for teens, by teens. I loved that they speak so frankly about their experiences, including both the positive and the negative aspects of their experience. In addition to talking about coding, they discuss topics such as anxiety and impostor syndrome, trying to figure out what you want...

Cover of Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas' Red: A Haida Manga . Image care of chapters.indigo.ca Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas is often credited with the creation of the "Haida Manga" genre of graphica, and Red  is one of his most well-known works. It tells a classic Haida cautionary tale of pride and revenge in a very visual style. What's more, the pages of the book can be removed and put together to build a mural (though readers will need two copies of the book to do this properly). Mural made of pages from Red: A Haida Manga . Image care of Huffington Post . Yahgulanaas encourages readers to take the book apart for this purpose, and as much as it hurts me to take books apart, I think this is required to really appreciate the art of this book. When read in a linear fashion, some of the book feels out of order or like bits are missing. The extra connections made between pages complete the picture, and the story. And I think students would love the opportunity to ta...

In spite of having surgery today, I am going to get out an IMWAYR post this week because I have just read so much amazing stuff!  Speak  by Laurie Halse Anderson is an incredible book that I first need to mention comes with content warnings for sexual assault, self harm. These are difficult and yet necessary topics to discuss with young adults - they are sadly a reality for many youth these days and need to be discussed in classroom in supportive ways. Anderson, Laurie Halse (1999). Speak . New York: Farrar Straus Giroux. The book itself includes resources for youth needing support related to sexual assault, though they are USA centered. The first thing I recommend if you are going to discuss this book in a classroom setting is gathering resources that are local and useful to students in your class. Chances sadly pretty high that someone in that class will need these resources. Laurie Halse Anderson's Speak . Book cover care of goodreads.com Laurie Halse Anderson t...

The last bit of my life has been spent creating a website designed for the absolute beginner to learn how to use a 3D printer for education. This project really challenged my skill set, but I am so glad I did it. Introducing: DIMENSIONS: Beginner's 3D Printing for Education This TED talk by Stephen Elford might help spark your interest in 3D printing in education. Creating this project really combined and built on many skills I have learned during the LIBE 477 course. I decided that the best way to make a tutorial on how to 3D print for teaching would be to actually go through the steps of trying to do it myself. One of the most important skills I built up during this course was how to develop, maintain and take advantage of my own personal learning network. It's incredible the help people are willing to offer if you just ask. A good friend has a 3D printer, so I enlisted his help to try setting up a print myself. He recommended software and helped me when I got stu...

Digital Resources: Evaluation and Improvement Plan Resource: ERAC BC Digital Classroom , grades 9-12. Includes WorldBook Online Reference Centre, KnowBC, EBSCO Secondary Mini-suite, Gale in Context Series, and myBlueprint. Analysis: Riedling (2013) recommends analyzing indexes and databases for Accuracy, Authority, Format, and Scope (pp 90-91). Accuracy and Authority : The ERAC BC Digital Classroom is a trusted resource and the available databases are from trusted authorities and are considered to be highly accurate. Format (including accessibility) : Most of these resources are easily searchable, but require some added training to perform more complicated search functions. Some of these resources can be used in accessible ways. For example, EBSCO products support text-to-speech technology, provide transcripts for videos, and a few other tools to improve accessibility. The Gale In Context Series also offers text-to-speech and translation into over 20 common languages (...