Mindful Ed

My final task in the CPCO PQP 10 day challenge is to create a post summarizing my thoughts on what it means to be a digital leader. This happens to coincide with my participation at the MISA Innovation conference today in London. Rather serendipitous! In one of the open spaces, discussion centered around teacher/administration buy-in. How do we move the system forward? A key concept we kept coming back to was the idea of partnerships . - Partnerships between administrators and teachers where risk is embraced. This relies heavily on trust and both individuals taking a co-learning stance. It's about asking the 'What if...' and 'How might ...' questions. - Partnerships between teachers perhaps through demonstration classrooms or informal mentorship opportunities. - Partnerships between administrators, teachers, and students (learning with and from each other). Building these partnerships requires time and the alignment of resources with priorities. Changing t...

The first 6 weeks with our 3D printer centered around experimentation and debugging. We familiarized ourselves with TinkerCad, conducted research, and spent many hours grappling with our failed prints and mishaps. With our new motor installed, and heightened appreciation for the functionality of this amazing tool, we got started on our first design project. I brought a few wooden mind puzzles into the classroom for interest and relaxation, but also for their value in developing spatial reasoning. They provided us with the inspiration we needed for our first project! My purpose for integrating 3D printing in the classroom stems from a curiosity of students' spatial reasoning abilities and how designing and creating in a virtual 3D world might enhance their thinking. These capabilities are essential in many STEM careers (science, technology, enginering, and math) and are linked with overall mathematical performance. Spatial reasoning is an area in mathematics education that is a...

Over the past few weeks we have been learning about ecosystems and the impact humans have on their delicate balance. My teaching partner came across this website and we signed up for a camera spot. We connected with National Geographic Education's special guest Jonathan Colby who is studying frogs and the impact of the Chyrid fungus on their survival. The students listened intently as he described what he does (loved the idea of hanging out in tree canopies in the rainforest), and how they are working to protect amphibian species. Students from all ten connected classrooms from around North America had the chance to ask questions at the end of his talk. It was an incredible opportunity to connect with an expert and really brought the curriculum to life.  Check out the website here to book your own camera spot:  http://www.exploringbytheseat.com/ Grade 7 Students listening to Jonathan Colby's talk.  Curriculum Links Provoking thinking about human impact...

Our subsequent prints have led to some rather interesting results...  It is our thinking that the filament got tangled about half way through the printing process which led the extruder to be pulled and the calibration offset. Although the print was not what we intended, we do believe it is a rather beautiful failure - almost a work of art! I sent our images to the M3D tech support and they stated it could be an issue with the motor. They suggested we conduct an x-axis skip test and record the process. Let me pause here and note the vast amount of learning acquired through our trials. So far as part of this project we have uncovered the extruder and examined the mechanisms, learned the logistics of calibration, and used the manual to navigate the software to perform diagnostics tests. It is clear from our x-axis diagnostic test that our motor is skipping. We attempted to rotate the rod to a looser position as it states in the troubleshooting guide with no luck. M...

Last week, we visited Daniel Pink's website as a class and viewed examples of "What's Your Sentence?" responses. Students then spent some time thinking about who they are in a quest to come up with their own sentence. I found it quite incredible how much you can learn about somebody from simply one sentence. What is the essence of that person that they wish the world to see of them? Powerful!   Students then added personal reflections about their sentence to their blogs. I am adding purposeful time for meditation, prayer, and reflection to work towards the Catholic Graduate expectations. This includes providing more opportunities for students to reflect on who they are and how they wish to impact the world they live in.  As the students completed their own blogs, I reflected on my own sentence to model reflective and creative thinking. Summarizing oneself in as few words as possible is a difficult feat. Who am I as an educator, a leader, a sister, a daughter...

For our first project, the students worked in groups to design objects to add organization to our learning environment. Since we are experimenting with the use of tables over desks, this is relevant project very much connected with life in our classroom. During their first experience with  TinkerCad  students navigated through help tutorials to familiarize themselves with tools and functionality.  Then they got work brainstorming options. I noticed students using measurement tools to create designs that were reasonable in scale in relation to the objects they were intended to hold.  After our design work period, we selected our first print!  Unfortunately , our print stopped about half way through. It seemed as though the filament got tangled in the internal feed port.  We used this first failure as an opportunity to better understand the inner workings of our M3D printer as well as misconceptions about the scale in our designs (as you ca...

Just over a week ago, my classroom's 3D printer arrived. It was a Friday, and as eager as I was to check it out myself, I wanted to share the experience with my students. So there, on a large rectangular table, sat the box ... I took a picture of it and posted it to our instagram feed (@weberswonders7) to instill a little curiosity.  On Monday morning, the classroom was a buzz of excitement. We had a class discussion about what we believed to be in the box and what might be possible with this new learning tool. Students recorded their thinking on sticky notes and attached them to the (still closed) box. We have been talking about the design process and students made connections with the importance of getting inspiration from the world around them.  This sticky notes was my favourite!  The following day we opened the box and created a list of questions and wonderings about the M3D printer. Initial Questions: How do we take care of it? ...