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Week 32-Reflect on your learning journey (Check)

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What? Upon starting with the MindLab course, my main goal coming into this was to upskill myself with the most current technology tools and knowledge as I wanted to feel more confident. I had graduated from a four-year teaching degree many years ago but had only relieved since then. I felt like I was getting behind the times. Participating in this course it has gone beyond my original expectations. It has completely changed my teaching practice. As I am a beginning teacher I came from not having a lot of teaching practice, especially within a classroom as I also teach via distance. I was able to identify that engagement was an area that impacted on the quality and quantity of teaching that would happen. It was important for me to target this area and implement change so that I could make connections to the disconnected students and their whanaus and start making that difference, which was the reasoning behind wanting to be a teacher in the first place. Now what? As Osterman ...
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Week 31 - Evaluate Your Impacts (Check)

To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? What? The evidence from my 'Take Action' phase shows, that the number of students that logged into our online platform before I started my inquiry compared to the end, that there was a significant increase. The impact of having ClassDojo implemented into my teaching practice was highly beneficial not only for the students but also to their supervisors. The valuable feedback that I got from the student's supervisors was all positive, they loved how Classdojo was keeping them informed with how their student was doing and also loved the connection it provided to their student's learning, and also to me as their teacher. Some of this feedback was displayed in the feedback collected by the Google Form that I sent out, however, some were in conversation over the phone or face to face. One other thing that I cannot single out and provide evidence for is the number of times that my stud...
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Week 30 Reflect on Your Evidence (Take Action)

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To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? What? The data that I have collected for my inquiry is qualitative and quantitative. My quantitative data was a tally of week one engagement through our My Te Kura portal and also again as endpoint data in week five. I chose this method of collecting data at it was a true representation if the student was logging into our online platform to access their learning content, which would then would show that they are engaging. I needed to gather baseline data and endpoint data this way so that I could make comparisons between the data and begin to analyse it. This is a snapshot of my quantitative data from week one: And week five: I also collected weekly data for the weeks in between: I also sent out a Google Form survey which looked at qualitative and quantitive data, which I sent out in wee...
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Week 29 - Consider your audiences (Take action)

To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? What? The wider audience context for my inquiry is my community of learning (COL) which include my mentor teacher and other teachers in my office. I also think that my wider community involves other teachers that are a part of The MindLab community as I share these blog posts with them. The theme that I have chosen to look at in this reflection has been identified in  Bolstad, Gilbert, McDowall, Bull, Boyd & Hipkin's (2012) reading of New views of equity, diversity, and inclusivity (pg.25). So what? I chose to look at this weeks reflection through the equity, diversity and inclusivity lense because raising engagement drives my inquiry which aligns perfectly with Bolstad et al's (2012) idea of 'producing educational engagement and success for all learners is an important priority.' (p.25). My mentor teacher's perspective towards my practice is very supportive and op...
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Week 28 - Act in Your Professional Environment (Take Action)

To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? I am continuing to use  Rolfe's Reflective model (n.d) to reflect this week. What? I have identified that I do have an ethical issue that potentially could be a problem if it were to arise. The data that I collect on a weekly basis, from our online learning platform, does have the students name on it, however, for my inquiry purposes my students and their supervisors were told their identity would remain anonymous throughout it. I need to make sure that throughout my inquiry, anything that is written down does not and cannot identify the students directly. So What? For this part I have chosen to use  Connecticut’s Teacher Education and Mentoring Program (2015) framework: What possible issues/concerns might this scenario raise? This scenario could raise a breach of privacy issue. How could this situation become a violation of the law, the “Code” or other school policies? This...
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Week 27 - Examine Your Cultural Context (Take Action)

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To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? This week I am using Rolfe's Reflective model (n.d) again to review and reflect on the process so far. What? My understanding of indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness is being aware of who my students are, who their families are, where they have come from and what I can do as their teacher to make them feel like they are safe, included and feel like they belong. The area that I have chosen to focus on for the next part of the discussion is communication methods. So what?  I have chosen the ‘Culturally Responsive Practice for Maori Scale’ as the framework for the reflection and the concept I have chosen is Whanaungatanga (building relationships). I chose this as I believe that I am making my relationship with my students and their families stronger by providing them with another way that they can communicate with me, which is value number two in the Whanaungatanga con...
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Week 26 -Reflect on Your Inquiry (Take Action)

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To what extent does gamification impact on behavioural engagement for distance learners? This week I am using Rolfe's Reflective model (n.d) to review and reflect on the process so far. What? During the Take Action phase of my Inquiry, the most notable event has been that I have started to give out Dojo Points! The Dojo Points are carefully thought out and consist of the behaviours that I desire the most. These behaviours have been allocated the most points in the hopes that the students will keep repeating them: By the end of this week, I had given out a total of 40 Dojo points to five different students, which was super exciting! The points that I have given out have been for contacting me, completing a module on My Te Kura and asking questions. This is a really positive start for my Inquiry as the lack of contact with my distance students I have found very frustrating and has lead to even more disengagement. The majority of the students on my class list are ones th...
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