As a high school teacher, technology is not an option, but rather a necessary way of understanding life through the lens from which my students see the world. I’ve been teaching a rotation of Career-Life Education 10 that focuses on community, volunteering, and post-secondary exploration.
Using Google Classroom as a platform, students have been comparing post-secondary programs through the MyBlueprint app, a helpful tool which allows them to directly compare different programs from any university or college in North America.
They’ve put together collages and creative presentations using Explain Everything and Google Slides to showcase what community means to them. Through these presentations, I’ve learned a lot about my students as individuals and it’s helped us create a more positive, understanding classroom environment. I feel lucky to have this focus for my rotation, as it allows the classroom to become cohesive more quickly than if other content was driving the learning.
My students have put together engaging presentations on the UN Sustainable Development Goals and applied them to our community, the small town of Grand Forks. Students were able to draw many parallels between global and local problems and (more importantly) solutions that are creative, innovative, and flexible.
Without the SET-BC iPads, none of this work would have been possible, as our school is small and does not have consistent access to technology for all students. The iPads enable students to dig deep into this CLE 10 rotation and truly explore the crux of what “community” means.
