Hello there! My name is Veronica and I hope to be a teacher in a school near you soon!
I grew up in Montreal my whole life, I love school and I am particularly interested in teaching Secondary English one day.
Media & Technology are wonderful tools that should be incorporated into every classroom! However, with these great tools, must first come great preparation. Media literacy is an important competency that should be taught and elaborated upon, especially in childhood / teen years. A number of websites can be looked at individually, then followed up with a class discussion in order to talk about seeking reliable information.
Younger students minds are particularly malleable. As educators, we should assist our students by working together in order to develop their critical skills in order to better prepare them. By the time they get older, a sense of critical media literacy will be especially useful for their own personal knowledge, as well as an asset to be used in school.
As a class, students may be assigned an article or advertisement to look at once individually then to have group discussions to think about why it may or may not contain accurate information. Providing students with our (teacher) feedback and guidance promotes a scaffolding approach so they can develop these skills and learn to apply them in their own daily lives as well.
Technology is also an amazing way to get students engaged in class discussions as well as an additional resource for learning class material. Some websites such as Kahoot, allow teachers to post online interactive quizzes to be done in class if students have computers or tablets at their disposal to play along with. Another useful resource would be H5P, which allows students/teachers to actually make their own interactive videos! Lastly, Khan Academy provides students with practice quizzes, tests, notes and instructional videos to really solidify the information they are being taught. Khan Academy (available for all grade levels and various subject areas) is a great way for students to catch up on something they might not be understanding in class, or to independently learn something on their own!
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