The reality of educational technology in my current context is necessary and at times complicated. I am a core French Teacher on a cart for grades K-3 so I push into numerous classrooms with a variety of tech set-ups. I primarily rely upon connecting an iPad via a variety of means (air server, cable, doc cam).  I rely on technology daily to service my students. Everyone on the team is very supportive and we work together, but it can be challenging when it is different in each classroom. For the bigger picture in the school, I am new, but I see a lot of cool things happening from classrooms with Smart Boards, to mini drawing robots in the Learning Commons, to a variety of direct supports for students. As I am also new to the district I am just starting to experience the context of education technology at the district level. Looking through the district Hub I see many software subscriptions and mentions of other hardware available.

As a new FSL (French Second Language) teacher I am only starting to understand the use of technology in relation to second language instruction. As songs are an essential part of language acquisition I am using many videos with songs. I am curious about online games/apps beyond Duolingo, and that are geared towards primary students. I am also curious about open ed resources such as dictionaries and translation software that are also vetted or reliable in terms of accuracy. I am sure I will have more thoughts on this as the year progresses.

When I applied to join this cohort I was not teaching FSL so my primary areas of interest for Ed Tech related to: technology use and digital citizenship in primary classrooms, the integration of technology and outdoor education, and overall the use of technology or software in a school in relation to teacher training. I was surprised when I started entering various classrooms how many teachers not only did not know what technology was available to them but often had little to no support in learning to use the technology already in their classroom (and hence often did not use it or did not use it optimally). Also that some districts had combinations of technology/hardware that did not work well together, and teachers were trying to best adapt under these circumstances. I am starting to think about how to add an FLS teacher lens to some of these areas or may continue to pursue ideas outside of FSL instruction.

Here is a favourite counting video of my students, merci à Alain Le Lait…