I appreciated having some time in class to, not only hear about new technologies, but to also have an opportunity to use the technology introduced to us. With the advice of our instructor, Andrew, I chose to try using Notion for creating a lesson plan; a lesson plan that Cameron and I will use for our Greenspace Lesson Assignment in EPHE 312.

Creating an account was as easy as entering my email address and then the signup code sent to my email’s inbox. Once inside Notion, I was able to find a template for a lesson plan and start filling it in, beginning with the title and due date. After reviewing the assignment requirements for the Greenspace Lesson, I realized that our instructor for EPHE 312 had given us a lesson template we are supposed to use. With a simple Ctrl ‘A’ and Ctrl ‘C’, I was able to Ctrl ‘V’ the EPHE 312 lesson template right into Notion. Easy.

In class, we quickly used Notion’s AI to generate a list of the predators and prey species that live in the Southern region of Vancouver Island. This helped kickstart our idea for the Food Chain Game we would like to create for our Greenspace lesson.

Our guest speaker this week was Joseph Gamble, who has a combined role of EdTech Support and Teacher at École Catholique Saint-Dominique-Savio in Owen Sound, Ontario. The most salient message I got from this talk (which seems to be a theme of the course) was: If you don’t know, ask. Schools and school districts, pay people to help teachers navigate the world of tech, and, no matter how tech-savvy a teacher may be, it is good practice to ask and make sure, because there may be aspects of tech-related use, such as the legal aspects, that we may not be fully aware of. As we will be working in education, it makes the most sense to practice education as a community, to learn from those who know, and be humble in our own unknowing.