Over the past 3 months I have taken up crochet for my free inquiry project. I have really enjoyed learning this new skill, and will definitely continue with it over time. I have made many projects over the past few months, including about 50 mini hearts, 1 blanket, a few granny squares, coasters and more.
Below I’ve included a picture of the blanket I made. The entire blanket it made of half double crochets. This took me roughly 6 weeks from start to finish, working on it when I had the opportunity. I used 10 skeens of yarn, which came out to about 1200 yards of yarn. I definitely could have made it larger, but I had already bought so much yarn and I was getting tired of working on the same project. In the future when I make a blanket I will try making it out of granny squares so I can work on one piece at a time.
I enjoyed the benefits of crochet, like a lower screen time, less stress, and the confidence boost gained through creating something. I am planning on making friends and family slippers for christmas which is exciting. My mom made me a yarn advent calendar this year, so I don’t think I’ll be dropping this hobby anytime soon.
This class has opened my eyes to the different responsibilities we have as teachers to use tech in appropriate and accessible ways. I included designs that stood our to me from different topics. We discussed some of the pros and cons of AI, our digital foot prints, what role (if any) phones should play in a class room, tried 3D printing, and more. We also had daily check-ins, which a wanted to include as it will be something I will take with me into my own classrooms.
Thank you Rich for such a great class through out this semester!
This week Brittany Johnson came back to our class to share some classroom management strategies with us. I really enjoyed the advice, tools and strategies she told us about. We talked about SEL check ins, Modelling, soft starts and other helpful strategies.
Routines and SEL
Setting routines is a great way to manage a class and set expectations with students. Setting routines is also a great practice in UDL, since it helps set many types of students up for success. A specific routine Brittany shared with us is her SEL check in at the start and end of the day. SEL stands for social and emotional learning, and introducing something like the check ins we do every class, or the Inside Out one we did today. This is an easy way to understand what your students are bringing to school with them each day, rather than assuming all students are starting the day on a strong note.
Soft Starts
Soft starts and transitions are a way of easing students into class activities and learning. There are many different ways to do soft starts with students, the activities can be stand-alone or a way to transition into the lesson or activity planned. Incorporating soft starts into classroom routines is a way to get students on the same page and ready to learn. I have seen soft starts/transitions used in my link to practice classroom and they are super useful to both the teacher and students.
In this weeks class we discussed how incorporating games into education can come with pros and cons, coding and computational thinking. We watched a few videos and looked at some examples of ChatGTP making directions to better understand how literally computers take direction. During hands-on time we worked on some simple coding games.
Gaming in Education
Before class, my only experience with coding was in middle school. Coding class was apart of our M.A.T.H (Music, art, trades and home eco) class rotation so I only had it for 2 months a year in grade 7 and 8. We used similar websites to what we used in class today and I remember really disliking it. I think adding coding/games into lessons is very polarizing for students. while it may seem like a no brainer that a child would obviously enjoy/become more engaged though the gamification of a subject, this isn’t always the case. In my case I enjoyed the first few classes of coding but after I realized we would be doing very similar things every class I took it way less seriously and almost fully disengaged. I think it is important to include games/coding games in class from time to time but, I also think it’s important to do so with a purpose opposed to just allowing students to have 45 minutes of free time on a coding website. Much like any other subject including UDL and understanding students can show what they know in different ways is supper important to successfully incorporating coding and games into our classes.
Computational Thinking
Computational thinking is a problem solving skill that involves breaking the problem into 4 aspects and systematically finding a solution that both humans and computers can come to. The 4 aspects of computational thinking are: Decomposition, which breaks the problem down into smaller parts. Pattern recognition, which is using your prior and contextual knowledge to approach the problem. Abstraction, which is focusing on the important parts/order of operations to efficiently solve the problem. Algorithmic thinking, which is the final step and your creation of the steps that will solve the problem.
I never knew it was called computational thinking but I’ve been breaking problems down like this for years. I find I can become overwhelmed when I start something new and computational thinking makes things less daunting, both with academic and personal problems. Computational thinking can help learners in so many ways. It can help them learn how to break down school work and learn how to show thier process for subjects that require that such as math or science. It can also help them learn how to break down personal problems that come up in life such as how to share spaces/materials with classmates. Providing students with many problem solving strategies will set them up for long term academic and interpersonal success.
This week I finished making heart pins so I had a full set to give out in class today. Over the last 2 weeks I have made roughly 50 crochet hearts and given them to family, friends and classmates. I like that they are small are not too time or resource consuming but are still super cute and easy to add to other projects such as hats, blankets, granny squares, etc. I think if i were to make them again I’d leave a loop on a few so people can use them as keychains but realistically I think if someone wanted to make theirs into a keychain it would be pretty easy to do. I love creating little physical tokens of my appreciation, I feel like it helps people remember they are appreciated, so I’m glad to have taught myself how to make these as I can totally make them for students in the future. I asked a couple classmates if I could add a photo of them with their mini heart to my blog, shout out to Ella and Hanne!
This week I’ve also been working on my blanket. I started working on a green blanket about two weeks ago and it has been coming along quite well! I greatly underestimated how much yarn I would need so I had about 4/5 days between running out and being able to get more but all things considered I’m making pretty quick work of it. I’m using a “half double crochet” stitch for the entire blanket and I love how it looks so far. I find it super relaxing and passive since I’m just doing the same thing over and over again so I don’t have to pay too much attention. Also through making my blanket I’ve had to learn how to “add on” which is just adding a new ball of yarn to the project. At first I was scared since it seemed like a skill that would be tricky but it was actually really simple.
Over the past week I’ve made 25 mini hearts! I’m hoping to make 10/15 more before “Link2Practice” next week. I have been following the same patten as I did last week, from “lilthings” on youtube. I have also started to work on a blanket, however, I’ll leave that for next week’s blog. Micheals, the craft store, had a 30% off all yarn sale this week. I was able to buy a ton of yarn for various projects and save a decent amount of money so that was really helpful.
Growth and Challenges
I’ve seen a lot of growth in my crocheting over the past week. I’m finding it much easier to follow patterns (instructions) and recognize any mistakes I make in my stitching. I’m able to crochet the hearts without watching and following along with the video anymore, which is motivating since now I listen to podcast/audiobooks as I make them. My biggest challenge this week has been struggling with patience. Since I know that I know how to crochet a heart I would get really frustrated when I messed up or felt like I was taking too long. I find that usually I just need to take a break and come back and I feel better.
Benefits of Crochet
So far the most prominent side effect of picking up crochet has been my decreased amount of screen time, especially on my phone. I don’t get stuck in the trap of scrolling on Tik Tok or Instagram for hours when I’m bored nearly as much as I just grab my hook and yarn. Social media, as I’m sure we are all aware, can be super harmful to our mental health and beyond that I find it can be a bir brain numbing. I feel much more productive and confident in myself after spending 1-2 hours crocheting and listening to a podcast rather than using that time to mindlessly looking through my socials.
I also find crocheting has helped me to put more time into processing my day, feelings, thoughts and emotions. It’s challenging to prioritize being thoughtful about my personal life when I spend so much time thinking about school, work, practicum, responsibilities, etc. but crochet has helped me to focus on myself for a bit. While crocheting I need to pay enough attention to my project that I don’t mess up, meaning I can’t really think about school work. This sorta gives my brain permission to ignore things outside of myself, since they would require too much focus. It’s nice to practice mindfulness in a way that still feels productive and thus eliminates some of the stress/guilt I can feel when my plate is full with responsibilities but want to practice mindfulness.
This week we discussed the negatives and positives of sketch-noting and infographics. Sketchnotes are a way to take personal notes that in theory should help with recall and retention. It can help with memory/recall since you are “Dual coding” the information by writing and drawing a simple sketch.
Above are my sketches from the libraries sketchnoting workshop “skill building” activity. I will definitely be implementing sketchnotes into my notes moving forward since I do tend to doodle anyways so it may as well be helpful and connected to the material.
In Class Work
I decided to make a sketchnote page geared towards english speakers interested in Spanish. I included greetings, food from Spain, common phrases, a resource to easily access Spanish movies/subtitles, where Spanish is spoke in the world and a very brief bit of info on the origins of the language.
How could sketchnotes be used among different grades?
I think with very young students sketchnotes would be helpful to aid in learning the “basics” in any subject. Adding drawing to spelling lessons would be a great way to add multimedia and dual coding to the lesson, aiding learners and giving them different ways to try and recall the information.
I think incorporating sketch notes into lessons for older students would be extremely helpful for a few reasons. First of all it shows them a way to take notes that might actually work for them. When I started university I felt so lost on how to take good notes, my teachers never taught me any note taking strategies beyond highlighting. Through teaching students different note taking strategies and styles we are setting them up for success in their futures, weather they choose to go to post-secondary, take on the work force, travel, invent, etc. as taking notes is not limited to a school setting. Sketchnoting is also a great way to practice UDL and provide learners with a different way to engage and participate.
This week I sewed together the sides of the bag I created last week. It took alot of trial and error since I didn’t follow a pattern, and I’m sure it could be a bit cleaner bit I like how it looks. Somehow the top of my bag ended up uneven so I’m gonna change my plan a bit. I’m going to make a rice bag and put it inside to use as a heat pack. this should make it so I can hide the uneven-ness by just sewing everything together.
The light blue-green coloured yarn between the yellow near the bottom of the bag is what I sewed up
This week I also worked on a couple mini hearts and I’m seeing improvements which is really encouraging. They are pretty simple but not as mindless as just crocheting in a row, like I did for my bag. They require a “magic ring” which can be a bit tricky to work with. I’m really hoping to make at least 10-15 more over the next week.
Finally this week I made a granny square which is a crochet square that can be used to make larger projects such as slippers, blankets, table clothes, sweaters, etc. I followed Alt Knot’s Youtube tutorial “Crochet Solid Granny Square Tutorial”. It was a bit challenging to follow but It turned out pretty well for my first attempt. It required chains, double and triple crochets and slip knots.
In this week’s class we discussed accessibility. Why it’s important, who may need/benefit from accessible tech/spaces, and how we can make small adjustments to our websites to make them more accessible and user friendly.
Example 1: Accessible Photos
Pictures are an amazing tool in education. We have already discussed in class the benefits of including images in our lessons, opposed to only speaking/text. While images are great it is important to keep in mind that people struggle with a wide range of vision impairment. We should be doing everything we can to provide accessible resources so everyone can benefit from the lesson material. One way we can do this is by including alternative/descriptive text boxes.
If I was teaching someone how to make different kinds or coffee/ran a barista blog it would be super helpful to include photo descriptions for a few reasons. It would make me website more accessible and user friendly for those who cannot see the photos. It would also be helpful because all coffee looks pretty similar and you can’t rely on visuals to know what something is. By including alternative text someone can figure out exactly what they are looking at without having to read though the entire blog.
My Own photo
Example 2: Accessible Videos
Much like Rich mentioned in class, accessible videos are a great tool for both folks with and without hearing loss/issues. I have found closed captioning to be super helpful in many different scenarios from school settings, to public places and at home. I also think playback speed it a great accessibility tool. Both captions and adjustable playback speed are available through Youtube. Below I’ve included a Youtube video I made, showing a website I love to check leading up to concerts called Setlist.FM .
My own video made through screencastify
Digital Accessibility Practices Often Skipped?
A digital accessibility practice I see missed commonly, even among UVic professors, is providing documents that can be put through text to speech software. This most commonly occurs when a professor/website provides a scan/picture of a physical page(s) in a book or when a resource doesn’t allow users the copy function if they have highlighted text. I understand it chan be an annoying extra task but I think it’s only reasonable to either exclude readings which cannot be properly formatted or put in the work to fix the formatting/type everything up into a suitable format if it is a class required reading.
I definitely didn’t consider how my websites colours could cause some issues for those with visual impairments until I put my website through WAVE this week. I’m glad I know now and have changed it to be easier to see. It’s definitely something I’ll keep in mind moving forward.
