Today’s DFI session was both insightful and thought-provoking. One of the key ideas I took away from the session was the importance of making teaching and learning visible for students. It encouraged me to reflect on my own classroom practice and how the way we design and present learning can significantly impact student engagement and understanding.

Dorothy’s presentation was truly an eye-opener. It highlighted how, as teachers, we can sometimes unintentionally overwhelm students with excessive written work, lengthy notes, and numerous worksheets. While these resources may be created with good intentions, they can often lead to students losing interest and motivation in a subject. This made me realise that effective teaching is not just about delivering content, but about presenting learning in a way that is accessible, engaging, and meaningful for students.

One of the most valuable aspects of today’s session was learning about the importance of creating lessons using Google Sites. Designing lessons on a digital platform such as Google Sites can make learning more interactive, organised, and visually appealing. It allows students to access resources, instructions, activities, and learning goals all in one place, making their learning journey clearer and more manageable.

Using Google Sites can also support student independence, as learners can revisit materials at their own pace and take greater ownership of their learning. For teachers, it provides an excellent way to structure lessons, reduce reliance on paper-based worksheets, and create a more modern and engaging classroom environment.

Overall, today’s DFI session reinforced the idea that teaching should not simply focus on delivering information but on creating learning experiences that students can clearly see, connect with, and engage in. I look forward to applying these ideas in my own teaching practice and exploring how digital tools like Google Sites can help make learning more visible, meaningful, and enjoyable for my students.

Today’s Professional Learning Reflection

Today’s session was both engaging and valuable, as I learned more about developing and improving our class site. One of the highlights of today’s learning was finally understanding how to embed a Hāpara Workspace link into a Google Site. This is a concept I have wanted to learn for a long time, and I am excited that I can now confidently add Hāpara resources directly to the class site. This will make it much easier for students to access their learning materials from one central location.

Another useful skill I learned was how to embed our class blog into the Google Site. Having the blog integrated into the site means students can easily view updates, reflections, announcements, and learning activities without needing to navigate between multiple websites. It creates a more connected and user-friendly learning experience.

Using both Google Sites and Hāpara together offers many advantages for teaching and learning. Google Sites provides a well-organized, easy-to-navigate platform where students can find lesson resources, announcements, assessment information, and important links all in one place. It is accessible from any device, simple to update, and encourages students to become more independent learners.

Hāpara complements Google Sites by providing a structured digital learning environment where teachers can distribute work, monitor student progress, give timely feedback, and personalize learning. Students can easily access assignments, complete activities, and stay organized with their learning tasks.

My Goal for today’s session was to  ensure my google site is updated as I post resources in Hapara. Previously, my learning site was not very updated and the feedback that I received from my colleagues were:

DFI Class Site Feedback and Support Non-contact Cohort 2026 (Responses)

Overall, today’s session has given me practical skills that I can immediately apply in my classroom. I look forward to using these new features to create a more effective and engaging online learning space for my students.

My Biology Site

Today’s DFI session was both insightful and thought-provoking. One of the key ideas I took away from the session was the importance of making teaching and learning visible for students. It encouraged me to reflect on my own classroom practice and how the way we design and present learning can significantly impact student engagement and understanding.

Dorothy’s presentation was truly an eye-opener. It highlighted how, as teachers, we can sometimes unintentionally overwhelm students with excessive written work, lengthy notes, and numerous worksheets. While these resources may be created with good intentions, they can often lead to students losing interest and motivation in a subject. This made me realize that effective teaching is not just about delivering content, but about presenting learning in a way that is accessible, engaging, and meaningful for students.

One of the most valuable aspects of today’s session was learning about the importance of creating lessons using Google Sites. Designing lessons on a digital platform such as Google Sites can make learning more interactive, organized, and visually appealing. It allows students to access resources, instructions, activities, and learning goals all in one place, making their learning journey clearer and more manageable.

Using Google Sites can also support student independence, as learners can revisit materials at their own pace and take greater ownership of their learning. For teachers, it provides an excellent way to structure lessons, reduce reliance on paper-based worksheets, and create a more modern and engaging classroom environment.

Overall, today’s DFI session reinforced the idea that teaching should not simply focus on delivering information but on creating learning experiences that students can clearly see, connect with, and engage in. I look forward to applying these ideas in my own teaching practice and exploring how digital tools like Google Sites can help make learning more visible, meaningful, and enjoyable for my students.

Day 1- DFI Reflection

There was lots of useful information covered by the facilitators of DFI today and it will definitely   improve my teaching pedagogies. I was able to update my google chrome. Updating and using Google Chrome is important because it helps keep your device safe with the latest security fixes that protect against viruses, malware, and online threats. Regular updates also improve speed, stability, and performance, so web pages load faster and run more smoothly.

I appreciate the information on google groups since it will help us to send note or message to our class group all at once. Google Groups at  workspace makes communication and collaboration much easier. . You can control who can join or post, keeping information secure, and it integrates seamlessly with other Google Workspace apps like Gmail and Drive. This helps teams work more efficiently and stay organized.

Finally, the best part which I will use in my teaching and lesson preparation is create and share using google documents. Google Docs lets you create and share documents online, work with others in real-time, save changes automatically, and access your work from any device. I have learnt features like searching for the images from the web, how to change page color’s and other minor details.

Looking forward to learn more on digital technology from other  DFI sessions.

This day provided valuable professional learning on the effective use of Hāngā, YouTube as a learning platform, Hapara for monitoring student activity, and Google Drawings to enhance teaching and learning in Science. The session strengthened my understanding of how purposeful use of digital tools can increase student engagement, support differentiated learning, and improve monitoring and feedback.

Using YouTube videos helps make abstract scientific concepts more visual and accessible, particularly for visual and auditory learners. Demonstrations, simulations, and real-world science applications shown through videos help students make connections between theory and practice. I also learned the importance of using guided questions, pauses, and follow-up discussions to ensure active engagement and critical thinking rather than passive viewing.

Day 2 Reflection

Session was very informative. I learnt a lot about learning through the google meet, it is valuable and meaningful experience. Features which was interesting was screen sharing, chats, breakout discussions which can make the lesson more interactive and engaging. Google note is also an important tool in everyday life, it is easy to learn, accessible anywhere and most importantly it gives a reminders and notification.

Blogging is also essential in school setting as it improves writing skills, shares knowledge and ideas. Blogging in Biology helps students to open up in discussion which further helps the students in their external examinations. Other advantages include it improves confidence.

Moreover, I have learnt how to upload recording to the drive and also add the recording to the blog post.