Note: Some footage used in this video was filmed prior to the pandemic and may not depict social distancing measures.
Year: 2020 — Province: Newfoundland and Labrador
Certificate of Excellence Recipient
Vanier Elementary School
French immersion, all subjects, grade 4
St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador
I love how she makes learning activities fun. … I will miss how she challenges us to be better. I love that Mme Hudson lets us make stuff instead of just writing it down or reading about it.
For Ashleigh Hudson, teaching is not just about thinking outside the box. It's about figuring out how to make the box, why making the box is important and what else the box could be used for. As a result, teachers and classes in all grades quickly pick up new teaching method or technology she introduces.
Teaching approach
As a French-immersion teacher, Ashleigh seeks to create as rich a learning environment as possible, since she not only has to cover the curriculum but also introduce a new language and the culture and history associated with it. To that end, she takes her students' learning out of the books and into their hands.
In the classroom
- Integrates technology, coding and digital literacy into all subject areas: as students build skills they also develop a familiarity and ease with, for example, 3D printing and video production, and then demonstrate their learning through collaborative projects, such as making interactive posters or recording podcasts.
- Emphasizes video creation as a learning tool: students created video tutorials about math strategies; this helped them retain the concepts and develop problem solving, critical thinking, collaboration and communications skills during production; the videos are on YouTube for other Grade 4 teachers to use.
- Fosters multi-modal learning: for example, students created a scale model of a community of the future—including recreation, transportation and infrastructure—using coding, robots and 3D printing, learning about healthy eating, safety, community structure and math concepts such as perimeter and area along the way.
- Expands learning through projects with outside organizations: using knowledge of fractions, students slice pizza made with produce they grew under provincial Little Green Thumbs program; sold seeds from school-grown kale and tomatoes at the farmers market and learned about the economic benefits of agriculture.
Outstanding achievements
- Recognized twice in the provincial legislature for class's environmental efforts using technology: students produced a green-screen video about climate change and a second one, "Don't be that guy," about the dangers of single-use plastic, along with essays asking for a legislative ban on single-use plastic bags.
- Inspired the school by her example to make technology access and STEM a goal for the full student body; school targeted fundraising efforts to build a school learning commons for all classes to use that includes a variety of technologies, including a 3D printer, iPads, Chromebooks, and robotic and film equipment.
- Shares her ideas—and help for other educators looking to implement new forms of technology in their class—through her blog "Adventures in Technology Education," offering how-to guides and best practices, and through Twitter.
- Featured in Brilliant Labs Magazine and the Brilliant Labs Maker Minute Podcast; a student-created video about rocks and minerals, which also featured a song the students wrote, was profiled on the CBC.
Get in touch!
Vanier Elementary School
85 Ennis Avenue
St. John's NL A1A 1Y7
709-754-2440
ginaducey@nlesd.ca
https://www.nlesd.ca/schools/schoolprofile.jsp?id=242
Twitter: @VElementary, @mmehudson