Architecture

Basic Elements

Although the architecture of your digital hub may change over time, to get started, we recommend that teacher candidates include the following four elements in the initial design of their site's navigational architecture:

• 1. A static home page that introduces or frames the purpose of the Hub for visitors. The home page should communicate in words and through photographs, colour, use of whitespace and font a clear message about what this space is and who you are as a teacher.

  2. An About page that includes information about your professional experiences and is written for an audience of students, parents, community members, teacher colleagues, principals, superintendents, and professors. Please do NOT include personal information such as your home address or telephone number on your About page.

  3. A blog that includes critical professional reflections, curation of coursework artifacts (e.g., videos, lesson plans, unit plans, images, infographics etc.), teaching resources, and/or ideas related to teaching.

  4. Links to professional social networking accounts (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Google+, email). Some people like to embed widgets that automatically pull their social media posts into their digital hub. Others prefer to simply add social media icons that, when clicked, take users to their social media account pages. The essential thing here is that you create professional social media accounts and link them to your digital hub space.

Examples of Digital Hubs that might be of value for Faculty and Students alike can be found on the Examples page.

Several examples are also provided on the Choosing a Platform page.

Year 1

Your digital hub architecture should be designed to include evidence of your understanding of what it means to be a teacher in Ontario and how you serve the public through your work as a teacher. To this end, you might create a top-level menu item called Courses with sub-pages for each of the courses you take. Each of these pages could include the best example of your work from the course with a brief pre-amble that contextualizes the assignment in terms of the broad themes of the course, and that explicitly highlights your understanding of teaching.

Year 2

Your digital hub architecture should grow or be revised to include evidence of your development as a teacher researcher. To this end, you might include a top-level menu item called Research with a page that features the work you are doing as a teacher researcher during your second year of the program.