The following is my own learning journey as an ICT support specialist over the past 2 years

The Journey for me as a student doing school support ICT has been really exposing and educative ,as someone that did not do computer applications technology i was exposed to the subject of CAT and the amount of skills the subject can give students,I was exposed to a different way of the use of computers as i just knew they are for typing and watching movies,the journey was challenging but my lecturures and the university stuff were excellent in understanding and making it easier and inclusive for all of us and they made sure we all received the same opportunities and knowledge despite having different backgrounds.The final 2 years were mostly based on being an ICT school support specialist instead of just being a CAT teacher and i can say that they were the most interesting as one was able to learn and be exposed to things that i will be able to pass on to others in life,I was able to learn about different ways one can use ICT tools to support learning and administration for example i was able to learn about OER which is Open Educational Resources and different tools one can use to create such,My final year which is the year 202 exposed me to realities and the school environment as it was the first time i was in control of a class as an CAT teacher since the past years it was mostly observations,The following is the journal entries i have made throught the my second and final WIL experiece.My learning for the 2021 academic year and final year has really been a conituinous series of challenging and mind changing experiences,I approached the year thinking that just like the other years we are just going to do what we already know and build up on it,but the way academics are designed this year was not soemthing i was expecting but it is something i did not know i really needed as an individual for my growth as a student teacher in these challenging times. I have always know that online learning exists and i have always advocated for it and always thought it is easy for learners and is an easy task for teachers,but this year my course work and the work intergrated learning opened me up to seeing the different side of online learning and made me see reasons why a lot of teachers rather stick to their traditional way of learning than to change with the world as it changes,the changing world is challenging and luckily for some of us we are well eguipped and prepared for change as i noticed that th coursework of the subject School support ICT has been preparing us both theoritically and practically and even in ways that we do not notice,for example it introduce me to a different view of teachers as it taught me that teachers are researchers and that concept fascinated me as i kept having a lot of questions around it but could not voice them out,but after my experience during the W,I,L and see the challenges and my responses to it,i realised that the conceot of being a researcher played a role in motivating me to finding solutions to the problems whenever i thought of quiting. Every time when we do a new topic i also have question of how they fit in me being a teacher and how will they be of use to and when time goes i randomly find myself in a situation that will make me realise the importance of the information i took for granted and that has changed my view about the coursework and this module in general, I always wonder how it was going to feel like engaging in it fac to face in a class full of other students and i would imagine what the enviroment would be like when as students realise the concept we learnt appearing in a situation and realise its place in our education and development.This module has helped me pay attention to working on the type of teacher i want to be and that came through me being introduced to the concepts like teaching persona and teaching philosophy.Currently as a student i can say that my experince is going well despite the lockdown and uncertainties happening all around the world,and i am grateful that i am now exposed to the chellegenges of blended learning as that has gave me something to always look foward to perfecting as i pride myself in the fact that i will be a teacher well equiped to help introduce people to technology and pedagogic integration and guide them so that they can be equipped with skills needed in this 21st century world. What i knew before is that since almost everyone has access to mobile phones and other technological devices it will be easy to implement online learning ,and after experiences one was open to,i realised that a lot of factors contribute to a successful implementation of online learning and until we tackle them our education system still has a long way to go,and i realised that a lot of solutions are being taught in this module and the more attention we school support ict students pay attention to the the information offered the better it will be for us to help the outside world take our countries education to where it needs to be in terms of time and advancements

The august Work integrated learning was the longest i have been responsible for a class ,specifically a Computer applications technology class and i can say that for my first weeks it was really challenging as it made me realise that i have mastered the practical part of the subject only and only know a few about the theoretical part of the subject,and with the practical part i mean Microsoft word,powerpoint ,access and excel and other applications that result in skill development. The realisation resulted in me being under pressure and for a good week i just chose to observe my mentor teacher as i studied the theory i needed to study on my free time and that slowly helped me relax and gain confidence in my self and just when i thought i was fine and ready to be in control i realised that unlike in other subjects i had no idea how to approach the teaching of content in CAT, as even in our micro lessons i have never taught a class that starts with theory and ends with theory, to me CAT as a subject has always been about applying skills and i never really paid that much attention on the theory that it has and the fact that i had to teach its theory was a good wake up call.I challenged my self into making sure that i learn the theory and also a way in which i can effectively deliver it to the learners and make them understand, and i thought to myself and came to a conclusion that contextulising the content and relating it to real life situations is similar to doing a practical and since i am good in the practical part of CAT then approaching the theory his way is much better,i did not come up to the solution myself,my mentor teacher also contributed. My mentor teacher really helped me a lot in showing me ways in which i can approach teaching theory, he was really patient with me and through that whole experience i started seeing the importance of teacher agency which is a term i had just recently learned about in the beginning of the year.All that experience had a positive contribution towards my growth as a student teacher as now i can say that i am an all rounder ,my strengths are balanced now,i can do both the theoretical and the practical part of teaching CAT effectively.

My W.I.L experience was getting better so was my teaching and after interactions with other teachers and the learners my views about certain beliefs i had about teaching were questioned and some experiences made me look at things differently,for example i realised that a lot of teachers that are currently in the field do not really know what an ICT school support specialist is,even the teachers that are teaching CAT most of them had no real idea of what a school support specialist is.This realisation came because during my stay at the school ,there were a lot of issues especially technical which arose and i would fix such issues as most of the things are what we have learnt in the past year under ICT and some of them i learnt myself,the teachers and the admin team would call technical support and wait hours for the machine that has malfunctioned to be fixed instead of trusting that one would fix it as it is not much of a technical issue.It took a lot of convincing for the teachers to begin trusting that i can fix some of the issues and for them to start being curious about School support ICT speacialist.That experience really made me realise that a lot needs to be taught to the public about school support ICT and how exciting it is.

The last day of my school experience was a day filled with mixed emotions as the whole W.I.L experience was a mixture of experiences that somehow shaped my view of some beliefs i had,for example some time during the first weeks of the W.I.L i was convinced that teachers that are already in the field just make it their point to make the life of student teachers difficult in a manner to discourage us or kill our spirits for being teachers,but with time i began to understand that they were treating us like teachers instead of student teachers,and i am grateful that they did that as now i was able to see what to expect when i get into the field and in general the way they treated me and the way our ICT lecturer treats us made me to add another trait in the type of teacher i want to be,I want to be a teacher that’s a leader,I want to guide people into things that will grow them positively and contribute into their life and life experiences,as during the W.I.L experience our lecturer also encouraged us to go out there and gain an experience ,he told us that it is okay to make mistakes as the aim of all this is to build and grow us not to break us,and that really helped me a lot when things got tough during the W.I.L ,that made me realise that i also want to be a leader .