Mar

2

On becoming a networked teacher

Filed Under Blogging in and out of the Classroom | 2 Comments

networked-teacherjpg.jpgI’m wanting way too much. I’m like a little kid in a candy store except my candy store is the World Wide Web, and the candy is all the exciting digital technology that’s out there, never mind all those interesting websites to read and podcasts to listen to . I ‘ve been so busy grabbing all that yummy candy and trying to unwrap it for my classroom blog it seems I’ve little time for anything else, including this blog. At least a regular candy store is closed some of the time unlike the WWW which is open all the time and will let me in at 8:00pm and let me stay until 1:30 am. No problem.

I do feel as if I’m making some headway though. Thanks to bloggers like Kevin, Sue, and Chrissy who’ve helped me unwrap some of the digital candy like like Voice Thread, and Voki, I’ve been able to create a classroom blog that engages my reluctant learners. I ‘ve learned so much in the last while that I’m starting to feel that I’m no longer a newly landed immigrant who has to constantly struggle to make her way through the digital technology. I keep telling myself that it took me years of practice to become a proficient gardener, seamstress and knitter. Why would it be any different with digital technology. I’m still learning new things about gardening, sewing and knitting. Things change over time. Come to think of it, teaching’s no different. It takes a long while to become proficient at it, and there’s always something new. Teachers are life long learners. Things change in teaching too.

Teachers are gradually moving toward becoming Networked Teachers. (Courosa’s graphic of “The Networked Teacher” that I uploaded from Flickr illustrates this very well.) Come to think of it, I’m well on my way to becoming a Networked Teacher myself . The Networked Teacher takes the curriculum documents which are a given for his or her subject areas and creates lesson plans that will deliver the curriculum by interacting with such things as popular media, print and digital resources, video conferences, social networking services, social bookmarking, digital photo sharing, wikis, podcasts and blogs as well as interacting with colleagues, students and their families and the local community. The Networked Teacher has new sets of tools to help engage her students and make their learning more relevant and meaningful. Of course, this presupposes that the curriculum the Networked Teacher is given is relevant and meaningful for students in the 21st century. I’m thinking there may have to be some changes in curriculum made- but that’s a whole other topic.

Just to get you thinking about the topic, I invite you to watch [youtube aPQlu5Vxm28]. Enjoy.

Feb

6

Today’s Snow Day morphed into today’s Professional Development day

Filed Under Behaviour Management, Blogging in and out of the Classroom | 9 Comments

Today, Winter sent us another snow storm and another Snow Day. That’s two Snow Days in less than a week. Last Friday we had our first Snow Day and now again today.That must be a first! I can’t ever remember having that happen before. Most years we don’t even get one Snow Day let alone two in one week. I got the Snow Day phone call early this morning to tell me that the schools would be closed today given the weather. Take a look out my window in the photo above, and you’ll get a sense of what the day was like.

Snow Day, great I thought. I can spend the day learning how to use some new- to- me software and work on my class blog. The software Voice Thread looks like it has lots of possibilities for engaging the reluctant writers in my class. I have to thank Kevin for telling me about Voice Thread, and I have to thank him for helping me understand how to use it. I was stuck and thought “now what?”. Then I though of Kevin. He has lots of patience. I know because I’ve tried it before. I sent Kevin an email asking for help, and he responded at once with a link to Chrissy’s site where she explained things so that even I could get it. Thanks Kevin. Thanks Chrissy. Why is it that once you know how to do something it seems so easy? I experience that a lot when I’m sitting in front of a computer.
As far as PD sessions go, I have to say it was a pretty good one. If I had one of those forms to fill out that you usually get at the end of PD sessions, I would have to rate the day excellent in all categories - if I do say so myself. Lunch was even really good-thanks to Kurt who has a passion for cooking and had his famous chicken soup simmering for hours on the stove-what better on a day like this.

Now that I can use Voice Thread thanks to some help, I want to have my students use it in the classroom. If you have moment, take a peek at what I’ve done using Voice Thread in my class blog. It’s very basic because I haven’t learned to use all the bells and whistles yet. Students really like writing comments about the pictures and quotes that I’ve posted. Their comments are actually quite thoughtful. Students didn’t ask how many words they had to write. I haven’t had one complaint about writing thus far. I hear them laughing and commenting on what they’ve written. It’s nice to hear laughter.

There was a bit of confusion when I introduced the blog, but now everyone pretty well knows knows what they’re doing more or less. I guess when I introduce Voice Thread to the class there’ll be a bit of confusion, too. To try to minimize that, I’m going to introduce it in stages. First, I’ll show a few of my stronger students how to use the program , and then they can show other students how to use it. That’s what our Board does when it rolls out something new. I think the Board calls it “teachers teaching teachers”. Someone goes and gets trained on some new piece of software we have to use and then that person comes back and shows the rest of us- if there’s time.

Oh yes, before I forget, Voice Thread has a version for educators. That’s the one I signed up for. There’s some good ideas for the classroom on the site. I’ll take a closer look at those later. I also like the security features like having the option of going public or keeping the thread private, having or not having search engine access and allowing or not allowing comments. I’ve discussed the security options for our classroom blog with the students and most prefer to have the security of no search engine access and the comment moderation. As I get more comfortable with my students, I’l l open things up more. Right now I’m a bit hesitant, but I’m sure that’ll change as I get to know the students better and our classroom and blogging agreements of mutual respect, no put downs, attentive listening, appreciation and the right not to participate during class discussions get entrenched. I see that happening already. The kids are identifying put downs and instances of disrespect. I think that’s the first step because for some kids so much of the inappropriate behaviour is an unconscious habit. When I call them on it, the response I get is “What?”. First they have to know what’s appropriate in order to do it, and then once they start doing it I’ll can catch them doing “good” to reinforce that appropriate behaviour. That catching them doing good is part of the appreciation and mutual respect that I want to show my students. As Ken Weber wrote so many, many years ago The Teacher is the Key. I agree.

 
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Feb

1

Reflections about starting my classroom blog

Filed Under Blogging in and out of the Classroom | 7 Comments

For most of the last two weeks my head’s been spinning. There’s just too much going on. Final evaluations are marked, report cards completed, one meeting attended , two meetings attended, three meetings attended, my desk in office all cleared off, well almost, new classroom blog created using www. edublogs. org, learning how to get more out of my widgets, learning about hyperlinks and html, learning how to customize my blog roll learning, learning, learning. I need a break from learning.

Most of this learning has been learning things in order to set up my classroom blog. I’m really serious about having a class blog for my Advanced Learning Strategies Class , and I’m trying to remember my own advice: think big, start small. Except, I want to think big, start big and do it all now, hence the spinning head.

I’ve decided to take it one small step at a time. I’m going start by posting journal assignments in The Advanced Learning Strategies Blog, my classroom blog and then have students write their reflections as a comment. I’m having a lot of fun finding pictures for my blog. I’ve only got a couple of posts up because it’s the new semester. Ironically, today was supposed to be the first day of the new semester but school was canceled because of a wonderfully impressive storm. The groundhog is in for a real surprise tomorrow, Groundhog Day, when he comes out to see if he can see his shadow and tell us how much longer winter will last.

As far as the blog goes, I’m trying to grab the kids attention so later next week I’m posting a photo of a tattoo that’s really cool and fits in with the classroom agreements about mutual respect. I also have a photo of face piercings that I just know will generate some buzz. I want to catch their attention. I don’t want the blog to be just another form of a notebook. I’ll see how that goes. I’ll start by moderating any comments, too. I know that students would like to see what they have written instantly, but I’m not ready for that yet. Yes, I think that sums it up as far as classroom blogging. I’m not ready for the big time, yet.

Maybe I need to have something like a graduated license for student bloggers much like the graduated license we have for new drivers here in Ontario. Now, I know there are huge advantageous to throwing student blogging wide open. I’d like to do that, but I know that some of my students - how shall I say this - need to have boundaries in place for them so I’m reluctant to give them free range even after discussing appropriate behaviour while on the blog. I think the appropriate behaviour on the blog would be much the same as the appropriate behaviour in my classroom- mutual respect, attentive listening, no put downs, and showing appreciation when appropriate. I think that covers everything.

If someone reading this has had experience with a wide open class blog with kids who can be very creative in the ways they amuse themselves at the expense of others at times, I would really appreciate some feedback. If not, I’ll just take one baby step at a time until I feel comfortable having a more open blog.

At this point, I want to say that the edublogs.org site has been very user friendly and the new Edublogger by Sue explains things so that even I can get it. Believe me, sometimes I have a hard time getting even the obvious. My brain just doesn’t think in a digital fashion ,and I won’t be able to get something to work because I miss the obvious. My kids tell me that I’m making it too hard. I used to think that I had this problem because I was a digital immigrant, but I’ve come to the conclusion it’s not that. It’s just my brain. I just don’t get the obvious. Lucky I’m persistent and people around me are patient.

 
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