When I am enthusiastic about something, I like to share with others, and I was able to share so many resources and experiences from last year in my placements and when I returned to being an E.A. for the last time for May and June of last year. I found that the teachers that have been teaching for a few short years are already feeling like they are a distance away from the cutting edge of Internet resources and advancement. We are at an advantage in taking this course and curating our information that we have gathered in order to be able to share it with our future colleagues. I am pleased that I took time over the Christmas Break to add to the spreadsheet that I had started in last year's class as well as create a Symbaloo for videos that I like for professional development and for classroom use.
Looking outward now, I want to say that there is much to learn from the connections that are made on our behalf, as good mentors do. A great example of this is when Tyler Letkeman and Kristen Thompson were invited into our classroom space. These two teachers leave us with the impression that integrating tech and the internet in our classes is rewarding and worthwhile.
I loved how Kristen's message for us was broken down into three parts. Curation/organization, Communication/connection, and assessment. What I will take away best I will be that it is okay to add technology to our classrooms in stages. It can be easy to become overwhelmed by someone who has an enthusiasm for tech and implements everything and they have so much going on. Tech integration needs to work for the person using it. If for example, one thing such as weekly emails sent to parents is working and you are getting positive feedback from parents then you are ready to expand into something more. Keep things realistic for yourself with the expectation of succeeding, then just as importantly, keep setting new goals! By the same token, if you are trying a classroom website and updates on Twitter and struggling to keep up or the feedback isn't what you thought it would be then it is okay to drop it. Maybe the timing will work better another semester or another year.
It was my third time attending one of Tyler Letkeman's talks and look forward to others in the future. He has shared specific ways in which he integrates technology into his classes. I adapted one of his ideas already in my French class last term - #bestwordchallenge with my grade nine class. I felt it was a successful challenge for the students to explore French vocabulary for describing a scene. I have also taken close notes on how Tyler makes Shakespeare in the classroom relevant by integrating Quizlet and turning "I can't believe you studied" to "I can't believe you didn't work on this" when learning the modern synonyms to Shakespearean language. My grade 10 ELA class coming up will hopefully prove this strategy works.
And so, I am at the beginning of a new journey with #I4Ed ...
Is it risky to admit I am not much of a Star Wars fan? As I explored the resources from the course website, I came across an article by Nathan Jurgensen about Augmented Reality. I think Cyborgology will be an interesting source of material to share with students to open up great discussions. @cyborgology
I really like your point on introducing to technology to our classroom in stages. It was something I never really thought of, but something I believe is super important. By introducing it in stages it allows the students to ease into, as well as gives us time to deal with the any kinks that need to be worked out. By throwing everyone in at once it could cause the students as well as us to drown in all of these new tools.
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