Oh the Diigo we Go!!

In my opinion,  social bookmarking is an easy collaborative tool that can assist teachers and students in searching the web for information.  I discovered Diigo in May of this year and created an account.  To my surprise it was one of the tools that we were going to learn about during my Emerging Technology course!  I have enjoyed working in Diigo, looking at my networks, and researching content in the Diigo groups so much that I have created a podcast for this tool.  I am going to introduce it to my staff this coming year and feel this podcast could be helpful for them to begin collaborating with colleagues!

Enjoy the podcast about Diigo!!

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Change...Why?

I find it interesting that as teachers we fixate to routines just as our students may during the school year.  I know I always thought I was flexible and willing to try new things, but found it not to be as true as I believed.   As I have been learning about web 2.0 technologies and all the collaboration that it will bring makes me wince as I like to plan things on my own to complete tasks appropriately.  The idea of joining and creating personal learning networks can be intimidating as I think it is up to the community of teachers to make the PLN successful.

So we know change is hard and time consuming, but I say go for it!  If we continue to move down a path that is not updates, we are moving forward with no chance of development a stronger more improved system of learning for students.  Teachers need to get out there and join all kinds of communities to develop their own skills.  Teachers need to take chances to change so they can learn new ways to develop their skills in all areas of their instruction. 

We can all try new strategies but it would be helpful to set two or three long term goals with a few more short term  goals that will help you reach the long term.  With these goals in mind they will be to focus on a few technologies instead of all of them at once!  That could just make your head spin!

As we are approaching the 2011-2012 school year, my long term goals are as follows:
  1.  Develop a communication system for PLC groups at PAVCS
  2.  Develop a school wide use of Diigo
  3.  Create optional trainings on Web 2.0 technologies for teachers--self guided with some instruction from me
  4.  New Hire Wiki

I believe these goals are obtainable so now I need to set up timelines to ensure that I am changing and happening my staff to change too!

Again, change is hard but we all have to do it at some point in our teaching careers! 

Even in Traffic

Yesterday I traveled to Myrtle Beach South Carolina with my husband and three children.  It was not a pleasant ride as we left at 7:00AM and arrived in SC at 6:30!  It does not normally take us 11 hours to get here, but my 2 year old son vomitted twice within four hours which made us stop and lots of TRAFFIC!   During the first hour and half wait in traffic I looked around my car and noticed something that never really made me think twice until now.  My husband was listing to a podcast from a Philadelphia morning show, my older son was watching a movie on a computer, my daughter was playing with a Leapster, my 2 year was playing a game on my other son's DS, and I was looking at FB on my phone!  We were three lanes deep in traffic and yet we still were connected to games, entertainment, and friends with the devices in our car.  Driving to MB is something we do each summer and bring most of these items, but it was seeing my 2 year son turn the DS on, play a game, and show me a picture of himself that made me realize just how technology truly influences the decisions we make on a daily basis. 

For example a question came up, "Where should we get crabs this week?" My older son says,"Lets Google it."  Where can we go fishing?  Lets Google!  What time is that place open?  You get the point!  All of the decisions we make are influenced by the technology we keep in our company so I would suggest to keep good company as it can make for an interesting daily plan:)

Web 2.0 Technologies in the Classroom

Recently I had the opportunity to attend the ISTE conference in Philadelphia which as a bit overwhelming!  There was so much pertinent information regarding technologies but most was how to implement the tools in the classroom.  I was able to attend a few sessions that had the same message which was it have a purpose for using the tool and not just use them.  We cannot forget about the pedagogy of teaching and what teachers need to do to assist students in their progression of curriculum.    There was the idea call TPACK which stands for

Technology
Pedagogy
Content
Knowledge

The philosophy is as follows, “a way of thinking about the knowledge teachers need to understand to integrate technology effectively into their classrooms (Mishra & Koehler, 2008).” Teachers who exhibit best practices with technology are “creative, flexible, and adapt ways in which they navigate the constraints, affordances, and interactions within TPACK framework. (Mishra & Koehler, 2008).”
As I begin to review my notes from the conference I am going to research this ideology of thinking as I feel we need to continue focusing on content but also engage students in a collaborative way of learning!

It is an exciting time to be an educator!!