Saturday, February 25, 2012

Big Picture

In meeting with our technology committee the other day, it was great to realize that we are starting to have a true vision for where we want our school to be one, three, five, and ten years from now. We started to discuss the needs of our students and how we could best prepare them for the "real word" and how we need to create independent, confident, moral digital citizens who know how to not only use technology to solve problems but also question when technology is not the best means to an end.  I feel like we are at an exciting time at my school and it's pretty fun to be a part of it...

Monday, February 20, 2012

End in Sight...

Well, I can't believe I am writing this but I believe the end of my internship project is in sight.  Keith and I have been leading successful professional development for ePortfolio and will soon be leading sessions for the student Moodle.  While the professional development sessions and staff training will never be finished, it will be nice to close out this particular portion of my internship.  Once I have submitted it to David (hopefully this week or early next week) I can sit back and breathe for a minute.  I can't really wrap my head around the idea of being finished.  I mean, to think, that a weekend would pass and I would not have to plan professional development, work on my internship portfolio, blog about my experience, discuss development goals with my administration, or upload documents to my internship weebly sounds absolutely wrong.  But, what a relief it will be!  Looking back, this internship has been extremely rewarding!  I have enjoyed how it has changed my role at my school and allowed me to help lead my staff in professional development.  Also, it's given me more confidence to speak to my staff about emerging technologies and hopefully this internship has opened doors and paths to communication that will remain open for a long time.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Can you help me with...

One of the most interesting aspects about this internship is that little by little my staff is viewing me differently.  Because of all of the professional development sessions I have led on various technologies for my staff, they now view me as a go-to person when it comes to technology questions.  Just today a fellow teacher asked me about the remote clicker system that they had heard about in one of my sessions and I was able to show her how to set it up and how to get the kids involved.  I can't wait to hear how it went...

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Same Teaching, Different Technology....

     In talking with a colleague today, I was surprised by her definition of "embracing technology" in her classroom.  She informed me that she was doing a powerpoint presentation with the kids and how it was really so easy to incorporate technology into her classroom.  She went on to tell me that technology was exciting and that she loved powerpoint and thought it was a great way to really "get kids excited."  When I sugested that there might be better ways to "get the kids excited" she managed to simply nod her head and then change the subject.
     Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!  Really?!?  Using powerpoint to get kids excited about education.  Ummm, welcome to 1995. I'm sorry but it's attitudes like this that make it obvious to me why kids hate school.  We use technologyvin our classrooms in very weak, peripheral ways and expect the kids to congratulate us and be impressed because we used an outdated technology in our classroom.  What's worse is that many teachers who have adopted technology tools like powerpoint or LCD projectors in their classrooms have not actually changed the way they teach they just do hat they have always done with a technology overlay.  How can I use my internship to make teachers see that technology should change how we teach and how the kids learn.  It's not something to be added so we can check it off a list and say we did it.  If so, what's the point?