Teacher as a Learner
This is exactly why we need to re-imagine PD. Great quote from @willrich45 #edchat "Our collective inability to... http://t.co/LF6qQby1qt"
— Chris Rogers (@chrisrogers07) August 23, 2014
As the technology coordinator and coach at my school, I have made this my number one goal this year. We are beginning with the theme "Connect - Teacher-Teacher" for September. I am challenging our staff to participate in self directed challenges through a series of linked Google Docs. Explore the directions document and look through the challenges - I hope they will help provide you with ideas for challenging yourself and your colleagues as well. We are tracking our points through Class Dojo, and collecting monthly challenge info through a Google Form. With this effort, I hope to enable and empower our teachers to embrace new pathways of learning and to make professional learning more meaningful and relevant.
Looking Forward to Learning
A Day in the Life of Web 2.0
Social media would be fully integrated in my ideal Web 2.0 school. Students would have individual accounts that both protect their privacy and enable them to contribute to the shared knowledge of the community. Currently, we have a school Twitter account, and some teacher/class accounts that post regularly with the #HarbinsES hashtag. The embedded feed of both the school account and the hashtag can be viewed publicly from our school website. This is an important step in telling our story as a school. We no longer have to rely on official district channels and news outlets to be the sole storytellers - we have the power through social media to tell our own stories. I hope that we will soon embrace Google Apps for Education for our students as well. Our teachers are currently using Google tools in the classroom and for school communication, and I'm hopeful that students will get there shortly. One book that I highly recommend about social media in education is "It's Complicated: the social lives of networked teens" by danah boyd (she uses all lowercase on purpose). You can even download a free PDF of the book at her website.
I'm looking forward to learning with each of you this semester as we explore digital tools and the potential they hold for transforming teaching and learning. Thanks in advance for your feedback on this post.