My name is The Weak Geek and I no habla Geekese! I just read the first paragraph of “a day in the life of web 2.0,” and I’m working on accepting this new language as a challenge and not giving up or giving in to frustration. I was excited to read about the teacher, Ms. S, because what she is doing for her students is what I dream of doing with my 3-6 grade literacy class for MISD teachers; she’s created a blog with all the pertinent course information that also serves as a forum for discussion.
For the last few years I have been using the old school method of having teachers journal, turn them in to me (or really high tech, they could email them to me), and I responded to each individual teacher. That way we had just a two-person conversation. With the blog, everyone can read the thoughts and questions of the rest of the class and increase the learning by working as a community to process the information.
Other aspects I love about Ms. S’s blog is that students have an authentic purpose for writing and know that others besides a teacher will be reading what they have to say. That creates tremendous buy-in for the activity. It is such a natural way to stimulate higher order and critical thinking.
Back to that language problem! I'm not sure I'm dreaming of creating a blog or a wiki? I’ve had minor introductions to wikis, RSS, Twitter, etc. Just enough to say I have heard the terms. We always talk to kids about the various ways you can know a word. I’m at that bottom rung. I can pronounce them and have heard them. Some I know a little about, but I certainly hesitate to use them in conversation at this point because my understanding of them is minuscule. I think that will be changing rapidly!
As I continued to read this article, I had a sensation of reading the science fiction genre. But I know it’s real (somewhere)! I want to make it part of MISD! So come on! Teach this old dog some new tricks. Can you imagine opening up what we do in our classrooms to parents and other teachers the way that was revealed in the article. How fabulous!
LOL! I can already tell your posts are going to be quite entertaining. You are so going to love all the new "toys" you will be able to utilize for the Literacy Class participants.
ReplyDeleteLove your writing style! By the way, as I've looked over most of the other participants' blogs, it has helped me to gain confidence. When I started this course, I figured I would be the only one who wasn't already familiar and comfortable with all this new-fangled technology. I have learned by reading these blogs that there are people at all levels of competence trying to complete this course. Whenever I am unsure about something, I do two things...I first find a blogger on here that has already completed that "thing" and see what they say about it. Then, I enlist the help of one of my teenagers. If you can beg, borrow or steal a teenager to help you, I highly recommend it. They are all familiar with everything we are doing here. Good luck and don't quit! I enjoyed reading your posts.
ReplyDeleteOh, weakgeek - you're not as weak as you think you are. You are already "getting it" and seeing applications for these tools which is what we want! Keep up the good work!
ReplyDeleteI would guess that you and I are on about the same rung of the ladder. I have heard of all these things; I even have a Facebook page and love it. But I think we have definitely reached the place where new things are popping up faster than we can learn them and keep up. (or maybe that's just age speaking!) :-)
ReplyDeleteGood luck to us all!
I love the idea you had for your literacy class. Have you started that blog yet?
ReplyDeleteI wish I could be in your literacy class without having to change grade levels! I think, in general, we teachers make our jobs a lot more difficult than they have to be when we don't keep up with cool new developments in technology -- the resources are boundless. And we can become the groundbreakers when we use what we already know with something new that we learn (e.g. technology). I'm all for saving time and engaging learners at the same time!
ReplyDeleteThe title of your blog is what this course is all about! I am sure that we might have a few people taking this course that already know how to do some of this stuff. Personally, I had the hardest time just getting started and not feeling dumb for not understanding everything clearly. As teachers, I think that we all tend to forget that we feel like our students when they don't get things quite so easily. So like your title, we are all transforming. I tend to have to remind myself that taking this class is something that will benefit me and that I will not always "get what I am supposed to do." That is what life is all about. I look forward to reading your blog as we both "transform."
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