Finding Technology’s Place in the Curriculum

I have enjoyed this exercise more than any other.  I am a visual learner and many of the tools for sharing and manipulating pictures were new to me.  I am having great fun exploring and will add this set of Things to the offering for our summer staff development classes for teachers.  The entire Learning Web 2.0 class is a great learning experience.  Thanks!

The out of doors remains one of my favorite places and I often try to capture images of bark, ferns and other small, interesting things in nature that are often overlooked.

CC is a great idea and resource.  As a teacher it gives you access to all types of materials and other information and also provides a teaching opportunity to discuss intellectual property with students and the reasons for doing the right thing.

I’d like to bring everyone’s attention to the organization called the Atlanta Area Technology Educators. (AATE)  For over twenty five years educators interested in technology meet to look at news trends in technology, share ideas, offer support and review products.  Currently we are meeting four times during the school year.  All interested persons are welcome.  Check out our wiki web at http://aategroup.wikispaces.com/.  

I was introduced to RSS and Google Reader about two years ago and have found it to be a simple thing that makes a big difference in my day. When I open my email in the morning I also open Reader so I have it in the background. Many of the sites that I subscribe to are what you would expect of a technology school person. Also living in the South getting weather updates is also helpful. As a former science teacher and someone who is interested in the environment I subscribe to the the Louisiana Sea Grant site http://www.laseagrant.org/that is the educational arm of the University of Louisiana. It conducts research and educational projects on topics such as ecosystem restoration, flood protection, and sustainable foods from the sea.

In one of our high school current events classes each student has an RSS feed will some news sites common to all and others by choice. It makes for interesting discussions.

I have been a bigger fan of wikis than of blogs. My experience has been blogs are wordy and nuggets are harder to find. However I have been thinking about a blog as a way to harness students’ interest in social networking. Teachers report that using blogs to encourage peer review for writing results in students writing more and better papers. How about using blogs to record observations in the science lab so that information becomes available to all students as their compare results and draw conclusions? Or how about using blogs for students in your class to report and reflect on current events? Or better yet having your students confer with students from other schools or countries about current events?

I am finding all of the Web 2.0 tools exciting and even thought I have been using many of them for sometime I am learning more. Even more exciting is talking with my teachers and having fun exploring teaching strategies. I am especially enjoying reading the thoughts of teachers from other schools.  The problem of course is time! The darn day-to-day stuff keeps getting in the way.

To anyone who is reading my blog: Welcome! I been using Web 2.0 tools for sometime but am finding the K12 Learning Web 2.0 class really fun. I especially like how the lessons are open-ended and exploratory. I have found that peer learning, review and sharing is one of the most effective ways to learn. For all of us sharing ideas, sharing a new skill and helping each other problem solve is great fun.   One of the things that interest me most is having adults put into the position of learner.  This is especially true of teachers and involves how they see themselves in the classroom and the behavior that they model for students. Because of my responsibilities, I am always looking for ways that teachers can be learners while feeling supported and how they can stretch their comfort level without being overly stressed.  I think the place is to start is with myself.