Streaming da vids

OK, I admit it. I've gotten a little off track on this blog.

I think I went a little crazy with the looking around the internet, the trying to express stuff through which I was wondering out loud how to get stuff done.

Ya know, I am only hooman.

In any case, here is a streaming video, one version of which started my off on my road to where I am now. I follow Karl Fisch's blog these days, and he's the one that put together the now famous "Did You Know" presentation:





I mean, it's good. This particular version has not quite got the same feel as the one which I was presented first, three years ago. But it was something that set ideas in my head. Teaching is running the risk of losing a whole number of students if we do not get on board. Older teachers, me included, have to keep sharpening skills in order to keep the learning going forward.

I know what Marva Collins would say; I know what my dad (a man with a similar length of time spent in a classroom) would say: technology will never replace a teacher, or motivated students.

But, what about the ones I need to suck into learning, as unwilling as they are? What if I have to get them to learn Shakespeare through blogging about it? Or tweeting about it?

Hmmm?

Interwebs, again?

Well, I have been suffering a good deal from "double Burnout" - that feeling after getting through a tough part of the year, wherein a lot of you free time is sucked out of you by, well, working.

And now, I am working on my annual learning plan. That is, I made a concerted effort to find ways to integrate technology into my classroom. And I found something "new" ... at least, new to me.

In a word, "Wordpress".

One of my buddies swears by it. I'd like to sit with him, but he's in Vancouver. And he runs his own "bid'ness", and really can't spare the time to sit with me. (as an aside here, I will be sitting with the Ontario Blues tech support dude learning how to use "Dartfish" the first week of June. That should be cool, man. Fo' sho.

But back to the "Wordpress camp" in Ohio this June. Seriously. That would be above and beyond the call of this e-ducation thing, right?

Right?

That it is for people trying to make money off of their blogs and writing for the interwebs is not the point. That I could take students to the "next level" (I HATE that cliche) and get them the skills they need to thrive in an electronic/digital environment is the point. Schools are here to provide help with that.

Right?

the Interwebs is at it again

So ... I'm a reader. I like to read, well, just about anything. I like to consider myself a fairly intelligent person, and I worry about a lot of stuff.

Especially what goes on online. In the most recent version of Canadian Teacher, it has an article about Managing Teacher/Student relationships Online. It's a good read. Take the time to download it, perhaps even print it off and share with your staff. One of the suggestions was Edmodo and another was Hotchalk.

I dunno, they both look pretty good. I set up a blog for my current class; last week my students set up their own blogs while on school property; most are just confused at what they will be doing with it, but others are merely frightened. I seem to be a mad scientist to them, as I am able to type semi-quickly on a "real" keyboard and do all the "gammar things" and "editing stuff" at the same time. (I was teaching "how to write an essay" on a smart board the other day ... I love my MacBook.)

To make a long post short, I'm wondering about summer school - about how much more "resonance" I can generate if I decide to use one of these online tools. By extension, how much more effeicent could I be in my real school if I have my students able to intereact with me both in real life and after hours?

What does that mean to me as a person? Do I ever get to not be a teacher? Will I set the precedent and make my fellow teacher, some of whom are not nearly as technically literate as I, do something against their better judgement and try and join me online, without knowing excatly what they should be donig?

For that matter, what should I be doing?

And what about malicious people? How afraid should I be of a student who has just failed my class (or test) and dcides to try and ruin my (digital) reputation? Would my life, filled with mortgage payments, car payments, day care payments and so on, be put at risk so that I can try to teach better?

Would people (the media?) be ready to forgive a teacher whose account was hacked into, but cannot prove it, other than to rely on a reputation ... which is basically information that might be also maliciously messed with? Would my School Board?

I am trying to think through this myself - certainly the article from Canadian Teacher is a good place to start in order to learn how to protect myself. I am thinking about Edmodo and HotChalk this week. But I'm not sure how it is all going to work out.

Please remember.... there is no delete button on the Internet.

What was I thinking?

Uugh.

Started my Spec Ed III online this morning. Goes until Aug 13.

What was I thinking?

I'm up too early today - and it's 8:30 already.

Man, it's like I want to start using technology to further my career or something. Take advantage of what it is that I have in my hands and make stuff happen for myself. Something about taking charge of my life ... yadda, yadda, yadda.

Hmmm .... I need some inspiration.

Oooh, the interwebs are giving me ideas

Ok, I have been doing an awful lot of other stuff: finishing my double, setting up a clinic for rugby in Burlington, recovering from two huge blisters and generally turing myself back from a mumbling idiot to a good reader again.

I found out today I've got a dozen books waiting for me at the library. I'm currently ripping a copy of Food Inc, as I have to return it today.

On top of that, I run into this: A page for teachers who want to volunteer overseas. I could even caoch rugby. That'd be awesome.

Hmmmmmm.

The next step

Ok, I have not been the best blogger for this particular blog.

I have, however, been blogging elsewhere.

and I am going to make my class use blogs to further their own learning in the next six weeks course I teach.

I've also been reading online about how else to use blogs, why to use them and to make them a part of my Pro Dev.

How will I make it a part of their mark?

It will be integrated into what it is that we do in the classroom. Class Portal is also something I am finding useful. But Blogger.com being free and easy to use is what I want to continue to learn by and with.

Why?

Well, one of the first "Short Pieces" in my Short Story Unit will be "How to make money with a blog". Heck, I might even make it a web quest.

In any case, at a staff meeting, I let my fellow staff members know about the results from my Health for Life course blogging results. It worked well, but using blogs was more of a survival technique than anything else.

I mean I had to come up with a way to teach students healthy choices about physical education while in a computer lab. What else are we going to do?

Here is a few of the links to go and see for yourself:

Student One
Student Two
Student Three

and someone who was less than finished when the course ended.

As you can read, there was some really good work being done. I was impressed. So much so that I want to continue to use blogging in my classroom. There is always the question of facilities and whether or not it was a useful learning tool. But, I think, on the whole, blogging is a good way to learn literacy, technology and perhaps take on a career.

Or it could be just about keeping my students off of facebook. ;)

The future : facebook, dope and Ferris Bueller

Well, are we there yet?

I have to ask. As I may have posted already, I taught the story "The Fun they Had", by Issac Assimov, in the last few weeks. I'm wondering if we are there yet.

In a rather unique twist on the story, a prof is now outsourcing the marking of his papers to a company he runs in India. Now, it seems, not only are your Pizza orders taken in India, so are your technical support questions and marking your papers.

On the whole, this to me seems rather foolish. Why get others to mark the papers you should be marking? Why do that? Laziness is too easy an answer. Perhaps time demands. Perhaps an aversion to the bone crushing repetitiveness of all that marking. (I mean how many times CAN you circle simple spelling errors before lunacy begins?)

What's worse is the "gasp" students on Facebook during university lectures. How is that worse? Well, try paying for the honour of sitting in that lecture hall, then tell me facebook is worth it. Honest to God, who the heck does that? Why spend the money to get into University, to take the time to go to class and then not pay attention?

Now try teaching a Phys Ed class in a computer lab with the idea that I am a Kinkos and a free Internet Service Provider. Judging by what I am seeing, that is some students' perception of my school. (Who needs five print offs of one newspaper article? Who needs twenty copies of their own resume?)

Whatever.

I was speaking to several fellow teachers about their student-teachers in the past few weeks. (I've never had one, not sure if I'd like one, as you'll read in a second) Seems this student-teacher in a grade one class was on her last day. Had pencils to give out to the students and then asked the supervising teacher if she should leave them dull or sharpen them.

As I was being told this, I wondered out loud "Who the hell cares?"

Which was exactly what the supervising teacher let out, too. A little snarky perhaps, but that is what is happening in the future world of teachers.

Someone else I know had to repeatedly speak to the student teacher to go and meet the students, go and talk to them. Find out their names, things like that. Things that I try and do one the first few days of class. On the last day of a five week placement, being quizzed about children's names, got three correct.

Why? Why do that? Why make all the effort to get into a classroom and then do nothing but waste that opportunity on facebook, being unprepared or not having the decency to think for yourself and take the lead?

I think I am preaching to the converted here, but man I'm seeing more and more slacktivism, morons preaching marijuana and just plain Ferris Buellers in the classrooms.

And I don't think it's harmless.