Do U C What I C

I spent some time this morning running errands, and had time to reflect on a skype conversation I had last night with a few online friends.  We talked about several things, but one thing stuck in my head.  I must tell you that in this company of people, I always feel welcome, but can’t believe how much they know about tech compared to me! I always leave the conversation with a new idea, or a new understanding of something.  So it shocked me last night when someone said ” I don’t have anything to teach, but I have a lot to learn.”  Now, I am not going to mention names, but let me tell you, this person has already taught me so much!  How can she think she has nothing to teach?  Is she being humble, or does she truly not see how much we all learn from her?!  

Do you think that most of us feel we know less than the others?   I still mentally say to myself before every conference deadline,  ” I am sure everyone knows this already, so I don’t know why I think I have any business presenting it.”  Then I go to the conference, and most times there are some people who want to learn about what I am doing.  I just find it funny that people who I learn from all the time have that same thought of not having anything new to teach.  In a way, I like it, because when you enter into a converation online, you may not have a clue who it is you are really talking to, but you are sharing ideas, learning from each other.  It could be someone who has been doing ed tech for years, or it could be someone who is just beginning.  Either way, I learn.  If you have been in this for a long time, chances are I would be too chicken to walk up and have a conversation with you face to face, but I will sure chat with your avatar in SL!  Even if you have just begun to explore the world of ed tech, I can learn from you!  You see things with fresh eyes, ask questions that make me re-think how I do things.  Maybe you know what you know, or maybe you don’t.  I just think that the next time you hesitate to comment on a blog, or chat on a ustream, you should remember that no matter where you are in your ed tech journey, someone can learn from you!  Step up!  Speak! Be heard!

Tanner, my son,  and I have similar personalities I think.  We are both outgoing and like to be around other people, most of the time.  Sometimes, though, he gets overwhelmed by the amount of chaos and chatter, and just disappears for awhile.  One year I remember we were opening Christmas presents, and there was alot of noise and people and stuff, and I looked around to see if he was soaking in this moment, and he was gone.  I found him in a back bedroom, hiding under a small table.  He was not sad or upset, he just needed a quiet place to escape.  There was just too much going on, and he took the time to step back and re-group.  Wise child, that son of mine.

So, why do I start a post about NECC with this story?  Well, I have had a surprising reaction to my upcoming trip to NECC, and I have been “hiding under the table” for a few weeks trying to re-group.  I am usually so excited in the weeks before a big conference.  I have been looking forward to meeting people face to face for the first time, hearing people present for the first time, continuing to make connections with people, learning new things that I can come back and share with my students.  I am usually driving people crazy by now because all I can talk about is my trip to (insert event here).    I don’t know why it is not that way for me right now. 

I am, perhaps, overwhelmed by the sheer amount of information and choices that are available.  I want to get online and finalize my schedule, but there are too many things that I want to see, and they all happen at the same time.  Then you factor in the unplugged events, leave a bit of time for bloggers cafe, and next thing you know I am headed back under the table again!  I have appreciated reading others thoughts about how to “do” NECC.  I have resisted signing up for some things like the twitter dinner, simply because I don’t want to schedule my entire time and feel obligated to be somewhere.  I almost feel like I have skipped a step in my evolution as a learner.  I wish I was going into NECC a bit less connected.  I wish I wasn’t aware of all of these events that I so want to attend.  I feel like perhaps I would enjoy NECC more if I knew less at this point.  I just want to wander around, soak it all in, and not wonder about who is at bloggers cafe, or what dinner I am missing.  Is that wrong?  I am sure by the time NECC rolls around, I will have this all settled in my own mind, and be totally excited and ready for whatever NECC has to offer- so look for me, say hello..but… if you can’t find me, start looking under the tables:)

I love to read about how people interpret and use tools.  This one from Jakes was another big conversation.  I commented early, not really getting into the defense or torching of twitter itself- I guess it hit me in a different way because I had just watched the debate.  So when I went back to it to read the flow of comments,  I had a different reaction.  I do enjoy reading what people have to say about things like twitter, but I don’t like the idea that people think they know why I personally use twitter.  I don’t like assumptions like I am announcing my posts because I want to be somebody in the world of twitter.  I don’t like feeling guilty when I reach out on my twitter network to ask a question, or send out an invitation to join a project that my class is doing.  Isn’t that what it’s for?  I want to learn from others, I like knowing that I have an army of experts on a variety of topics just waiting to be bothered with a question by me:)  Could I go find the answer myself?  Sure I could, and I often do that.  I know that as a learner it will benefit me to figure it out myself, but sometimes I just get plain stuck, and I need help.  I also realize that if I can get a quick answer on twitter to a problem that would take me an hour to figure out, then isn’t my time worth the quick twit?  I think for me personally, it’s silly NOT to use twitter!  Why wouldn’t I want to ask KarenJan an assistive tech. question about a student?  Why wouldn’t I want to ask ColleenK to help me solve a problem when creating a new math tech project for my kids?  Why wouldn’t I share what I know about differentiation if people ask?  Again, isn’t that what it’s all about?  If not for twitter and SL, how would I have ever found these people?  How would I find classrooms to connect with all over the world?  Why should I feel bad about using Twitter to benefit my kids, my classroom, and myself?  Truth be told, I don’t feel bad.  I will continue to participate, ask questions, announce posts, and squeeze all the use out of twitter that I possibly can.  I am certian the benefits will outweigh the consequences.

A few days ago, I had the pleasure of hosting about 20 college students in my classroom.  They are completing an introductory course in technology and education at the local college, and the instructor wanted them to see what it really looks like in the classroom.  I was excited to have them come in, and knew that my students would be ready to show them all of the great things about our eMINTS classroom.  I didn’t really change our plan for the day, I just decided to let them get a little taste of reality.  I didn’t mean to scare the pants off them, but I think I did.  I forget how chaotic and overwhelming my room can be to an observer, because my kids and I are just used to it by this time of year.  Let me paint a picture for you…

24 students, 20 college kids, 13 pc’s on tables, all in one classroom- that in itself was a victory.  I had the list of tasks and projects on the board, the kids know that they can pick and choose what to work on, but eventually everything has to get done.  Some are scanning doodle4google pictures into a folder on my laptop so we can make them into a voicethread next week.  Some are adding to the never ending story wiki that our class started this week.  Some are using Inspiration to create a circle story outline.  I am attempting to conference with a student before he prints and publishes his book for the end of year writers exhibit.  Some are commenting on our spiderwick voicethread.  The rest are reading, blogging, journaling, working on a math review page.  The room is louder than usual as my students explain what they are doing, and answer questions.  I stand at the front and field questions about my website, lesson planning, our online curriculum.  Then the hour is over and they file out of the room with their heads spinning.

My students breathe a sigh of relief, and get back to what it is they need to do.  I flop into my chair and immediately start analyzing the whole event.  I wonder what they thought?  Did they think I was crazy?  Did they get what was going on?  Should I have toned it down? Revved it up?  What good did that do them?  What will they take away from this day?  What can I do?

I have talked many times about shaking up the world of pre-service teachers, and this just made me realize that I need to get with it.  Those students need more than two hours of mass submersion in a tech classroom!  They need to eat, drink, and sleep it for months!  They need to understand how it changes the lives of those kids!  They need to see what I see every day!  They need a little bit more reality if things are ever going to look different in the classrooms of the future, and I need a plan…to take over the world of pre-service education:)  Maybe Dembo will help me!

Quite a few months ago, Riptide/Fred and I were having a conversation in a ustream chat window and he said…”if your kids are doing wiki projects, how come I don’t know about it!?”  We chatted about setting up some sort of writing project at some point, and I put it on the back burner but never forgot about the idea.  So now it’s time to DO IT!! 

It’s a quick, fun, end of the year project that could turn out pretty cool I think.  If you wish to participate, just email me your username, and I’ll add you to the space.  I created one username for my class to use just to make it easier.  If you have done wiki with students, you know that only one person can edit at a time.  I would set it up as a center or something if I only had a few computers.  I happen to have more than that, so I created a hallowed wiki cup (just a cup;)) and that is the person who may edit.  When they finish editing, they pass the cup to another. 

Hope you will all participate, and I look forward to seeing how it turns out.  I hope to have something cool to share at our NECC poster session:)

Here’s the link-  www.neverendingstory08.wikispaces.com

Next week we finish our round of state-mandated testing.  We have been on the review and test track since Spring Break…..well, really since the first day of school.  Everything feeds into how they will do on this test, whether I want it to or not.  Sure, we have done some great inquiry lessons, my kids have become real thinkers and questioners, and for the most part I feel like how they see themselves as learners has changed.  But always in the back of my mind looms the question- is this important enough to be taking up time? Well, that tunnel vision is about to come to an end, when the final test booklet is in the box, and we have reached the light at the end of the tunnel…finally!  I am giddy with the thought of what is to come!

Now, most teachers at this time of year are just counting down the days, wondering how to keep the kids busy for another 6 weeks when all they want to do is be outside.  Meanwhile, my kids are ramping up, because they know that this last 6 weeks belongs to them…their ideas…their projects….their imaginations!! They are READY!  The little seeds of creativity have been sown all year, and now all of the time can be devoted to growing.  While a great number of teachers will be struggling to engage, here’s an idea of what we’ll be doing:

A student of mine decided to write an advice column in his journal, and ask other kids to submit questions for him to answer.  The class thought it would be cool if he could really have his advice column in a newspaper- chaos ensued, and out came the class newspaper project.  We’ll be diving into that next week.

My students have a huge interest in widgets, and spend a great deal of their choice time creating them.  They started with the standard iknowthat.com kind, then graduated to their own designs on phun physics.  Now they want to make them in real life, full scale.  They want to turn my classroom into a giant widget- we’ll be planning for that as well.

Each student will be choosing an independent project to complete,  we’ll finish and publish our stories for the writers celebration, and probably mess with an idea for a never ending story on wikispaces.

Will we ”finish” all of this in 6 weeks?  Do I care?  The best thing about this part of the year is that we all get to soak up the excitement and knowledge of learning, and it’s really more about the process than the product.  I love to sit back and watch …it’s a chance to really appreciate how far they have come, and how much they can now do without me.  They don’t need me to lead their small group planning session because they have learned how to work together.  They don’t need me to troubleshoot their tech issues because there is most likely some 9 year old in the room who can figure it out faster than I can, and they know that.  Camera experts, scanner masters, fairly decent collaborators….yep, I’ll just sit back and smile, and hope that they are loving it as much as I am.  I wish the whole year could be more like this, and I am really working on that, but for right now……WOO HOOO!!!  I see the end of the tunnel!! 

I was surfing my reader tonight, and fell upon this post by Cool Cat.  My comment seemed more like a post once I got finished, so I put it here:

This is always such a hot topic when it comes up on blogs, or in SL, or twitter.  I have a couple theories on why this always seems to hit a nerve.  First, I think that it’s human nature to want to be accepted and connect to others, especially when it is with people who potentially have so much in common that matters to us.  We are not the kind of educators that teach because of the phenomenal pay or the never-ending recognition.  We are the kind of teachers that want to change things, impact the future of education, create the greatest environment for our students!  I want to know you, talk to you, suck every bit of genius that I can out of you!  I feel the same passion for education as you, so of course I want to connect with you.

Second, I think it is especially sensitive because this is perhaps the only group of people we truly feel connected to when it comes to how we think and feel about our profession.  I don’t know about anyone else out there in the tech teaching world, but it’s lonely outside the box…I don’t have much of a sounding board at my own school, just a couple really, so this is where I come to feel  NOT like a freak:)  Of course I want to be invited to the blogger party!  Of course I want to feel connected and valued in this community.  It’s nice to see that I am not the only person who has an unhealthy attachment to twitter, or can’t seem to get their hair to look right in SL.  I mean, if people still talk to you after you turn yourself in to a box on the virtual dance floor how can you not feel some acceptance there!

After kicking it around for a year now, I realize that it is really more of a spectrum of acceptance than a closed circle.  I sometimes pop into a ustream and feel like it is 100 miles over my head, so I sit on the edge and absorb.  Sometimes though, I pop in and realize that I actually know enough to contribute, and usually the contributions are welcome, and I realize that there are others sitting on the edge listening and absorbing from me.  I have felt the occasional “who are you, and why are you talking to me” vibe, but I have learned that for the most part, we are all just trying to soak it up and learn from each other.  I don’t think you can take anything here in this world of virtual connections too seriously, or you’ll lose sight of the real reason we are all out here doing this. That’s just my take on this never ending hot topic….read it..or delete it:)  After 16 years outside the box, my skin is pretty thick- 

Thanks to Cool Cat for the inspiration it took to get me posting again:)

It’s Monday morning, almost 10am, and I am still in my pj’s drinking coffee and reading blogs….must be spring break!  I take a lot of grief from people about being a teacher around this time of year, because of course our job is so easy, and we have so much time off.  I don’t know how many times I have smiled my way through a conversation about someone wanting to become a teacher so they can have their summers off.  I have given up defending myself because the only people who really understand what the word “break” means to a teacher…..is another teacher!   Sure, I’ll sleep in as much as my 8 year old will allow.  I’ll fight tooth and nail to stay in my pj’s as much as possible.  I’ll read, and blog, and do all of those other things I consider to be relaxing and rejuvinating, and I’ll love it.  But already, the mental list is forming in my head….it’s seeping into my consciousness as I type.  I will probably manage to ignore it for another hour, and then it will take over….THE LIST.  I will start making lists…lists of things I need to do at home, with my son, for school.  Errands I have put off until I have a weekday off to do them.  Dentist appointments, haircuts, new shoes, spring projects, updating my website, finishing a smartboard project, cleaning out my emails, new tires on the van, etc.  Somewhere in there I will manage to keep my son engaged with reading, board games, some basketball in the driveway, and perhaps batting practice.  I will cook for my husband, which is a rare event.  Then, if I play my cards right, we’ll be on the road for a quick 8 hour trip to Nebraska to visit my family for the holiday weekend.   Then on the long drive home, I’ll go over THE LIST in my head, and wonder why I only managed to get 1/2 of the things done.  I’ll make a mental note to start my new list when I get home……my summer list.  Happy Spring Break teachers, and here’s hoping you don’t teach for the summers:)

I am evaluating myself on a different level today, and it’s not like I haven’t done this before.  Sometimes I laugh at myself because my classroom is such organized chaos- it’s “plandom” as my principal likes to call it.  I really am quite anal when it comes to how I like things to go, particular about odd things….. like how clean the top of my desk is before I leave every day, even though my drawers are a mess.  Militant about the way my day begins with attendance and the pledge- yet my classroom can take a 180 right in the middle of the day, and I don’t bat an eyelash!  So I guess I am flexibly rigid….or something like that…ANYWAY….I try to tell myself that the little things don’t matter, and then something like THIS happens!! 

Our school is in the middle of a big shuffle-long story- everyone is in some manner going to be uprooted next year.  I was ok with the changes for the most part, though my tech buddy next door is no longer going to be next door. I was ok with having to build a new team within our new hallway.  I was ok with shuffling committees, changes in master schedule, extra duties that might need to happen, losing my lunch with friends.  I’m flexible, everyone is dealing with change…it’s just the way it has to be. 

Then, I get this email from our tech department that is like a slap of reality for me.  I knew I might have to move to a new room, but it just hit me….what about my STUFF!!  Now, I know it’s not about the STUFF when it comes to tech teaching, but I have spent the last few years creating the perfect classroom.  I got my room set up the way I like it, I got new tables last year that I love, I have my teacher workstation in a usable place next to my smartboard.  I have trained my students to treat all my stuff with extreme care and love…no stray marks on mouse pads or stickers on the pc’s here!  I finally feel like I have this great environment for learning and it took me all this time to get it just right…and now I am moving??!!  ARGHH!!  I am as flexible as the next person… I think, and it’s not about packing, or not getting someone elses stuff in another classroom, but …..well….I don’t want someone elses stuff, I want mine!  I want my perfect room, my beautiful tables, my pristine mousepads.  Don’t make me start over in a room full of crap!  I am panicking!  Seriously, if it’s about being fair and making everyone pack and move, then I will pack up my whole room, carry it around the building TWICE, and then put it back in my room- how’s that for fair?  Why can’t I be flexible about this, when I can allow my whole days lesson plan to come to a complete halt when a better idea rolls out of the mouth of a student?  How can I get past this panic attack…..why can’t I just keep my own STUFF?!!  How Flexible Am I….Really? 

I am thinking of stirring up some trouble.  I don’t know if I will really do it, but I am thinking about it.  I have some issues with the amount of time we are expected to spend reviewing for the MAP test.  I have been prepping them for the MAP since August.  I know what they need to know, I know how they need to say it, I know how it will be scored.  I teach with that in the back of my head every day….and now I don’t want to be told that I have to drop all of my projects and routines and cram random facts down the throats of my students.  If they don’t have what they need to do well on the test by now, they won’t have any more of it after 3 weeks of cramming.  I know that I need to go over a few things so that it’s fresh in their minds.  I know that we are currently judged by these test scores.  I know that I may be called to the table if my kids don’t perform.  But I am not sure I care…..I mean, I care about my students doing their best on the test, but that’s as far as I can go with it.  So I think I’ll just keep going….teaching, facilitating, differentiating.  This time of year is always hard for me, but I think a couple things are causing me to take a stand this year.  One:  I have become more aware of the bigger picture this year, via my social network.  I could just sit back and swallow my beliefs as I always do and conform to the usual drill, but it seems more like a sell out now because of what I know, and the conversations I have had.  I feel like I need to make a little fuss in my own little corner of the world, for the greater good, you know?  Two:  I scored the MAP last summer, and it was the most enlightening look into the belly of the beast that I have ever had.  I think it has made me realize how random and unrepresentative the scores actually are- it made me mad really, as a teacher of children.  I think these two things have pushed me over the proverbial edge when it comes to high stakes testing.  The question is, will I cook my own goose?  We’ll see….here comes trouble:)