The Begining of a New Plan

Photo courtesy of jscreationzs at freedigitalphotos.net

Not surprisingly, it seems that every website, tweet and blog I look at currently has a Top Ten list and/ or resolution. It's a New Year so I suppose that 1.1.11 is as good a time as any to make changes. I don't like to be dictated by the calendar and I'd prefer to think that I could set goals at any point of the year. However, since I have been off school for the past 2 weeks, I have had a lot of time to think and explore edublogs as well as get caught up with tweets. That always gives me a lot of new ideas and makes me want to spend some time learning about things I might be able to apply in the classroom. That, in turn, leads to the making of lists of things I want to do. Maybe I should call them resolutions but I know that there are too many things on my list to really adhere to them all. How should I decide which to focus on?

Photo courtesy of nuttakit at freedigitalphotos.net

Some are health-related - eating better and exercising more are probably the most important of anything else on my list but also the least fun (apologies to my sister who runs a gym!)
Some are work-related - blogging here, cleaning up my email inbox, planning what to do at school, etc.
Some are just for fun - how about one of those 365 photos projects or watching TIFF's 100 Essential Films?

The problem is that they all require daily attention. Can I really add 8 tasks that currently occur only sporadically to every day all year long? Probably not. But, as I am constantly told, I always want everything and don't want to decide on just one of them. So, I think that this afternoon's project will be to sort how if/ how I can do as many of the things that I want to do in 2011. As an IB-PYP educator, I am always explaining to others that the key is to combine as many things together as can naturally fit together without forcing them. Maybe that's the solution and I should take my own advice. I could take daily photos that include my exercising and food intake!

Time to plan...

The Best Laid Plans...

 New Job, New Blog?
I thought that with the start of a new job last September that I would also start to blog. Well, it was a good plan... I should give Dale Shareski some credit for getting me going again. I watched his video about sharing yesterday and was easily convinced about the possible benefits of blogging. I immediately wanted to re-start my blog and started to record some notes about what I would like to include in this blog. A few hours later, while pouring over edu-blogs, I learned about ds106 (Jim Groom's open online digital storytelling course) and really want to take part! Since this requires that I have a blog to post to, it's a perfect kick-start! Thanks to those of you who already blog for getting me to begin (again).

photo courtesy of Salvatore Vuono (freedigitalphotos.net)

Loving PE!
In the past 3 months I have become accustomed to my role as an ICT and PE teacher. I have to admit I have enjoyed teaching PE much more than I anticipated! I always thought that it would be fine but it has been great to see the students in such a different light. We are lucky enough to have 60min of PE every day so I feel like I get a chance to really get know the students. However, I do miss the constant connection with a small group of students and, though I hate to admit, it really is much easier than the role of classroom teacher. Or maybe it just feels that way because I work with such a collaborative group of colleagues and really love the two subjects I focus on.

Tech Continues to Be Fascinating
The students are always keen and have done a myriad of things from simply reading or practicing math skills online to creating comics that illustrate digestion, movies that describe Canada and presentations that describe and illustrate modern uses for ancient artifatcts. I hope that I will eventually get organized enough to post some of their work here. In the upcoming term, I am looking forward to helping them connect with students at other schools and utilizing some web 2.0 tools.

Most interesting has been the varied responses of teachers to having someone (me) as a dedicated Information and Communication Technology Teacher. Some really want me to plan and execute a tech curriculum and don't really care what I do. Others are very involved with the planning and don't want to do anything unless it is directly related to what they are doing in class. Since I strongly agree with the latter and wish that I had the same title as my high school counterpart (Technology Integrator), it makes planning with those who have different beliefs about the role of technology and scheduled ICT classes quite a challenge. My goal is to find ways to work on this in the new year!

So, welcome (back) to my blog. Hope you enjoy what goes on here and that I "see" you again.

Lara

Looking Forward to a New School Year

As Eric Conti noted in his 2010-2011 Parent Letter and posted on Superintendent's Blog, "Nothing proves the theory of relativity more clearly to me than the brief time it takes for the summer to pass in comparison to other seasons." How true!

I have one week left before I return to school. This year I feel like I did when I was a kid returning to school. With the start of my new job as K-5 ICT Integrator (and PE teacher) I needed to buy new school clothes, I am not sure where my desk will be, I am not sure how everything is going to work out and I am certainly excited but also a little nervous.

I have spent my summer attending conferences, bookmarking sites, reading blogs and following some inspiring educators on Twitter. I have learned about numerous tools that I could use with teachers and students but I really need to wait until I meet with teachers to discuss what they are teaching and learning about in class before I can determine which tools to actually use/ introduce with them.

Welcome to my journey!