tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19520161204182802992024-03-13T10:18:23.855-05:00MyClass2.0The Tempest in the PanopticonUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-3047895384570320762015-04-27T14:07:00.001-05:002015-04-27T14:07:49.923-05:00Why I Jumped Out of a Plane<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I said this year is all about pushing past uncomfortable boundaries I have for myself. I began the year by diving into a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWsywrUlqCg" target="_blank">40 degree pool</a> (that's 5 degrees for the rest of the world) and since have tried to challenge myself to do things that I am hesitant about.<br />
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So for my 45th birthday I traveled two hours or so north to jump out of a perfectly good airplane, as my father described it. I never really had wanted to skydive, though I do like the adrenaline rush of speed. This was to prove something to myself as much as anything else.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>First: the tangibles and logistics.<br />
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My friends and I drove to Cullman to <a href="http://www.skydivealabama.com/" target="_blank">Skydive Alabama</a> for the event. I had been talking about it for a while and when my friend Scott took care of the scheduling, pricing, etc., my bluff was called and I had to go through with it.<br />
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I paid for a cameraman with two GoPros on his helmet (one for stills, one for video) to jump with us so he could flim my descent. It was an extra $90 for this footage, but who knows how often I will do this.<br />
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We split into two groups of two, and were all strapped to the chest of our tandem divers like we were in a <a href="http://www.babybjorn.com/ImageVault/publishedmedia/19o00u5ui6ffhidwpf1k/babybjorn-baby-carrier-miracle-carry-your-child-facing-outwards-from-five-months.png" target="_blank">Baby Bjorn</a>. As I sat with mylegs hanging over the side and I could feel the rush of the wind on them and I felt like backing out. But it's all about pushing past uncomfortable boundaries so from 14,000 feet, I let gravity take over.<br />
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The free fall is surreal, falling so fast from so far above ground that it seems like you aren't falling at all. The wind made the skin on my face ripple and I felt as exposed to the sun as I ever had.<br />
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After we popped the canopy at about 10,000 feet, we gently floated the rest of the way down to a soft landing in a seated position. The adrenaline flood I was experiencing is like little I have dealt with in the past. I was literally inebriated on my own flood of hormones.<br />
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So why did I do it? Why push by these uncomfortable boundaries?<br />
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When I started this boundary pushing initiative for the year, I was still in the classroom full time. I like to say when people ask me what I teach that my subject field is Social Studies, but I teach teenagers. Helping these young people succeed is part of my job. So many things in our lives we want to do, but we don't. The thing that keeps us from doing these things are internal boundaries we erect in our head.<br />
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This year has been really great for me. I have a great new job that I love. The students gave me an amazing send off. I have been recognized as one of the top 16 teachers of the year in the state and was awarded an award for Excellence in Teaching With Technology as well as Most Innovative by my department in my Ph. D. program.<br />
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A half of a decade ago, things were different. I was working hard with my classes and steadily improving the way I implemented the blended classroom model. I knew I was doing some good work that was effective.<br />
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But I was under the misconception that good work would be recognized. I am not saying that good work is always unrewarded, but if no one is aware of your good work...<br />
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Self promotion has always been an uncomfortable thing for me. I do it, but it is uncomfortable. I once heard Tom Petty say that if you have to tell people you are a rebel, you probably aren't. I had my own corollary: if you have to tell people you are awesome, you probably aren't.<br />
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But by pushing past uncomfortable boundaries and self promoting, a lot of amazing things have happened in the last few years. I wanted to model this for my kids. If you want to do something but don't, you are probably the main impediment. Granted, there are lots of forces at work that may be barriers to you, but we can get by a lot of those and do what we set our minds to do. Make it a priority and do it.<br />
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When I booked skydiving I was hoping to model that for my students. I have shared the pictures and videos with enough of them that I hope that some of them realize what they are capable of and push past their own uncomfortable boundaries.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-22699889262999793512015-03-17T15:19:00.003-05:002015-03-17T20:23:20.319-05:00Students Aren't Anecdotes, They Are PeopleI was in my first full year teaching at one of the rougher junior high schools in the city. It was the year Tupac and Biggie both got popped, and the ominous feeling that violence was right around the corner lay on the campus and community like a thick fog. I lost a handful of students that year. Some were killed, and many times death was communicated to me with a great nonchalance. Others did the killing and disappeared into the justice system. The students had seen so much violence and many expected that to be the way they went, sooner rather than later.<br />
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There was one girl I have told stories about over the years. I will refer to her as Dee. She was roughhewn, aggressive and funny in her own way. I didn't realize it at the time, but she quoted the movie <i>Friday </i>almost every time she opened her mouth. She rarely came to school, when she did she was obviously high. I know she was searched on more than one occasion, with no contraband in her possession. But her drug use was written on her heavy eyelids, and many times on the reek of smoke that permeated her. I never knew her story, why she was missing school or any details of her life. Dee was just that girl that showed up roughly a third of the time, and when she did she was stoned.<br />
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But I did have that story about Dee.<br />
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One day when Dee showed up for school, she was more stoned than usual. Shuffling down the hall, eyes half closed, she almost walked into me. I spoke, told her to move on to class. She grunted back and kept moving. Then she skipped my class an hour later. When she was disciplined for this, she remarked that she didn't think I had seen her that day. I have told this story on a few occasions to have an example of how out of it some kids are at school. This story usually gets knowing nods and bemused chuckles of familiarity.<br />
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I haven't seen Dee for almost 20 years, and then last fall I go to a new fast food restaurant in town. I don't do fast food for myself often, but my boys wanted it. As I am standing in line, I look back into the kitchen and see Dee.<br />
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It is obviously her, but to confirm I wait to see the nametag and sure enough it is her unique first name. I stood there doing the math in my head. She would have to be in her mid 30s, and I am ten years older than her. But looking across the counter she looked a decade older than I do.<br />
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What sort of life has she had the past two decades? Has it been a motley collection of dead end minimum wage jobs and scrambling to get by?<br />
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When we tell amusing stories about our students, many times it distances us from them. This was a student I failed to reach and help. Granted, I wasn't the only one and there is probably a list of institutions and people who did not help this woman pull herself up. But she isn't a semi-humorous cautionary tale.<br />
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She is a woman who is struggling. Behind our anecdotes about our students are real human lives. Sometimes we distance ourselves from our students in a variety of ways. We must not lose touch with the fact that their stories don't end with us. Our students are first and foremost people, and we must not let things distance us from their humanity.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-31491712423401059492015-03-12T12:15:00.002-05:002015-03-12T12:56:31.806-05:00Why I Don't Like Digital Learning Day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Admission: the title is a little clickbaity.<br />
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I love digital learning and have built my classroom and career on Instructional Technology and would plug my brain directly into the <br />
Internet if I could. I think that we have a tools to change the world with modern Information Technology and we have to teach our students to use those tools in a world in flux.<br />
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But whenever I hear talk about Digital Learning Day (DLD), I think of some of the arguments I have heard to <a href="http://www.pbs.org/black-culture/shows/list/more-than-a-month/" target="_blank">end Black History Month</a>. These arguments usually posit that the role of African Americans in our country is too great to relegate to one month. Black History is an integral part of learning American History. The story of African Americans is one of the important facets of the story of Americans as a whole. But relegating it to a particular month, we are segregating and labeling it as a subset of the bigger picture.<br />
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This is my problem with Digital Learning Day. If you are reading this blog, you most likely don't need a Digital Learning Day. Most days involve digital teaching and learning. Most nights do also, as we read blogs and our timelines and constantly learn to improve our classrooms and selves.<br />
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Many of those participating in DLD will find some way to integrate technology into their classes that day. Looking over Alabama's CCRS standards and Courses of Study, I find several lessons that require the integration of a technology component. Alabama, as well as several other states, requires that all graduates have a digital learning experience.<br />
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But all of this is a tokenism of digital learning and technology integration. It is relegating it to a specific place, instead of seeing it as part of the whole.<br />
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Digital Teaching and Learning is not just about if the students use a computer and an internet connection in a lesson or unit. Technology integration is the process of using tech to collaborate, produce and create, as well as manage our time and workflow. Does every lesson need a technology component? Of course not. Especially when technology is rolled into a lesson just for the sake of using technology instead of improve teaching and learning.<br />
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The integration of technology should grow naturally from the lesson. What ways can we bring collaborative elements into this? What can students create for me that will make my lesson come alive for them? How do I get the students to use the Internet, the greatest information tool in history, to find information on our topics that is relevant and accurate?<br />
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We should also model technology integration as a part of our lives for our students. I have Google reminders going off all the time as well as calendar apps and task-lists keeping my deadlines straight. That information I am supposed to remember is either in Evernote or Keep. That file you need... it is in my Drive, or my Dropbox, let me share it with you. Technology can make our lives easier and more productive and a big part of digital learning is modeling that for our students.<br />
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I guess I do like Digital Learning Day. The thing I don't like about it is that it isn't every day for most people, educators included.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-71448807601852711402015-03-10T10:50:00.001-05:002015-03-10T13:49:22.290-05:00Thoughts on Wearables, particularly SmartWatches<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU8sFq85RD06xm0f9q6qUhGH_56zhWgsRm7HvNoWQXep9R3gvJ3ahZRSLq7gKAHmty3N-qo1jKV0qciP2AIaxJcKj3MWBSddxwrxscBWh38Ig1JuMWCl6sBBraPSYsfO8L92t5B-plQdh-/s1600/Apple+-+Apple+Watch+Sport+-+Silver+Aluminum+Case+with+White+Sport+Band.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiU8sFq85RD06xm0f9q6qUhGH_56zhWgsRm7HvNoWQXep9R3gvJ3ahZRSLq7gKAHmty3N-qo1jKV0qciP2AIaxJcKj3MWBSddxwrxscBWh38Ig1JuMWCl6sBBraPSYsfO8L92t5B-plQdh-/s1600/Apple+-+Apple+Watch+Sport+-+Silver+Aluminum+Case+with+White+Sport+Band.png" height="200" width="172" /></a>Yesterday was Apple's <a href="https://www.apple.com/watch/" target="_blank">grand unveiling</a> of their new watch offerings, that has people both praising and mocking the concept. The new Apple watch is impressively designed with the sort of polish to the interface we have come to expect from Apple and iOS.<br />
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But do you need a watch that interfaces with your phone? That seems to be the question. Being an Android guy, the iWatch (Apple Watch? aWatch?) will not be for me, but for the last three months I have been the proud owner of a <a href="https://moto360.motorola.com/" target="_blank">Moto360</a> that is paired with my (still) trusty <a href="http://www.google.com/nexus/5/" target="_blank">Nexus 5</a>. I have never been much for watches and since cell phones became de rigueur I have always had the equivalent of a pocket watch, but I wanted the Moto360 when I saw it. So my wife bought it for me for Christmas from CostCo so I could have a nice long return window and it has changed the way I use my phone and made my relationship with my technology more personal (who knew that was possible?) and visceral.<br />
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The Moto360 and Apple Watch seem to have most of the same sorts of functionality, with the traditional sorts of differences between Android and iOS products, that is to say, mostly interface issues. At its most basic, notifications come to the watch. I get an email, text, Facebook comment or message, Google Voice text, etc, I see it on the watch. The more tightly integrated apps such as Facebook Messenger, Hangout, Gmail or texts allow to reply easily and quickly via voice, hit a Like button, delete or disregard the notification easily. Other apps let me read the notification and then open the message on my phone. Many apps are not not ready for primetime on the watch yet but they are coming.<br />
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I can also see my Google Now notifications on the watchas well as perform searches, initiate text conversations, mostly by using voice prompts. Media player controls show up on the watch letting me pause, play, skip and control the volume right from the phone face. Some of these details are still being worked out. For example, if I am watching Netflix or Hulu through my Chromecast, the pause and play buttons don't work, a problem I am sure is on the list.<br />
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Navigation directions come directly to the watch also. Before an upcoming turn, the watch vibrates and the face turns to a directional arrow with the street name. This is a really easy and low distraction way to navigate and I think a little touted feature of the smart watches. Having timers as well as location and time based reminders available with a quick voice command is also something you don't realize how much you would use until they are living on your wrist.<br />
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The 360 allows a variety of faces and with a $1.00 app called <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.jeremysteckling.facerrel" target="_blank">Facer</a> I can access a wide array of user created faces or make my own. The <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.meedori.dresswatch" target="_blank">DressWatch</a> app lets me match the watch face to clothing on the fly. In the image to the right, I created a custom watch face featuring the market district from Sarajevo.<br />
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It is hard to express how the paradigm shifts when you have the watch on. Instead of checking a notification by pulling out a device, a quick and subtle glance takes lets you read and a couple of easy motions allows basic responses. Wearing the watch, I feel connected personally to the internet, rather than just carrying a device that is. I joked that on one of my first shopping trips with the watch, with the phone in my pocket, my <a href="http://www.plantronics.com/us/product/backbeat-903-plus" target="_blank">Plantronics BackBeat</a> bluetooth headphones as well as the Moto360, that I had taken my first step to becoming a cyborg. I was only halfway joking.<br />
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A smartwatch isn't for everyone, but it definitely changes the way you interact with this always on connectivity we have in our pocket, primarily by letting you leave it in your pocket and live your life while maintaining the connectivity.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-65413077434790504542015-03-07T23:19:00.000-06:002015-03-09T20:33:48.192-05:00Test Driving Weo.io: the "simple" LMS<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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On <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/edtech" target="_blank">r/edtech</a> last week, some developers wanted to get some people test driving their new LMS, <a href="http://www.weo.io/" target="_blank">Weo</a>. Always a sucker for a good LMS, I decided to give it a spin.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Weo reminds me of <a href="https://classroom.google.com/" target="_blank">Google Classroom</a> in its initial layout. It generates a time line and teachers can add assignments or announcements for students. It has a bit (just a bit) more flexibility than Classroom in the kinds of assignments that the teacher can make, but does not do the job of managing GAfE documents that Classroom handles effortlessly.<br />
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Setting up your account and login is simple. You can fill out the registration for or let your Google credentials take care of it. I was able to easily start an account with both a standard Gmail account and a GAfE account. Once the teacher is in, they can set up their own classes and send the students a code to join the class.<br />
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Once in the class the teacher can add content or questions. The content can be any number of questions (some of which, like multiple choice, will self grade), links, video, text blocks or images. You can add as many or as few of these items as you wish, as well as turn a discussion element on or off for the question.<br />
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When the student clicks the assignment, they are presented with the content and questions. They can answer or review the items and if questions are to be answered, the student will have a turn in button. If presented with a multiple choice question, it will be graded when the student turns it in. Others teachers may grade and assign a point value.<br />
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This is certainly, as it says on the label, a simple LMS. I have a feeling some people will love the simplicity and find this is all they want from an LMS. After experiencing the tight GAfE integration of Classroom, I miss that in Weo, but teachers not immersed in the GAfE ecosystem will not. I would think having no way to attach a document as a student is a glaring omission, but this may not be a design choice but something in the pipeline.<br />
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Weo is coming into a crowded market, but Weo could find its place. I believe with just a few minutes of test driving the platform, teachers hesitant to use an LMS could really find a comfortable fit with Weo. The old hands at the blended classroom are going to find the lack of features limiting, but with a few added features, Weo might possibly the simplest and most straight forward LMS on the market. That is going to appeal to a large number of teachers just beginning with a blended classroom model.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-18318831439981742902015-02-28T21:14:00.003-06:002015-03-01T17:17:43.846-06:00Leaving the Classroom<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In October 1999, I came to BTW Magnet midyear. February, 2015, I left BTW, also midyear. The students have been everything I could hope for in a lot of ways. Yeah, there were frustrations, problems, etc. But today was an amazing send-off by the students, with the help of a lot of my faculty colleagues and it typifies why this school can be an amazing place to work.<br />
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As I walked across the parking lot, a trumpet started playing "Taps." I told the trumpeter I wasn't dead and was told that I better not be, there was a lot ahead. As I turned the corner on the stairs, I was greeted with abut 50 students with cameras out and a huge banner. After a couple of emotional words, I went into the classroom, which had nearly 50 Diet Coke two-liters scattered around the room, a huge bag of Lemonheads and what seemed to be a 55 gallon drum of soft peppermints. My kids and colleagues know me so well.<br />
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Teary and emotional students brought me cards and letters all day. One insisted that her letter should be read aloud. There had been a sign up sheet for students to claim 15 minute intervals all day to text goodbye messages. Sure enough, every fifteen minutes another batch of texts came through. Some funny, some well wishing, some dripping with emotion.<br />
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I gave a little farewell to each class. I told them that this is conceivably the last day I stand in front of a class full of teenagers, and that I knew last night whatever I said would be eclipsed by a discussion of <a href="http://www.wired.com/2015/02/science-one-agrees-color-dress/" target="_blank">the dress and its colors</a>. So I embraced it and used it to demonstrate the idea that reality is a social construct. Yes the dress itself was blurple (bluish/purple) and black, but the picture of the dress wasn't that cut and dry. It existed at a crazy crossroads of rods and cones, picture exposure, the way pixels work and data compression so that people would see it obviously one way or another and they weren't wrong. I told them success in life was the same way, that only they could define what made their life a success and they would be right about it. What they saw as success is what it was and they should fight for their vision of it. But additionally, even though I saw gold and white, I could tilt the picture or squint and see the blurple and black. Not only that, but the shade of blurple was a my favorite shade of purple. I attempted to see someone else's perspective and was rewarded for it. During the day I got a couple of tears from that talk and was told that was the sort of thing they would miss.<br />
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My first block had a little party, with cake, donuts, chips, etc. Second block was low key with farewells from students and visitors. Third block I left campus for a few minutes to meet many of my new colleagues, then I returned to cake and visits with my faculty, many of whom I have worked with for 15 years.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL6IBwTr3fxdKdExCfyI6ob9yJcFc9Q3RG1PMCVHs0nqZh80wRg_On_ciEOQlNhm4s0eSMe3PEBgtIzrDmy63ymetA_e5NMHGEmox3Di5LJDDh9anTB-ViRbCbWRAqt5FoLbMi39uZwa5c/s1600/IMG_20150227_134659.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjL6IBwTr3fxdKdExCfyI6ob9yJcFc9Q3RG1PMCVHs0nqZh80wRg_On_ciEOQlNhm4s0eSMe3PEBgtIzrDmy63ymetA_e5NMHGEmox3Di5LJDDh9anTB-ViRbCbWRAqt5FoLbMi39uZwa5c/s1600/IMG_20150227_134659.jpg" height="147" width="200" /></a>The final block of the day, a group of about 20 chorus students came in and sang an original composition about excellence and inspiration that was upbeat and energetic. Shortly after, they called all the seniors to the Blue Room auditorium and then a lone senior showed up and my door demanding my presence. As I walked into the Blue Room, every senior was there and they sat me in the middle of the room in a chair. All of a sudden all of the questions I had received all weeks about my favorite pop song and old school hip hop made sense as 90 seniors serenaded me with "Firework" (I just saw The Interview and it has been stuck in my head ever since) and a PG13 edit of "Big Poppa." Then one senior took the lead and was then joined on the chorus by the rest of the seniors for "Stay With Me." They wanted me to "do a song!" after I said a few words and so I got all cheesy for them and hit the chorus of "End of the Road." Luckily they all knew it because I only knew the first two lines.<br />
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Afterwards were snacks and pictures and cards and tears and hugs and a huge card signed by all of the seniors. The notes and cards from my students say the sort of things I would dream students would write about me, about knowledge and curiosity and inspiration and dedication.<br />
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Back to class for the last few minutes and suddenly I heard the band, standing in the hall playing Auld Lang Syne. As the bell rang a steady procession of students came by keeping me there for pictures and hugs and good-byes.<br />
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I have been at BTW longer than I was in school. And today was a perfect example of why I was comfortable staying there.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1952016120418280299.post-16749863460681536542015-02-28T20:55:00.002-06:002015-02-28T20:56:03.046-06:00Relaunch of MyClass2.0: Another Breadcrumb on the TrailSince the turn of the century, known to my generation as Y2K aka the apocalypse that wasn't, I have left a fractured trail of blogs across a variety of platforms on a variety of topics. But this time I believe will be a bit different.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>On Monday, March 2, I begin my new position as District Technology Instructor for Montgomery Public Schools. This will involve a lot of teaching professional development and helping out individual schools.<br />
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But I think PD should be a more organic thing. We tell students to be life-long learners to the point it is a cliche. But many of us stop learning. It is easy to understand why: so much PD is excruciatingly mind numbing. Of course there are exceptions. For example, any PD offered by the Alabama Learning Exchange (<a href="http://alex.state.al.us/" target="_blank">ALEX</a>) is outstanding. Many sessions at ed tech conferences such as the Alabama Educational Technology Conference (<a href="http://alex.state.al.us/aetc/" target="_blank">AETC</a>) are amazing. I hope PD I develop for MPS is also engaging.<br />
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But part of learning as an educator involves immersion in the environment of learning. Reading blogs and using Twitter regularly helps us all interact with other educators and maintain awareness of the latest tools and research.<br />
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To those ends I plan to use this blog regularly and increase my Twitter presence. I was just getting into a groove of blogging and had a healthy Twitter presence until I started back to <a href="http://education.ua.edu/academics/elpts/intech/" target="_blank">grad school</a>. But now I am considering it as part of the job description. This blog is only one part of the strategy. I plan on making the hashtag #MPSedchat a well used stream on Twitter. As of this writing there is a <a href="https://twitter.com/search?f=realtime&q=%23mpsedchat&src=typd" target="_blank">little activity</a> where the Minot Public Schools debate using it as their hashtag and move on to another option, Hopefully as time passes we will schedule regular chats and use the hashtag regularly.<br />
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If you have suggestions for tools, resources or PD ideas, please <a href="mailto:jmarkcoleman@gmail.com" target="_blank">email me</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0