Monday, December 15, 2008

Wish Big!



I was walking down the front hall of our building the other day and noticed that someone had put up the words "Wish Big" on their office windows. If you "wished big" for instructional technology, what would you wish for?

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

15 minutes of Fame!


What was important on my blog yesterday? One picture says it all (left). I created the image using Wordle and the RSS from my blog. Wordle generates "word clouds" from text, blogs or social bookmarks. Mine was a response about my beliefs about all students, so students is predominate in the image. Great way to analyze text.

Andy Warhol coined the phrase "15 minutes of fame" and I had mine yesterday. Because I responded to the "3 things I believe about all students", Vicki Davis mentioned my posting on her blog!!!!! I have been visiting her website for a year or so - she is doing so many neat things with her students - and I think she's awesome - so it is just way too cool to be mentioned on her blog!
It is somewhat risky to post your words for the world to see. What if I'm wrong? What if someone disagrees with me? As I said before, I've been inspired to try to use this blog for my own professional learning network...so I will continue! Days like yesterday inspire me!




Monday, December 8, 2008

3 Things I Believe About ALL Students

While catching up with the people I keep up with (their blogs) I read Vicki Davis' response to a "meme" from Nicole at Teaching Tomorrow.
1. Share three things that you believe about all students.
2. Reflect on your thoughts in your blog. (If you do not have a blog, you can share your ideas in a comment from this post.)
3. Be sure to link to this post and to where you were first tagged.
4. Tag your response with AllStudentsMeme
5. Invite others to join the conversation by tagging them to be a part of the meme.

I wasn't tagged either -but here are my thoughts:

Three Things I Believe About ALL Students

1) We Get By in Life on the Things We Do Well
While working in the business world I realized that adults get by AND SUCCEED in the things they are good at - especially in a collaborative world - while in the world of education everyone must "pass" every subject, every test - even the ones we aren't very good at. For some students, for whatever reasons, continue to fail areas of state testing - this has discouraged them enough to drop out of school. What a loss for the world. I believe that each child has gifts they bring to the world, and like Vicki Davis, I believe they are special gifts that only they can give to their world. School should be another place (in addition to home, community, church) where students can discover and develop those gifts. Sometimes it may be the primary place.

2) All Students Can Learn...
I believe in giving students every opportunity to learn and grow, and setting high expectations. One of the beautiful things about kids is that given high expectations, they often surpass them. But one size does not fit all. The challenge remains for teachers - to help their students reach their learning goals, and realize their potential & value in the world.

3) Every Student Needs to Learn How to Be a Good Digital Citizen
The students in school right now are living in a world that is different from the one their parents and teachers grew up in. As educators, we are encouraged to imagine these students' future and prepare them for it. The more we can help students learn to use digital tools to learn, connect, and communicate with the world and people around them, the better prepared these students will be to use the digital tools they will encounter in their future. Ethics, people skills and relationships are an important part of learning to be a good digital citizen.

Tag! you're it!
Claude Cunningham

E. Young

C. Petty

Monday, December 1, 2008

Sometimes imagination is not big enough!

I have created several blogs...just never felt I had a whole lot to say that anyone would care about! but, I've been challenged by David Warlick at techLEARNING's Southwest TechForum to build my own PLN, which includes blogging, so here goes...

Twenty-six years ago today I became a mother. Never could I have imagined all the joys that would bring, and especially not the one to the right - my granddaughter! Getting to experience the world again through this child's eyes is a delight too great to explain!

At work today, I am looking at information related to preparing our students to have the technology skills they will need to be ready for their future. That is also my granddaughter's future, so it is with both a professional and personal interest that I read and absorb that information and try to imagine what her world, and that of our students, will hold.