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Category: Reflection

Sharing is Caring

nancy 1 Comment
Two children sharing a milkshake
Image by krzyboy2o via Flickr, CC BY 2.o

The best thing I do in my job is share. I love sharing. It makes me happy and I like to think it makes those I share with happy, too. I don’t understand teachers who want to keep everything great they do to themselves. Not that I believe that what I am doing is great, but if you want to use it or adapt it, be my guest. Do you need to know something that I know? Just ask me to help you. I share wantonly and with abandon.

Teachers are some of the hardest working professionals around. If I can make the life of my fellow educators easier by giving them something I have done, I will happily do so. Do they want to change or adapt it so it better suits their needs? Excellent! I hope they will share it again when they have finished.

I am very lucky to have a job that gives me the opportunity to share generously. I get to meet with teachers and share my knowledge by providing training and assistance in technology use. In addition, I can share ideas on how they can incorporate that technology into their classrooms and even share lessons or unit plans.

My sharing isn’t limited to what I do on the job. I also share on Twitter, Google+, at conferences, at CUE Rockstar, and at edcamps. When I present, I share all my resources. Why would I want to keep them all private and under lock and key? My ultimate goal as a teacher is to ensure that students learn, and if I can help more students learn by sharing resources and information with their teachers, then how could I refuse?

My favorite teachers

nancy 2 Comments

apple-256261_1280Image by jarmoluk via Pixabay.com

This week’s #YourEduStory prompt asks, “How are you, or is your approach, different than your favorite teacher?” I have been through lots of schooling and I have had lots of teachers. I remember many of them fondly. I don’t remember all their names. What I do remember is that I enjoyed being in their classes because they showed me they cared about me and my learning. They made me want to come to school to see them and to make them proud.

Considering how I am different from these wonderful educators was challenging for me. I struggled to think what distinguished me and my teaching from theirs. Even though I came to teaching after several years as a stay-at-home mom, I know that my teaching style was influenced by all those teachers and professors I loved. I made a conscious effort to emulate them; I didn’t want to do otherwise. I aimed for an approach that took what was best from those teachers and put it into practice.

So, how am I different? What sets me apart? I suppose I would have to say the fact that I believe in flattening the walls of the classroom to have students connect with others as much as I can. Being a media specialist, I don’t have the final say in how lessons are delivered, but I try to help my teachers come up with plans and activities where their students can share, interact, and collaborate with people in other cities, states, or countries, be it through Mystery Skype, writing and commenting on blogs, publishing work online, or something else.

Far be it from me to criticize my teachers for not doing this when I was in school. We had pen pals in one class, but it wasn’t nearly the same. The technology to do what I do didn’t exist back then. (I know, I’m old. At least I got to use paper and pencil instead of a stone tablet and chisel.) They did fabulous things with what they had available, and they certainly went above and beyond what was expected. For example, one of my teachers, Mr. Augenblick, used to take his classes camping for a week every year. He was wonderful, and we stayed in contact long after I left 6th grade. He was even invited to my wedding. He passed away in 2013 (you can read all about him on page 8 of this issue of United Teacher), but I am sure he would be proud of me and what I have accomplished. I hope all my favorite teachers would be.

Making the world a better place

nancy

MLK quote

Martin Luther King, Jr.. (n.d.). BrainyQuote.com. Retrieved January 13, 2015, from BrainyQuote.com

Martin Luther King, Jr.’s,  birthday is approaching, and this week’s #YourEduStory prompt, suggested by yours truly, asks us to consider how we will make the world a better place. Of course, there are lots of ways to do this, and I practice many of them. I donate to charity. I recycle. I take short showers to save water. I vote. I don’t drive if I can walk (rare in the L.A area, but I try). You get the picture.

All of these are great habits, and I plan to continue practicing them, but they are not much compared to what I can do inside the classroom. As a teacher, I have the opportunity to change the future every single day. Some may believe this statement to be an exaggeration. I don’t think it is.

When we interact with another individual, our words, our attitude, and our behavior convey a great deal of meaning. They reveal our thoughts and attitudes, and their emotional impact can be significant. That impact is magnified when teachers are working with students. What we say and do affects them deeply and, naturally, depending on what our words and actions are, those effects may be positive or negative.

As a media specialist, I am lucky to work not only with students, but with their teachers. I am working to make the world a better place by trying to ensure all my interactions with both students and teachers are positive and empowering. It is my goal to help them realize their own potential, whether I am working with second graders struggling to complete a project on an iPad or teachers learning to use a technology tool to engage their students. When teachers are self-assured and empowered, students benefit. When students know they can succeed, they are more willing to take risks and persevere until they meet their goals. They will grow up to be better, happier, more confident people. That is what I want for them. And for the world.

One Word: Consistency

nancy 7 Comments

This year, I have decided to focus both my professional and personal life on consistency. Not the kind in which everything is the same with no interesting variations (think factory-produced rubber ducks on an assembly line), but the kind of consistency that is a habit. In a good way, not in the, “I should hang up my coat but the closet is 20 feet away so I’ll just leave it on the couch like I always do,” kind of way.

rubber ducks “Rubber duckies So many ducks” by gaetanlee – http://www.flickr.com/photos/gaetanlee/298160434/. Licensed under CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

Like any educator, I am always working on several different things at once. It’s not really a problem; I love multi-tasking. It keeps my interest and creativity high when I am consistently forced to change my focus. The problem is that I have a less-than-stellar record about returning to what I was working on before that new thing came toddling down the lane. I always complete everything I have to, but I would like to be more consistent, finishing what I start, making what I create match my vision of what it should be, and doing regularly those tasks that should be done regularly.

For example, part of my job includes developing resources to support teachers in my district. I created a website on book trailers and finished all the sections needed to do the professional development I was facilitating. The website is good, but I had other materials on additional tools and have not yet added those sections (note to self: work on book trailer site next week). Similarly, I was planning on writing more frequently on this blog and even posted about it last May. I haven’t done that, but I am going to try again. I am joining the #youredustory blogging challenge because I hope that the support of this community of bloggers will help me improve my practice by encouraging me to reflect better and more deeply on what I do and who I am as a teacher.

And just in case you were wondering, in my personal life, the two main areas in which I am struggling to be more consistent are exercising and filing paperwork. Suggestions for ways to address any of these issues are welcomed.