Tuesday, May 3rd Reflections

  At class tonight, I was thinking about what Michelle said. I agree completely. It really isn't a matter of using the technology, but using it well. How can we utilize the tools we learn in a way that will promote not just technological literacy, but in my case, actual literacy. How can I help my students become successful adults? All year long I have been working off a theory by Robyn Jackson, in a book titled, "Never work Harder Than Your Students." She has a free webinar next Thursday,Click Here for information. She notes the amount of time teachers put into their lesson planning, in hopes of wowing the students. What we should be doing, actually, is tweaking our plans so that they are more rigorous and effective. I have learned so much from her series. It has me thinking about my plans in a different way. How can I facilitate the connections students make in their minds? It is through the connections that true learning takes place, yet some of my students come in lacking many of the basic blocks I need to build on. If they don't know what a noun or a verb is, how am I to teach infinitives and dangling participles? Worse, how do I get the students engagement so that I can teach them? My colleague said to me the other day, "I don't see why we need to use the technology. What is wrong with a pen and paper? What do we really get out of computers?" This was following a session on, "I can't get my students to stay awake when I read in class. They don't read out of class, they don't read in. It's a no win situation." I asked her, did she not notice her engagement level every time we have the computers? We have 100% engagement on Mac Lab days. These are the days when we have to use the technology to teach the basics. It's a twofer. The kids learn tech, and they learn traditional curriculum.