Techno in the Classroom: Time to play

Well I am so glad I made it to the holidays. Wow. What an amazing first semester I have had in my new TAFE job. There have been times when I was truly excited by my student's progress and other times was really frustrated by their lack of motivation and commitment. However I have discovered that I really enjoy teaching adults. It is very interesting teaching a class of adults with age ranges from 17-50. No matter how old the learner the need to extend and challenge students in their learning and thinking remains the same. Student's responded well to BLP (Building Learning Power). It was really effective when asking students to reflect on which learning muscles they had used during the lesson. Students became more aware of how they were learning and were able to become efficient at self reflection and questioning. I really enjoyed the lessons we had on creative writing. So did the students. Noticed that their writing in other text types improved as they became more confident writing in their own voice.

Finally after many months of hard work I can reveal my logo. Thanks to Tracey at On the Level Playing Field Graphic Design. It has been a dream of mine to start a business as a consultant to train other teachers on how to use technology in the classroom. I am currently working on my website site. Apart from Google sites I've never built a website so I'm teaching myself from videoes on Youtube and using wordpress to put things together.

Have been having some interesting conversations with teachers in the last few days about the changes that are occuring in education and I've been interested to see the revolution taking place with the impact of technology on students. Some of the ways they communicate are morphing into the cyber world and for some these realities and conversation are as real to them as if they were talking face to face. A real challenge for parents and teachers to guide these young people through this brave new world of technology to develop well rounded individuals who can cope with the stresses and strains of life. Hoping to do some more reading on this. An interesting article in the Sydney Morning Herald about the ipact of ipads in the classroom.

http://www.smh.com.au/digital-life/digital-life-news/what-are-these-tablets-good-for-20120630-219bu.html What are the tablets good for?

The great thing about the holidays is it gives me time to play and find new ways of engaging students or catching up on some reading about the new changes and thinking in education. I might add that I do plan also on reading for pleasure and will be out and about spending time with the kids. Going on a bushwalk to Somersby Falls. Can't spend all my time on the computer.

This week's favorite links:
Alice in Wonderland as a Subway map
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/06/25/alice-in-wonderland-transit-map/

Really interesting Youtube about some of the new features in Google Docs