"But it IS part of your curriculum."

I've spent the last couple of days at school in and out of classrooms and labs plugging in and imaging computers, climbing under tables and jamming cords through the holes in computer desks, keeping a list of how many ethernet cords have magically disappeared over the summer, and, well, you get the idea.  (This is truly the absolute worst part of my job.)  Naturally this means I've already seen a lot of teachers as they set up their classrooms.  I had one conversation in particular with a teacher, a pretty strong tech user, that kind of frustrated me.

After the "how was your summer" chat...
Teacher: How do you think it's going to be now without a 5th grade technology class?
Me: It will be interesting.  I think we can do more integration.
Teacher: I'm just worried that it's going to take away from instructional time for our curriculum if we have to teach them how to use things like Prezi.

I'm not proud of my response, so instead I'll tell you what I should have said:
"But things like Prezi ARE part of your curriculum!" 

Why do teachers continue to refer to technology as something that takes away from their instructional time?  Have we still not learned that process and skills are more important, or at least equally as important, as content?  (By the way, I do work in a district that gives product and process grades on report cards.)  Are we still so ignorant that we believe taking the three and a half minutes it takes to provide an overview of Prezi to our students isn't beneficial to them?

When is the last time you had to rattle off the facts of the life of an Early American Explorer?  And when is the last time you had to send a professional email?

We need to stop thinking of technology instruction as something separate.  It is part of your every day life.  And it IS part of your curriculum.  And if we're going that far, maybe plugging in your computer should be part of your classroom set up, right there with hanging the poster about taking risks, and not something separate the Tech Teacher or IT support need to be doing, eh?

Happy New Year!

New Year's Eve is one of my favorite holidays.  I know it can get hyped up with all the "What are we doing? Where are we going? Which sparkly dress are you going to wear? Who will you kiss at midnight" stuff, but I love the idea of a fresh start.  It doesn't matter what happened the year before.  The new year just seems hopeful.  I love that moment at midnight when everyone is simply HAPPY.  You forget about everything and just hug and laugh and blow your noisemakers (and if you've got someone special...or someone for the night...kiss) everyone around you.  That's kind of how I feel about the start of a new school year too.  It's a fresh start with some new teachers, a new group of students, and a little bit wiser you.
  
Since I just spent 90 minutes answering school emails, I have accepted that the new school year has pretty much begun.  While we still have two weeks until the official start date, emails are flying, ideas are flowing, and I'm starting to get a little excited despite the sadness I'm feeling about summer vacation coming to a close.  

Quickly, I thought I'd share with you a few new things that will be happening at my school this year!  First, we are implementing a 1:1 iPad pilot!  The pilot group is a "house" (as we call it) of four 6th grade homeroom teachers and 1 Learning Behavior Specialist.  The students in the pilot are actually assigned to a "team" of two teachers.  Since last year, we have been meeting regularly to plan, plan, plan and make sure everyone feels comfortable for the start of the year.  Things are really moving quickly now as the iPad shipment is in and legal documents are being finalized!  Second, I will be teaching a new course called "Our Global Climate."  This is actually a course that combines Problem Based Learning and Project Based Learning and is centered around global climate change.  Stay tuned for posts about these two exciting initiatives!

We all know that the year can spiral, and before we know it, we're on winter break.  Sometimes, I can get stuck in the rut of just trying to keep my head above water until eventually (and pretty quickly), I realize that is just boring!  If we want our students to grow each year, we should also grow.  To conclude this first post, I thought I'd share some of my goals for the year....minus the whole SMART list of action steps...

• Document!  It is my goal to use this blog this year to document and share ideas, resources, and reflections. 
• Initiate Global projects - This has been a goal of mine for a while.  I'm fortunate to work in a school with a LOT of technology use, but it's time to take that use to the next level.  We need to start engaging students in opportunities that take them outside the school walls. 
• 1:1 iPads - This isn't my most clearly defined goal.  I just know there's a lot going on with this, and I want to make sure it's successful.  To be more specific, my personal goal will be to create and implement a structured professional development program for the next round of 1:1 teachers.

Okay, so maybe I've still got a little bit of "summer brain," because that's all I've got for now in terms of goals.  It's a start...