I love to use technology in my classroom and generally feel like I am more than willing to take "risks" in trying new things. Therefore, this has been one of my favorite weeks. I thoroughly enjoyed the suggestions of possible sites for students from Michele Eaton. I am anxious to implement a few of them and see how the can be incorporated into my students' learning and eventually assessment.
I am thinking that parents are not going to be as accepting of some of these ideas since they do not get the immediate feedback that they often like. A few last year were upset when we tried to do some projects that they were not involved with. I think the time involved explaining the projects and the overall enthusiasm of students helped to win these parents over, but once again, it took time. Evaluation is much more subjective and this is going to be a challenge, as well.
My other challenge at the moment is that I do not know what I am teaching (subject wise) in the fall. We are departmentalized and with a new administrator, we are awaiting our schedules. I am guessing that I will be teaching science and/or math, but that is not set in stone. Therefore, to try to picture any of these ideas within my fourth grade classroom is difficult.
I have to admit that I am also struggling with the lack of a human connection in this course. I am far too "social" for the way this course is arranged. One would think that being able to be invisible to the person you are asking questions of would be a positive thing. I am finding the exact opposite to be true. I guess I like to be able to discuss things face to face.
Maybe it is the elementary way, but the lack of actually talking to someone is rough! I have to hear things and comment back and forth for ideas to make sense, much the way my first graders are!
ReplyDeleteThank you for helping me to realize that I am not sinking out here with no one in sight! This simple comment makes me feel like survival is possible and I did not get out into water that is far too deep.
DeleteI agree that it would be nice to have more face-to-face interaction as it is a better way to bounce ideas around.
ReplyDeleteIt is hard to bring parents on board as it is so different from the way we learned as kids and it goes against the traditional notion of "school". I had a group of parents that was pretty "hands-off" which meant they didn't give me much grief about anything, but they didn't do a lot to support their child's learning outside of school. It was a very mixed blessing.
Those are truly the mixed blessings. However, that kind of parent worries me because just when I think there is no interaction, they seem to come bounding in with a MAJOR complaint.
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