Tech Tool

My digital Story

Podcast #1

PLN reflection!

What is PLN? It's a thread of networking, where as Tom Whitby states "Each individual educator becomes a potential source of information."  

What is a constitutes a thread?" One connection, a follower, a blogger, a person on Google + leads a thread, a link out to other who share a particular interest you have professionally. I see it as a massive spider web of helpers, those helped, guiders, followers, teachers and followers.

Through a tweet I came across this article, From Edutopia "A PLN is a tool that uses social media and technology to collect, communicate, collaborate and create with connected colleagues anywhere at any time. Participating educators, worldwide, make requests and share resources." 

After reading the article from Edutopia and tweeting to share with others, I have realized the following the benefits of developing PLN can be 4 BIG C's!

• -CONNECT
• -COLLECT
• -COLLABORATE
• -CREATE

These big C's have shown me the how PLN will radically change your once limited access to new ideas, connections now to a global level! It's a process that requires time, effort and patience. Just within the first Edchat @NT2t, I realized that in order to stay up with the conversation, you need to be digital literal, know how to tweet quickly, know how mentions will be beneficial and necessary. There are live people on the other end there to inspire, guide you and teach you! I found that during this Edchat I felt, "connected" in more ways than one. Connected to other individuals on a human level, and also knowing that there limitless resources to help to improve your career. Being a teacher requires consistency, clear vision, creativity and a constant willingness to change. I can easily see how social networks can either be too overwhelming, because that was my initial thought. In order to counteract that feeling of overwhelm, balance and discernment will be key. Moving forward, I will learn to understand what  I should learn and how  I should apply it.

The first C, Connection, is the first step, it was wild to see how having a new follower brought me from thread to thread, first their blog, then to a friends blog and then I tweet and post on Google +, before I know it I have created a know I have created link in that massive social spider web for  my new tweet follower. It was mind boggling to realize through the Edchat, the cofounder of Magic Schoolbus and Goosebumps was in that chat! Through that interaction, I went onto his blog, found some inspiration and ideas there and posted on my Google+!

Here's a real live example of "C" collaborate, Through the tweeter EdChat, I will now chat with a Google certified teacher about getting our school onto Google Education! That will transform the way the school I work at operates! She will know directly e-mail me and we will move forward on getting our school running with more technology.

 I view tweeter as the spark plug that lights up connections that bring you to resourceful blogs, videos, etc. The benefit of tweeter is the life and active interaction of it! Through my light up connections, I found Feedly to be helpful to put all of my blogs into one place, it's a nice consolidation.  Feedly is a very convenient way to stay up to date on any subscribed blogs, I found that tool to be extremely helpful.  I subscribed to a blog "The Creative Classroom" and through this blog I learned a new speaking strategy tool. In fact it has become a routine activity.Through commenting on a a a blog regarding a frustration I experience in the teaching foreign language on ensuring total participation, the blogger responded back to my question and for some reason this shocked me to understand there is actually someone on the other end willing to give you a hand, to give you advice! Not only did she answer my questions, there are downloadable templates that I can customize for my classrooms. 

The interaction with "The Creative Classroom"  helped me to understand techniques to structure a classroom with focused goals and activities that bring in real life experience. It was inspiring to see that such strategies do work and that these people are willing to help you get there. Creating a link to credit the blogger is a great way of spreading the information and growing the network, I have subscribed to many blogs via link and reference. Because I was interested in "The Creative Classroom" whoever that blogger was following, I trusted that it would be another good resource.  I would highly recommend blogs as a way to share knowledge and allow for instruction to others. I think it would also be a great tool for students to know how to create a blog, find blogs that are a useful resource for them, just as I do with other teachers.

The only challenge for all of the PLN sources is unwillingness to change, pride (not willing to learn from others) and over stimulation. Ah yes, you must become digitally literate to be able to navigate through tweeter chats. I still don't fully understand how mentions work, verus DM (direct message)...that will come in time, for sure. Social media needs to be properly harnessed to be able to  absorb all the information and apply it in a balanced manner. Depending on what kind of person you are, one can fall easily into fascination with the social media tool and distracted with the plethora of information, etc. So it's a double edged sword, the information and knowledge is out on the web to guide you and help you grow professional. Use what works for youand take it all in pieces and steps. Bit by bit.

SNAGIT ZONE!!!

My Feedlys!

-http://offqc.com/,

http://worldlanguageclassroom.wordpress.com/,

http://martinabex.com/,

http://creativelanguageclass.com/

http://www.secretsofparis.com/heathers-secret-blog/

BLOG POSTS!

POST ON GOOGLE + Community

6 TWEET FOLLOWINGS

RETWEET 2x

HASHTAG

Edchat @NT2t

Content + Skill = 21st Century Student

What matters for students? How do teachers act as an example of someone who demonstrates 21st century skills?

Well, this answer is complex. As educators, we must know what the desired outcome should be for students. Before going any further, we must reflect, are these outcomes aligned with 21st century student/citizen?

Our desired outcome is a student who can intelligently take the academic content and apply it to all circumstances in life.

Once our outcome is crystal clear, the educators act as guides and show the steps to incorporate academic content, 21st century skills to their personal life and future career skills.

The only thing consistent is change, thus while teaching all the sciences, maths, world languages, arts, history, educators must be  infusing the importance skill of flexibility and adaptability!  "Only people who have the knowledge and skills to negotiate constant change and reinvent themselves for new situations will succeed." (Kay,year? pg. xvii) Sadly, Kay comments how these 21st century skills such as, innovation, creativity, critical thinking and problem solving are rarely incorporated into daily instruction.

Sheer rote memory based learning may get students good grades in grade-school and even up to college, but according to Kay, those skills will not make a student successful. John Bransford, the coauthor of "How people learn" believes that rigor is not based in sharp memory or ability to regurgitate information said to students thousands of times, rather  the application " However, in the 21st century, the true test of  rigor is for students to be able to look at material they've never seen before and know what to do with it." ( Kay, year? pg. xxiv)


Lastly, Kay retells a conversation from a manager at Apple about expectations of the workers, "any employee who needs to be managed is no longer employable." (Kay, year?, pg. xxi)

Bottom line, we want students who KNOW how to think not WHAT to think!

How thick is your immigrant accent? Or are you seen as a native?

I'm hybrid Immigrant-Native. As I was reading through Prensky's essay "Digital Natives Digital Immigrants, I could see many immigrant and natives aspects within myself.

This article was written in 2001, 13 years ago. I can remember my family getting our first Gateway computer, the size of a mini fridge, with the cow pattern on the box. I can hear the dial-up, the hours spent on instant message.And  I  can also remember NO technology in the classroom. The closet thing to technology would be informative movies made in the 80's, that usually put me to sleep.

Yes, I do have some reservations on the impact technology has on the youth. I see students have difficulties sitting still or are easily distracted. There must always be stimulation and that multi-tasking can be detrimental for students concentration. "Today's average college grad have spent less than 5,00 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours playing video games(not to mention 20,000 hours watching TV.)" (Prensky, 2001, pg. 1) KEEP IN MIND this was 13 years ago! This fact was startling.

The only thing consistent is change, thus teachers must be ever vigilant and active in the changes taking place in the society and the classroom.  I teach at a Catholic school, we could call it an "Immigrant school" because I have two outlets in the whole classroom. I don't think the nuns were anticipating a Smartboard, a TV, mini net books...etc...So, there is a prime example of the shift of having "natives" stuck in an "immigrants" class room. Within my school, I have many immigrants and many natives, it's apparent who are the immigrants, "ah how do I sign on, I don't know how to edit my wiki..., I'll just sent a parent letter home." These are frequent comments from immigrant teachers.


The students of today are a much different audience of even 7 years ago, "they have little patience for lectures, step-by-step- logic, and tell-test" instruction." (Prensky, 2001, pg. 3) In order to reach the students we must be able to speak their language to some degree, not to become one of them but to be aware of these changes and be willing to adapt.

While teachers are adjusting to the new styles and methodologies to communicate to our "native" students, the "legacy" content stays in tact, students are still receiving important and traditional content. I suppose this is where the "immigrant" teacher can feel comfortable, by teaching the truths but in a way that the students will grasp. The art of teaching is all in the presentation of material. In personal experience, if I'm about to teach a necessary topic that may be challenging or even "dry" I try to hype it up for them and show that everything is important. As educators, be it immigrant or native, we must be receptive to our environment and be willing to adapt, because only the strongest will survive!

Using Social Web as a Learning tool

Network literate is teaching students to not only know how to use the tools to publish but to be able to form strong, trusting and respectful connections. Teachers have the duty and responsibility to model the shifts in this new collaborative net-work based learning.

From personal experience, I use the web as an "interest based" (Richardson, 288)  function, I connect with those who share the same interests. I have learned and implemented countless activities in my daily instruction from other teachers insight. For example, I've watched youtube videos on how to make día de los muertos  cake pops as skulls for a class activity!Network literate allows students to understand how to use global knowledge that is readily available.

 As for Nelson's case, "the Web is no longer as "read only" technology, that we now have a read/write relationship with other users." (Richardson, p. 288). People, communities are connecting, sharing and collaborating, we are now participants. The web has turned this information exchange from a passive one to an active one. Richards states that we are are contributors who participate in this effort to make knowledge more readily available. We have to teach our students skills and strategies to digest the knowledge and synthesize it all so that they can learn from it. 

Interestingly enough, Richardson states we must " look for those with whom we can learn and trust in the virtual sense absent the typical physical space cues and interactions to which we are accustomed. (p.292)

 The web opens to doors to vast amounts of information where as in the past was only done through newspapers, currently we can tap into "the wisdom of the community" which are ways to retrieve more reliable and someone we can trust.  Teachers could help students answer these questions, "when do we email someone instead of comment? Do we create a video response? How do we disagree in appropriate ways?" 

Tom Carroll  declares, "The stark differences between ways we approach the learning process inside the walls as compared to online are pushing schools and classrooms toward a sense of irrelevance....we must recognize that schools and classrooms are becoming nodes in networked learning communities." (2000).

This quote was 14 years ago, this quote clearly states the struggle for adjusting with the new and now. Gathering and sharing information has radically changed; we must adapt to ensure we are moving forward and not staying stagnant.