fenelon

http://coolcatteacher.blogspot.com/ 11/04/2007

"Never mind that we're exhausted and have a thousand reasons to go on autopilot. We have 20 or 30 reasons sitting right in front of us to put all of our heart into today... bright shiny faces who need to know how to live."

This idea is so good for us, as teachers and prospective teachers, to hear, as many times as necessary. Having just gone to the Illinois Council of the Teaching of Foreign Languages this last weekend, I heard a very similar message. The keynote speaker at the conference had the aim to motivate the foreign languages teachers to  never lose heart or passion for the students or the language. Seeing the speaker's own commitment and passion inspired me so much, and I felt like that speech was the best of the entire conference. Yes, teaching is challenging and reaquires a ton of time and planning. That's why it's good to be reminded every now and again the reason that we do it! For the love of the students, and the love of the game. The more we can do to motivate and encourage one another as educators, the better.

http://weblogg-ed.com/2007/supplementing-my-kids-education/

Supplementing My Kids' Education  

"As I've said numerous times, it feels like my children are being fairly well prepared for a world that is already past, not the much more "hyperconnected, hypertransparent" world that is their future."

Although this statement is blatantly true, I had, surprisingly, never before considered it. If we do not teach our students to be interactive with technology, we are not adequately preparing them for the future. This is becoming more true, as time goes on and more technology, including "everyday use" technology becomes more advanced and widespread. It has come to the point where ignoring our responsibilities to employ in the classroom/teach ways to use technology might be comparable to ignoring our responsibilities to teach students math. Bravo to those encouraging the use of educational technology, and education in technology.

http://durffsblog.blogspot.com/ "Stifling Our Learners' Voices" 10/06/2007

"The all powerful IT departments are no longer keeping us connected but censoring where we go."
I completely agree here. Instead of pretending as though certain types of websites don't exist, it would be better to inform our students how to effectively navigate around the stuff they should avoid, and get to the stuff they should be seeing. However, if the latter is censored with the former, the students learn nothing of either. Students, like you said, already have their connections outside of school. The focus should now be to teach responsibility and safety.

October 09, 2007

 http://wedderburn-college.blogspot.com/2007/08/our-new-project-being-green.html

"My idea was to create a connection with a school overseas and to develop a problem based project that used the Intel online Thinking with Technology tools"

-Anne Baird

I was excited to read this blog entry for two reasons: the first is that I myself am a Green and think it is incredibly important to be stressing to students the dangers of neglecting our responsibilites in terms of trying to keep our planet clean, and so on. The second reason is that as a future French teacher, who is looking for ways to incorporate exciting technology into my future classroom, I am happy to see students connecting with people overseas. Something like this could be extremely valuable in a foreign language classroom, giving students the opportunity to communicate or speak directly with native language speakers, in my case, French. I really like the idea of using technology like this to gain perspective about how people in other countries view and deal with the same issues that we ourselves deal with. I feel that this promotes a sort of connection with other peoples, and that this will allow the students to identify with a culture about which they might have thought they knew very little. To sum, your new project sounds like a terrific one.

Our Classrooms Are Leaking

http://davidwarlick.com/2cents/2007/08/27/our-classrooms-are-leaking/

"These tentacles that have sprouted from our children are not visible.  We can't see them.  They can't see them.  But they are a part of our children.  They are the hands and feet that take our children where they want to go.  And they enter our classrooms, and we chop their tentacles off...

...because we want our children to be the students we want to teach,
rather than teaching the children that they are."

Very important idea, excellent points made. It is difficult, even today, to find a middle school, high school, or even college student who is not connected to some type of social network, whether it be Facebook, Myspace, etc. And what kid doesn't have a cell phone or iPod? Extracurricular technology is coming into the classroom, whether welcomed or not. To ignore or ban these feats of technology and phenonmenons of social connectivity is difficult, but will only become increasingly difficult. I think that instead of trying to cut off the "tentacles", maybe instead we should grow a few ourselves to find out how they work and what good use they can be put to. Technology used in this way should be viewed as an opportunity. Students will always come up with new, inventive ways to cheat and frustrate teachers, but maybe if we know what we're up against, we can be better prepared.