The skype conference George gave us on tuesday, february 8th was very impressive. He is a very knowledgeable person and his passion for learning and technology is very recognizable.
I was blown away with how he was talking about students in his school in grade 3 were using blogs as a way of learning from each other and reflecting about what they had learned. That impressed me alot. Blogging is a very unique way of sharing information, thoughts and ideas, I think every classroom teacher should definitely include them in their classes.
What I thought was very interesting is that the world is a ever changing place, so why aren't the schools? He said he wanted his school to be the best school, and by the sounds of the way he incorporates technology in the classroom, he is well ahead of others. I really agree with that statement if the world is based around technology, then why aren't we doing this in schools? No wonder kids are getting bored by reading a text book, they go home in the evening and do everything online or on a computer, go to school and is forced to read a 15 year old book. We as teacher's need to get with the "times" and start using every possible resource of information possible to keep things interested. If you get comfortable in education thats definitely a bad thing, everything is always changing around us, so we need to adapt and get with it.
The use of technology always people to be closer and more efficient. This is in regards to george's comment with how talked to this one principal on twitter for 8 months and then did a presentation with a guy that he never ever talked to face to face but it felt like he knew him his whole life, if it wasn't for technology that would never be possible. I think its very interesting how we can learn from peopl from other countries through skype, blogs, any social media applications with the click of a mouse.
I feel if the funding and the technology is their in my classroom I will definitely be attempting to use all the stuff I have learned about ICT and use it for teaching my children, to keep them engaged, make learning FUN, and to make my job more interesting.
GET with the TIMES PPL!
Nathan Corrigal
Very cool observation Nathan. You would be surprised at how quickly we connect and can learn from "strangers". I think that one of the coolest things is that when you do connect with people that have blogs, you seem to know them better than you do many of the people that you work with. They are open and honest with their intentions and you can easily connect.
ReplyDeleteGood luck as you begin your teaching career. The access you have to great ideas is amazing; take advantage of it.