Not on Twitter?!?! Let's Get Started with Twitter 101!

I find Twitter to be one of the best communication and collaboration tools out there. My PLN has grown to hundreds of educators around the world, and they share with me, on a daily basis, new ideas, articles, and thoughts on education. While I feel comfortable on Twitter, I know many people do not, so I created a video with Screencast-o-Matic and EDPuzzle to help people get started with the mechanics of Twitter and reflect on how they will use this incredible social media platform. If you have questions, I'd be glad to share what I love about Twitter, so follow me on Twitter and let's engage in some EdTalk!

On Being a 21st Century Educator

Teaching in the 21st century has many advantages. Multiple technologies make possible what was impossible twenty-five years ago, when I was a student at the same school where I now teach. Although the technology is faster, better, and more innovative than when I roamed the halls of Mt. St. Joseph, teaching itself is not incredibly different. To me, being a 21st century educator and innovator means a focus on one thing: choice.

In the above clip from Jurassic Park, Dr. Malcolm laments over technology becoming blinding to the point that scientists do things just because they can instead of asking whether they should. If we replace the word "scientists" with "teachers," my views on 21st century education are perfectly summed up by Dr. Malcolm. There is so much technology at our disposal as teachers that many teachers use tech just because it is there and they can. These teachers do not exercise their ability to choose.

Teaching, as always, relies on pedagogy and content. What you want your students to learn, understand, and synthesize is still paramount. True, there are many tech tools that can help streamline material and make it more flavorful for our students. There is tech that makes teachers' lives easier and more efficient. But it is incumbent upon each teacher to choose only that tech that complements a lesson, a unit, or a project. Using a Google product, or YouTube, or an app simply to flout one's use of technology can be damaging and self-defeating. 

Being the best 21st century educator possible means knowing your content, understanding the myriad ways your students best learn, and then applying thoughtful, appropriate technologies, when it best serves the educator and, most importantly, the students. Educators have powerful tools at their disposal, but the most important technology choice is whether to use it at all or not. Only when the technology supports and facilitates learning should it be applied.

In this respect, teaching has not changed much since I was a student. What has changed is what technology is available -- and on a grand scale. More than ever, a teacher must understand his students and his courses and understand what technology helps make his students better learners. With this mentality, focusing on choice, a teacher can wield technology confidently, helping students become more collaborative, allowing students the freedom to express themselves more creative, guiding students to think more critically, and have students communicate more effectively.

#ETCoaches Blog Challenge Post #1: Reflection & Connection

The Awakening

I began the school year with a hope not to just innovate in the classroom, but to share what I was doing with as many people as possible. I restarted an old blog; THIS was going to be the year I was consistent with it!

School began; I began trying new lessons, assessments, and projects. I began a grad school program in EdTech. And my blog began collecting cobwebs. Then, on September 8, I woke up and saw this on Twitter:

That simple question re-energized the passion with which I began my blog. So here it goes again. I don't want perfection. I do want to share with others, receive feedback, and collaborate. I have two main goals for TeachDMD.com: reflection and connection.

I want to use the blog to reflect on my own practice, not just through relating my successes and failures but through communicating with others who read it. My own reflection hits walls without the fresh perspective of my PLN members. I'm hoping they help me break through these walls to take my practices higher and higher. 

This is where connection comes into play. I hope my blog reaches as many other educators as possible so they can share their wisdom, experience, and suggestions with me. I'm hoping I can help others learn something new as I learn from others.

As I begin my EdTech grad program, I also hope I can collect many thoughts here about EdTech in education, my philosophies on EdTech, and reviews of products, apps, and information related to my program. I hope I can connect with other EdTech educators who will be able to help me learn new technologies in an effort to help my students reach their potentials.

Beyond EdTech readers, I hope to connect with other English instructors who, like me, introduce EdTech into their lessons, where applicable and innovative. I teach British Lit, World Lit, and African American Lit, and I love the creativity and passion with which my students approach the stories, novels, poems, and essays that we study.

The Bottom Line

Simply put, I want to reflect and connect in an attempt to better myself, to learn and grow throughout the year with the help of others. Thanks to Penny Christensen and the #ETCoaches group, I hope to discover many like-minded educators and make this a terrific year!

Cherishing Simplicity

The summer before I left for college, I celebrated my eighteenth birthday. Like most 18-year-olds, I am almost certain I thought I was the biggest deal on earth. Becoming an adult, leaving for college...I had it all. After the family and friends had been welcomed, the hot dogs and burgers (so skillfully prepared by my dad; a different done-ness for each person, just as they preferred it) consumed, the ice cream and cake demolished, it was time for opening gifts.

When it was time for my sister Christine, age 9, to give me her gift, she walked up to me, an air of anticipation and love around her. She presented me a small box, clearly and painstakingly wrapped by her, and she just watched me as I opened it. I discovered this:

I had no clue what it was. 

She then told me she had spent her own money and bought it for me at the yearly neighborhood yard sale down the street from our house. 

"It's for you to put your paper clips in at school."

To this day, I hope I didn't display any facial expressions that exposed my confusion or skepticism. True to form (even to this day), Christine had chosen for me a gift from the heart and given it to me full of confidence that I could use it exactly as she foresaw. It didn't matter that it only cost five cents; what mattered was the love flowing from her face.

I bring up this anecdote because school begins in full force tomorrow. Too often I (and I would assume countless other teachers) feel like I need to be perfect in what I offer my students. Yet, inevitably, I will fail. I will forget to attach a document to Google Classroom; I will spend an extra day grading when I wanted to have their work back ASAP; I will get sick and miss a day of school. 

At our school, we follow five Xaverian charisms: Trust; Compassion; Zeal; Humility; and Simplicity.

Christine's gift was a perfect model of Simplicity. She gave me a gift from her heart, paid for from her own money, because she was certain her gift would aid me in my studies at college. She didn't worry about what I or others would think; she didn't compare her gift to others. She just gave what she could, based on a hopeful idea that it would make me happy.

This mentality is what I want to give my students this year. One of my goals for the year is to improve communication and relationships with students. While I might not always be perfect for them, I can always strive to give them all I can in the hopes that it will make their day. If I adhere to this mentality, I think I will have an edu-win on my hands. I don't need to be perfect to give all I have in my heart to my students.

And to always keep Christine's lesson in mind, I'll just have to look at my desk to see this, a wonderfully simple reminder of a young sister's love for her brother:

When Disconnecting Means a Better Connection

It seems odd to be discussing disconnecting in my first post on a blog dedicated to edtech. Everything nowadays revolves around apps, social media, and plugging in. And I’ve followed this trend, as much as one can.

And maybe that’s why I’ve felt so burdened and ineffective as a teacher and a person.

A few months ago, I decided I was going to focus all my attention to trying new things this school year, to pushing envelopes, to innovating. Early this month, I joined a Google+ community of like-minded educators in reading George Couros’ The Innovator’s Mindset, and my biggest takeaway was this, to paraphrase George: it’s not innovation unless it is both better and new. This repeated mantra made me reflect on my own attempts at what I liked to call “innovation.” This reflection made me face an ugly reality; I wasn’t innovating as much as regurgitating, though my digital presence made me feel like I was doing something different.

This needed to change. Stat.

So I took inventory of my doings. And what I found was unpleasant. The most vile of my activities was Facebook. Comparing how I used Facebook and Twitter, I saw two different people. Twitter Me was more thoughtful, posted relevant and helpful information, and truly sought to connect with others in a mature, effective way.

Facebook Me, on the other hand, always wanted the apt witticism; memes were tossed out without thought or purpose, in many cases. And, oh, all the snark. That needed to be reined in. Add to this the miasma that is Facebook lately: the vicious, hateful comments; the ridiculous updates where my “friends” knew I wouldn’t copy/paste their statuses because such a small percentage of people were good/strong/courageous enough to do so; the constant one-upmanship. I was tired, oh so tired, of the pissing contests. And this doesn’t even count the current political climate on Facebook!

Something needed to change, and that was me. If I truly wanted my classroom and my life to be better and new, I needed to get outside of my comfort zone. I needed to scare myself. And leaving Facebook has been an anxious event. I won’t lie, I sometimes wonder if I am missing some critical post or picture or invite. But you know, if any of those things are important to me, they will find their way to me in other ways. I am confident that these feelings will pass, in time; it’s simply a form of withdrawal that this addict needs to work through. Filling my time with more meaningful pursuits will lessen this anxiety.

My goal is to connect, with family, friends, students, and colleagues, in more traditional, meaningful ways. Facebook was neither traditional nor meaningful for me anymore, if it ever was. I want to think about what I write before I click send. I want to look someone in the eye to wish them a happy birthday. I want to call and ask my friends about their lives. I want to engage again. While Facebook did allow me to connect to those outside my geographical area, that simply isn’t a good enough reason to withstand the bombardment of filth that the rest of Facebook is to me.

Engagement. Honest. New. Better. These are the words that are driving my new journey to innovation. In coming weeks, I will share with you my ideas, goals, and aspirations for my classroom and my world. Many of these will be connected (no pun intended) to edtech, but at the heart of all of them will be true, honest interactions with others. I feel a burden off my shoulders already. I’m breathing easier, not feeling the tug to check my phone every five minutes for the next update, the next picture, the next waste of time. There is too much to do without frittering away my time.

Thanks for reading; talk with you soon.