Bigger, Stronger, Faster

Unlike The 6 Million Dollar Man, teachers weren't offered a way to become stronger and awesome after a near death experience, we have to figure it out for ourselves. As I work to plan this year at a new and very tiny school, begin my doctoral degree and move to a small town out west, I've been thinking a lot about how we connect to each other.

For one of my doctoral classes, I've been asked to create Google+ and Twitter accounts. Because I am a good student and always looking to learn, I have opened them and started to explore. Those accounts, especially Twitter got me thinking. How can we best use technology in our classrooms?

I'm all for using technology to connect with students and help them to learn and become prepared for the future, I will admit however that Twitter bothers me. From what I understand, anyone can follow anyone else. There is no way to keep worlds separate
(assuming you are a constant Tweeter).

That being said I encourage exploration in the world of technology, you never really know what the best way to help a student may be!

Educators should be like Olympians

Before the Olympics began in July, I watched Oprah's special on some of our most famous Olympians. Carl Lewis said that striving for less than excellence is unacceptable...and I think he is onto something.

Our world continues to berate teachers and the education system for being poor. We are, overall, a fairly poor system because not all of us strive for excellence in the classroom. I do not believe, however, that the lack of excellence is because of a lack of desire. I believe it is because of a lack of confidence, support, and preparedness. I realize many of us spend hours upon hours preparing but we are often reworking the same thing instead of working on something new. In order to achieve excellence we must make the leap into new territory, whether that involves new texts, new styles of teaching or a new way of gathering references.

This year I will start a new job in a very tiny district with little budget on which to survive. My challenges will be many, including structuring a classroom for only two students, teaching English to students from 5th to 12th grade and bringing in new frames of reference and materials for my normally remote and somewhat sheltered students. I am lucky to have the support from friends and family who willingly purchased new texts for my classroom. People outside of the classroom really do play a role in improving the world of education, whether they know it or not. Just like Olympians have support systems to help them become the best, educators need support systems to become excellent.

Add your friends and family to your toolbox and see what you can accomplish with a little help. Share new text titles with friends, sign up for an educator blog, check out DonorsChoose.org, visit Teachers Pay Teachers, use ReadWriteThink.org, read new magazines, watch shows the kids enjoy and listen to their music on occasion. You never know what you can use successfully in the classroom until you are willing to explore the routes open to you. Sometimes the seemingly obscure is what you've been looking for all along.

Ending up

The year has finally ended and this has been the hardest of my career to date. I do realize that it will likely not remain that way forever. I made it and the teachers in the trenches seem to have made it as well. As we go forward, at least in the state of Texas, we have new standards to process as well as new TEKS in some of our core areas. I look forward to the summer with friends and family. This is my time to refill my proverbial cup and I'm excited about it. In a couple of weeks a friend and I will be traveling to Florida for a workshop with English teachers. We already have plans for things we'd like to plan while on our road trip - among those plans we want to write some new songs for the classroom. In the fall I will begin my doctoral degree in Reading and I am very excited. I hope to one day become a professor and teach the next generation of teachers. The best way for a novice teacher to learn, aside from being thrust into the classroom, is to learn from other teachers. The way I figure it, if I can teach at least five novice teachers to teach in the way I know it should be done then I've reached hundreds more students than I ever could on my own. For the summer, refill your cup but also read and learn. If we stop learning then we ultimately stop teaching. New things and ways in the classroom are not evil - they are required to keep our students engaged and help them to learn and retain. If you have not yet seen "Waiting for Superman", rent it now! Enjoy the summer and I hope to post more regularly when school begins again.