Monday, July 27, 2009

Teacher PD Days

Yesterday I ran a session on Social Media and English teaching. It was largely a intro for many of the people present, but it appeared to be worthwhile.

We covered Twitter, Blogs, Wikis, Facebook and Nings. We finished the session by creating a private Ning for our group of teachers - and overnight I was comforted by the quick use of the site. As the creator, I received emails at different stages over the hours since the session detailing the addition of questions, photos, videos and responses.

In short - Nings are great!

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Inspiring Change over Depression

Perhaps it is that last week of a long term talking - but how is one to inspire change in a school where you are battling a large group of 'status quo' adherents. I do not doubt that I am alone in my depression regarding this but it does seem to be an uphill task to change the system to actually encourage real learning as opposed to doing the same old thing.

Okay - depression over, the task ahead includes the following goals:

1. Demonstrate and get teachers involved in social media (explaining Twitter, blogging, Facebook and their uses).
2. Completing and sharing my computer games unit for Year 9 English students.
3. Work with other staff to create a great and rich cross-curricula project for 2010.
4. Ensure our tech heavy English classes are ready to go for all teachers (podcasting, video, animation and game creation all are happening in different years next term!).

Anyone want to give me some advice on these simple tasks?