So, what’s new in SD?

As I’m reading through the many comments on this week’s topic and catching up with others, I’m reminded of how much of an impression TTL made on me about 7 years ago. I remember the awe I felt at the possibilities for technology in our schools and the responsibility I felt as an educator to make sure I was in the forefront of knowing enough to keep up. Then DTL and WebCT came along two years later — these seemed to be mostly for HS teachers, I felt, so I didn’t pursue finding anything more interesting for a long time. Maybe I fell behind, maybe there just wasn’t anything new being offered to us teachers, nothing with any sense of training for something new and exciting to get my attention, at least.

With this class and a couple of others that are now being offered through TIE, I’ve found that sense of excitement for new things, technologies I’m not familiar with, and challenges to my thinking about how to incorporate these in the school. Thank you TIE!!!! Please keep this up, because I firmly believe that teachers need to be trained (and cajoled, sometimes) in ways to use new technologies. We need to be shown how to do things, just as we try to show our students how. I know that reading it out of a book or having someone tell me how to do something doesn’t work for me at all. I also love the freedom of the online format with it’s asynchronous learning, so thank you TIE for that also.

The experiences have mostly been very positive, although the time it took to make sure I had all the updated versions was more than I anticipated. Thank goodness for the help I received.

I realize now that blogs and wikis and even podcasts have a place in my teaching, so I need to learn more and just make them become a part of my reality. I also realize that I can go back to WebCT and find ways of using that again as a protected space to work in with my students. Lastly, I realize how wonderful it has been to be exposed to the variety of students in this class and to be allowed to listen to, as well as interact with, their ideas, thoughts & plans about these technologies.

As to incorporating these things in my everyday life, just this morning I found a new RSS feed to add to my list of 25 feeds and unsubscribed myself from the email newsletter. I like that!!!!