Skip to main content

It's All About The Learning

Chromebooks, tablets, smartphones, laptops, desktops. There is so much to choose from for a blended learning classroom. How does a teacher begin to figure out which one is best?
For starters, it definitely helps to have a knowledgeable and accessible director of technology. My director of technology, after listening to my blended learning ideas, decided that Chromebooks would probably be the best option for my sixth grade class. And after the first several weeks, I like the decision he made. The students, who are beginners with the Chromebooks, are starting to use them with ease now. The students are up and running in no time, and with no help from me. So, there is that "independence light" at the end of the tunnel that I was wondering if I would ever see after the second week. The students will get there, and probably much faster than one may think.

It is easy to become excited picking a device. It is easy to become wrapped up in the device that was chosen and read about all the things it is capable of. It is easy to start planning elaborate lessons with the new classroom tool. It is easy to see its drawbacks when starting out, too. It is also easy to become lost of what the true intent of that device is. Whatever the device, it must always be all about the learning. No matter how many bells and whistles it has, it must always come back to the learning. If one loses sight of that, no device will work.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

K.I.S.S.

Third week into the blended learning classroom and I felt pretty good with how things were going. Still a little messy. Still some bellyflops. But overall I was happy with the progression. Then, specials happened. This cut my class time down from 70 minutes to 50 minutes. Just when there was a flow starting to occur, I was forced to try to figure out the best approach to run the stations with a shortened class. I knew the day we would have specials would mean shortened class times. So it was not a surprise to me, but somehow that day just snuck up. What I discovered in trying to figure out the best approach for that day, turned out to be the best approach for every day. I ended up simplifying the stations and rotations, which made for a much more efficient class and positive comments from my students. I took that simplified approach into the rest of the week, and things really started to take off like I had been envisioning since last year. All I had to do was just keep things si...
Post a Comment
Read more

Why I Left the Classroom for Administration

"So there looks like there might be an opportunity for you." At the time when I heard this, I was literally in the middle of having my best teaching year. My sixth grade blended learning classroom was going better than I could ever have imagined. I was "teaching like a PIRATE," engaging and empowering my students, making learning relevant and meaningful to them, learning along side of my students every day, watching them get that love for learning back, and getting to know my students better than ever. And yet, a career opportunity came up that made me leave all of that. Why I Thought Left When I was told, "So there looks like there might be an opportunity for you," I knew it was to step in as acting elementary principal for another principal in my district who needed to take a leave of absence. I did not know how long it would be, but I knew I had to take it. Opportunities like these do not come along often, and if I wanted to take the next step in ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Flipping Out for Faculty Meetings

This year my classroom grew from about 25 students to about 665 students, as I made the transition from sixth grade teacher to elementary principal. It has been an exciting and enjoyable transition. It has also been interesting being on the other side of things. For example, being on the other side of faculty meetings. September's faculty meeting I did the traditional approach. Scheduled it. Sent out an email reminder. Met with the faculty and started going over what I needed to say, offering very little time for discussion. But then I did change things up about half way through. I introduced our district's Google Expedition VR kits. I took them on a few virtual reality field trips and showed them how they could be used with any subject. Then before I knew it, it was time for the students to arrive. As I prepared for my October faculty meeting, I thought about how I introduced the teachers to the Google Expeditions VR kits and how teachers in grades 3, 5, and 6 used tho...
Post a Comment
Read more