Professional Development!

We had a great discussion in the middle of all the humor at the TechPodZone this past week. It made me think about so many of our schools' mission statements and/or goals. I made a statement in the show about many teachers being hypocritical about creating life long learners. Many of these teachers are not life long learners themselves. They come to school, deliver their lessons, and go home.

I believe connecting to other educators with similar passions for their classroom can spark that original love for teaching. I have learned so much from my connections through podcasting and other online events. I do love to learn and look forward to listening to the new podcasts and checking my bloglines everyday.

One of the tools I love most are podcasts of conferences where the presenter is leading discussions. It makes you feel like you are right there. That is why I am looking forward to this year's K12 Online Conference. I hope to share this event with as many educators as possible.

Hope to see you there! I'll be the one sitting in the recliner couch with his feet up!

Got to get back into it!

It's been hard to get back into the blogs and podcasts this year. I don't know why. I guess I need to just start. I have a few tools to share with you. Of course you can hear all about these over at the TechPodzone.

If you are using a PC to display information on a screen then you need ZoomIt. It is free software that can zoom you in and around the screen. It's great for older staff! You can use it to draw with as well.

I also started to use Slide. It is another online slide show creator. I like this because it is easy to use and you can embed it in your wiki. Wikispaces has been upgraded and Slide is a choice for embedding. They make it so easy.

Check out our classroom wiki and our teacher in service wiki. I use these tools everyday now to share with our staff all of the great tools out there. Don't be shy, let me know what you think or what you use.

First Day of a New School Year!

Today we sat there just like every other year. Listening to the different school constituents pump us up for another year. At first I kept thinking about the past 26 times I sat here and how much each year seemed the same.

Then I started thinking about all of the new teachers and what it must be like for them. The sense of not knowing what to expect from this day and being nervous about tomorrow.

I was fortunate to be able to work directly with all of the new teachers last week. I spent a whole day giving them laptops, resources, and encouragement. I also took the opportunity to discuss the new web 2.0 resources and mindset with them.

I realized that I had a lot of work to do! When I asked them if they had ever heard of a wiki not a one raised their hand. We had a mixture of new and veteran teachers.

We will get them!

This year I look forward to my classroom wiki. We will be wiki centric! Check it out and follow along as my class begins another wiki year!