Last Days of Summer
I broke the seal, the teacher’s summer seal: today I set foot in my classroom. These next few days should be all about squeezing the last bit of relaxation out of summer; yet, from this point on my uncounted thoughts are focused on new students, new schedules, new curriculum... There is no turning back from this point; my vaccation is officially over.
Walking into that classroom, I felt overwhelmed. Four blank walls. Each year starts tabula rasa, a clean slate. It takes imagination to envision your classroom, it takes intelligence to plan it. Desks are lined back up, teacher supplies stored away, and posters bulletin boards redecorated for a new year. I've accounted for the physical space. It's the learning environment that will take more time to co-construct with my students.
What do I want my classroom to become this year?
Wikis lend themselves towards collaboration. My student wiki will be reserved as a workspace and showroom for group projects. This is my answer to the group being unable to present because their work was saved on the personal drive of a student absent that day. Additionally, I hope to appeal to the students' multi-modal needs. I've already started a teacher wiki intranet to promote horizontal and vertical content articulation. This upcomming year I'll train a handful of teachers. Together we'll use the wiki to collaborate grade level benchmarks.
Blogging is a great tool for writing personal responses. I imagine myself posting reading questions as the blog, and students responding through the comments feature. The EduBlog space may not be as robust as a phpBB style discussion board, but it is certainly much more flexible. I need to explore the EduBlog before I ultimately decide how it will function in my virtual classroom.
Walking into that classroom, I felt overwhelmed. Four blank walls. Each year starts tabula rasa, a clean slate. It takes imagination to envision your classroom, it takes intelligence to plan it. Desks are lined back up, teacher supplies stored away, and posters bulletin boards redecorated for a new year. I've accounted for the physical space. It's the learning environment that will take more time to co-construct with my students.
What do I want my classroom to become this year?
I have an advanced plan for Lucy Calkins’ Units of Study for 6th-8th grades thanks to joining the Teachers College Reading & Writing Project this past summer. The programs' strength lays in well planned writing lessons and sequencing of units. I'll need to adjust my current teaching style to accomodate this new approach.
Wikis lend themselves towards collaboration. My student wiki will be reserved as a workspace and showroom for group projects. This is my answer to the group being unable to present because their work was saved on the personal drive of a student absent that day. Additionally, I hope to appeal to the students' multi-modal needs. I've already started a teacher wiki intranet to promote horizontal and vertical content articulation. This upcomming year I'll train a handful of teachers. Together we'll use the wiki to collaborate grade level benchmarks.
Blogging is a great tool for writing personal responses. I imagine myself posting reading questions as the blog, and students responding through the comments feature. The EduBlog space may not be as robust as a phpBB style discussion board, but it is certainly much more flexible. I need to explore the EduBlog before I ultimately decide how it will function in my virtual classroom.
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1 Comments:
Sounds good, Joe! Keep me posted on how it goes!
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