2009 is my hope for 2010

Of course this time is a great time to be reflective and figure out if 2009 was a good year or the one that I will slip away quietly. There were many events that I found about 2009 to be personally rewarded.


Feeling closer to my network: This was the latest addition, but one I felt should top the list. I am truly blessed to have a wonderful network of people that I can learn from everyday.


Article about Grants: The unexpected surprise of someone outside of my school and PLN finding out about my plans to bring new technology to the school. The best part was that students were the focus of the reporter and photographer. They were the whole reason for all of that work.


Finishing Grad School: The other day I realized that I earned three degrees in one decade. I can't say that I found all of the answers in formal education, but it did give me a great foundation to be a reflective educator.


Becoming the Tech Liaison: This has been a great lesson in leadership and learning about the needs of my school.


ISTE 2010 Acceptance Email: This was an amazing surprise since I never expected to have my first proposal accepted. What was even better was that PLN bud Ken Shelton brought up the idea of working on a proposal during a rough tech moment at my school and helped me through the whole process. The icing on the cake is having an amazing panel to converse with during ISTE '10.


The Last NECC Conference: It was local this time which made it a different experience than San Antonio. I had the best of both worlds by spending more time with those I rarely get to see in my district and from across the country.


The Last MICCA Conference: At the time I didn't know this would be the last one due to the name change to MSET. It was a perfect ending because it was my best experience at MICCA. Of course it was the people that made it a cloud nine experience. I am so grateful to have a local sect of my PLN that give me the courage to push my own limits.


Powering Up with Technology: While I can't say this has been highlight in my presenting experience, there were some definite highlights! Spending a day with my favorite techies, supporting a new presenter, and seeing Aaron Smith, the Art Guy, win a netbook only to rid it of Windows XP was worth it.


DEN Leadership Council: This is still a work in progress, but a great lesson on being a member of a group.




The best part about all of these events is that they make me excited for 2010. I like the idea of a fresh start and new adventures. While I spent days trying to find an inspiring ending to this post and 2009, I think I will borrow the words from my High School/Facebook friend Scott:

My resolution for 2010 is to let no day this year go wasted. I hope all the people close to me find a little bit of happiness in every day of the year and on some days a lot.

I <3 Grants!

Like most educators during this part of year there is a combination of the desire for the year to come to an end and reflection. This year I had to add an element to my end-of-the-year routine and that was finishing grant requirements. Even this post is me avoiding the four more lessons that I have to finish for my grant that got me a set of clickers. I was proud that I sent in my invoices and wrote my article for my MICCA grant that funded video cameras for my 8th graders to tryout the AFI curriculum. I am extremely grateful that the Best Buy grant has no additional required elements. 

While I realize that grants are a lot of work, I also realized that I love grants! Of course free money is a plus when a new era of spending freezes and budget cuts, but that is not the main reason why I love grants so much. Everytime I applied for a  new grant this year it caused to me evaluate the needs of my classroom and the school. The grant writing process forced me to develop innovative projects that would stand out in piles of other application. Most of all winning the grant has forced me to work on the project. I'll admit that I am one of those that come up with a million ideas, but only really work on a few. I learned so much by having to do my ideas and to make them work.

Well I couldn't stop with the end of the school year. Right now I am waiting out the last two days of voting on the We Are Teachers Summer Learning Microgrant. This has been a totally different experience because I had to enlist help from my PLN, students, colleagues, and anyone I could think of to get enough votes to stay in the top 10. The compeitive side of me wants to win just because, but more importantly I look forward to doing this project. I still have hope for my staff entering the 21st century and I keeping trying new things to bring them on board. If you get a chance check out the site please do so. Even if you vote for another project, you are supporting a great idea by a lot of great teachers.

Becoming a 7th grader again

In my school, I teach technology integration to 6th,7th, and 8th graders. I lovingly call my seventh graders, "the pod students." See in sixth grade the kids are sweet, eager to learn, and down right scared about the middle school experience. Eighth graders are more mellow, some taller than me, and are looked up to as the cool kids of the building. Then there are the seventh graders with their constant mood swings, their intellect, and their stupidity. Follow one and you may see laughing, crying, fighting, and laughing again within an hour. Most of the time they don't know why they make the decisions they do and they lack long-term focus. Of course this is my own observations and has little to do with solid research.

So, you may wonder what is the point of all of this?

I feel like I am leading the life of a seventh grader these day when it comes to my career. There are these incredible lows where nothing seems to be going right and then the incredible highs where everything seems to be falling into place. The highs of last week were great with winning the Best Buy grant and getting all of my proposals accepted for the MICCA conference. I wasn't as happy as I thought I would be when my principal gave me kudos about the grant at the faculty meeting. At one point I was looking onward to another job, but am the happiest when I am teaching in my room. For awhile I decided not to push technology anymore in my school and now I am working on two projects. It seems like utter chaos right now which probably means I am growing up a little bit.

I don't know where this is headed, but my hope is that I will morph into a cool tech leader.

Birds of a Feather...

There is nothing like being in a group of tech-savvy educators. The excitement of sharing ideas and working through challenges is better high than any drug (not that I have experience in that area). I have had the honor of meeting so many innovative educators through the Discovery Network, Google Certified Educators Group, and Plurk and have learned so much in such a short period of time. Today was an opportunity to work with the top dogs in my district and I am still on a positive high.

It was a half day meeting, but I chose not to go my school for the other half. I didn't want to ruin my meeting experience with any nonsense from my school. I got there early to set up and chat with those I rarely get to see. My course supervisor took the time to make sure I was going to submit a proposal to the MICCA conference. She proceeded to say that she thought I was a good presenter and that I should be getting my name out there. I was like a kid with an A+ paper. I suppose everyone needs a good ego boost once in a while.

As a group we proceeded to continue to evaluate online conferencing tools and products the district already owns. Twiddla which is a great, free tool allows collaborative use of an online whiteboard, demonstration of any web page, and the sharing of documents. There were a couple of hiccups like this site allows access to filtered sites and everyone collaborating at one time is a big mess. Despite any flaws, I think this could be a great tool in the classroom. I will be trying it out to review the features of Animoto.

Then we went exploring the tool that district already owns. The district spent $250,000 on the Polycom system which utilizes the phone, Window NetMeeting, Mac Xmeeting, and actually Polycom equipment. It has hardly been used and they still don't know how to use completely. I even had to share a laptop because it doesn't work with Vista. Which make me wonder if this system is worth the effort because when it will be obsolete? Is it obsolete already?

It was a great experience and I look forward to the February meeting where we develop a district plan for online conferencing. In the meantime I work on change in my classroom, this blog, and my new photo blog 52 Chances. Oh and I almost forgot, those MICCA proposals I promised my supervisor.

As 2008 wraps up...

As a blogger I am ashamed that I haven't been posting in awhile, but I think many of us experience this as life gets busier. For me it was the new state technology measurement (this needs it's own post) and finishing another semester of graduate school. I really did miss blogging because of the reflection piece.

This month has been very busy for me on the technology end. I actually got invited to join a district group that is exploring different online conferencing tools. Being the only teacher is kind of making me nervous around the heads of testing, library services, and technology. They are great people, don't get me wrong, and I have known many of them before this but I want to show them my best. I used Google Docs to take notes which impressed the group and threw out some ideas that really started some good discussion on the potential of online meeting tools. The only bad part is that it has put my head in the clouds about future opportunities outside of the classroom. Since my district's budget is under severe strain, I going to re-focus my efforts on being a great teacher while still making the connections I need to for future opportunities.

Then I great early Christmas present, I won a MICCA grant! I get $600 for some pocket video cameras and memory cards. In return for the grant, I have to present in the poster sessions at the MICCA conference. Unlike other grants I got some extra bonuses, free MICCA membership and free registration to the MICCA conference. The MICCA membership is going to come in very handy when getting a room for NECC. Of course no one at school will care since I have gotten no response on winning the Turning Technologies Grant or on becoming a Google Certified Teacher, but I have gotten to the point that I don't really care. I have a freedom in my computer lab that most teachers have to fight for. I have decided in 2009 I am going to embrace being off the radar to expand the projects in my classes.

So what is next? Yesterday I spent some time on grantwrangler.com and found some good stuff. There are some great contests for my students to enter and I even set up a Google Calendar just to reflect all of the upcoming deadlines. As much as I enjoy the time in my PJs and the laptop, I am excited for school to start again.