Taking care of yourself should be priority #1.

I don't care what anyone else tells you.  This is probably one of the most difficult things for me to learn and to live by.  But I'm trying.  If I do this, I am more relaxed, level headed, a better teacher, a better human, and better able to handle everything that comes at me in and out of the classroom.

I faltered the last two weeks and violated rule #1.  I paid for it. My fiancé paid for it.  My students paid for it.  And I suffered, and so on and so forth.  Well after a particularly difficult Saturday, I found myself determined to "take back my life".  I went to yoga because that's where I go to become a better person.  I went to yoga again today. 

And guess what?  I had some wonderful PQA with two particularly difficult classes and decent other classes.  I actually did successfully provide CI today, which has been something I haven't been able to do in almost two weeks. 

And guess what else?  The tests didn't get graded.  And no one asked about them.  The students know it's the end of the year too (imagine that right?).

So yea.  Make taking yourself rule #1. It's kind of like when you step in your classroom, and you make your students feel safe they'll play the CI game, but if not, you can forget about it.  It's like that.  If you take care of yourself, you'll be able to lead the CI game, but if not, you can forget about it.

It's a tough time of year, but this too shall pass.

A Saturday of Professional Development

Today I spent my day in then annual technology conference put on by my district.  It was thought-provoking, inspiring, overwhelming and exciting.   Each session lasted about an hour and was jam-packed with information that I'm trying to process, but I'm inspired to write about this day so I'll attempt to do both in one sitting.

Getting started:
This was an exceptional presentation by two younger teachers.  It really addressed my overwhelming feeling about taking on more technology.

Collaborative writing:
This presentation was exploding with great uses for google's platform of presentations, documents, groups, sites, etc.

Flipping your classroom:
Karl Fisch always does a great job of provoking thoughts.  Today he picked my mind about what I can do outside of my classroom.

Gone global:
During this presentation the overwhelming feeling and guilt spread over me.  I had signed up for the Peace Corps' World Wide Schools partnership this year, and typically of me, it was too much.  We haven't done much with it because there just isn't enough time.  Perhaps I can combine this idea with Karl's and have it as an outside of the classroom connection.  I do realize that this is an extremely valuable undertaking, but I get anxious just thinking about attempting it.

Innovative Libraries:
I found myself asking, "What does technology literacy mean?" a lot during this presentation.  Thankfully, our CIO answered - It is determining who a source is from, not where it is from in order to identify it's credibility.

I happily left the conference (we got out a half hour early!) with lots to process.

What I have come up with for next year is that:

1) I would like to explore with making my class more tech-friendly.  I'm looking at developing my teacher page into something to use as more of a resource.  If this is not possible, I'll try to look at google sites or a wiki.

2) I hope to increase the amount of time students have with comprehensible input through the use of technology, especially for my third year students (a 3-day/week class).

3) I want to use google docs/presentations more instead of Microsoft products myself and with my students (in order to stop supporting the "commercialism" of public schooling).

What a wonderfully thought-provoking Saturday.  I just wish I actually had the time to sit down and process it all!