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Post date: Dec 24, 2014 5:57:39 PM
Wow what a Whirlwind the last couple of months have been. The band and choir are bigger than they have ever been. I've been made part of the District technology leadership team. My duties as President of my local CTA chapter have at times been almost overwhelming. Then add to this my decision to enrolling in the IEC program after talking with Juli Kimbley at the Fall Central Valley CUE conference.
So far the IEC program has been good, a challenge time wise with everything else I have on plate but I'm picking up a few new tip and tricks to add to my bag for the classroom. Anything that makes me a more effective educator for my classroom or I can share with fellow teachers is a good thing.
I need to find a better balance of time to continue on in January. Some things will have to go from my schedule. Even as I write this I'm on the train to San Fransisco for a few days to get away and clear my head and re-focus my priorities. For the short term extra student club activities will have to go. One big association duty was in the process of being handed over in November and should be completely off my plate by February.
Even with my crazy schedule I have gained some great information so far here are a few of the highlights:
Google Search: I've been using and teaching students about Google Search for years but Lucie opened a few new doors and reminded me about a few features I had stopped using. Teaching my computer apps classes how to be effective researchers and modeling with my music classes effective searches is one of the most important computer skills I can teach at the middle school. At the same time as I'm doing this I'm stressing the importance of what it means to be a digital citizen.
Google Maps & Earth: These take time to plan so I need to be very purposeful in when I want to use them and how but they can have a lot of bang for students. They can open up the world for students.
YouTube: I already had my own YouTube channel before this session and was starting to organize it. John opened my eyes to using a Google App that I already used with YouTube videos in a different way to scub videos for showing in class. That was putting them into a Google Presentation. I have been inserted YouTube video's into Presentations before only as part of a Presentation. I had never thought of using Presentation as a way to simply show a video so that you don't have comments or all the garbage video's on the side of YouTube.
I have not done it yet but I'm going to experiment with this on my iPad with Presentation on the iPad for AppyHour. We are using AirServer to screen cast our iPads.
Has all the stress this course has add to my life been worth it? The extra hours? The loss of sleep?
That would depend on what my end goal is. If I plan on being a full time music director for the rest of my career then I would say no at this point in time I should not be doing this. I have more than enough technology skills to be a music director, in fact I have more technology skills than most of the music director I know. But my hope is to start shifting more into educational technology. So to that end yes I'm gaining a deeper understand of and better use of application I'm already familiar with.
I'm so thanksful for the chance to get a peek inside Google Classroom because I work in a non GAFE school District. While I think it is a bit limited at the current time I think it would be a great tool for the teacher that is not comfortable with using technology due to it's relative easy of use.
As this comes to an end so does 2014 I'm looking forward to what 2015 has in store.........
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