Personally, I believe that the greatest instructional shift that teachers have had to make with the implementation of the Common Core, particularly, is the introduction of the mathematical practice standards and the ELA speaking and listening standards and writing standards.  The expectation that these standards be integrated across the curriculum, running over into the NC Essential Standards, paves the way for classrooms to become dynamic learning hubs where a teacher is a facilitator of learning rather than a “sage on the stage”.     These standards are the portion of our new curriculum that has students delving deeper into each content area and demonstrating conceptual understandings of and building connections between the subject areas.

I see this change in curriculum as having a positive influence on the use of technology in the classroom. The Common Core urges teachers to take instructional technologies beyond a game on an iPod.  Teachers are called to help their students to demonstrate their understanding through multiple mediums, to collaborate, and to justify their reasoning, and to uncover evidence or ambiguities within text.  Many technologies for learning can assist in all these areas.  These new standards provide the perfect jumping off point for teachers who have been anxious about integrating technology into their instruction or unsure about how to effectively use technology.

My summer externship has been an eye-opening experience on a few levels. Working with DPI has taught me a lot about how our education system is organized and how it functions.  I’ve made a lot of contacts that I am sure will serve as excellent resources for my instruction and my curriculum heading into the new school year.  I feel empowered, as a classroom teacher, to reach out to these people when I need help and to share with these people when I feel like I have an idea and want my voice heard.  I’m sure that this will ultimately have a positive impact on my classroom curriculum.

More obviously, the work my fellow Fellows and I have done on our project, Making Math Count, will connect to my curriculum in that it will change the way that I plan for and execute math instruction every day.  I’ve learned about an assessment program for developing number concepts in the early grades called Assessing Math Concepts (AMC) by Kathy Richardson.  My first task for my summer externship was to attend an AMC training for Orange County Schools.  At the training I immediately realized that the research and method behind AMC was exactly what was missing from my classroom.  AMC lays the foundation for number concepts for young students and helps the teacher to meet the student, instructionally, exactly where he or she is.  As I was learning about AMC, I kept thinking back to my class from this year.  I had a group of girls that really struggled with math all year.  They were able to move through the procedures that would get them correct answers, but I knew that they weren’t connecting these procedures with the basic math concepts that they should have already known.  They were able to give the “illusion of learning” because they were able to navigate the mathematics topics well enough to find correct answers.  Looking back, I know that all the extra practice and guided math groups I was doing with these girls were not nearly as effective as I’d hoped they had been because I was not going far enough back.  I didn’t have the knowledge of the Critical Learning Phases that these girls had mastered and what they were missing in order to tailor my instruction accordingly.  This year I won’t make the same mistakes.  Between the experience in my summer externship, my relationship with my mentor, and what I’ve learned from my fellow Fellows (who are both phenomenal teachers) I feel certain that my students will receive more thorough and more differentiated instruction in mathematics.  They will ultimately be better prepared to take on the challenges of upper elementary topics in years to come.

My school has always worked really hard to meet each teacher’s requests for technology.  My coworkers and I are blessed with a very supportive and inventive PTA that focuses on raising money for the sorts of things that state and local funding has not provided for in the last few years.  Within a year of being employed at my school I had a Smart board for my classroom and 5 iTouches.   After my second year I had an iPad for my classroom. The school I work in has been operating on somewhat an “ask and you shall receive” protocol (of course, you have to provide valid reasons for requiring more technology in the classroom).  I’ve been on the front end of the distribution of technology in my school because I have asked to get more technology in my classroom.

Now my school is working on a 3:1 student to device ratio.  The upcoming school year will be the first school year that every classroom teacher has a Smart board in her/his classroom.  As we make getting technology into the hands of our students a school-wide priority I foresee some challenges.  In my last post I wrote about some of my concerns about technology in the classroom.  In response to my last post Kristin Bedell commented, “…   I think that balance is a little easier when we help children become aware of how they use technology. Much of our usage is consumptive rather than creative… helping students focus on creative technology is different: it returns electronic technology to the realm of ‘tool’ instead of ‘all-encompassing entertainment/information source.’”  I think she is exactly right.  Fun games on an iTouch do not empower learning.  Finding ways to integrate technology so that it promotes student creation transforms such a device from “all-encompassing entertainment/information source” to an effective learning tool.  I see this as our greatest challenge as my school moves forward with the dissemination of more electronic devices for student use.

Many teachers in my school are apprehensive about using expensive devices (especially with young children).  Some teachers have been able to achieve results that they want in the classroom with the teaching strategies that they have been using for years and don’t feel comfortable changing.  Luckily, the administration at my school is already out ahead of these challenges.  They are finding ways to show these teachers what effectively integrating technology in the classroom looks like.  Teachers that already feel comfortable using these tools in their classrooms are being asked to share at staff meetings and during Early Release PD time.  Some classrooms have been designated as “labs” where other teachers can pop in to see these tech-savvy teachers in action.  I am excited for the new school year to begin so that I can try to use some of the new technology resources I learned about at NCCAT in my classroom and share these with my coworkers.

I thoroughly enjoyed my week at NCCAT. I appreciated all the presenters for exposing me to new technologies that I can incorporate into my classroom and the opportunity to expand my professional network and build friendships simultaneously.  I absolutely loved the setting.  The North Carolina mountains provided the perfect backdrop for a retreat meant to be both reflective and renewing.

With regard to professional reflection, I found the juxtaposition of our Tuesday experience and our Wednesday experience to be the most thought provoking of the week for me.  We spent Tuesday immersed in new technology.  We wrestled with the good, the bad, and the ugly.  I know many fellow Kenans shared my mix of feelings at the end of the day on Tuesday.  There were times when I felt overwhelmed and inadequate and other times when I felt inspired and energized.   By the end of the PD sessions for that day I felt absolutely exhausted.

We spent Wednesday on the river.  Oddly enough I experienced all of these feelings all over again.  There were times when I felt overwhelmed and inadequate by the power of the river.  I felt inspired by the natural beauty of the gorge.  I felt energized each and every time we approached a rapid or a surge of freezing water hit me in the face.  Reflecting on these two very different, yet strangely similar, experiences helped me to process the information overload I experienced on Tuesday.  As  educators we have to be balanced.  I think that this is particularly important when it comes to the incorporation of technology into our instruction.  Using new and innovative technology in the classroom is now an expectation, but this can be taken to a fault.  The incorporation of technology can lend itself to more hands-on experiences and authentic learning for students.  The incorporation of too much technology also runs the risk of removing humanity from the classroom.  Debriefing with my friend and now colleague Emily Jolley on the way home, she shared with me her observations of the effect on her high schoolers of being constantly connected.  I see glimmers of this with my second graders.  It takes a lot to capture their attention.  I’m not sure they’d be as mesmerized by the natural wonder of the Nantahala and the gorge as we all were.

Balance is the key.  Peter taught us that a unique chemical balance is what keeps the Nantahala gorge beautiful and diverse.  We want to foster balance in children.  While new technology engages them, I personally don’t want my students (and eventually my own children) to require new technology to engage in their environment.

After spending a little more than a week with my fellow fellows and meeting my mentor to begin developing our project I can say very decisively that what I’m most excited to gain from this experience is relationships.  I am widening my network and I am not going to be the only person whose life if affected.  The relationships I will foster throughout this experience will change my students’ lives.  I am becoming a better teacher by collaborating with other fellows and my mentor.

Looking ahead toward our week at NCCAT I know that I will not only be strengthening the professional relationships I’ve built in the last week, but I will also be building personal relationships as well (and not just with my other DPI fellows friends). Pushing yourself to be an innovative educator is hard work. If there is something I’ve learned about teachers that strive to be the best it’s that they’re all the same kind of crazy.  Looking forward to NCCAT I am prepared to meet 40 new colleagues/friends that at the surface seem like completely unique individuals.  I anticipate, however, that the personal relationships among fellows will come pretty easily because there is something that is fundamentally the same about each of these people that make them the sorts of people that would pursue a Kenan Fellowship in the face of all the adversity that is public education in North Carolina.

In the last few months those of us in public education have felt bombarded by the bad news in North Carolina’s schools.  As we are required to meet increasingly rigorous standards we see our most valuable resource stripped away.  People.  Warm bodies won’t do.   We need people who care.  You don’t have to be a Kenan Fellow to be Kenan Fellow crazy; those are the people we need.  It seems there are some pretty influential people in our state who don’t get that.

Welcome to Blogs for 2013-14 Fellows Sites. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!