Tag Archives: teaching

Rocket Fuel.

Social media is essentially the rocket fuel that shoots awareness of anything so high that it surpasses our atmosphere.

Facebook, Twitter, Google+ (because yes, some people use that), LinkedIn (some people use this one, too…I think), Tumblr, Instagram, Flickr — all of these mediums of social media provide an open window into the worlds of others.

They can also be an open window to the worlds of our classrooms and schools.

It’s important to use social media to show kids and their families what’s going on inside the classroom, but I also feel as though it’s equally important to show other teachers what’s going on in their classrooms, too.

There are a few Twitter and Instagram accounts that I follow that are constantly posting about teacher’s practices and how their classrooms are laid out. I appreciate seeing the way other people implement organization in their classroom or choose to set things up in a certain way. It gives me a fresh perspective on a concept, and it’s so awesome that technology can make that concept reachable to people everywhere.

I also find social media to be a great platform to preach. I feel as though I’m constantly posting about the latest in education news, or I’m joining in as many Twitter chats I possibly can manage at once (TweetDeck can only get me so far, y’all) so I can further my practice as an educator. I tell people about my involvement in online PD with Twitter and often am met with snarks or smirks, but I can easily say that some of my best conversations revolving around this passionate profession have stemmed from social media.

There is power in numbers, and social media is a multifaceted way that we as teachers can reach not only students and their families, but other teachers and administrators, too. We can learn and grow together, whether we’re in the same district or in a completely different time zone. We can use words, pictures, videos — tweets, filters, Vines — to communicate and reach one another and show off the great things that are happening in our classroom. When great things happen, why wouldn’t we want to share with the world!?

This is what teaching in the 21st century looks like: working with others around the world to expand our knowledge of how to be better educators using a social media lens.

One-Way Flight

As I type this, I sit at my desk in the North Carolina Science Festival/Morehead Production Team office above Sugarland and Carolina Coffee Shop on Franklin Street. My water bottle drips a few beads of sweat while I pull my denim shirt tighter around me to ward off impending goosebumps. I think I might miss being perpetually chilly…

Today is my last day in the office with the team. I’m heading to Ohio for a few days with family, and when I return it’ll be time for me to start whipping my elementary school classroom into shape before the workdays start (does anyone else find it completely absurd that on workdays we never have actual chunks of time to get our classrooms ready? Or is that just me?). Truly, this summer has flown by.

It feels not so long ago that we were all at NCCAT meeting one another for the first time, making connections with our spirit dogs, and adventuring down the Nantahala (HOW GREAT WAS THAT?!).

As I sit here, I find the time to type this because my lessons are completed. My supplemental materials are finished. All that’s left for me to do is wait — I want to review the curriculum with the other third grade teachers at my school, and my mentors need to review the curriculum as well. I’ve started taking the teacher lesson plans I’ve written and translating them into layman’s terms for the Festival’s public library program so we can put together some one-page activity guides.

I’ve also been sketching planes and rockets, but that’s been happening since all this started in the middle of June.

This has been an experience that was unexpected yet wonderful. I’ve learned a lot, and not only in regards to flight. I’ve learned about professionalism, how to work with a wide array of people, and increasing community engagement by networking. I knew this internship would look different than that of my peers, and it was hard for me hearing about all the amazing, hands-on activities so many other people were doing throughout the summer while I sat on a computer most of the day. I had to continue to tell myself to be patient, and that my hands-on moments would come, they’d just come later.

Now that our summer chapter is coming to an end, I’m feeling very hopeful, excited, and happy. I feel very good about my program activities, and I can’t wait to see them translated into activity guides for librarians, informal educators, and other teachers to use. I think the lessons are solid and the community outreach piece that we’re still working on will be just as strong. I’m excited to continue my connections with people at places like the Carolinas Aviation Museum, North Carolina Library Services, and the Wright Brothers Memorial. I’m beyond excited to start communication with companies like Raytheon and Lockheed Martin (insert nerd FREAK OUT here).

Ultimately, I just cannot wait to meet the sweet babies that get to be my passengers on this curriculum pilot with me!

[Puns!]

This whole summer has given me a fresh perspective on what it means to really engage my students. I like to think I’m fairly aware of what hooks my kiddos, and I’m constantly trying to do all that I can to make their learning experiences enjoyable ones. I’ve seen firsthand the effectiveness of getting kids to create and do, not just “sit and get” their information, and between my previous classroom experiences and this summer’s KFP experience, I’m more cognizant of how imperative it is to grab student attention with science.

Even though today is my last day in the office with NCSF and Morehead staff, they know they’ll have to do more than take away my keys to rid me of this office. 🙂

Here’s to a beautiful summer filled with experiential learning, and an even more beautiful start to a new school year!

Control Panel

There have been a few a-ha moments for me this summer. My eyes have been opened to things that have been lighting up on my control panel for a while that have needed tending to, and now I know that I must do something about those flashing little lights.

  1. Professional Development: The level of PD that I’ve experienced with this program has been out of this world. I’ve been engaged, I’ve been challenged, and I’ve been left with a mind that’s just reeling with questions and ideas. I’ve never left a PD at my school feeling this way, so this is quite refreshing. My time with Morehead Planetarium and the NCSF has also opened my eyes to what it means to be a true professional. It’s been an honor to be called the “in-house teaching expert” while I’ve been there, and it feels so good to be seen as competent, trustworthy, and knowledgeable about my craft. I keep a personal blog and word exploded this post about PD — feel free to check that out if you’re so inclined.
    Action steps: Take my PD experiences with Kenan Fellows and do my best to translate them into my school environment. Continue to stay positive and implement all I can while on the school’s leadership team this year.
  2. Citizen Science: THIS is how to engage kids, y’all. This right here. I had never heard of citizen science before this summer, and I am HOOKED (if you think I’m joking, as any of my non-teaching friends what I’ve been talking about for the last few weeks). The ways we’ve had the chance to engage in citizen science projects with Dr. Holly from NCCAT or with Prairie Ridge Ecostation, all I can think about is my kids and how much they’d love what I’m doing. I’ve always believed science, and education in general, should be very hands-on and experiential, and this concept of citizen science has totally renewed my teaching spirit in this thinking! I literally cannot wait to take this idea back to my school and my kiddos in a few weeks — those eight-year-olds are going to love it!
    Action steps: Integrate citizen science into my every day classroom curriculum. Already thinking of ways I can get involved through our science units this year!

There’s been another overarching a-ha moment for me as well. I really love what I do. I’ve known this and have felt completely confident in my decision to be a teacher (or did teaching choose me? Of course there’s a blog post about that, too). This overarching a-ha comes in the form of reinforcing my passion for this profession. I take this job so seriously, and I am absolutely humbled to call myself a teacher to these precious children in Chapel Hill-Carrboro. I am also humbled at the fact that I have the opportunity to work with all of you Kenan Fellows. I can’t help but think “A-ha! This is exactly where I need to be!” every time we get together. Thank you for that, fellow friends!

Looking forward to experiencing many more a-ha moments as this journey continues.