Not only do schools face this question, but teachers as well; do we allow the use of social media in our schools? I am a technology teacher, so you  would think that I would be the first person to say ‘absolutely we should allow it’, and yet I find myself very torn. The majority of our students not only use social media as a main form of communication, but it is also their news source, their photo albums, and ever more so an increasing part of their social identity. I think the concept that many schools and teachers are grappling with is the last component I mentioned; that more and more often social media is becoming increasingly intertwined with a students both social identity and self identity. While this in and of itself is not bad, what is becoming a problem is the abuse of the power of social media.  Schools are constantly trying to combat cyber bullying, which can be very difficult to control and potentially even more difficult if social media is allowed at school.

I believe that certain forms of social media really can enhance education. In my classroom we often use Youtube to upload videos the students create or find videos about SketchUp or other engineering questions. While yes there is content that is not appropriate for school on Youtube, monitoring students while they are using Youtube can really combat this problem. All of my students create blogs for their design portfolios, which is another fabulous tool for education.

I think where we are finding more of the issues are social networking media and micoblogging sites like Twitter and Vine. While these sites can be beneficial and many people use them, they are much harder to regulate in the classroom. If say a student tweets something negative about another student and it starts trending around the school it will happen much faster then might happen on a blog site. The sticky situation here is we also have social media sites like Edmodo which is an excellent teaching tool, but technically it is still a form of social networking.

Honestly, I think that teachers should be able to use their discretion as to what social media is allowed in their classroom. If the teacher has a good handle on the social media being used and feels comfortable and competent to regulate it then it can be wonderful teaching tool and a fabulous form of student engagement. The world and technology are rapidly changing and education needs to figure out a way to keep up.

I have absolutely loved my summer experience both as part of my Kenan Fellowship programs and my work at NC State and the ASSIST center. I came into the program knowing very little about nanotechnology and wearable devices, but I knew that it is a concept that is growing very quickly in the tech world and that I should somehow relate this to my classroom. Now I am hooked and keep trying to find more articles about nanotechnology and I keep coming up with new ideas to implement in the classroom.

Both Dr. Jones and Dr. Jur have been wonderful to work with. They definitely kept us on our toes and Dr. Jones constantly made us laugh. I really wish that we had more time so we could go into greater depth in the subject and really refine some of our projects and concepts. I can’t wait to implement my lessons in my classroom and use some of the awesome technology and tools that we were given through the program. Plus I am going to try really hard to get a field trip approved to take my kids over to the textile building and try to get Dr. Jur to give my students a tour…they would love it!

I have really loved my Kenan retreats as well and the incredible people I have had a chance to work with and will continue working with! I have learned so much already from all of the other Kenan fellows and the PD has been wonderful, especially some of the new technology I have learned of.

Honestly, I have nothing but positive things to say about this summer. While it has been a crazy one (moving houses, jobs, getting married etc),  I have truly enjoyed all of my Kenan experiences thus far and am exceptionally grateful for my work in the ASSIST program.

I have loved writing my new lesson plans. They are not lesson plans I would normally think to write, which is really exciting. I am really excited about being able to incorporate healthcare and animals into my engineering curriculum.  The one thing that I am concerned about is having the time in the curriculum to implement these new lessons.

One of the best parts of these lessons is that both lessons bring professionals into the classroom. The dog lesson will bring in a dog handler and the rescue dog, so that students can present their designs to the handler. I have also found someone willing to bring chickens into the classroom so that my students can study the movement of the chickens.  Any time I can expose my students to new things in life, I feel like I have succeeded.

I am still struggling a bit with creating the assessments for both of these lessons. Any suggestions will be welcome.

I am so excited about all that I have learned during my externship because most of it I can take back to my class. One of the greatest things that I have gained from this externship is the all the wonderful contacts I have made at NC State (plus of course the other teachers I have been working with). Plus, I now have amazing access to different materials at NC State and wonderful ideas for field trips to the university, and even better professors and graduate students who are willing to host my  students.

JeVar and I are going to try and set up a competition with Dr. McCord for a global One Health Challenge for middle school and high school students to participate in and that will be judged by professors, graduate and undergraduate students at NC State. We are hoping to develop a competition where students will design a product/solution to a global health challenge.

I have developed two great lessons that will expose my students to integrating healthcare and nanotechnology into the design process. Both lessons will involve animals and hopefully I can actually bring the animals into the classroom to inspire the students even further.  I am incredibly excited because Dr. Jur is getting two 3D printers to rotate between our participating schools. My students design incredible projects, but it would be so amazing if they could actually print a model of these projects.

I always try to design lessons that are relevant to the real world and that work to solve the Grand Challenges of Engineering, but I have constantly struggled with how to incorporate healthcare concepts into the curriculum since that is not my background. This program has been wonderful at helping me both learn more about healthcare and developing ideas about how to incorporate these concepts into my lessons. I can’t wait to bring all of this back to my classroom!!!

I have learned so many neat new technologies that I am really excited to implement, but there are definitively some drawbacks.  There are lots of phone apps that are really neat and I would love to use in my class, but many of them run into the problem of first do all students have a phone and since I teach middle school that is not usually the case. I have also run into the case that some of these apps can only be found on a particular platform and not on another.  Also, teaching technology, we constantly run into glitches, like the district server is down for the class, or three of the class computers are running updates. These are all problems that can be overcome, but it does make it more difficult to implement at times.

Working with nanopaint on glass.

I absolutely loved rafting. I had such a great time and it was a wonderful bonding experience with the teachers; it definitely made it feel more like a ‘family’ and less like a professional development session. I also really loved my AR session. These were apps that I had no idea existed and that both I and my students will have so much fun using. It will really make learning a fun and interactive experience. I am definitely going to try and create a lesson for a gallery walk of student work using Aurasma.

While at times this week has been a bit exhausting and overwhelming I have learned so much. I am really excited about implementing a lot of these new technologies in my classroom. I also know that these connections that I have made and am continuing to make with other teachers here and the staff will be invaluable not only to my learning experience, but also to what I bring back to the classroom. This really has been a great week all around!

So I wrote this yesterday and then forgot to click post…this is what I get for trying to multi-task. After just the first day I have already made create connections with other teachers. We have already been discussing lesson ideas and grants, which is exactly what I have hoped this week would contain. I am hoping to learn new technologies that I can use in my class and just get new ideas that will be both exciting to teach and learn.

For every PD I have ever attended I have learned more from the teachers  I am with than any of the presentations I have attended. Though I have to say the AR stuff is pretty awesome and I will definitely being using it in my classroom. Even better though, I did not even know about the apps that he talked about, so that was really exciting. I am just really excited to be getting new ideas to use in the classroom and discovery cool ways to implement these ideas. Can’t wait to see what the rest of the week will bring!

This has been a very exciting and busy week working on the ASSIST project. It has been a bit challenging go from teacher mode to student mode and I am having to get use to sitting and being the student again. I have had difficulty sitting through some of the science lectures as science was never my forte, but I have loved the time we have spent in the textiles lab. I think most of the lab parts will be things that I can use in my classroom. Some of the more basic science experiments that we have done I can definitely still use in an engineering classroom and maybe just take it in a bit different direction. I think I will really enjoy the development aspect of this project and I am loving being inquisitive and curious again about things.  Off to Cullowhee tomorrow!