Author: kstrachan

Digital Native vs Digital Immigrant (a problem?)

kstrachan Group 1, Participant Post ,

I would consider myself to be a “digital native”. I grew up with Nintendo controller in hand and a Macintosh Classic (used of course) to play my “sticky Bears typing” game. I have found myself as many young educators have, becoming an agent of change because of the “expertise” in regards to technology I possess. I love to include high tech things in my classroom and share lessons I have done with my colleagues, but am I really helping them?  Am I able to provide them with what they really need to use technology like I do? I find myself reflecting; can digital immigrants become digital natives?

If we consider technology to be a new “language” then we must also know that learning a new language as an adult will only give you a basic skill set. You will never have the same language abilities as the person who has grown up speaking that language. This is not to say “can’t win, don’t try”, or that Digital Immigrants should go back to where they came from, but I sometimes feel defeated. How can I create more hours in a day for someone to spend time learning about how to use new technology? I think that time is one of the biggest constraints for the adopting Innovative teaching. Myself, I have No kids, no elderly parents to care for and so on, and I feel very busy with the normal day to day duties of a teacher. I could not imagine trying to take on learning something so foreign to me just because others are telling me I should.

Well, luckily today’s teachers are not afraid of the word immigrant. I think that educators know that immigrant just refers to someone who was once somewhere else. I feel that there are more and more avenues to help promote the use of innovative teaching practices.

Even people who identify as digital natives can feel like immigrants at times as well. For example: I have created Wiki’s, Weebly’s, Blog’s, twitter accounts, etc. This site was completely new to me.  www.pearceplace.edublogs.org.

 

From Immigrant to Native all over again in one 30 minute learning / creating period.

 

Share in your comments some of your favourite Educational website for me and other to explore.

George Pearce

Strathcona Elementary School

Cluster 1971.

A Reflection to Re-Inspire….

kstrachan Group 1, Participant Post ,

Here it is, 11:00 pm on the day of our first PD day with George Couros and I can’t sleep.  I have to admit, I left the Admin Building today feeling disappointed and frustrated that I didn’t get much from the day’s presentation.  I spent the past seven hours thinking about how I would respond to my administrators asking how the day went in a way that wouldn’t get me kicked out of future opportunities.  I was preparing a speech about being inspired and about how many ideas I have to share with staff — all the while being grateful that it would be the last day before Spring Break which would leave me no opportunities to really get into any conversations.  I would have a week to think up my next move.

Feeling comfortable with my plan of action, I was ready to crawl into bed and shut off the day’s disappointment.  Then it hit me — today actually did leave a mark on me!

  1. I connected with teachers from across the division on Twitter, which will, undoubtedly, inspire me to think beyond the 4 walls of my classroom.
  2. I met some incredible teachers who shared some incredible thoughts with me — people whose path I will cross again and again and who will, I’m sure, become life-long friends.
  3. I helped teach someone at my table how to understand what Mr. Couros was doing as he flipped from screen to screen to screen through applications that she was assured she didn’t need to know anything about prior to attending the workshop.
  4. I re-discovered how limitless teaching and learning is.

My last realization is the one which is leaving me unable to sleep:

I re-discovered a passion for sharing professional ideas with other teachers and for taking risks in my teaching.

I work in a school where it is easy to get lost in what I am doing in my own classroom — shutting the doors and locking everything in….or everything out.  There are two teachers who I share ideas with regularly, the ones who stay late every night, who are passionate about students, who really live teaching.  They are what keeps me going from day to day.  I need to share, I need to learn, I need to feed the inner cravings for knowledge…. Which leads me to today’s PD.  As George went on about some of the things that keeps him passionate about education, I was looking at the Twitter account that I have neglected for the past year and re-established some of the connections I had made when I first began my Twitter-journey.  There are countless educators around the world ready to share and chat about what is happening in their classrooms and they help inspire me to continue to build and reflect on my teaching practices.

I had a set of iPads in my room last year which encouraged me to take risks with my students.  We blogged, we joined in Twitter Chats, we created projects, explored different applications, and explained our learning through pictures and videos. The opportunity to have the iPads shook me out of my comfort zone (in a good way).

This year, I do not have the iPads and I reverted back to my usual way of teaching.  Today, I asked myself “Why?”.  Today, I am reminded that the opportunities to grow and learn as a teacher are limitless.  Today I was re-inspired!

 

Written by: S. Seafoot,

Grade ½ Teacher at Lord Roberts School

Cluster 1971