Tag Archive for teachers

Celebration

05/08/2010 Joh food, friends, relationships, work

Tonight I’m going out for dinner where Darin works with Rhonda. She has gained her Certificate IV in Workplace Training today and I am delighted. I’m happy for her but I’m also happy for the kids she will get to teach. She is a great teacher and has positive learning relationships with students. We’ve worked in the classroom together a few times and they have been the best years. She makes a difference to students and their learning.

I think it would be great if teaching were an apprenticeship. It would be awesome to have an apprentice to be in classes with you, assisting in all the ways an extra adult in the room can. Giving you feedback about what worked and what didn’t. I remember when I had a student teacher I sat up the back of the class and saw my students in a whole new light. I noticed some where totally engaged, just not in what was going on at the front of the room. I hadn’t noticed it when I’d been at the front of the room!

It would be great for the student as they would get hands on learning and watch all the real things about teaching like classroom management, rapport building and other things that you don’t always learn in a book. I’ve seen many students do the whole teaching course and then find they hate teaching. This way, you would get a pretty good idea quickly.

There are so many resources available to teachers now that I think the idea of a person who is all knowing as a teacher is redundant. I have taught a number of subjects over my teaching career that I learnt alongside my students. I could never be an IT teacher if I hoped to know the most in the room. The best teachers know how to build great relationships with students and understand them and their learning styles. They need to like the students enough to find a way for them to learn what they need to learn, in order to get to where they want to go. They need to be assertive enough to create a safe space, so students are free to learn. They need to love learning themselves and model that to young people. Anyway I reckon Rhonda can do all those things, hands down.

More important than the curriculum is the question of the methods of teaching and the spirit in which the teaching is given
~ Bertrand Russell quotes

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New Template and other changes

05/05/2010 Joh blogging, learn, work

I have changed the template on the blog in case you are reading this post in a feed. I’ve also been reorganising my categories and tags and things. I have 1010 posts! It has made me realise the things I post about the most. The 7 most popular categories are tabs on this template. I was surprised by some of them to be honest. I still have some more reorganising to do. I deleted a lot of categories that had only one or two posts in them, just so I wouldn’t have to scroll through them all. I have a much better sense of a category and a tag after nearly 5 years of blogging :-)

I’ve been thinking about how much the improved technology at school is making my life easier. There is a suggestion that all students will have laptops instead of text books in the near future. I look forward to that day. It just makes sense to me to be honest. All students have an email address for the first time this year and having students email me their work, is fantastic. It effectively timestamps their work and I can correct it anywhere and email it back to them with a lot more ease. I am never in doubt about when I received it or if I’ve lost a peice of paper in my travels. I love it.

I also hope the increased uptake of technology by teachers will make sharing ideas and resources easier for us all. There is a little resistance I must say. Not all teachers have been fiddling with computers and playing online for so long as I have. Some can’t touch type so I guess it is a steep learning curve for them. I find it difficult to fully appreciate what it must be like. I keep thinking surely they saw it coming. So with them in mind, I try not to look too excited about it all in public. I am though!

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Sharing Blogging with Teachers

29/04/2010 Joh learn

Tonight went ok I guess. It reminded me of when I was in adult education teaching beginners computer lessons. Some have a reasonable skill level and will dive in and have a go. The people I feel for are those who are completely out of their depth. Every instruction needs to be explained and in some cases to create some momentum, done for them.

 I don’t think it is impossible for anyone to learn how to use a computer, or to blog, if they want to. It is a big IF though. My mum has learnt to use facebook to stay in touch with my overseas sister. I heard on the weekend my dad is doing footy tipping online. I have helped them both out on the computer, they have slowly become more competent, yet I imagine this game my dad is playing will have him build skills faster because it’s something he enjoys. I have watched Darin’s mum learn how to use skype, to connect with her grandchildren who live interstate, in a short period of time. She wanted to do it badly enough that she kept at it. She asked lots of questions. She enjoyed some success when it worked and now I reckon she could guide someone else to do it.

The resistance I find when introducing new things to any student, is always the problem. The reluctance to make a mistake leads to them to stick with what they know. I have no idea what it is like because I have gradually expanded my skills over years. I wanted to learn. I made plenty of mistakes and then corrected. I have in no way made all the mistakes yet, there is still bucketloads more I don’t know. I remember this game I played a long time ago called the maze game. It was played in teams and you had to navigate your team through a grid that sometimes changed. People would stand there, with their foot up in the air afraid to put it down, because if it was wrong, you had to start all over again. The lesson was to make the mistakes quickly by just having a go. The quicker you made the mistake, the quicker you would get it right in the end. I wish I could find the instructions to that game and play that with some classes. It is a lesson that could make all learning come easier. So many of us have been taught to avoid making mistakes.

Some are not just learning blogging, they are learning a whole range of skills, even how to use a keyboard.  If they are that disinterested in computers, when they have been around them for so long, I feel a bit of personal frustration to think I can share much with them at all. It is going to take time and practise for them to be competent enough to use them in a classroom. I doubt they have the time or the interest to practise. I know I shouldn’t make assumptions about students and I don’t weigh up young people like that as I have tonight with the adult learners.

All in all though, it is a start.

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