Exciting Opportunity and In Need of a New Template

On Friday, my district Curriculum Coordinator paid a visit. I always like when she comes because I enjoy our conversations. Friday she told me that she would like for one of the 7th grade LA teachers and me to put together a training class for new teachers and teachers needing a refresher to our SSI curriculum. I'm looking forward to doing this for a couple of reasons:

1. I didn't have training when I first taught this curriculum. It was kind of a "Surprise! Guess what you're teaching this year?" approach.
2. There are so many places to build on what we already use from Pearson. 
3. I would like future SSI students to have a great curriculum and teachers excited about teaching this class!

As soon as the state testing is over (April) is when planning for this starts up. I'm so looking forward to it!

New Blogger Template: I'm desperately in need of a new template. Right now I have a free one from The Cutest Blog on the Block. I don't know if I should pay for a new one or continue with the free. That is my dilemma right now. I guess for a Sunday night before the week before state testing that's not too bad. If you have any suggestions of places to look for Blogger templates, please comment below!

Staff Development- But Wait! What a Great Day!!

I know what you're thinking already. Staff development? Are you serious? YES!! My district does such a great job organizing staff developments. I rarely feel as though my time is wasted and this is important to all of us as teachers. Well, today I had the opportunity to share information, my friend Lori, and myself have learned about blogging with our students.

We had 90 minutes to make addicts of hook the teachers on blogging in the classroom. Not to brag, but I really think we did a pretty good job! Lori uses EduBlogs with her kids and I use KidBlog, so between the two of us we had quite a bit of information to share about each platform. About half of the session time was spent allowing the teachers to play around with the blogging platforms. It was a great day!

The remainder of the day we were able to focus on technology at our home campus. I think I'm finally going to be able to correctly mirror my tablet/laptop after today. That's the part I struggle with the most. It seems so simple and yet I never can get it to work. Watch out 8th graders! Mrs. Bush is on a technology high! Yeah...those essays still aren't graded.

Technology Overload!

Right now I'm on a lunch break from my Technology Integration Academy. I'll be linking up with Technology Tailgate (I know it's not Tuesday but I've been here since Tuesday!)

 My school district is BIG into technology and after your third year they expect you to have a certain amount of techno skills! Three days of straight technology information is a lot but I have learned so much and now I have some really neat tools to use in my classroom. Some I've used/played around with before but never really knew the true capabilities of it.

Our district uses Moodle for teachers' assignments. Each teacher has a Moodle page and that allows parents and students access to files and other activities determined by the teacher. During TIA I learned that Moodle is now Moodle 2.0. Boy! Talk about bells and whistles. I'm going to need a class on the new Moodle to learn it all. I can now have a Twitter feed embedded into my Moodle page. And yes, I went ahead and created that!

I also discovered Livebinders (I know I'm super late to that party!). I've heard of them and seen people talking about them but never knew how to use them. Watch out 8th graders because I'm pretty sure you'll be using this (can we say PBL??).

Livebinders: used a Google search to fill with articles! WHAT?!?!

We also delve into Google forms. Again, I'm all over this. I'm thinking about creating a spreadsheet on Google forms to use as a Status of the Class for my Language Arts class. I've been the one that has been asking them what page they're on in their independent reading. Why am I doing all the work for them?? These are 8th graders. They need to take some ownership over their own learning and responsibility for it!

Google form: Status of the Class in progress

 We also played around with making a simple form for parents to sign in at Open House. You know sometimes things are just so simple you don't think of them yourself!

Google form for Open House- Please sign in!

We start back pretty soon. I see we're going to be talking about QR codes. I'll have to tell you in another post about my QR code and book trailer idea for my classroom library. It's time to get back to work. I just love technology!!

Training, Training, Training

I don't know how this post will go over. I'm sure some will agree and others will disagree but I'm going to put it out there anyway. Hey! Maybe it'll spark some conversation at least!

I've been at the dreaded professional development all week. Today's the only day I haven't had it. I've been learning about GT students. It has been extremely intense starting at 8:30 and going until 3:30 with a one hour lunch session thrown in. Yesterday, I don't think I talked to anyone but my mom because she was dropping off my daughter and my husband.

While there, I kept hearing other teachers say things like, "I can't believe this is how I'm spending my summer vacation," "I'm only here because I have to do it," and "I can't believe they expect us to take four days of this training and give up my lunch!" I listened to the griping around me. I started thinking about what they were saying. Why is it that we as professionals don't like doing what other professionals do, which is to learn and continuously improve what we do? I know we all have children and families. Our time is very valuable. Professionals in other areas have the same issues.

I have a seven month old. I want to spend as much time with her as possible because she's constantly growing and changing. I already miss so much while working. I'm torn. I also love what I do. I want to not just be a mediocre teacher but a great teacher. One that changes the way the students think. One that makes them think!

How else are we supposed to be better without learning? I consider it part of my job. I know every summer I'll be attending professional developments. As teachers, I don't think we should complain about the time that we put in to learn more about the profession but instead embrace the knowledge we're given, digest it, and see how we can apply it to our own classrooms.