Student Blogging

Ah, it’s been far too long since I’ve been able to sit down and devote my time to a really good post. Well, better late than never.

So what’s been keeping me so busy? I now have 145 student blogs up and running. Whew! I can tell you that many times over the past couple of weeks I kept asking myself if I was out of my mind! When I came up with the idea of setting my students up with blogs I figured I would start with two… Continue reading

Ashamed To Be Called An American

I feel embarrassed and ashamed to be an American right now. You see I don’t pay too much attention to “normal” news and I just found out about the whole hoopla surrounding President Obama’s speech tomorrow. First I read the speech that was released today, then I went back looking for articles trying to figure out why so many people are up in arms.

Here’s what I found at The NY Times

Summer Reflections and Conclusions

You know the saying from Of Mice & Men, “The best laid plans…”, well that’s sort of what my summer was like. I originally thought it would be my typical: lay by the pool, read a ton of books on my Kindle, watch the 200 TED’s that are sitting in my iTunes, and generally relax. Unfortunately not one of those things occurred, but what did occur was an amazing amount of learning. So when I received the principal’s welcome back letter today I realized it’s time for some reflection and… Continue reading

OneNote Files

As my mind now turns toward the upcoming school year I am diligently working on transferring all my files into OneNote folders. (If you missed my post about OneNote, it’s worth a look.) So this is just a quick post to let you know the folders are being updated and you can access them here.

BTW, if you don’t have OneNote in your MS Office suite. You can download a trial copy. It’s good for 60 days, and if you find that you don’t want to purchase it… Continue reading

Truly Using Technology In The Classroom

Yes, this does seem like an ad for Apple products, but get past that and think about what is really happening here. The ultimate engagement experience for students. My mind swims with the thought of having students who are excited about being in class. Instead of us just talking at them, they are partners in their own learning. This is how technology benefits us! This is truly my ideal, what I hope to experience as an educator before I retire. Hey, I have 20+ years to go, so maybe there’s hope!… Continue reading