How is My Game Plan Going?

In the first area of focus, getting students to work together collaboratively and creatively, I feel i have made some progress in the last couple of weeks. For example, we have a school-wide spelling bee every year,of which the first two rounds are completed on Scantrons, as I read sentences containing the spelling words. To practice, I set up teams of students who used word parts and other strategies to make meaning of the spelling words, and they competed in a kind of collaborative bee, in teams. Since I have some students who have difficulty with understanding print, and some with very limited vocabulary who do not understand how to arrive at correct pronunciation of difficult words, I set them up with print-to-text programs on the computer so they could become pronunciation experts and teach the others how to properly say some of the difficult words. In addition, students in my class are now teaching each other how to use develop research questions, how to use search engines to conduct research, and how to use Bib.me.org both to gather notes and create their bibliographies. In another class they are learning about the persuasive language of advertising, and are creating their own commercials in video form using advertising techniques and claims; at the same time they are developing an awareness of audience by using images to target a specific audience (usually kids their age). I still need to get us to collaborate with other classes outside our own walls, but I still have faith that that will happen late this year. Some ideas I have is to use virtual field trips and to use Skype as a communication tool, possibly with a parent in their workplace since one of my main goals is to explore careers.

In terms of the second area of focus, engaging in professional growth and leadership, I have been con a campaign to introduce teachers in my school to tools like Delicious, online document storage and sharing, and basic blogsites they can use with their students. I have spent a few hours in the last week doing just that. I also posted soem of the text-to-speech mp3s of spelling words made by my students on the Language Arts communication board, and shared what I had done with my colleagues at out learning community. One major stumbling block I have run into and which so far remains unresolved is that I noticed some time ago that at work we are using an outdated version of Firefox, but every time I tried to download a new version I would receive an error message saying that I did not have enough privileges. I spoke with the technology expert at our school, and he told me to call the district help desk. I made the call, and was on the phone for almost an hour, while the tech on the other end used remote access and all kinds of Uber-passwords, to try the download, to no avail. Finally I received an email saying that the situation was server-related and actually depended on the tech expert at our school. I forwarded the email to him, but have received no reply.Check but not mate -I'm going to keep pressing on to find a solution. I also discussed with a science teacher how we could find grants to replace the dying laptops in our carts, which is another issue. There is no money apparently to replace kaput batteries.

All in all, though, I am optimistic that things will change. Our principal is rather technology-oriented, although she has relegated all grant-writing to teachers, who typically have the least time for it. At least she allowed me to have a laptop cart in my room, and I am very grateful for that.