People are afraid of change, and experience has taught me that teachers in particular are no different. While we claim to be resolute in teaching our students how to discover the skills in becoming life long learners, realistically many of us seem to hit the occasional wall when it comes to our own learning. If we are learning we seldom hold ourselves to the same regimented reflection of our learning that we expect from our students. The pressures of the job: plodding through curriculum, grading papers, daily classroom administration, parents, students, and administrative pressures all weigh us down, slowly extinguish the very flames of inquiry we desperately try to stoke in our students.
Nowhere is this aversion to learning new skills more evident than in the field of technology and the classroom. Perhaps it is emergence of what seems to be daily innovations on the web, or the demands surrounding its use, or perhaps it is just the fear of not being the expert in our respective fields, but I have noticed a powerful mistrust and aversion by the majority of teachers to learning about technology.
Before I continue let me make clear that it is not my intention to offend or put down the teachers who are not technologically savvy. It has recently been brought to my attention that sometimes my tone can be harsh, one-sided, and non-inviting. Sometimes, it appears, my passion can alienate rather than bring people together. I need to be more sensitive to the feelings of my peers and colleagues, and while this sensitivity may not be obvious by the introduction of this post, I hope to end in a place of collegiality and a focused vision for growth. How can we help teachers use technology to help themselves learn, so they can better understand what the crazy tech-geek is constantly bleating about?
Unfortunately technology seems to often be the line drawn in the sand between the tech-oriented teachers and the “technologically challenged” as they sometimes times quaintly call themselves. Experience has taught me that forcing people to switch sides in this technological divide can be extremely divisive and bad for a school’s morale.
Upon reflection and reading Working With The Willing, I am realizing that until teachers use the tools for themselves, they will never effectively integrate them into their daily life in the classroom. So what to do? I have decided to start a Blogging Club with my peers to help them better understand the power of Web 2.0. I hope to start small and build our own network and then introduce them to the ever-expanding world of educators that I have had the pleasure of meeting online.
Here is the email I send out inviting teachers to join:
I have a tendency to be quite long winded. I started to type this email a few hours ago, and I metamorphosed into a two-page blog post. I have decided to consolidate my points in a more easily digestible email. Here goes:
After reading about some of my technological musing, several teachers in the Middle School have asked for more information or advice on what or how they can use technology to help them. I chose to end the previous sentence with a period intentionally, because I think often time we are worried about how to use new tools in our classrooms, but we overlook how the internet and computers can help us better organize, utilize, and synthesis information for ourselves as learners.
For me personally, I love to write. I love to read. I feel it is this process of textual communication that connects us as human beings and allows us to evolve. But I may be biased as a Language Arts teacher…I am drifting again. Here is my proposal:
I would like to create a low-pressure club for Middle School teachers to write about their interests, reflect on their teaching, and share their work with their peers. The point is not to inundate you with tools to use in your classrooms, but rather to establish a place for us to learn from each other; simply put this will be a place for us to read, write, and comment on each other’s work.
I hope to show members how to create a blog as a foundation for their own learning. Time and interests allowing, we will explore other useful tools like Delicious, RSS readers, Twitter, Nings etc…
Once we have established comfort within our own newly created network, I hope to look to see how we can connect with other educators worldwide. The ultimate goal is that once we are using these tools for our own learning, we will see how vital they are for our students as well.
I would like to meet once every few weeks, so we can establish the basics. But once established we will not need to meet too often. Our collaboration will occur mostly online in our comment boxes. Please reply to this email if you are interested in setting up a personal/professional blog and learning more about how technology can help you with your learning.
I hope that this will not turn into another school meeting that becomes a chore. I would like for us to have fun, so we can meet at any time you feel would engender this environment.
I will throw out an opening date and we can work on a regular schedule at the first meeting.
How does 2:00 pm on Tuesday, March 4th sound? Room 3208. We can tweak the time to work with other commitments, but I would love to meet at some point on that PACT day. I am also offering a parent workshop at 6:30 on the 27th if you are interested in a more formal presentation on Web 2.0 and 21t century literacy.
Final note. (I promise) I have sent this email to a few High School and Elementary school teachers who have shown interest, but feel free to pass it on to anyone you feel would be interested.
Jabiz
Do you have any advice for me or for these new pioneer teachers?
Great post Jabiz – you are really keeping a positive light on achieving the change you want to happen and letting small steps be the first ones. I am in a similar position at my school and had to run a sample class for three groups of staff last week, so I just showed them my blog and did a twitter call out. The silence in the room was deafening at times and I am still wondering if I will get some feedback from the people attending. I guess all we can do is keep on our path, be positive and supportive when people do open themselves up. I know for many of the older staff at my school – and I am one of them-getting themselves into technology means giving up control of the situation and many of them feel foolish or intimidated. The easier we can make their movement across the divide the better and i think your proposal is terrific and I wish you all the best. maybe I should give it a go too and we could compare notes? All the best Sue
Offer some cookies! Food is a great bribe! Hope it goes well!
Jabiz, I agree with offering incentives such as food…always creates a good atmosphere. After the first meeting you can ask for volunteers to bring the next plates of biscuits etc.
Don’t forget about our talk last week re getting our schools together and organising somehting in may. Will be in conctact about this after Mumbai…maybe this topic could be discussed at your PD sessions in terms of sharing and exploring further than ASD….just a suggestion.
Great to meet you at last the other night…..talk soon!
I love this idea. I started something similar this week (though it’s a forum on our content management system). I look forward to seeing what happens. And now I wonder if setting up blogs for them might have worked better.
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