Five tools for 21st century connected teachers - a story of connection.

Last week, my friend Melanie Matthews and I presented an afterschool workshop to the Connected Taupo Teachers group at Tauhara College.  Celebrating Connected Educator Month was a priority for us, and we modelled this connectedness in an unusual and unplanned way.
But I will give you a little bit of background to begin with.  Melanie and I live only a few blocks away from each other, but did not know each other before we had met online in the Virtual Learning Network (VLN). We also connected through mutual friends and decided to form a group in Taupo for teachers who wanted to share and learn from others.
Hence the Connected Taupo Teachers group was conceived and born at the end of 2013.  Supported by two more friends, Kristen and Angela, with ideas and resources, we have met each term to provide an opportunity for local teachers from all schools to meet face to face and share and learn.  Our facebook page is growing in popularity and each time we hold a meeting we see new faces which is awesome because it is achieving the purpose we wanted.
Our term 4 meeting was held this October, which is worldwide Connected Educator Month.  So we decided to focus on how to use 5 tools that help teachers become and remain connected.  Our presentation was based on a talk or discussion for 10 to 15 minutes on each of five tools - Twitter, Feedly, blogging, Diigo and the VLN.  The slides, along with links on the slides, can be seen here.

 So when it came to the day of the presentation, Melanie unexpectedly had doctors orders to stay at home and keep off her feet.   So coming to the meeting and presenting her share of the slides was impossible.  Luckily Melanie never missed a beat.  "Connect me up with Skype or Hangouts and I'll do it from home," she said.

So when I arrived at the venue, I connected my ipad via Skype to Melanie at home, and we co-presented, with me holding the ipad up when it was her turn to talk.    The group interacted with her, asking questions which she answered with aplomb!  

I reckon we did pretty well, modelling connected-ness.  

Connected educators

October has begun.  Nothing unusual in that. October follows September. But for educators, it is time to stop and take stock.

Educators, ask yourself.  Are you connected? That means using technology to forge relationships with educators you wouldn't meet at your own school.  Strictly speaking I suppose that may not be the official definition, but for me it is the most relevant.

I spent 33 years at an isolated country school.  Professional development meant two hour trips to bigger centres where I would meet others for the day, and then we would go our separate ways, maybe meet up at a follow up workshop, but just as likely to never see and share resources and experiences again.

I must admit that I liked to get out of my own school and get copies of what the other teachers were working with, and share my own work.  I once found my own work turning up in a booklet made by others in my subject area, so nebulous were the connections.  

As email and technologies developed, the connections became a little more long lasting.   But things have changed now.  We have opportunities to connect with others whom we may never meet, and if and when we do meet, it is sometimes as old friends.  Virtual friends that is.

I have made friends with educators across the globe.  People who are willing to share time and effort to help, discuss and investigate.  I belong to overseas communities, one of which is the Flipped Learning community based in USA.  When I joined that community, I was the first in New Zealand to do so.  There were about 500 members across the USA.  Nowadays it is more like 20,000 members across the world.  

How awesome to be able to lurk in the community, join in virtual events, and discuss with members across the world!

One of the other overseas communities that I belong to, has webinars regularly.  Usually they are not in my waking hours, sometimes 2 or 3 am in the morning.  Through technology, they are available to me as soon as I get time to watch them.  

The virtual world has allowed me to travel down a pathway that was unimaginable years ago.  I am happy with and cherish my connectedness.  So as I write in the middle of the North Island, New Zealand from Taupo,  I wonder how far afield my readers are tonight.  My request to you is that you write in the comments below how far away you are from me.  

This will be a celebration for me during Connected Educator Month. Please join me in celebrating my lifelong learning journey.

Upping the ante

With "Connected Educator Month" coming up, it is timely for me to increase my blog output.  The month-long event is a prompt to remind me how much I learn from blogging and to get onto it.  It  is such a useful learning strategy to reflect on what I have learned, and where I am going and sometimes just cogitate.

I sometimes feel that blogging is my outlet for venting frustrations as well but then I remember I should be politically circumspect.  In my work, it pays not to get too "out there" with your political stance - it could get you into trouble as Mr Whale Oil (Cameron Slater) has found out.  I suppose he has made his money in the meantime though.

Blogging is also a way for me to connect with other educators.  Isolation has been one of the barriers I have suffered from (and also enjoyed) in the past. Not just geographically.   My social self is underdeveloped.  I am always the person who stands on the outside of the crowd, the last to be chosen for sports sides, the most likely to not have a date for the ball.  (Despite all that I have a happy marriage (the second of two, in fact),  lifelong friends and a great career.)

Blogging gives me an added dimension.  I have a voice.  It is not restricted by social mores.  So, over the next month, I am going to put myself out there more often, more regularly and more directly.  My goal is to blog once a day over connected educator month, at the end of the day.  With something to say, or not.  Getting on this bus and going for a ride.

Let'e see what comes out of it.