The Virtual Journey Continues

I haven't posted in a while - I was trying very hard to stay "disconnected" while we were on Spring Break. I needed to that in order to spend some quality time with my family - "reconnect" with them, if you will. We took a short trip up to Boise and went swimming, watched Alice in Wonderland at the IMAX, went bowling, and visited our newly remodeled Capitol building. I wasn't able to completely stay "disconnected" - I corresponded with @mrspal concerning the "muchness" discussed in Alice in Wonderland, and how that related to education. She has a great blog post about it!

But...I digress. The purpose of this post is to discuss what occurred just before Spring Break started. We have many "new" administrators in our district this year - I put "new" in quotes, because they aren't brand new, but in new positions. Our Superintendent, Business Manager, HS principal, UE principal, and Federal Programs director are all in new positions this year - lots of learning going on in our district! So, we held a "strategic planning" meeting last Thursday - I know, I know - curb your enthusiasm! We were all so looking forward to spending this time together - planning. BUT what a great day it turned out to be!

Through the discussion of the day (we had an outside person "coaching" us through the process--really a taskmaster.), we discovered what our vision for our students REALLY is. AND, the idea of "technology for learners v. technology for learning" came up. I grabbed the chance, and "confessed" my twitter habit that had developed in the last month. A great conversation erupted from my "confession" to these professionals.

Through my "testimony", I was able to share a glimpse of why I have been tweeting. Our district "tech" guy, who was leery of my obsession at first, was beaming with excitement. I have not always been known as a tech expert by any stretch of the imagination, but what I had been doing is exactly what he wanted to see in classrooms. I shared my skepticism of this social media platform as a "learning" tool, and how the skepticism had quickly turned to excitement and amazement in all that I had learned. I found myself so excited to share what I had learned, and the excitement became contagious.

We discussed some of the "negatives" to this idea - the fact that many of us (us being digital immigrants) see too many "bad" things associated with the Internet. Because we ARE digital immigrants, our students know much more than we do about this whole venture. I shared what I have read in multiple tweets - we are dealing with digital natives - whether we like it or not, social media is their world. We might as well teach them how to use it for "good" rather than for "bad".

By the end of the day, I was able to whet enough appetites, that this discussion is going to continue. In fact, our curriculum director has asked that I do a presentation for ad council (all our admins) about how I built my PLN, and how they can do the same. I am still in the process of learning all of this, and am honored that they want to learn from me.

What started out for me as an experiment - a trial- has turned in to an adventure that may possibly change the direction of instruction for teachers, and learning for students, in our district! I can't wait!