Okay, these are two totally different thoughts on tech and presenting. One is from Laura Bergells from her blog “Maniactive” or “More than Powerpoint” entitled “How do you earn attention when presenting.” 

Laura tells a tale of a presentation she went to where the presenter was rude, arrogant and all together a jerk about tech. The presenter told the audience to pay attention only to him and turn off all electronics.  hmm, my that sounds familiar to these teacher ears.

In the end, Laura asks, “How do you EARN attention when presenting to a modern, tech-savvy audience?“  Right. How do we, as teachers EARN our learners attention. I “present” 3 times a day, for an hour and a half, to three different groups. How do I EARN their attention? Are they required to give me their attention?  I think this is the main question of the modern teacher.

Which brings me to the second idea from Dangerously Irrelevant. How many teachers have I heard say both of the phrase, “I am not good at math,” and “I am not very good at computers.”

I can not count that high. I try to be polite, and helpful when presented with these individuals, but I really have to struggle. These teachers think their audience is just going to give them their attention, and they have to do nothing to earn it. What really gets me is the wave of the hand that says, “it doesn’t matter”. Really?  It doesn’t matter that you are defective?

Don’t you think your learners have figured out you are defective? Does that impact the attention they give you? Personally, I have to say yes. I think I must EARN my learners attention. Every day. 3 times a day. For an hour and half each time.

No wonder I am tired at the end of the day. No wonder I look forward to going to school the next day so much!

I have really been struggling this year with my electronic organization.

Firstly, I am in charge of web development using the Angel LMS for the group of teachers creating and teaching our Advanced Algebra Applications 5-6 course. It is a new course, and the only course in the US that teaches the math it does. 

What that means is that I am in charge of a small amount of content today (250 megs) that will blossom over the next few years. Assessments, worksheets, photos, videos, and more will be created by this course.

And then there is the 200 megs of my AP stats material, and the 400 megs of powerpoints I created for my Alg 2 courses last year.  They suck, but given they were my first year teaching it and my first attempt, they will get better.

All that material is on my laptop.  Yes, the same laptop that is strapped to my back on my way back and forth to school on my motorcycle. Yes the same laptop that can be dropped and all the material created is gone in a second.

EEEK.

I have dealt with backing up before and have been doing manual backups.  That is so yesterday. If you have not been introduced before, meet Dropbox! It is a wonderful system that will synchronize your files with any number of computers for FREE! (2 gig limit on the free accounts).

With the very small Dropbox app on my computers, I now have full access to every file on my laptop I want. Using a very small “junction” hack, I directed Dropbox to look three folders in my directory, AP stats, Alg 3 -4, and AAA files.

Now, on my Mac laptop, my Destop at school, my smart panel desktop at school, my desktop at home AND my laptop I have access to every single file.  Even more, if any file is added in ANY of those locations, it is added to ALL of the computers I use the next time I turn it on.

Even better! I can access those files anywhere I have web access.

But wait, there’s more!  It is FREE for 2 Gigs.  Now, I actually have 2.25 gigs, because I used a link to login from another blog. As a way of giving back (and perhaps getting more myself) I would like to invite you to use Dropbox as well.

All you need to do is follow this link here, enroll in the Dropbox service, and you get a free extra 250 megs and so do I. Many of your (and mine) file backing up and syncing problems go away using this service. Heck, I may not even need to take my laptop with me everywhere I go!

I have been rather silent in my blogging the last several months mainly because I was so overwhelmed that I had to not do something, and blogging was it.

You see, 5 years ago this month I ran for my local school board. (I know, I know, why do you care but there is a point to this).  It was for an open seat, the member who was retiring had been on the board for many years and was an amazing and powerful woman who demanded success of the schools and worked tirelessly to achieve that. Very large shoes to fill, but I was passionate about education and from the private sector I felt this was the best way I could be involved.

Short story. I lost.

I came in third behind two very strong women who had lived in the community for many years and had many thousands of contacts and involvements. I lost to two very good candidates.

Losing was the best thing that happened to me!  Losing got my name out there as someone who was interested in contributing and helping, not tearing down. I became a board member of what was then the Education Collaborative. I served on committees and worked my fanny off.

Until one day I realized that I did not want to be a committee member, I really wanted to be a teacher. “Self,” I said, “it is time to either poo or get off the pot.”  So I did. Three years ago this month I quit my job, that I loved and enjoyed, and went back to school at UNR’s department of Curriculum, Teaching and Learning to get my teaching credentials.  [I loved the department and the courses, and had a tremendous time learning. Probably one of the few people who won't bash the education department it seems.]

This May, I graduated with my Masters in Education. That is the reason I was so behind in my blogging, because I was fulfilling what was in the end a 5 year plan. To become a teacher was a journey that lasted 5 years, and it was worth every second of the pain and agony of the trip.

Granted, I have been teaching now for 2 years with the Washoe County School District and am still on many committees (LOL) but the trip is over with the M.Ed.

Where do I go from here?  Time for a new 5 year plan.

From 15 April to 6 May, ASCD is offering a free ebook, no subscription or membership required. The title is: “EBOOK Engaging the Whole Child: Reflections on Best Practices in Learning, Teaching, and Leadership” and the link to it is here.

I downloaded it yesterday to both of my computers. It looks to be a good book.  367 pages, covering everything from violence and safety, to “empowering students” (not a phrase I would ever use, but whatever) to Instilling the desire to learn (easier said than done, but if there is one tip that helps me in those 50 pages than the time is well worth it.)

I have not read it yet, just the table of contents. But all it takes is one thing I can take away and use to make it a worthwhile use of my time.

Well, as a blogger, so far this year I have been less than stellar.  I still have 1/2 the year to improve on this though.

The year has been eventful so far, and is shaping up into a good year. My experimenting with powerpoint and podcasting in my Algebra classes has been successful, although to make a good powerpoint takes 2 to 3 hours after all the problems have been stepped out and worked.  Next year will be better when I can edit them and make them more … interesting besides just the same ol’ same ol’.  It is hard to try to improve the basics of teaching while simultaneously improving the interestingness (is that even a word?) of my lessons.

Back to the topic of this post, though.  In my travels, I have come across this site:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/  They give away, no strings attached,  full licenses of software every day.  I have only been following it for the last couple of weeks, but the quality of software is very good, and I can see the use for some of it.  Not all, but being selective here can pay off with good software for very cheap.

A teachers dream.

I finished reading “The World is Flat”  by Thomas Friedman about two months ago.  Wow.  It really makes you think about our place in the educational system.  I have a whole bunch of quotes noted on the back cover that I can use later.

The most striking quote I picked up on in the book was on page 11.  It was one sentence.

Where do I as an individual fit into the global competition and opportunities of the day, and how can I, on my own, collaborate with others globally?

The rest of the book can be thought of as justifying that one small challenge.  Why should an individual care about the global marketplace.  I mean, really.  The book talks forever about Walmart, and business?  Should a teacher even care what happens to Walmart and GM and other business?

My answer is an emphatic YES.  We have to care. Those trends will shape the learners we have today and the learners we will have.  Those trends are going to shape the future of all of us.  After all, the future is what I care about.  It is where I am going to spend the rest of my life. (paraphrasing Charles F. Ketterling)

I have mulled over the quote by Friedman almost daily over the last two months.  I had already set up my blog before I read TWiF, but I had not posted to it.  I really didn’t know why I wanted to set up a blog and post things to the interwebs.  Friedman gave me a reason to follow through and post the things I am doing.

Thanks Friedman.

I had a very Ah HA! moment today. I was doing a lesson on graphs, and had the annual reports from GE and Citibank as examples of why graphs matter. As I was passing them around and discussing the different graphs present, a group of Hispanic learners were looking at the pictures of the Board of Directors and of the people in charge of GE. One of the learners said, “none of these people look like me.”

(taken from GE’s website)

You know, he was exactly correct. 3 women, 1 African American male, and one of the women is African American. No Hispanics at all.

Is that really a problem? I mean, just because they don’t have any Hispanics on the board is that a problem with GE? I don’t think so. But it does mean that we need to have some educated and smart young people who can put themselves on board of directors and run companies. Given the statistics of the population, many of those smart young people will be Hispanic.

I quit working in the private sector because I care about making sure that these kids aren’t counted out before they even get started. The best way to do that was to get involved and make it happen myself.

Is there really a better reason to start teaching?

Well, here I go into the wide world of blogging.  First, a little about me.  I am a new teacher, just finishing my last three weeks of my official first year of teaching.  That’s right.  My experience in teaching is 1 year of grad school doing coursework, 1 year of internship (simultaneous with grad school – that was a rough year) and 1 year of actually being fully employed as a teacher.

And, after my first year, I have to say I am pretty not happy with how I taught that first year.  Oh sure, I tried some different things, and I had some pretty happy kids who did some pretty amazing things and learned some math pretty darn well.

But …. was I successful? ….

How does one define success in teaching?  When I was a manager in business, success is pretty obvious; did sales go up? did expenses go down? did profits go up? good job!

But teaching … how do I define success?  I know how I don’t define it.  I don’t define success as having to tell learners to constantly sit up and not sleep.  That is not success.  I don’t define success as having a homework turn in rate of around 20 to 30%.  That is not success.

So I started doing some research outside of the M.Ed. that I am working on.  I started reading blogs. Lots of blogs. I read Dan Meyers blog http:blog.mrmeyer.com and I realized that there is about 10 million things I can do differently in year two.

So, why am I setting up a blog?  So that I can use it as a tool for feedback and reflection on how I am teaching. I WILL use video and sound to teach math.  I will be using some of Dan’s ideas and methods.  I will come up with some of my own.  But I will improve.