Course Blog Posts.

The other day I was given a copy of "Creating Thinking Classrooms - Leading Educational Chance for a 21st century world" written by Garfield Gini-Newman and Roland Case of the Critical Thinking Consortium.  Our program team is doing a study of it and really working on looking at what Critical Thinking is.  This is my first year in my role, so maybe that's what they always do, but it isn't what I have always done. We began in small groups trying to figure out what Critical Thinking really is.  What would a success criteria look like?  One idea that I kept coming back to, over and over in conversation and in my mind, was the meta-cognition piece.  Critical thinking, to me, involves a great deal of reflection on the ideas in your own head.  You can take all of the subject matter you have learned, evaluate it, then critically decide what matters to you and what doesn't.  This is thinking critically about information you are taught. To me, this blog is my big take

When I graduated teachers college I was given a workbook for first year teachers.  In it was a reflection page to photocopy and put into your day plans at the end of every week.  Reflecting on your plans, lessons, students.... what went well and what didn't.  This was something I did every week without fail.  For my first LTO. As an educator I feel like we reflect all the time on how a lesson went - for us and for our students - but in an informal way (chatting with friends, thinking, etc.)  But what do we do after that?  If something went poorly we think about different strategies to put in place or different resources.... maybe sometimes we give up on the concept and try something else.  If it went well we might tell someone about it.  But then it's gone, hopefully to be remembered the following year when we teach that same curriculum again.  But it could really be gone forever.  Reflection Maybe regular reflecting is done with staff or team members.  I love unpacking a d

I have started NUMEROUS "blogs" in the past, in the hopes that I feel something inspiring or influential beginning within me.  Platforms are tricky I feel.  I really love integrating technology into my lessons, but have a hard time figuring out how to start technology or fix it.  I have issues switching my television over to the right setting to run a DVD or Blue Ray (which apparently is the same machine even though I had thought they were different until approximately 2 weeks ago). Other than figuring out a platform, I hope this Google one works for right now, I feel nervous by this whole idea of an audience.  Where as I really had the goal of having my class blog this year because I see the advantage of them writing for a greater purpose, I have a hard time validating the idea that I too may have thoughts to share.  What is a valuable thought that I might want to share with the world?  It makes me nervous.