A week ago (Friday 21st and Saturday 22nd November) UNIS Hanoi PD was led by Jeff Utecht. This was an exciting and dynamic two days for faculty from our middle and high schools. As a school in the second year of rolling-out a one-to-one tablet PC program, PD such as this is (should be?) our lifeblood right now; nevertheless, we are of course struggling with change. Like most organizations undergoing similar technological transformation, our faculty range from the unsurprisingly tech-savvy youngish ones to the oldish, severely technologically challenged, and all shades and combinations in between.
Personally, as one of those ‘combinations in between’ (an almost oldish yet surprisingly tech-savvy type in constant conflict, who, when confronted with new ICT, fights off deep, dark, almost Pavlovian urges to turn into my father – who has yet to master the ON switch of a VCR ) I was inspired by the two days! Even if I was feeling a little inundated, I was even more excited by the opportunities. So, to help me help myself I felt I needed to set some goals for myself. As I pondered and wrote these goals, I thought it might be useful if I were to share them with everyone else who had been along for the ride. And, perhaps most importantly, as an ‘in-between’ almost oldish, if I were to get the tone of the message right, I might be able to offer some succeour or just a glimmer of hope or spark empathy to the severely technologically challenged as they sat mutely, shell-shocked in the corner. So here is my emailed goals:
Just thought I would share something…….
So much great new stuff…… so little time!
In an attempt to make sense of what just happened (I feel like I’ve just climbed off a very fast train!) and to try to actually use it to help student learning, I thought I needed to do something, anything ……
So I have set myself some goals, in priority order (ask me in two weeks time how I went!)
1. Create a web-based wiki using wetpaint (before Wednesday)
2. Schedule the use of the ‘gems’ plus other ‘tools’ at least once within the next two weeks…..
3. Use students to change, adapt, rewrite the textbook (thro the wiki?)
4. Answer this question: How am I going to adapt use of OneNote to fit with the obviously needed, web-based wiki?…………….do something by next Friday!
5. Share my findings/experiences/links etc with the students (before I ‘use’ them in a lesson)
6. Organise my favourites to include all the new ‘gems’
PS I’d blog this in the ‘perfect world’ but since the only ones who would read it are those who don’t need to I thought an email was better
It’s almost one week later – how close did I come to achieving my goals? Did I offer any hope to the other targets? The answer will have to wait……….
