Uncovering Who I am as an Educator

  PechaKucha Presentation As I thought about what change project would be most meaningful to my work with students in the classroom I reflected significantly on what it was like for my students and I to teach and learn during COVID restrictions in our Connecticut public school last year . What is most memorable now is how sad my students felt overall, every day and how much I did not like my job any longer. I have spent significant time thinking about everything that was taken from us and that this is exactly what I would need to bring back with intentionality. Last year, they learned math and I taught math and we connected as best we could, from six feet apart, half of our faces covered, emotionally tired of offering and receiving “simulated support” from the physical and emotional distance we shared space in together. From this experience I learned that I believe students learn best and I teach them best when there is time afforded in class to create a community every single tim...

Growing up 3 hours from Disney World made Disney a clear and present entity in my life. I was shown all of the Disney movies as a child and was completely taken by feelings of not being enough to have my “happily ever after” for I felt more like a step sister (although not wicked) than the lead Cinderella. I was young and a victim of the narrative that is unspoken throughout the Disney themes growing up as a female in our culture. I remember having ridiculous expectations for young men I dated and never feeling satisfied in a relationship. Ultimately, I surmised that I would never be happy the way others were because I did not hold any of the overt messaging of the princess who got the prince. This ideal unattainable image for myself left me with an unfillable whole that I hid from everyone including myself and ultimately caused heartbreak after heartbreak in my life. In my twenties I did end up picking up a more critical lens of how females and males are portrayed in Disney stories an...

From the book   Rethinking Popular Culture and Media (second edition) I found a section called Math and Media that I can definitely integrate into my seventh grade math class this year. The section was short and to the point, students in class use math to track media bias. I like this model of critiquing to use in combination with the qualitative arguments my students make in their social studies and english language arts classes. The quantitative data gathering discussed in this chapter will help support students in the ways they observe and report out about the world around them. This article uses basic graphing, percentages and average computations that are accessible to middle schoolers and offers a variety of topics and research ideas for students to investigate. The premise is to start with something they notice or wonder about, which I love because it hands the reins over to the student and their own interests! Then, the student gathers data on the topic for a given amount...

  I am featuring Edpuzzle as one way to make a video lesson interactive. I use Screencastify to record the lesson ahead of time because I love all of the drawing tools and including my image as I teach them. It also handles the sound that comes from the recording and my mic for my voice really well. Tech Tool Video Please drop any questions in the comments and I will be happy to answer!

  Sugata Mitra had very intriguing findings from his research of placing computers around the world to see what kind of learning would happen. In his Ted Talk, Build a School in the Cloud , he takes his research findings and has the extreme and radical idea to do exactly that. I think this could be a great idea for remote areas who do not have physical schools to learn in, current technology and educators. I do not like the idea of removing the human element of learning with the supportive granny via video. Connecting his ideas to what can be used to improve teaching would be presenting a central question students would enjoy investigating, providing encouragement and positive feedback and using technology to investigate the answers. In the online learning environment, I can see how providing a central question or topic that is interesting to students will shift learning to be more intrinsic and motivating than the model we have now in education. Regarding students as naturally cur...

There is a strong relationship presented in the ideas of Sherry Turkle’s Ted Talk Connected, But Alone and the article from Wesch titled Anti Teaching: Confronting the Crisis of Significance . Both of these authors push back people’s passivity in life,  technology and its use in our culture, Turkle lifts the veil on our lack of vulnerability and ability to reap the treasures that are found by being alone with one’s self by our constant simulated connection through our phones, while Wesch is integrating technology into his educational model for students to use tech in appropriate ways, answering the deep questions that lie within us instead of being the passive participants of traditional lecture model in college. Both Wesch and Turkle want people to use the quiet, self reflective compass that we can find within each of us that allows us to reach back out into the world for connection, change and really great questions. I think their message is the same, don’t be one of life’s pass...