Thoughts on Week 1
I am starting with an image created by Will Lion, since the image of drinking from a fire hydrant resonated with several people. I worry that the class was trying to drink from a fire hydrant during my presentation, since I felt like I was talking a hundred miles an hour!
Two years ago, when I started the T-L diploma program I was all about the books. I was so happy to have an excuse to read all the children’s literature and YA books I wanted. Then, as I took classes, I got excited about the unit planning and collaborative aspect of the job. Now, I recognize the importance of technology in our job, and the need for the librarian to be an advocate for ICT. I am trying to be a leader in my school, although I am still a classroom teacher. I volunteered to be tech liason, and have been trying to integrate some technology into learning activities. I even set up a padlet for teachers to share ideas for our whole school performance of the Jungle Book next year, and am happy to see that some have started using it!
I was very much looking forward to this course, thinking I would find new apps and web tools… I mean web resources to use with my class. Having finished the first week I see that I will learn some of that, but I will also come away from this class with a much deeper understanding of the theory behind ICT use in schools. I struggled with the volume of theories, terms, and content that the class was generating (fire hydrant) and felt that I wasn’t getting a good understanding of anything (trying to drink). I am the kind of person who wants to understand and learn everything, but I was leaving class with more questions than answers. I know this is good because I have so much I want to learn, but exhausting because I know I don’t have the time to learn it all now.
After a minor meltdown last night (my husband is a good listener!) I have decided to focus on what speaks to me. I’ve started a spreadsheet where I am keeping topics and questions I would like to find out more about, and know that I can come back to this list. Meanwhile, I will choose one thing from each class to investigate and write about in my blog. This will hopefully make learning manageable for the next two weeks, and create a bank of potential topics to research in the future.
That is a great idea, setting up a method for collecting terms, ideas, and methods to explore later. The fact is that there is much more to know than anyone of us can comprehend fully as individuals. However, we can learn to trust each other to help us fill in the gaps, as we identify gaps that are hindering our progress. I think this is the true spirit of collaboration. What I don’t know I will be able to learn from someone else. There is going to be something that I know that I am going to be able to share with a colleague. This is the idea of distributed cognition, a sense of our minds being connected, and being able to draw on diverse interests to engage a broader view or a deeper understanding. Part of the process of grappling with the complexity is developing the ability to discern what is important at this point in time, and what we need to shelve for later. I used to want to read every book in the library because I loved reading and I wanted to know! But then I learned I could save them, and just read one at a time, in due time.