It was finally back to school for me.  I returned to my what was my home-away-from home for almost the last decade...  The Grizzlies were excited to see me, and I was equally excited to hear about all their latest-greatest adventures.  As I mentioned before, my old classroom has been taken over by my best friend, Kyla.  So I was hangin' out with her, and at one point a former student of mine approached her desk where I was sitting.  I instantly went into teacher-mode.  It was like I'd never left--tear!  I miss teaching and the kids, but I miss my little angel even more.  Although the visit was good, I'm looking forward to going home.

It was same-old, same-old at my old school.  The teachers have way too much to do, and the gossip was already taking over the teacher lounge.  The biggest discussion was about academic freedom and what academic freedom means to middle school teachers.  Apparently, and I had not heard this, teachers in the the Bellevue district in Washington state went on strike--there was too much scripting taking place, and the teachers didn't feel they had their rights to academic freedom.  Now I haven't read any official articles on the happenings, but it sounds like the district caved...  The teachers are back to work without the rigid curriculum requirements.  Hmmm... makes you wonder who's next...

On a different note, have you checked out Edmodo ?

It’s another interesting web 2.0 application to add to your tool box, and one that you can use fairly easily with your students.  It is similar toTwitter, but Edmodo does much more.  Students and teachers create short messages--140 characters or less--and disseminate them.  The messages are sent to defined individuals or groups--not the whole world.   You have much more control over who views each message, instead of allowing public access for all. 

If students choose to respond to different posts, their replies are threaded with the original post, making it easy to follow a variety of conversations.  With Edmodo, you can attach files. You are able to attach files, embed links, assignments, etc.  

There are public pages available, with RSS feeds, so if you do have something that you want to share globally, it will support that, too. Students are able to save specific messages in their ‘locker’ to refer back to them at a later time.  Assignments appear conveniently in the sidebar as needed.

You might wan t to take a peak at Edmodo.  I can't say that I'm a great 'twitterer,' but I can see that there are some cool applications here! 



 


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