Thing 1
Write a reflective blog post based on the 7 1/2 Habits of Effective Lifelong Learners. You may write about anything related to your own experiences or beliefs about Lifelong Learning, and your thoughts about this course. The three things you were asked to consider were:
- Which habit(s) may be most challenging for you to employ as part of your K12 Learning 2.0 experience?
- Which habit(s) will be easiest, or are most resonent for you as a lifelong learner?
- Which habit do you think will be most important for you as you work through this course, and why?
Alright, the most challenging. I’d have to say that would be being a teacher/mentor to others in my field. As a first year teacher, newly graduated undergraduate, and beginning graduate student, I feel that I have very little to contribute to educators in my field. Knowledge and Wisdom comes with experience, and as I have yet to experience even a year of teaching, I can’t, in my mind, contribute any knowledge or wisdom. I’m hoping that as I progress in this year and in this class, I will feel more confident about expressing my opinions.
The easiest habit for me would be using technology to my advantage. As a very near-member of the younger generation I’m trying to teach, I’ve grown up with technology as a constant. Using computers, iPods, and the internet has never been a problem for me, and I can’t see any technology they can come up with as ever being an issue. To me, technology is a love, and to be able to use it in the classroom would just make it that much more important in my life.
Now for the most important. I think viewing problems as challenges might be the most important habit to learn, not only for this course, but for my future education. Every assignment I’m given always seems to be a speedbump rather than a ramp. I need to learn to take each assignment as a learning experience, rather than something to be done on the way to learning. Everything I do is important, and something can be learned from everything, even if it’s learning not to do it again.
September 20th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
As a first-year teacher you bring the ENTHUSIASM and IDEALISM that many veteran educators yearn to recapture! Capitalize on these true strengths — for they DO give you a decided advantage in many situations
September 21st, 2008 at 11:56 am
“a speedbump rather than a ramp” – I like it!
I’m just having a look around to see what other Science teachers think about Web 2.0 and the possibilities for using it to help learning.
I agree that wisdom comes with age, but I’m not so sure that knowledge does. As a recent graduate, you have the most up-to-date and relevant information about your field and the way it is being used today. You are also in the best position to see what areas are going to be necessary for the future and to pass this on to your students. So don’t feel that you have nothing to contribute.
Also, as the first comment has mentioned, you have enthusiasm. In my mind, this is what science should be all about. We are privileged to be able to teach a subject that explains the world around them to students and I love it when they suddenly realise that they actually understand, for example, why they get vaccinated, or why they have to keep breathing hard after they are finished exercising, and you can physically see the light bulb go on in their brain! The whole reason I got hooked on Biology was the infectious enthusiasm of my first teacher and I keep him in mind when I feel myself getting jaded at all.
September 25th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
While your youth is just a tad annoying — just kidding! — it’s exactly what we need to bring freshness and newness to what we’ve done in the past. We teachers get into ruts. I know I do. It takes me forever to embrace something new, and then by God I think EVERYONE should embrace it, whether they want to or not!