Bud the Teacher

This is why I have a job. 

    Tonight, I am finishing up a piece of writing that my wife and I owe our editor.  It’s overdue — but we did have a baby a month ago.  That’s worth some extra time, right?  Our kind and generous editor thought so.
    Actually - - I can’t believe that my wife and I have this writing gig.  It’s perhaps the biggest professional honor that I could get. 
    And so instead of finishing up that piece, I’m writing a blog post here about how much writing for deadline freaks me out.  Figures.

Oh, dear.

    I’m tempted to say something snarky or otherwise clever — but what if they’re reading?
    Nice military computers. 
    See Spot run.  For his life.

    I am currently using a discussion board to connect some of my students with students at another school three hours or so away.  I love that we can "get together" via the Internet and talk about the books we’re reading and what’s going on in our lives.  I think the discussion board is good practice at communication. 
    But it’s not so user friendly sometimes.  Wouldn’t an RSS subscription to the blogs of all of the students involved in our online exchange be a much easier tool for students to use?  They would spend less time searching for comments and more time responding to those comments that interest them.  I know I’ve said this before, but thanks to Will Richardson, I can’t stop thinking about it.  Now if only I had time to catch up on the other great ideas at his blog.

    It’s Sunday night, the dishes are done, the baby’s sleeping.   It’s time for me to get to work.  I spent some time this afternoon looking for portable digital music players.  Seems to me like if I’m going to want my students creating podcasts that involve  interviews, I’m going to want them to be able to leave the safety of the computer lab.
    Of course, I don’t yet have any students working on podcasts.  Which is the really beautiful and problematic piece, isn’t it?  I don’t yet know what can and will go wrong,  who I will ultimately offend or confuse, or if this silly notion is even a good idea.  Isn’t that the great thing about any new teaching idea or strategy?  When the brain is pumping, fresh ideas are rubbing against even fresher ideas, and the friction created give you sparks of excitement that are self-sustaining.  And then you go into the classroom with that great idea to see if it will soar or splatter.  My gut is already knotting just thinking about failure here.
    I used to not quite understand how someone could get so personal and introspective on the Internet.  Now I get it.  Rereading this post helps me to understand how easy that can be.  It’s times like this I hope that no one is "listening."
    But if you are . . .would you mind letting me know?

    I had a small moment of excitement on Thursday night.  I took some recordings of my students reading their poetry on a local radio station, some techno music and that Audacity software and made my first digital audio production.  The two minute file, which I won’t release until I get permission from those kids involved, was a hit with the other teachers at school.  It’s amateurish, silly, and, frankly, not going to win any awards or accolades from anyone other than my kids.  But I recorded it and learned the software, proving that I can teach kids to do this sort of work at school for very little money.
    Next step — get some good microphones.  I think I’ve got a lead on some and the money to buy them — but, as always, I’m open to any recommendations from those of you who know this stuff better than I (that’s just about everyone.)

    When I walked into school, there it was.  Someone had written, in dry erase pen in the center of the empty board, one simple word:
    "Blog"

    You know something has potential to reach students when it so quickly becomes graffiti. 

    Are you a teacher who wants to know more about RSS?  Maybe you’re interested in expanding your knowledge base, or eager to check out the good stuff?  Me, too.  This little manual, put together by Will Richardson, is pretty handy. 

    He, and many others, have done much or the groundwork that will get this stuff in the classroom.  Now all we’ve got to do is to convince people to try it.  I have been given permission to do just that for nine weeks this spring.  In my talks with students about this elective, they have some great ideas — and many of them have more knowledge than I have. 
    This keeps getting more and more exciting.

    It is sometimes hard to find the time to post, given all the responsibilities that I have at school and home.  I am interested in knowing how others find this time.  Heck — I feel guilty posting at work, even though I think this blog is fast becoming a teaching reflection journal for me, and that can only serve to help my teaching. 
    Reading, too, is getting difficult.  There seem to be so many interesting teacher blogs out there — and I know I’m only scratching the surface.  I’d love to know what tools or strategies others of you are using to manage your time so as to be an effective and an informed blogger.  I suspect my students, once I introduce classroom blogs, will be interested in these strategies, too.

    In between fiddling with podcast feeds — I think I’m getting close, but it’s time to get some RSS help — I have been scanning the educational blogs that are out there.  Man, are there plenty!
    I’ve found that Weblogg-ed News has found its way into my aggregator.  And I’m reading the archives.  And my brain is spinning by what’s to be found there.  For example, as I"m thinking about student portfolio publishing at my school, Will writes:

I’ve always thought that the most efficient model for using blogs in
schools would be the one that collects student work from all courses
and then feeds it out by categories to teacher aggregators. That way
students build an online archive and ultimately, perhaps, portfolio of
work throughout their schooling. Teachers simply subscribe to the
relevant content from each student blog and comment back as necessary.

    What an elegant solution.  And another fine reason to incorporate blogs into my classroom.  Right now, I use a discussion board for all of our online discussion.  But what if I used blogs instead?  A two-way, rather static and sometimes artificial conversation could be transformed into a very organic and interesting collection of student work — and it would be a single click to have it all delivered to me — a handy help for taking care of recording progress for the purpose of  silly ol’ grades.
    I’ve still got lots of back-reading to do to better understand the potential of this technology — but I like what I am seeing more and more.