Thursday, September 1, 2011

Pushing the Envelope

The start of the school year is way more thrilling than the start of a calendar year, even if the confetti and crystal balls are replaced with clean uniforms and bulging pencil cases.  Come August, there are always dozens of students to eagerly greet and meet, a multitude of strategies to perfect, lessons to tweak, colleagues to catch up with, and initiatives to implement.  The 2011-12 school year has been more exciting than usual because of the notable number of new projects taken on for the sake of changing times, and our amazing students.

The 1:1 laptop program is one of the noticeable changes in my classroom. My students are like the astronauts, happily exploring previously undiscovered resources and skills that are accessible in the wonderland wonder known as the internet. I am the commander they rely on for some direction. Truthfully, all I really provide is a nudge. The young teenagers are fearless in the vast space of the 2.0 world.

In the 20 or so days since walking in the door of our educational vessel, the students have taken off full blast with any task asked of them so far: blogging, commenting, making and uploading music videos, e-mail, citing, collaborating, completing forms, and note taking.  There have been some technical glitches and false starts, but none have outweighed our collective determination and curiosity.  In a moment of looking back with awe, I find myself especially eager to see what technological and academic adventures the next nine months will bring.


Laptop by Dan Barbus @ flickr (CC BY-NC 2.0)
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7 comments:

  1. Bam2016September 1, 2011 at 9:22 PM

    The post is good. I really like the font you used.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kelly HouSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:25 PM

    The blog post is yeah... and nice... and yeah....

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  3. Matthia HadikusumoSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:25 PM

    This is a well written post. Yes, I agree that the 1:1 laptop program is a big change in the 8th grade. In my opinion, I think that this year is going to be great.

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  4. MarkSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:25 PM

    I like the story because it is quite in depth since there are some interesting events in it. It also contains some good words for us to learn. They also have some metaphors and similes which make it more interesting!

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  5. lenaSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:25 PM

    I understand that having the laptop program in school is good, because we get to go online and do things in class, such as blogging, commenting, uploading videos, etc. But, personally, I think it wasn't so interesting.

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  6. AnonymousSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:30 PM

    This is a fine post. You're a great blogger. I liked the way you described the school year making it look too over exaggerated.

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  7. Charlie YuSeptember 1, 2011 at 9:30 PM

    The word choice of these words are good. They are in a higher level of English, and requires good skills to understand. As a student, i find this boring. I do not understand the writing. Its about some laptop program and your students. The picture is only keyboards. It has nothing to do with school. I hope you write it in a more interesting, like fun school pictures or student way of writing can make us read and understand more.

    ReplyDelete

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