In order to beat the Winter Blahs, the Library and Technology Staff challenged the faculty and staff to set a personal technology learning goal. We emailed the following to members of our school community:

Make and Keep a Technology New Year’s Resolution

New Year’s Day is a great time to set new goals and start creating new habits.

Did you set a personal technology learning goal for the New Year?

Did you receive a new camera for the holidays and you need to learn how to download or edit the pictures?

Is there a technology topic, such as setting up a course in Moodle, creating a Google Custom Search, how to create a digital story using PhotoStory or VoiceThread, how to use Microsoft OneNote, create a screencast using Jing, that you would like to learn?

Would you like to learn how to use additional features of NoodleBib?

Interested in how to access and edit Discovery Streaming Videos for use in your classes,  that you have heard about or seen and want to spend the time exploring and learning?

For the past two Tuesdays, we have had 7% of our faculty and staff stop by at our informal Technology Resolution sessions. (This does represent a rate of return than is typically achieved by direct mail response) During these sessions, we guide and mentor the faculty and staff towards their goal. It has been extremely successful and rewarding. The faculty and staff who are coming have technology skills which run the spectrum from being what I would consider our most adept users of technology to those who have been apprehensive.

They have wanted to learn how to:

• Add websites and files to their Moodle course
• Download their pictures from their camera so that they don’t have to rely on their children to do so
• Set up a blog
• Set up a flickr account and upload pictures
• Create an group email, to email parents of sports teams, neighborhood, etc.
• Learn how to create the class push page
• Learn how to create a PowerPoint presentation

What is great is that in each of these cases, the individual created a personal learning goal which was not directly related to what they do in the classroom or as a part of their job description. However, in each case, the individual learned something that they have been able to transfer to what they do as a part of their job or in their classroom. This is higher order transfer of skills.

We have two more sessions that we have advertised and we are trying to figure out how to maintain the momentum while keeping the concept fresh. I am really excited about what the model and how we have grown the offerings.

To support the conference, a Ning has been created to allow those who attend the conference in person and those who are virtually attending have to opportunity to interact. They have set up discussion forums for people to participate, speaker’s notes, and blog posts about the conference. During the conference, I anticipate there will be more activity on the site.

Individuals have also set up 25 groups, from Teacher Writes to YA Literature Fans to 21st Century Literacies to Grammar in the Writing Process where more targeted conversations are beginning to emerge.

The cost of participation is only your time ( a precious commodity) and your energy ( a limited resources, especially at this time of the year). You can join the excitement at ncte2008.ning.com. I hope to see you there.

You see, I work at an independent school which belongs to the Independent Schools of the Central States (ISACS). To maintain membership as an ISACS school and more importantly, as a tool for growth, each school is asked to participate in an analytical review process every seven years. This self-reflection is one which is often loathed for the time and energy that it takes to go through. However, when done right, this process can help a school identify both what their strengths are so that they can continue to build on those. Each school also identifies its weaknesses with plans on how they are going to tackle that challenge.

It is now my job to simply go and observe and interact with the faculty, holding up the mirror to verify that the image that they created is accurate and not skewed. I have 48 hours to peel away the layers to make sure that they have reflected their core. During this process, I will also gain a new lens and perspective which to apply to the way that I view my school. I will be able to bring back ideas, but more importantly new ways to look at both the way that me and my department look at the challenges that we have and allow us to apply our strengths to help resolve our challenges.

The culminating artifact which will be produced is a written document which will then be provided to the school administration. Not only do we have only 48 hours to observe and confirm the picture, but we need to write our reflections for the school to process. It is an intense project and the final report was one that I used to dread. However, since I have begun to use this space to reflect on my ideas and the projects that I work on, I am finding the process to be much simpler. I am already in the habit of partially stepping outside myself to assess and reflect what I am doing.

What would  be interesting would be to produce a mini-documentary, or to provide images which we could use to show our views of what they are doing, we have to produce a document which can be easily accessed by the administration, who unfortunately is more are text based learners. Maybe in the upcoming years, as more schools provide opportunities for students to engage in these ways of creating a story, when they begin to be part of the process as adult teachers, they will push us for the opportunity to use different modalities to tell the story as well.

Now that I have emptied my head and documented my thoughts, I better catch some more sleep so that I will be able to be alert and ready for the morning. It will be here before I want it to be.