Texas Teacher Star Chart

Tonight when I checked my e-mail I had a message that during our inserviced on Monday we will be trained on an online evaluation system called Texas Teacher Star Chart. It is designed to assist classroom teachers in assessing needs and setting goals for the use of technology in the classroom in order to support student achievement. What a great tie-in to our class. I'll keep you posted on what it covers. Now I must post grades for project reports!!!

Great Class Tonight

I learned so much tonight to share with my students. Especially how to show them the validity of a web site. Today during class, one of my students got all excited to show everyone a picture he had found. It was a white dog, like the old Budweiser dog and his face was covered with porcupine needles. When I say covered boy I mean covered. However, I brought to his attention that when a porcupine shoots his quills, they can't round the corner of a dogs face and lodge behind the ears and shoulders. He said, "Well Miss, there's blood!" I said, go to worth1000.com and you'll see all kinds of things that look real. He told me I could give him a zero for the week if he was wrong. Tomorrow in class his web assignment will be to trace the owner of the site and the links! I'm so excited to share this new info with my kids. I will post a picture of the dog if he can find it tomorrow! Good night!
Kim

Why I Do It All.....

Finding My Purpose In Life


MY DEFINITION OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY
MY PURPOSE
WHO I DO IT FOR
MY SKILLS
MY VISION
MY PHILOSOPHY



MY DEFINITION OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY

Educational technology is the development of multitudes of computer applications followed by the integration of those applications into the classroom via areas such as communication graphics, business needs such as Word, multi-media, computer based learning in a classroom setting using such programs as Plato or NovaNet, and distance learning delivered via the Web or TV. It is an endless stream of improvements of hardware and software for which a teacher is responsible for staying abreast and then passing this information onto the students in high academic standards. BACK



PURPOSE

It seems that almost everything I do these days is centered around my students. Whether it is teaching them the value of an education or the value of friendship vs gang banging, I'm constantly trying to stay one step ahead of them. An easy task it is not. I am counting on this class to help me stay one step ahead of them in the computer technology arena. Every time I think, "Aha, I know something new to teach them," a wiser student enters my class. For this reason, I stay in college and take more and more classes... all to stay ahead of them! I want to learn more about the internet possibilites such as this blog. I have already started writing plans for next years lessons. I would love to understand the "server" connection to all technology, html vs java script, ftp, fireworks, dreamweaver, managing files/folders and programming. It's a lot but there's so much to learn!
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WHO
I teach students that are labeled at risk. Educationally the label means they are at risk of becoming a high school dropout. In reality they are at risk of dying of a drug overdose, dying in a gang fight, killing someone or committing suicide. I am of the opinion these risks are far more deadly than dropping out of school. If we could find the cause of their need to take such fatalistic risks, help them to address the cause and correct it, they would no longer be labeled at risk. After ten years of teaching at risk students, I am sure these students’ ability to learn is directly related to their level of being at risk.
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MY SKILLS

My students ask me all the time, "Miss, how do you know so much about computers?" Little do they know it only seems I "know so much" because they know so little. Yes, I can teach web mastering, business and multi-media, BCIS I & II, Photoshop, Basic Programming and even Keyboarding, but I have so much to learn. I know half of Photoshop because I never have time to learn the rest, no Java to move my students on who are ready for the next level, I've forgotten most of Front Page and know less than one of my students about Fireworks. It's not that I'm not capable of or don't want to learn more, it's just getting new students everyday, all at different levels keeps me on my toes. I try each night to learn something new in all my subjects and find information on the Internet that might be of help to them.

Personally, my skill is reaching my students to the level of a parent sometimes. I have students from five, six, seven years ago sending me e-mails on what's happening in their lives. Not unusual for a regular high school but very unusual at mine. For instance, I get mail from Huntsville from a past student sentence to life for murder, wanting to tell the current students make better choices.

So my skills may seem unending to my students, but it's hard for them to see anything wrong with someone who truly cares about them.

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MY VISION
I have a vision of becoming a principal at an inner city school, or opening a charter school. My soul purpose for these visions is educating at risk students. My dual Masters will allow me to apply for principal ship and infuse the technology that at risk students need to get back on track. I have seen students who at one point felt hopeless about their academic futures and counted the days until they were 17 and could drop out of school with the fear of truancy charges. I have seen these same students feel the thrill of success in learning through the use of technology. I have seen over the past ten years, students return to their regular classrooms more confident, graduate and enter college. Learning disabilities, language barriers, and physical limitations which can devastate a student academically, can feel less challenged and more in control of their futures by using today’s technology.
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PHILOSOPHY
After writing about my best and worst teachers and why they won the titles, I realized my Educational Philosophy differed greatly than worst, obviously, and fell in line with the best.

I believe that as teachers we are given the awesome responsibility and wonder gift of touching and shaping the lives of the young. It is the responsibility that built my philosophy. I believe that educators must teach to the entire child. When we bake a cake we wouldn’t use half of the ingredients and expect it to be whole. We wouldn’t change the oil in our automobiles and only put in one new quart of oil and 5 dirty ones and expect the automobile to run to its best potential. How can we then expect a student to put forth his best effort if we do not teach to the entire child? We can’t. Therefore, we must teach not only to the child’s mind but to morals, manners, respect, creativity, learning style and learning ability. We cannot teach about WWII without teaching of horrors of Auschwitz. We cannot ask a child to create a Power Point that will be graded on creativity as well as substance if we don’t allow them to create outside the box.

We must take time to “know” our students then attempt to the best of our ability to teach to the entire child


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