Greetings from Asbury Park Atlantic City, NJ, where my family is on vacation for a week. Coincidentally, I just noticed that today is my blog’s first anniversary, so here’s a link back to that first post from 2 August 2007. I’m taking advantage of a rare quiet moment when everyone but me is napping to get a quick post off.
Tracy Rosen tagged me in a piece entitled “By Any Means Human”, which asks teachers to consider the human element they bring to the classroom. As anyone who has been to university taught for any period of time knows, content knowledge alone does not a good teacher make.
For my part, my students have always told me that my sense of humor not only helps make sometimes dry material more accessible, but helps them connect a little more to me (and to each other) personally. In fact, I got a very nice thank-you card at the end of this past school year from a senior I had in my first quarter Shakespeare’s Comedy class. In it, she informed me that my sense of humor not only helped her to understand the works we studied*, but also helped the class of to bond considerably. There’s something about laughter that brings people together; I guess it’s the participation in a shared experience that does it. As I’ve said before, I’m all for engendering that sense of community in my classes, through whatever means I have at my disposal, technological or not.
This isn’t to say that the jokes I make are GOOD, per se – in fact, I pride myself on the ability to craft a cringe-worthy pun out of almost any situation (although the one I made about Titania and Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream had the entire class LOLing for a good while!). Maybe it’s more that I can (and frequently do) laugh at myself, which the students may find rare in a teacher. I take my job and my responsibilities very seriously, but myself much less so.
Instead of tagging individuals, I’ll leave the tag open to anyone who reads this – what special human element do YOU bring to your classroom?
* In a nine-week course, we study three of the greats (OK, two of the greats and Measure for Measure).
I’ve been actively involved on Twitter for almost a year now, and I have a lot to thank it for. I’ve been introduced to some fantastic folks via Twitter, some of whom have even made guest appearances in my classes. I’ve developed a PLN around Twitter that has heavily informed not only how I use technology in my teaching, but my entire mindset regarding education irrespective of technology. I talk every day with smart, funny people who care a great deal about kids, learning, and teaching.
So why might I jump ship?
Identi.ca is the new microblogging kid on the block, and at first glance, it not only seems similar to Twitter, Pownce, Plurk, etc., it actually seems like it has less to offer. No replies buttons or tabs, no search bar, just a steady stream of messages and the ability to ’subscribe’ to one another.
What entices me about Identi.ca is the fact that it’s open source. While Twitter has been having trouble staying on its feet lately (it has been better of late, to be fair), I wonder how long it would take for Identi.ca users with some technical knowledge to diagnose and attack the underlying problems. Seems like a good thing to have “more hands on deck.” There’s more to be said about it, but Mike Bogle covered it in pretty good detail in his post and follow-up comment here. With add-ons and other contributions from the Identi.ca community, I’m seeing the potential for Identi.ca to play Firefox to Twitter’s IE – highly customizable and community-based.
I also like Identi.ca’s commitment to the OpenMicroBlogging protocol. Essentially, conversations could take place across services, so there’d be no need for a Twitter account, Plurk account, etc. One protocol to rule them all, so to speak. There is already a plethora of services for cross-posting to multiple services, but nothing to aggregate responses and facilitate discussion.
To me, the discussions and exchanges of ideas that take place on Twitter are by far its most important factor, and why I won’t be deleting my Twitter account anytime soon. Identi.ca may evolve into something great, and I’ll definitely stick with it, unlike a lot of other microblogging services. Without the people who make up my network, however, it won’t be of nearly as much value as Twitter, broken down and everything. Ultimately, it’s the people, not the tools, that give the network its value.
In the meantime, I encourage folks to try out Identi.ca and see if it suits you. I’m @damian613 on both Identi.ca and Twitter; feel free to subscribe, follow, or just read.
As I’ve said before, I’m a fan of anyone bad enough to start their name with an indefinite article. Jose at The Jose Vilson asked for some help with his Ginsberg-inspired poetry meme, so here’s my contribution (read his post if it isn’t evident how I’m helping).
I’ve announced it through Twitter and Facebook, but not yet blogwise: I have been hired as a maternity leave school psychologist for next year. I’ll be working at my current school as a psychologist from September through early February, at which point I’ll transition back into my teaching role for the remainder of the year (we’re on the 4×4 block schedule, so it won’t be as traumatic for the kids as it sounds).
In all honesty, a maternity leave position is not how I thought I’d be starting my career in school psychology, especially a position that isn’t even an entire year long. I’m grateful for the opportunity to get some paid experience, though, and wondering if it’s not a blessing in disguise. It’s a low-risk way of entering the field – I’m at the same school at which I’ve taught for eight years, I know the people and the culture, and I’m pretty well-versed in “how things work” around here.
I had my sights set on a full-time tenure-track position from the outset (not necessarily an unreasonable goal in K-12 education), but the more I think about it, the more I think this may be the right position at the right time for me.
–Damian,
who occasionally needs to be reminded he must learn to crawl before he can walk.
Christian Long’s summer vacation is off to a bang with the development of the first meme of the season, in which he asks:
What was the “worst job” you ever had that ironically helped prepare you to one day become an educator?
I’ve been extremely fortunate in that I’ve never had any terrible jobs, but for the sake of the meme, I’ll say dorm security at The College of New Jersey during my undergrad years:
- Shifts lasting til 2am enabled me to work long into the night, like I had to during my first few years of teaching
- It was my first taste of working as an authority figure (to use the term loosely), which helped when I was 23 and faced with a class of 18-year-olds
- Conflict resolution (and avoidance!) skills came into play, especially when dealing with drunk freshmen. Similar scenarios have played out in my presence at school (presumably, minus the alcohol), and I learned to always keep the coolest head of the group.
Thanks for tagging me, Christian. I hereby tag some folks whose blogs I most sincerely wish I had more time on which to comment:
It’s that time of year again – the end of the American school year is always hectic, and as if you hadn’t figured it out, blogging’s taking a far backseat to my growing personal and professional obligations. I’m still around on Twitter periodically (as periodically as Twitter will let me, anyway).
Hope to get back to this sooner rather than later.
-
-
visitors since 8/5/07
