The Classroom

My first principal, Bill Drake, told me to always change schools every 4-6 years. Well after 7 years at Meyokumin, and 9 years of teaching grade 6 integrated mainstream – I’ve done it. I’ve graduated with my last class and moving on to Jr. High. I’ll be teaching grade 7-9 English Language Arts and Social Studies to literacy (special needs) students. I also get to be the English Language Arts and homeroom teacher for the 7B’s – a class participating in the 1 to 1 project. Each student will be given their own laptop, and the school retrofitted for wireless technology. We’ll be charting their progress over the next 3 years to see if this kind of 1 to 1 ratio of students to technology will actually effect their performance. It’s an exciting project, and I’m glad to be a part of it – and it’ll also give me a form to remind people that it’s not just the technology – but how we use it to teach that matters. A pencil is just a pencil, and a keyboard’s just a keyboard, it’s how we use them to inspire life long learning that matters.

To that end I’ll soon be adding another category to this blog for the 1 to 1 project – chronicling my journey with the project and sharing what I’ve learned about how to integrate technology into the classroom/school culture, and any of the pitfalls and triumphs I experience. I still maintain that I am not a technology teacher – I just use it to inspire my class, but that doesn’t mean I can’t talk about it right? I’ll still be writing my usual questions and comments on eduction in general – this will just be a nice addition to the blog.

Oh – and for those who’ve noticed I’ve been a little negligent in updating the blog lately – I apologize – but I was in the middle of final reporting, grade six farewell planning, and packing up and moving my class. The, seeing as it was summer holidays, I decided to take some time off! It’s still summer, so I won’t be writing as frequently as I did during the school year – but the odd post will pop up for time to time… promise.

-Mr. G