With that said I want to take some time to reflect on my experiences in ECMP 455 this past semester.

We got off to a bit of a rough start with some scheduling conflicts but overall I had a good experience in ECMP. The class was stuctured with some face to face time and some online time together. I think this is a good idea as it is important for us to get used to communicating online in the class. As much as I consider myself a digital native I find that I learn better in a traditional environment. This could be because of the fact that it is the only way I have learned over that past 18 years of my life. Because of this I think meeting in a classroom together a little more would have been beneficial to someone like me, even just twice a month instead of one time per month.

I was really excited to take this class with Alec as it is widely known that he is kind of the guru of this stuff at the U of R and beyond. I didn’t have the greatest experience in ECMP 355 and I really wanted to get something more out of the class in 455. I think I did.

What ECMP 455 forced me to do was become my own teacher, I think this was done on purpose. What this allowed me to do was focus on the types of things I wanted to focus on in the class instead of being dragged through stuff that a) I already knew or b) that I didn’t care about. I was able to seek out the stuff that interests me and I was able to go about it in a way that suited me personally. This was great.

My favorite part of the class was that I was able to work with other Business educators to create a online learning resource. I have a blog post about it below so I won’t get into it too much but I really loved working on this, I would definitely keep this part of the class.

Mentorship was another part of the class that I found parts of it to be rewarding. I learned alot in a little amount of time just observing from thousands of miles away from others and it was a good experience overall. I do have some criticisms but I don’t want to get into them here.

If I had to give ECMP 455 a rating out of 10 it would have to be a 7.5. I think it is a great class and with a few changes it could easily be a 10!

In the future I hope to take other classes like this and continue to explore what is going on in the technology world. I have not had a chance to really look into it but if there are master level classes on educational technology I would be interested in taking some down the road.

I got to thinking and thought how could a subject area with so much be dieing? For a project of mine I have created with a couple other Business Education students a wikispace dedicated to resources for different areas of business education. When we started the project out we thought about what subject areas would fall into the area of Business Education. Here is our list:

• Accounting
• Business Communications
• Communication Production Technology
• E-Commerce
• Economics
• Entrepreneurship
• General Business
• Information Processing
• International Business
• Law
• Management
• Marketing
• Memberships & Associations
• Personal Finance and Consumer Studies

I would think that is a good list of legitimate subjects that can be and should be taught in high schools. Maybe I am just a bit biased.

When you look at it though only the Faculty of Arts has a high enrollement than that of the Faculty of Business Administration in Canada. The stats back that claim up: http://www40.statcan.gc.ca/l01/cst01/educ54a-eng.htm. So why is it that Business Ed is a dieing subject area? Is business going to simply go away? I don’t think so.

To strengthen Business Ed we thought that the wikispace would be a great place to allow fellow business educators to come and share their knowledge with others. Collaboration makes us all better teachers and the wikispace is the perfect venue for this to occur.

Each subject area has it’s own page already loaded with resources, the goal is to invite others to contribute and make each page burst at the seams with content and resources. The first step in this process was undertaken at the annual Saskatchewan Business Teachers Association spring conference. At the conference the wikispace address was handed out to every teacher in attendance with the hope that they would then join the wikispace and add to it. Further efforts will be made such as emails to other business educators, blog posts like this one, and links sent to member associations across North America.

The process of creating the PLC was quite simple, as I stated before we sat down and brainstormed the different subject areas we considered to be a part of Business Ed. We then went and dug up resources we already had to add to the site, then we went online and found resources that we had not used. Within each page on the wikispace you will find links or information relating to curriculums, videos, online resources, games, simulations, articles and lesson plans. The beutiful thing about the wiki and allowing people to contribute is that people are not limited by what they add, if they have a great resource that doesn’t fit with the headers we have created they can simply add their own!

I am really excited about the possibility of this wikispace exploding with interest and content, not online within Saskatchewan but Canada, North America and the world. I would love to be able to get in contact with some educators from Australia as I know they have some great stuff going on down under in regards to personal finance. This is a never ending project that could turn out to be something amazing!

One last thing, you probably want the link to the wikispace:

http://businessedplc.wikispaces.com/

This presentation really gets you thinking about what we are teaching our youth. I know here in Saskatchewan we are looking at curriculum and changing the way things are done, especially in math right now. I think technology needs to be a big part of this change. The internet is such a powerful tool to be used in learning. No longer does learning only need to occur in the classroom but it can occur online through collaboration with others whether they be in India, China, England, Kazakhstan, Australia, Cote d’Ivoire, Uganda, Mexico, Chile, Brazil, Jamaica, Cuba, or even the school down the street.

I think the questions the presentation asks us to ask people around us are key. We are teaching the people who will be going out to find job in ten years. What will the world look like then? What type of jobs are we training them for? What type of literacy will be necessary? Where does this all start? With you and I.

Please check out this presentation and then check out the wikispace that is set up for this presentation it has even more information.

If you don’t know what I am talking about check them out:

http://www.theflip.com/

What is so great about them? They are cheap, durable, and easy to use. Those three things make them a great tool for classroom use. You don’t need to spend a entire period teaching the students how to use the camera, these simple gadgets can be taught in less than 5 minutes.

They are small enough and good enough to let the students take them out of the classroom to make some mini videos. Perhaps you are teaching filming techniques, with these little cameras you can send the students out and have them back in minutes with some good footage. Maybe you are teaching Romeo and Juliet and you give the students 60 minutes to go and film the entire play in a 3 minute video.

What is even better about these little guys is that the company that makes them sees them as an educational tool and therefor is giving a $10 rebate to any educator who buys one. Check the out here: http://www.theflip.com/buy_educators.shtml

What I love about it on top of all that is you can order them with your school logo on it so that you know it is yours! Here is what I would order mine to look like if I was still at O’Neill right now:

The Titan Flip

That is the flip – Check them out they are great tools for the classroom.

Even though I am white I am completely different from other white people, in our class, in my community, city, province and country. I am of Italian, Swedish, and English decent; my history is a combination of many different cultures. This is similar to other white people but the beautiful thing that we typically miss is that each person has a slightly different history behind them. Each person is slightly different. So why is it then that white people, including myself, saw inclusive education as include others and not everyone.

Recently I have had a number of interviews with school division in and around Regina. While preparing for these interviews I was thinking about the notion of inclusive education and I failed to see the amount of inclusive education I was involving in the class. I failed to see it maybe because to me it was simply what I had to do and not something I saw as different. Perhaps it is because it was within a mainly white school and I simply played it off as nothing. At any rate having this “ahah” moment two weeks ago would have greatly helped me in my interview process as I would have had plenty to talk about instead of a couple of sentences.

What I have learned from this reading is to be aware of what I am doing and to realize that inclusive education has little to do with others and lots to do with everyone. It is not about the minorities, nor about the majority but about everyone together. Each person needs to be included in the classroom in the process of inclusive education.

What has happened so far? I have been in contact with the people Alec and Dean paired me up with and I have been able to stay in contact with one of the teachers, I just need more follow through with her to get going. The other teacher I was paired with sent me an email saying he would pair me up with some teachers from his school but I have yet to hear from them.

What I am wondering is what am I going to be able to do with the class? I have a very busy schedule and don’t have any real time to sit down and work on homework until after 8pm virtually every day except Sundays. This means I won’t be able to do anything live with the class, which is disapointing. I am sure I will be able to come up with something when I talk to my mentorship teacher.

Why is it that the schools don’t incorporate technology into lessons as much as possible? I even had one instance with my classes that the teacher in the room said she would prefer if I didn’t use the technology I had in my plan as she was unfamiliar with it. Is this a typical approach to technology throughout schools?

During the Education Career Fair at the U of R in January I was talking to a representative from Medicine Hat and he mentioned that every teacher in the division had a laptop and smartboard in their class. They also give training and provide seminars on how to use the smartboards. I thought this was awesome and it definitely drew me to their division more than I would have without knowing that information.

Don’t get me wrong I would absolutely love to work for one of the two Regina boards, and possibly help create a movement for change in the way technology is viewed. Honestly I would give my right arm to work for one particular division, so I am not critisising in a negative way.

I guess my real thoughts are if the interviewers will be taken back when I talk about technology and how I think it is a great way to engage the students and make the lesson more meaningful to the students. I really do think that when you use technology properly the students may become engaged in a subject that they would have otherwise found mundane and boring. Technology as a tool is a great thing to have in the classroom.

What do others think? Should I pump up the technology or play it low key? What are the boards looking for? I want to stay true to who I am but I also need something to help me pay off all of these students loans!

The one the only - Jack Handey

So I am sitting here trying to keep up with all of the technology in my life, and just thinking about it makes my head hurt.

This led me to another question, if my head hurts so much from all of this technology overload how can I possibly expect my students to get it and be totally cool with it.

On top of this I had an “ah ha” moment. Up until this point in my life I have had a very difficult time understanding why someone doesn’t get what I get. I think many people in Education might have the same feeling as we are all usually at the top of our high school classes grades wise. This bit about technology made me realize that something that may seem so simple to others can be absolute information overload to others.

What scares me even more is that it took me this long to get this “ah ha” moment. What took so long? Why did I not see it? or did I see it and just not put it to an actual focused thought?

The real question in all of this is how do I make sure that I recognize this in my students when I am teaching? What happens if I don’t catch it?

So many questions and yet I have so few answers. This can’t be good.

Going back to technology I am wondering at what point is the point lost to students. At what point is it that we are simply using another piece of technology for the sake of using it? Is this process a bad thing or a good thing? They learn new technology but they may not get the content that you are using the technology to teach.

I would really appreciate some thoughts on this as I want to be using technology and would someday love to be “the guy” in my school or division when it comes to using it as an instructional tool.

The best part of all this is I know I will get some help on this, all thanks to one beutiful thing: Technology.

I am leaving for Las Vegas this afternoon to attend the Nike Coach of the Year Football Clinic. It should be a really good expirience as there are many NCAA coaches that are going to be there to offer their advice and expiriences to all in attendance. I am going with the coaching staff from the school I interened at, we had a great season going 6-0-1 during the regular season. Unfortunantly we lost in the city championship game.

I have only coached football this one time, but I have coached numerous other teams in baseball and hockey. I am really excited to go and learn as much as possible. Yes there will be differences in some things as we play with 12 on the field and they play with 11 but the overall content will be awesome. I love football and I can’t wait to get down there and learn. Though we are going to Las Vegas I am most excited about the clinic and hearing what these other coaches have to offer.

I don’t know if I will get a chance to blog while down there but I will definitly post a report when I get back!

Have a good weekend!

It is nothing but pictures of my hometown, Regina. I love where I am from and this blog shows off the beauty that we sometimes miss when we live here on a daily basis.

Why am I posting this on my education blog? It gave me a cool idea, why not have a blog like this for the school I am going to be teaching in. If I were to do it during my internship last semester it would have been called O’Neill in pictures and been a kind of online yearbook with a daily picture or pictures of what is going on in the school that day. I think it has lots of potential in classes as you can teach the photography, the media, you could add captions for literacy as well.

Just wanted to post about this site and get it out in the open, enjoy the city that I love!

PS – Apparently I touched a nerve with the twitter post. I’ll post something else about it later today or tomorrow.