Technology Training

If there's anyone out there who still gets notified when I post to this abandoned blog, you know by now that I cannot in good conscience make any commitments to posting more than once a year, but here I am for my annual checkup.

So, a year after I began teaching, I have one concrete piece of wisdom to share: Full time teaching will consume your life. On the one hand it's your life, and you need it for things like blogging, reading, napping or staying in touch with loved ones: those who live on the other side of the globe as well as those lying next to you in bed.

On the other hand teaching is a sacred profession, and it feels almost sacrilegious to give it anything short of the best effort you have. You worry, fret and stress over plans and grades and students who don't seem to get it, even over those who don't seem to care. You make phone calls to parents and send notes; you try to find the balance between praise and consequence; you check and double check yourself on every fact and detail because you want to give your students the best chance they have to succeed, not only in your class but in life; and if you don't, you may be doing it wrong.

Then, every once in a long, long while, something comes along that you just don't give a crap about. For me, that something is technology training. And that, my two followers, is where I'm sitting right now, as they say in Chapín: pelándomela. In theory, I'm very pro-technology training. I think that using technology in the classroom can enrich and transform education when it is used in a manner that is appropriate, purposeful and creative. I myself am constantly looking for new ways to incorporate technology into my lessons that will grab my students' attention, while teaching them core skills and without alienating or overwhelming the less technologically inclined among them.

So, when they told us we would be doing a seven week workshop on Technology in the Classroom, I was pretty excited. However, as it turns out, this is Technology 101 for the internet-impaired. And that's  AFTER they split us into a higher and lower level. What I have "learned" so far in this course includes: how to use email, facebook, twitter and now- blogger. Mind you, if the title of today's course were "How to Not Suck at Updating Your Blog," I would be hanging on the profe's every word (the trick there probably being to make a class blog, see Teaching consumes your life). The emphasis, though, in each of the 3 class meetings we've had so far (today is number 4) has been on the technical aspects of, literally, how to create an account, groups, posts; how to modify settings; how to mention someone in a tweet; etc.

Yes. In case that was not clear: I am in the "advanced" level of this workshop. I'm gonna give you a minute to let that sink in. In a city where there's an internet cafe on every other corner, in a school where every teacher has a personal laptop, in a building with wifi, in a teaching staff with an average age of 30...

Up next week: creating YouTube videos. Mine may look something like this.