New Year's Resolution?

Most people make new year's resolutions in December as the year comes to end and a new one begins.  Having an August birthday which coincides with the beginning of a new school year makes it a natural time for me to reflect, both personally and professionally, on what I've accomplished and what my goals are for the coming year. When I was a classroom teacher, I threw a "Happy New School Year!" party complete with hats, noise makers, a cake, etc. to set the stage for establishing learning goals for the year.

This is will be my 23rd year as an educator and when I think about all the things that have changed in that time, technology is the most significant change. My last blog post was about my experience attending TCEA, which was amazing! It opened my eyes to the ways educators and students are using technology to connect, reflect, and learn on a daily basis. I just thought I was "techie", but TCEA definitely burst my bubble.

When I returned from TCEA, my goal was to utilize technology to be more productive in my job and provide support for teachers using technology. Here's what I've accomplished since February.

1. I love Twitter! I've participated in Tweet Chats and connected with educators across the country to expand my PLN. Twitter is a quick way for me to find information, articles, etc. on topics I am interested in currently. The trick to Twitter is that you have to know who to follow. 
2. I learned how to use a Swivl. The possibilities are endless for how we can use a Swivl to capture instruction, students explaining their thinking, model lessons, etc. I recorded some students playing a math game and explaining how to play so new teachers to the district can watch the video to learn how to play the game. 
3. Time for teachers is valuable and I frequently meet with teachers to plan. In an effort to maximize our planning time, I created a planning guide for my 5th grade teachers and used Movenote to create a video explaining the planning guide so they could view it before we met.
4. I discovered Pocket, which I love because it allows me to save things I find on the web, Twitter, Facebook, etc. to one place. Currently, our district is focusing on #growthmindset so I've been saving everything I can find from different sources. 

If you know anything about the state of things in Math in Texas this past year, then you know I had a busy year last year. In reflecting on the ISTE standards and how I'm implementing them, I realized I'm doing a better job at implementing some than others. I think my quest to better utilize technology was a good start but here's my list of "new year's resolutions" for this year.

• Last summer when CAMT was in Ft. Worth, several of my teachers met Kim Sutton. To them, she's a celebrity. She offered to Skype with some of them, but none of them took her up on it. We're doing that this year! Google Hangouts are something I want to learn to better utilize. 
• The possibilities with Swivl are endless! I want to utilize the Swivl to capture number talks so we have our own "vault" of videos to view and learn from one another. I want to capture teachers teaching problem solving and student dialogue. 
• As an educator with a #growthmindset, I have to continue to model the use of technology for teachers who will in turn utilize it with their students. Our 5th grade students will have iPads this year and our 6th through 12th grade students have netbooks so there are a plethora of opportunities for me to help teachers with technology integration through planning and delivery of instruction.   

Over the years, it's been my experience that I am better at keeping my new year's resolutions if I tell my friends about them. Someone please check in with me and ask for an update! Happy New School Year!