Scanning the latest education tweets today, I discovered "Homework may not equal learning: one to two hours a night may be excessive," "Intricate lessons may not connect to the larger lesson/competencies," "The Power of Collaborative Learning," and "Pinterest has hundreds of resources for educators." And, that is from just 50 minutes of posts.
Rather than lengthy conferences at exotic locales or subscribing to pages and pages of pedagogic papers, teachers turn to Twitter and other social media sites for a constant stream of inspiration and detailed, tested best practices. I can learn more in an hour of reading tweets from "Eye on Education", than from most in-service sessions. Some may argue that face-to-face personal contact is more effective than impersonal digital messages. Maybe, maybe not. It depends on the your comfort with this new training medium. Guru Educator Dave Guymon pointed out advantages in a Dec. 7 blog about education and Twitter:
"With proportionately decreasing budget and increasing demands on classrooms, teachers having access to a tribe of educators on Twitter provides me tools, strategies, and a support system that I can rely on to continually help me to become a better instructional leader and classroom manager... Interest-based groups of educators connect to discuss theoretical questions, classroom practices, and educational reform in a supportive, collaborative online environment."
I can foresee that instead of jetting colleagues off to the latest and greatest, that the best education ideas are brought to the instructor's classroom through webinars, discussion nodes, digital social resources, and Twitter news summaries. This brave new world is efficient, effective, and avoids long lines at the airport security stations. It introduces us to new ideas and keeps us in the classroom in front of our students, which is where we want to be.
No comments:
Post a Comment