ISTE 2013

Wow!

It has been incredible and I'm only a day and a half into it!  My brain is on overload and my introvert self is shuddering from all the people.  But it's so wonderful to be surrounded by like-minded people who get it!

Just some short impressions here, and I'll add more detail later.

1.  The opening ignite session was very cool.  Ignite talks are 20 slides long and I think 5 minutes--I can't remember the timing, but they're short and quick.  The speakers pack a lot of interesting stuff into it.

2. The keynote speech by Jane McGonagal was very inspirational and made me want to figure out how to gamify everything.

3.  Went to this wonderful session on QR codes and got several ideas on how to use them.

4.  Learned a little bit about edmodo and how to use it with other apps such as educreation and QR codes.

5.  There was another great session called 101 free tools on the web.  Can't wait to try some of them.

6.  I went to a short Intel sponsored panel, where I learned about 3 pretty cool free resources.  I'll post them later as I process everything.

7.  The people.  There are so many people.  All of them friendly, but I feel a little bit of the loner.  I don't really know a lot of these people from the twitter or blog world and being an introvert I find it hard to just insert myself into the situation.  This is entirely my own problem.

8.  San Antonio.  I have managed to boat up and down the riverwalk several times (I purchased a 3 day boat taxi pass).  I've had very good food at all the restaurants I've been to.  I saw the Alamo.  I went up in the Tower of the Americas.  My only complaint so far would be the heat and humidity.  I'm used to heat, but humidity is a rarity in Salt Lake City, so that is a little rough to get used to.

I'm waiting for all my pictures to upload from my phone to dropbox, and it's taking forever, so I'll leave you with one picture for now, and try to get some more up the next time I post.  I'm too tired to sit up and wait and I have a full day planned tomorrow!

Ballroom A, this is where the keynote addresses are.  It fits the theme of Texas Big, that's for sure!  Love the screens spread throughout the audience since the stage is so far away if you're in the back.

I'll get some more pictures and share more of the ideas and details later.  The list above will help jog my memory.  It'll be like a table of contents for helping me remember what to blog about for a while.

Goodnight from San Antonio, Texas!
Joell

Blog Reboot

I've had a little time to digest my upcoming job change.  I'm getting more and more excited!  Since I'm mostly going to be working with technology, I've renamed my blog Teacher Tech Time.

Hopefully, I'll be able to share all kinds of technology tips and tricks.  I'll check in once I'm back from the ISTE conference.

Joell

Changes

Hi,

I decided after much soul searching this year that I need a change.  So, I spent much of this spring interviewing for various jobs in my school district.  I interviewed for a school technology specialist job in May and didn't get the job.  I was bummed, but came to acceptance with staying at my school that I've worked at for 19 years.

Then today I got a call.  Another position opened up for the technology specialist job and they wanted me!  I'm such a bag of mixed emotions right now.  Excited for the new opportunity and to get to use technology.  Sad to leave behind my coworkers and students of my school.  Scared about the change.  Unsure about how I'll feel about not having my own classroom with my own kids.

I don't know many details yet, but I'll be working in 2 elementary schools in my school district and I'll be in charge of all the tech stuff.  I'm hoping to be able to teach students on techie stuff and that will be enough of the teacher stuff to help me get over not having my own classroom--plus, no classroom=no sub plans when I'm sick, no recess duty, no parent-teacher conferences, no report cards...etc etc etc.

I'm not sure what will happen with my blog.  I don't know if I can just rename it, or if I need to just start from scratch.  Or just keep it the same but change the focus more to technology and less on the first grade and teaching stuff.

Have you gone through a change where you left the classroom?  Was it hard to leave the kids behind?  If you have any tips for me as I transition I will gladly take them.

Joell

Summer's here!

Hi,

I'm officially out for the summer!  I know I haven't been so good at posting.  I just get tired and leads to unmotivated.

I have some summer goals and plans.

I will be attending ISTE for my first time ever.  So if you're going and would like to meet an ISTE newbie, let me know in the comments below.  I'm very excited (and a little nervous) about this.

A few days after I get home from ISTE I will be leaving for a trip up the Oregon coast.

When that's all done, I'll work on some goals:

Exercise (wish me luck)
Get the house thoroughly cleaned and organized.
Learn how to create a report using data from excel.
Read, read, read, read, read and then read some more.

I'm sure as I find renewed energy I'll be posting here some more.  Until then, enjoy your summer!

Joell