Years ago, traveling on a plane to spring break, the woman in the seat next to me and I discovered that we were both teachers. We probably talked about subject matter, schedules, demographics at our schools.... And then she asked if I was familiar with a tool that every teacher should be using - the Pilot G-2 roller ball gel ink pen. "You must have one," she exclaimed. I believe she even gave me hers that day and I now have a set of twelve colors in the top drawer of my desk.
As I sat on a plane yesterday, traveling for the long weekend, that memory surfaced with this question: If I were to rave about one teaching tool today, which tool would that be?
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Good question! For me it would be RSS feeds. They have changed the way I learn, the way I teach, the way I live. I set up my RSS reader in Sept. 2005. I was an ES technology teacher then just doing my job teaching word, powerpoint, and watching 1st graders play edutainment games. Two years later, I have my own blog, write articles for Ed Tech magazines, have been involved in some pretty cool global projects, just presented at an Admin conference on technology, teach a grad course, Oh, and am now the PD person K-12 at my school.
How did that all happen in a span of 2 years? I set up an RSS reader and started learning! It doesn't have to be technology. There are so many resources out there and more than that their are so many people out there to connect to that it is a amazing what you can learn. I have learned more in my 2 years reading an RSS reader then I did all my traditional schooling before that. I was looking to go back and get a PhD but I can't find a Univ. that can teach me as fast and has accurate about what is happening in education at this moment then the blogosphere and my other RSS subscriptions. By far this is the one tool I'd hand you on an airplane. I would take a napkin and that ball point pen and write.
www.netvibes.com
That is my reader, my learning vehicle and every teacher should have one!
That's quite a testemony for RSS reader, if it's done that much for you, I am inspired to dedicate more time using it!
For me, I'd have to say the internet is the tool I could not live without in my classroom now, even though I did for years. I actually had to just this week at school because we were having connection problems. I quickly realized how often I use it, but also how important it is to my everyday teaching.
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