Reflections about Educational Technology Leaders

What is your connection/reaction/response to what educational technology leaders are thinking/doing/promoting (self evaluate with the class rubric)

Initially, I started out in the world of blogging wanting to learn about Middle Year's and their technological solutions/problems/strategies as well as a teacher's own development and practice within the technological domain and I came across Konrad Glogowski's blog of proximal development. Even the name of his blog for me created a reminder 'link' back to my first days in the Master's program when my mind was refreshed back to names of educational leaders and their theories such as Lev Vygotsky. "The Zone of Proximal Development refers to those skills that are in the process of maturation." http://www.teachandlearn.ca/blog/about/
After reading through dozens of other blogs, he was the first person I came across that mentioned Canada so this might have been considered a positive in wanting me to continue reading on, well as the fact that he attended a Canadian university.

I found many of his postings to be very informative for me because he directed the reader in almost every one of his postings to someone else who was commenting on my area of interest. Back then (in Jan. 'seems like a lifetime ago'- lol) , I felt like he was very much a team player/collaborator whose mission seemed to welcome the world and their ideas. Perhaps when I learned that he was using his blog to document his own learning journey through his Doctoral program did I see that I could use a blog for similiar purpose. It gave me a working example and understanding for the purpose of a blog.

I took Glogowski's invitation to read another blog entry on "schooliness"-in which Clay Burell in Beyond School plays on Stephen Colbert's 'truthiness' and spoofs the whole idea of what bad teachers can do with a good thing. "I saw a bleak dystopia: Blogging as “just another way to turn in homework.” Blogging, like thinking, creativity, and other joys, turned into an aversive horror by the forces of schooliness."
http://beyond-school.org/2008/03/04/what-is-schooliness-overview-and-open-thread/

The whole idea about getting another perspective was learned quickly and valued also as a concept to teach when using Web 2.0 tools and as a note to self not to kill the purpose of technology by trying to fashion it into a traditional school practice.

I really liked how Glogowski spoke about defending his research in his blog. Once again, I feel that this is like a map or guide for me to consider when I have to do that for myself one day. He used the message in an old world painting 'The Taking of Christ' by Caravaggio, to explain the importance of a new world phenomena-technology. He shows a connection between an idea hundreds of years ago that still has value in helping to build an an appreciation for effectiveness today. The painting is used "to explain the role of the teacher in a blogging community."The Embedded Practitioner-March 19, 2008 http://www.teachandlearn.ca/blog/2008/03/19/the-embedded-practitioner/
Caravaggio chose not to follow common place practices and as teachers today we should strive to step beyond the boundaries that are in place and be willing to learn and adopt new practices to gain a new and different perspective and "weave their readerly, personal voices into the fabric of classrooms-as-communities". Learn to participate but don't dominate a child's experience in the classroom, guide rather than drive!! I do not want to be like most teachers I had when I was younger so this seemed like a reminder to try to be a different kind of teacher, one who was not afraid to encourage the student to explore, question, lead, and be engaged in their own learning.

Paulo Freire is frequently mentioned in this blog as a leader in the race toward personal and/or teacher development and that of 'endless questioning' to fulfill our natural curiosity about things, to 'search and research and keep on searching in order to teach.' Freire, P. 1998). Pedagogy of freedom. Ethics, democracy, and civic courage. Rowman & Littlefield, New York.(pp.35-38).
Through many of my Master's classes, I have gone from an attitude of fear and loathing at the mention of Freire to one of appreciation and a bit more of an understanding toward some of his philosophies, so this blog for me is like a reminder of my journey and growth in my own learning and development.