Connecting

This week I was super connected. I loved it and have probably done more work in a single week than I had all year. The best part of all was it didn't feel like work. My passion for being connected and collaborating is making my job easier and I'm much more effective. 

This week I finished writing poems for a collaborative eBook with a few teachers in Ohio and another one in North Carolina. https://twitter.com/theipodteacher/status/468036008874082304 It was an awesome experience and showed me how simple and easy collaboration can be. Not to mention during the project students were motivated and wanted to do their best. Several were sent back to make revisions up to five times. There was no frustration, but just determination to publish an excellent poem. I want to thank @PrimaryTeachNC, Kate Haris, and @theipodteacher for helping this happen. 

I also took some big steps in using PBL more effectively. I had some local training done by my district and completed a course through PBLU on driving questions. This was quite an undertaking, but was actually fun. I even made time to plan a PBL unit around the novel Make Way for Dyamonde Daniel starting next week. I have learned a lot and hopefully the successes and mistakes in this new unit will help more. 

There is a lot more too, but those were two of the highlights from this week in being connected. One other smaller one is that I got a few kids excited about Pixel Press after learning about it on the #2guysshow. We will see where it goes. Next week I'm going to try to squeeze in some creative writing and use he ColAR mix coloring sheets. I have also started a #youmatter movement at my school thanks to some inspiration from @techninjatodd and his blog post http://nesloneyflipped.blogspot.com/2014/05/youmatter-day-2014.html. We will be ironing out the details tomorrow morning. I saw a neat idea on Twitter with area and perimeter designing your dream bedroom. My students need to review those concepts so I'm glad I found that idea. Finally, I need to start planning an Augmented Reality scavenger hunt. I want to do it, but just need to find the right content to work it with. 

It is amazing how driven I am to complete my own self directed projects as a teacher. I really need to spread this passion with my students. It is all from being connected and feeding off of the passion from like minded educators. I am really motivated and just wish I had more than four weeks left to inspire my students this year. Then again ISTE this summer is going to be awesome and transform my teaching even more.