// Langwitches Blog

Re)Imagining Social Media & Technology in Teacher Education with Alec Couros and Dean Shareski.

Conversation Description:
Dean Shareski and Alec Couros have been teaching technology and social media related courses in a teacher education program at the Faculty of Education, University of Regina. Over the last couple of years, we have focused on social and participatory learning [...]

Heidi Hayes Jacobs is presenting: Curriculum Mapping- Launching Pads to the Future
The state of Curriculum Mapping is dynamic! Heidi will share her latest work and provide practical strategies on how to Upgrade the Curriculum in your school setting to respond to the needs o the “class of 2023″.
Image licensed under Creative Commons by nasa1fan/MSFC
What year [...]

Differentiated Staff Development.

Laying the foundation (Vision)
Prologue to mapping
establishing reasons for mapping
Definition and vocabulary components.
creating a shared vision/understanding
identifying your leadership support structure
Launching the process/Getting Started
Maintaining, sustaining, and integrating it into the system
consensus mapping, diary mapping
Advanced Mapping tasks.

Most important thing is to lay the foundation and understand WHY you want the faculty to map. Establish right away [...]

On a chilly Florida night, Andrea Hernandez. and I hosted the 2nd Annual Jacksonville K12online Conference LAN Party. About 20 educators from 4 schools gathered in the computer lab of the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School to learn about the K12Online Conference, watch a few presentations and talk about the changing landscape of teaching and [...]

I am happy to announce
The 2nd annual Jacksonville, Florida
K12Online Conference LAN Party.
LAN stands for Local Area Network.

Download the flyer as a pdf to forward to colleagues and/or  print out to hang in your teacher lounge.
Last year I organized with my colleague Paige McGee two session that you can read about here and here.
This year, Andrea [...]

Almost two years ago, I wrote a post titled Collaboration Projects-Doomed to Fail? I wondered:
How much can you spoon feed other teachers? Do you write their lesson plans for them? Do you keep nagging and begging for participation? How do you find collaboration partners who are equally invested in a project? How do you motivate [...]

During my first year of teaching, I also assembled a teaching portfolio of my work. I wanted evidence of my work in planning, in the classroom, at professional development opportunities as well as projects I created and participated in. I wanted to grow my portfolio as my teaching experience grew. I used a binder and [...]

Cross posted to TechLearning  Advisor blog
Lately my thoughts and efforts are shifting from figuring out how to get educators familiar and comfortable enough to use technology  as just another teaching tool to how to change or facilitate a shift of a school’s culture into a learning community.
I invite you to jump on and take a [...]

Steven Kimmi, on his blog Experiments in Technology posted Taught Versus Learn, A Distinguishing Factor
Again,  it was a small sentence that caught my eye and I was not able to let it go. Just as Kim Cofino’s quote about “ Using Technology Integration in the classroom is a Mindset, not a skill set“, I [...]

I have been blogging for over three years now. I use my blog to:

document my thoughts about educational technology and my journey as a connected teacher
share  educational resources, lesson plans, How-To guides, web 2.0 tools, experiences in the classroom
develop professional development workshops
sprinkle awareness about cultural, country and language specific differences among us

This blog is [...]