Thing #3

Setting up my blog was pretty easy. This will be the 3rd official blog for me to write in.

I had one during college. It helped me a lot... just to get through the rough times. It was how I let out all the anger and disappointment about what was happening in my life. But in reality none of it was such a huge deal.... just something that a girl going through college without a best friend needed to get off her chest.

The most recent one I have kept is a blog about my year in teaching. I have not connected it to this one for various reasons. I hope to stay somewhat anonymous on that one, where as this one I am ok with everyone knowing who I am, I suppose. Again, my other blog is mostly about my struggles of getting through the first year and dealing with all the politics, crazy parents, and just all the things that keep most first year teachers from going back.

Don't worry though... I truly think this is my calling and while I will not be making any plans to "move up" to a principal or counselor in the next few years... I would be willing to start a Young Teachers of Texas group that would provide support for teachers such as myself. It would give us a way to voice our concerns and provide for the future of education. Mostly I have this idea because I am just sick of seeing only master (or just older) teachers at conferences and trainings. There should be no more references to Xanadu and other pop culture that happened before my time while learning about NEW strategies for teaching. We young teachers need to have a voice and a place in this population because without us there literally is no future for education. I know I am coming up against a big crowd to voice these things but I guess that I have just come from that generation who has grown up in a culture of technological change. Everything has changed. One day there was no internet and then it seems like overnight our lives changed and there was. We used to play games on the computer that were pixilated and very squarish (or more importantly we played sports outside) and now we have controllers that throw, bat, punch, shoot (and I'm not talking about the Duck Hunt), or whatever the game calls for and then can change again in 5 minutes if you get bored or master the first game. I mean geez.... we used to keep diaries that were private and locked up and now we write in journals that the whole world can see and yet we still post like no one is reading or maybe even cares.

While I may not be able to tell my kids and grand kids about walking uphill in the snow both ways, I will be able to talk to them about looking up things in an encyclopedia (GASP!) that my parents had strategically purchased for our education, versus just Googling something.... which my students and I do daily. While it is not perfect it has helped answer many science questions that we all just have to know... and expect an easy answer to.

And that's my soap box or as Mr. (well someday) Incredible would say that's one of my soapboxes. Except for these days I think we would have to stand on a Mac box!

Anyhow, I think the point of this Thing is to talk about the difficulties of setting up this blog but I found it to be easy. There were a few things I wanted to be a little more flexible like the colors and layout as well as my superhero outfit. I chose a superhero cuz maybe that's what I have always thought would be so cool. Now, as a teacher, I almost feel like a superhero at times as I get to pass my powers of learning and knowledge on to someone else. I wish that I could have had a superhero costume that was less daily and more super, but this one will do for now. I would, however like to have my own personal superhero avatar someday but that will take some more investigating on my part.

Now I am off to look around some other blogs and find some new information that could bring me closer to the end of my search for the 23 Things.