Welcome to "Talking Tech' in HD"!!! That is the new title of my blog. Thanks to those who took the time to vote! In the future look for the chance to vote on a logo.
The title of this week's blog is also the title of a Jim Croce song - please watch the video below.
Jim Croce is one of my favorite music artists. He is before my time - honest - but the title is perfect for what I wish to write about this week. The chorus starts with the following lines:
But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do once you find them
This has been an incredibly busy week here at HD, and especially for the staff as we have parent teacher interviews. I enjoy the 8 minute block that I get to spend with the parents as we discuss and work out strategies, talk about the course, talk about the "whole student" and depending on how well we know each other - just time to catch up. This is time well spent and is very valuable to me, the teacher, and I hope it is as valuable to the parents, the students, the school, my classes and the community. The time spent together provides me much feedback, thought, motivation, and blessings, therefore, it is time well spent.
In the last post I mentioned how our grade 11 class helped the office arrive at the schoolbookings.net solution to streamline the process of signing up for parent-teacher-interviews. The old method of scheduling consumed approx 40 hours, each term, from the office staff! While the old process had the same end result, it was not time well spent. The gifts and talents of our office staff could be and now are better put to use.
It was fun to see a smile on Mrs. Pot's face as we discussed scheduling PTIs, the smile was mostly because it is now so much easier and not a frustrating or time consuming task.
With the correct technology, we can be more efficient and give honor and value to the time of others.
I sometimes struggle with the balance of time and technology, and how it is not just my time but also my family's time. One of my struggles is how much time I spend using technology and how long I spend on one task. I enjoy working with technology and computers, and for me it is also a hobby and quite fun but I need to balance it.
If you have been following from the start, then you know that I am using Twitter (@hblyleven) to learn of it and learn from it. I have really benefitted from the thoughts of others as we share ideas and information. It, like this blog, has taken time but I think these activities are important, but I am making every effort to make sure that these do not take time away from important things like my family, my church, my friends and our community. To balance out the equation I need to give things up - I am watching way less tv - probably a good thing! I think that these activities are time well spent!
My challenge for you, for the next week, is to be conscious of your time spent using technology and that it is indeed time well spent!
Grade 9 Computers BTT1O
We are currently on a "rotation" with our class and Mr. Brink's class. The rotation allows the students to discover and learn about movie making with Mr. Brink. Mr. Brink is the other BTT teacher and is also one of the HD media teachers. His expertise in this area is much appreciated. As a result, Mr. Wensink has made the move to Mr. Brink's class and is working through spreadsheets with them. Mr. Wensink is already two thirds of the way through his 6 week placement. I am very grateful and impressed with the work that Mr. Wensink is putting into our classes.
Grade 11 Computer Programming ICS 3U
The students are creating a guessing number game in which they are incorporating all of their newly acquired programming skills. Mr. Wensink is also incorporating and engaging students with discussions about computer and technology issues such as; online censorship and how the Occupy Toronto demonstration is being supported by a hacking group called Anonymous . Below is a clip of the message that anonymous delivered to the Toronto government.
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