It is all over...Or is it just beginning??

Well I4ed is officially over and hopefully the wonderful and brilliant Mike Nantais will grant me a p+ for the course (that isn't sucking up, is it??).

Actually I really enjoyed the course and looking back over it and also the last 2 years of my education degree I really have learned a lot.  Even now as I am preparing for my last student teaching placement I find myself much more confident and using better teaching methodology within my unit plans then I did when I started.  Another thing that I find myself doing is waiting to plan my units.  Why you may ask? Well unlike in my first placement, I want to wait and get to know my students before I plan to much.  I want to see how the interact, what learning styles they have, and what each student brings to class before I plan too far ahead.  For this placement I find myself gathering strategies rather then specific resources for my units.  Yes I have basic unit plans and timelines but nothing concrete and even what I do have "planned" I plan to change as I get to know the students.

This is the most important thing that I have learned in my education...

The student lead the learning, the teacher simply guides them in the right direction.

Technology is great in aiding me with this.  I know that if a topic comes up that I don't know a lot about but the students want to learn about, I can easily have access to the information and possibly network with experts to guide them to through the learning.

I plan to use technology in my future a lot.  It causes tons of engagement by the students and allows me to connect with educators teaching the same things that I am.  This makes my life easier and the education for my students better so I feel it is a win, win, win!

Also I plan to keep blogging through my placement about what goes well and what doesn't.  I am also planning on posting my lessons, notes and resources that I use for this placement on here that I found to be successful.  I hope by doing this that whenever another teacher is teaching what I am they can come here and gather some ideas and resources.

Creating lessons can be very time consuming  Lets save our energy for what we all love to do, teach!! No one honestly loves spending hours planning but we all love watching our students learn.  This is why I believe in sharing what we do in class.  This will save everyone's time for what they really love to do!

Lets work smarter not harder!  Save our energy for what is really important...Our students!!