Nocking the Arrow

Today was my birthday. After nearly 1/2 century, the celebration is a bit muted tonight. Not just because 49 is an insignificant, prime number, but because my birthday typically falls during the first week of school, which as you know, can be a rather wild whirlwind, two parts excitement mixed with one part stress. That said, today does offer me a chance to reflect on a conversation that I shared with my principal during our weekly meeting. We shared our beliefs about lifelong, passion-based learning, and it was an enthusiastic discussion that inspired this post. I believe that it's very difficult for educators to stay current and relevant without PLN connections.   Okay, I'm Connected, Now What - Tom Whitby I believe that the very nature of learning is becoming a combination of crowd sourcing and small personal learning teams. Two Roads to Innovation - George Couros I believe that the joy, and reward of learning is found in personal meaning and shared appreciation. The S

In days gone by, the paperboy and the postman would bring reading material and information to your doorstep. After sifting through the meaningless junk, you could spend time reading the articles that were of personal interest. Today, information comes flooding to your web connected device, and with the help of RSS feeds, and RSS readers, this information comes "pre-curated" to your personal reading preferences and interests. With tens of millions of blogs available, who has time to filter through all of the irrelevant stuff? Time is saved because the sifting and searching has been done. Time is also saved because feeds are aggregated into a single location, called a reader.  Time is saved because updates and new information are sent automatically to subscribers. This short video explains Real Simple Syndication. Nearly all of my reading is now being done on my iPad. Here are three of my favorite apps for curating and reading RSS feeds on the iPad. Feedl

CC image Chris Harrison Earlier this week, I witnessed a graphic illustration of a significant learning gap. In this case, the connected versus the unconnected educator. My district hosts a leadership summit for the all of our administrators to kick off the new school year. Since we are moving from pilot to program phase with 1:1 iPads, the theme of this meeting was our new "brand"; extraordinary opportunities, innovative teaching, exceptional learning. I genuinely appreciate the simplicity and values expressed in this motto. Unlike previous mission statements and overarching goals that we have produced - this one actually used the word "learning". Innovative teachers and administrators were selected to present their experiences of teaching and leading in a 1:1 learning environment. Nearly all of these dozen or so presenters, including myself, share thoughts and resources with each other as part of a growing, enriching, and engaging personal learning network

I was sitting in Dr. Helen Barrett's ePortfolio workshop at ISTE-13 contemplating how I was going to introduce and support digital portfolios with my faculty and their students. We are in the midst of a 1:1 roll-out with iPads, and also integrating GoogleApps. Yes, I know - square pegs, round holes. Thus, the extra-contemplative look on my face. About the time that Dr. Barrett was going to start to ignore my rapid fire hand-raising, she unleashes the "one great thing" on me. You know, you hope to pull "one great thing" from the sessions that you attend at a conference. This "one great thing"- life-wide learning . "Hold on a second Dr. B.!  Please tell us more about this life-wide learning.", I said without trying to sound bossy. Since growth mindset and lifelong learning are at the core of my personal philosophy, it was fitting that the phrase " life-wide learning " caught my attention and prompted me to seek more inform