Teachers voices echo students silences

I couldn't help but jump in to the conversation that was happening on @gcouros's blog post "We are all teachers". It's nice to read messages longer than 140 characters long regarding people's insights and opinions! I thought I'd post my response on my blog too! It's interesting that feelings of inclusion and exclusion are universal across cultures and ages. The more signficant insight was by Michelle, which I later responded about what this means for students.

First Response:

Hi friends!

What’s amazing about twitter is how quickly I can become aware of important, highly-discussed topics amongst people whose opinions I respect.

I’m certainly new to this ever growing community, although I’m sure many of you are familiar with the #brocktechies tag that is regularly dropped by @zbpipe. As one of her pre-service students at Brock, I am so excited that Zoe has introduced us to such an infinite resource.

That being said, I am just one of a small group of #brocktechies who understand the value of ‘another social media’. The biggest difference? What you put into it. How do you expect to grow your network without sharing, speaking your opinion or collaborating? As many have already said, surely it takes time. But thankfully it takes time! If this went any faster I would absolutely lose my mind! There is no doubt that those who work hard at developing their PLN and who share constantly would have more followers, and they deserve immense credit!

Without being at Educon (although what a valuable experience from just following the tag) I can’t imagine that it was an environment any different than extended #edchat; highly inspirational and slightly overwhelming, but overall very positive.

My aspiration isn’t to have 10,000 followers but if over the course of time I develop more people who believe I have something to say or have something to share themselves, then all the better. I just find it a bit absurd that a term like ‘a-lister’ would even be introduced to such a thriving environment. It just doesn’t even make sense. As a recent tweep, all I see is human beings exploring with other humans, regardless of race, class, status, or role. Amazing.

The experience is what you make of it and learning isn’t supposed to be comfortable. I’m excited to be at the very start of a wonderful educational adventure, with a very open mind.

If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change. -Wayne Dyer

Second Response:

I guess we can call ‘them’ the A-team I just don’t understand what point the distinction serves.

Michelle has certainly addressed the issue, “How can we ensure that our students are heard? Not all of them are comfortable talking aloud in class, even in small groups. What other options are we giving them?”

I think ensuring our methods are differentiated, allowing for both inter and intra personal strengths to shine, is a start. The best way is to probably be proactive about the entire situation and work from the start to develop a safe, inclusive community.

Tweet, Tweet

Okay, I must admit, I was pretty skeptical about the whole twitter thing before starting my Teaching & Learning with Technology course. Without having an actual educator's perspective on it, I figured it was just another way to keep tabs on what Justin Bieber was doing at all times. But @zbpipe (our professor's professional twitter username) has truly unlocked some magical educational doors for me, something I greatly appreciate.

I've already networked with dozens and dozens of educators I surely never would have without twitter. All of them posting regularly with insightful comments, links to even more thought provoking blogs, and the resources just never end!

But this weekend is what really has me writing. Without twitter I would have never heard about the 2011 Reform Symposium Virtual Conference. On Saturday morning I couldn't help but noticed multiple educators that I follow tweeting like crazy about " #rscon11 " and I had to figure out what it was all about. Turns out it was an online conference with teachers and professionals around the world (okay so it ended up being mainly from North America, but I saw a couple from South America too!) conversing about various educational topics. From learning about Glogs with Mike Olcott and Jim Dachos to having almost 100 people sit in on a session with David Ginsburg discussing effective classroom management strategies (one of, if not the, main concern of new teachers!) I really couldn't even believe that I was actively participating in such an amazing community of passionate educators from my bed! We could raise our hand, applaud and speak with the microphone to ask questions directly to the speakers! They shared their desktops to show us exactly how to navigate resources or left the whiteboard open for us, the audience, to collaboratively share our stories (like in the "One Thing I've Learned" session).

I have a short attention span and start skimming an article when it gets to be about this length, so I'm going to try to keep my posts concise. Moral of the story, Twitter is one of the best PD steps a teacher in the 21st Century can take.