Resilience, a Key Word for Connected Educator Month

This morning I am blogging from my tablet using Blogsy, a pretty great blogging app that will allow me to submit this post to a blog on several different platforms. I don't usually blog from my tablet. I like the full functionality of my Laptop, the ease of finding links, direct access to locally saved images, and the comfort of habit.
This morning when I powered on I got a frightening error message from Microsoft about something being broken inside my machine and they assured me they were working hard on fixing it. I expressed my disappointment and moved on the plan 2.
As we move into Connected Educator Month, we have already started to hear about what it means to be a connected educator, or what it takes. From my perspective being a connected educator is a process of trying things out. While I always want everything I do in my class to work, I have become willing to take chances on tech. Sometimes this means that what I am working on fails in front of all of my students. When this happens I explain what is going on and move to plan B, or C, or D. The class period are short, so I rarely get past plan D. While I am teaching I share the process with my students, after I teach I share the process with my colleagues. Sometimes this means I spend my whole day explaining to others what I messed up or didn't know.

One of My FLL team
Early in my teaching career this would not have been comfortable for me. I was building my teaching identity, a knowledgable and caring persona. All of that is still there, but now I take the opportunity on a daily basis to model resiliency for my students. When something doesn't work we trouble shoot it together or just move on to the next idea. Failure is not a stopping point, just a chance to regather forces and ideas and try again.
Now that my laptop has rebooted (again), it seems to be working. I will switch over to it to check all my morning stops (Twitter, Message me, RSCON4) and get on with my day. As a connected educator I expect some glitches just as I expect that my students will try things in my class they have never tried before. I hope that you can join the conversation about being a connected educator this month and every month on the Tech Educator Podcast.

Comments

Jo-Ann said…
Hi Sam,
I was doing research for our Connected Educators California Edchat this morning and came across your blog post. Thank you for all that you share. You make my world a better place by being a part of my PLN.
Thank you,
Jo-Ann Fox