Patrick Goff
Beaumont Middle School
Fayette County
In what way (s) are you a connected educator?
I am using Twitter to reach out to multiple educators and science experts around the globe to help me grow as a professional. I also use Edmodo as a blended learning environment in my classroom. My students use Edmodo as the backbone of the class and are able to access the material anywhere as long as they have wi-fi. Also on Edmodo, I am part of the science community giving me access to thousands of science educators that are also on Edmodo around the world. I also use Facebook as another social media platform to connect with professionals in education and science. Lastly, I use the Remind101 service to help “remind” students/parents of upcoming dates/times/interesting opportunities.
How does being connected impact your practice?
I have worked with teachers to help develop lab activities that I use in
my room, bounced ideas off each other to help upgrade lessons, searched
out new ideas and to try and help each other. Specifically, I was able
to talk with a teacher in NY about an alternative
energy activity for dealing with solar energy that helped a great deal.
Through discussions with online teachers (twitter/Edmodo/facebook) I
have changed how I have students complete their lab reports and have
started encouraging my students to use their smart devices to capture
images/video of their lab experiments. With that,
they are embedding that in their Word documents or using Coaches Eye
(app) to narrate what is happening in the lab.
How does being connected impact you as a professional?
It goes back to why reinvent the wheel? If we put our heads together we
can make so much more than if we do it alone. Being connected buoys
me on bad days and lets me celebrate
when good things happen. I love being able to share ideas and ask
questions of such a wide array of members (teachers, instructional
coaches, principals and science experts).
You can have those professional conversations and get so much more
input from many more professionals. It is so nice to get help from many
experts and just raises the bar everywhere.
What advice or resources would you recommend to colleagues interested in becoming connected?
Jump in!! Go for it!! No point to dip a toe, just cannonball into the
pool. It will be an awesome experience. In the same breath, don't let it
consume you. Pick and choose, but it is so worth it.
Patrick Goff is an 8th grade science teacher and department chair at Beaumont Middle School in Lexington, Kentucky. He is National Board Certified. Follow him on twitter
No comments:
Post a Comment