I’m a new teacher, returning to relief / substitute teaching after 3 months in (several) classrooms. My PLN has changed the way I learn, and the way I teach, for the better. Yet, I am still to meet a new teacher in my part of the world who’s ever heard of, or has a PLN. […]
Continue reading →Casting an eye over my Twitter feeds this morning, I was mightily pleased to see an old ‘PLN friend’ and mentor back online. Clive Elsmore, or @clivesir as I’ve come to know him, has spent the past few years working in India and Sri Lanka as a volunteer teacher, training local teachers in […]
Continue reading →They say life has its twists, turns, and setbacks; and it can certainly throw up a few surprises. The last two weeks have been one wild ride, as I’ve embarked on my first full-time contract teaching position for the duration of Term 1, 2011. Michael Graffin (2010) An “Interesting” Start To the lady who left […]
Continue reading →As of 9AM this morning, on the first day of school, I became a classroom teacher for the very first time. While sitting there watching this mornings #edchat, and contemplating the QLD cyclone, I received a phone call from the Department of Education – and began a new phase in my professional journey. I’ve been […]
Continue reading →A very informative video for Twitter™ newbies like myself – I wish I’d found this earlier, as I contains many of the lessons I learnt by trial and error … as usual … Twitter for Teachers
Continue reading →Today marked an important milestone in my ongoing efforts to build a Personal Learning Network via my blog & Twitter™. At 8AM Perth time, I joined in an international #edchat conversation on the topic of participatory / inquiry learning. Following the conversation via Tweetdeck™ (for Google Chrome™), I started out by retweeting other teachers’ ideas, […]
Continue reading →Well, 2010 has been an incredible year. It was a year in which I passed some significant milestones in my fledgling teaching career, and it was a year of immense, transformational change in my personal and professional life. As my year draws to a close, I am finally starting to realise my aspiration to become […]
Continue reading →I excelled in my academic studies at university; however, as a result of my youthful inexperience, I always felt vulnerable and unprepared during my practical teaching experiences. While I had some excellent mentor teachers, on several occasions I found myself working with unsupportive, and in one case, overly critical teachers. One almost drove me to […]
Continue reading →As a new teacher, I established a reflective journal; documenting and reflecting on my teaching experiences, observations, and ongoing professional development throughout my first year. I view my journal as a very personal record of my experiences. As I flick through my handwritten entries, recorded in multiple exercise books, I can trace the low […]
Continue reading →Today marked the end of my first year of teaching. I have awaited this day for a very long time, and it has come about through my work in 23 schools across the Government, Catholic and Independent school sectors. To commemorate this day, I thought I would share excerpts from my very first reflective journal […]
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