The biggest challenge that I have dealt with in my career has been adjusting to the International Baccalaureate curriculum from the Advanced Placement curriculum. The most challenging experience that I have had is mentoring a difficult intern and the most rewarding experience that I have had is awakening the love of physics in young women (and men) who feared it initially.
I like to spend my free time working out so I'm not looking forward to the extra time that I am going to have to spend sitting in front of the computer. Grrr.
Finally, this is my 6th online course from MSU as I am working toward my MSSE degree. The only way that I can get a raise from my school district in the past 3 years is to add grad credits to my degree.
Hi Jill-
ReplyDeleteI saw your post on one of the wiki pages, sorry that you are going through a hard time. I wondered why you are taking the class, is it required for the degree? I'm a second career teacher too, I've worked as a biologist in industry, research, and agriculture. But, teaching is the most fulfilling job I've ever had. I also do a lot of outreach in the area of girl's and STEM. And I lived in MD for many years as a kid, but don't miss the humidity! It's always fun, to me, to see the commonalities many of us have. It's hard to get my head around all of the social networking tools in general, and then to apply them to teaching in a pedagogically sound way. But I also find it kind of exhilarating to think about, and our students are already connected--so how can we steer them to what's good and sound and how to be discerning about the use of these tools, and the information they stumble upon? I think it has become part of what we have to do.
My school became an International Baccalaureate School a couple of years ago and it has been a challege for our IB teachers to make the change. I am certified to teach IB Biology, but we haven't added the class to our program yet.
ReplyDeleteI am curious to see how the different web tools can be used in my classes. The IB program stresses global connections, so perhaps one of the tools could help make some of these connections for our students.