I’m back!
Long time readers of the blog would be aware that I left full time teaching in 2013 to have my first child. Since then I have had a second child and have been busy navigating the world of parenthood as a stay at home mum.
While on on family leave I’ve been doing a little bit of casual relief teaching, often for my former team teaching partner, Kelly Jordan. This has been an excellent way to keep my hand in teaching and gain new perspectives. I even get my blogging fix occasionally contributing to Kelly’s class blog!
While I’ve been more of a consumer than producer of educational content for the past few years, my passions for blogging, global collaboration and technology integration have remained strong.
In some ways I was expecting there to be huge changes in the world of education while I have been out of the classroom. Remarkably, this doesn’t seem to be the case. Many of the exciting and innovative projects some educators were working on a number of years ago are still not mainstream.
I’m optimistic that things will continue to change in classrooms across the world, even if progress is slow. We must ensure the education we are providing for our students is truly relevant, inspiring and dynamic.
A New Adventure…
I began using the Edublogs blogging platform back in 2008 when it had only been around for a few years. I quickly discovered the limitless potential of educational blogging and strove to educate others through this blog, conferences and other forms of professional development.
I have always enjoyed working with Edublogs to spread the message about effective educational blogging programs.
In exciting news, I am now collaborating with Edublogs to drive this message further.
You will find me:
- Regularly writing on The Edublogger
- On the Edublogs’ Facebook page
- Tweeting for Edublogs
- Sending out updates of what educational bloggers are up to via an email newsletter
Please connect with me on The Edublogger and social media. I will always be happy to hear from you!
The future of Primary Tech
As for the future of this blog, stay tuned. I hope to reinvent this space as an avenue for reflection and sharing.
This blog has a new look but all of my old posts remain. While it’s tempting to remove some of my older and less polished posts, I think they’re a representation of my learning journey.
Over to you!
What are you currently up to? Are you teaching? Blogging? Please leave a comment and fill me in! I’ve missed you!
Hi Kath. Great to see that you are blogging again. I enjoyed reading this post. It was your blog that gave me so ideas when we began our blogging journey and now we are going strong with our school blogs. I’m now a head but I teach every week and I still write my own blog at head.westwoodblogs.org. I also run our school radio station, radio.westwoodwithiford.org.
Good luck in your return. I will very much enjoy reading more of what you do. Thank you for inspiring us all.
Hi Ian,
Great to hear from you!
I’m really excited to get back into blogging. I have wanted to return for a long time while on family leave but I didn’t really know what to write about. Now I’m back in the Twitterverse etc, I have so many ideas!
So excited to hear your school blogs are still going strong and you know how much I love your radio station. I highly recommend others take time to have a look at your work!
Thanks for your kind words, Ian.
Kath
Welcome back! I loved CRT after my two kids and felt that it was a great time for ongoing PD to get new ideas from others. We are using Seesaw in our Prep-2 classrooms to enhance the home/School partnership, communicate learning goals, feedback, celebration and for authetic learning tasks. I love it! So easy and safe too. It has a blogging option within Seesaw which we haven’t explored. Would happily share it with you if you would ever like to come for a classroom visit.
Our 4-6s use Showbie with some Google Classroom as well. Lots of technology used in great ways that enhance outcomes, feedback and collaboration. No globally, but still great collaborative learning opportunities.
Hi Sarah,
We’re lucky we have the chance to do something like CRT in this profession. In other jobs, you might not have the chance to keep your hand in like that.
I’m very interested in Seesaw. That is definitely one thing I’m hearing heaps about on Twitter etc. I even read that one in four US classrooms is now using it. Crazy! It looks terrific. Thanks so much for the invite. I might have to take you up on it sometime!
I’m also interesting in Google Classrooms – sounds like it has some great features!
So maybe in my post I was wrong that things haven’t seemed to have changed a lot with technology in schools. I guess there are certainly some teachers/schools (like you!) that are flying along. This is fantastic news! Lucky kids.
Stay in touch,
Kathleen
Hi Kath
I’m so glad you’re back in the blogging sphere! I fear edublogging has changed a lot – a lot of voices have stopped or, like myself, are blogging infrequently these days. I hope that your enthusiasm will reignite a few of us ‘old hats’ to start blogging again.
I wonder what changes will you find in the blogosphere?
Stephanie
Hi Stephanie,
I know what you mean. I was pretty sad to find some of my old favourite bloggers are not writing now! I will have to check out your blog too. I’m sure you have some wonderful stories to tell.
I’m really enjoying exploring class blogs currently. There seem to be some fantastic ones. And also some who haven’t moved past using a blog as a place to house worksheets. Maybe we can inspire them.
Looking forward to staying connected and following your adventures!
Kath
Hi Kath,
Great to have you back! It was like old times when your Primary Tech email popped into my inbox!
I’m still writing our library blog at http://smotlrcblog.edublogs.org/ that I began in 2009. I can’t imagine not having it because it’s such a valuable way for me to connect with our students, school community and global visitors as well as a way to share what we do in our library. It’s also a wonderful record of what we’ve done in our library over the years. Sadly, I’m the only one blogging at our school.
I’m using Google Classroom more with the Yr 4-6 classes and our school is just beginning to use Seesaw…there’s always something to explore!
Kim 🙂
Hi Kim!
It sure felt like old times hitting that ‘publish’ button too. I liked it!
Your 9th year of blogging. Wow! What a shame others haven’t followed your lead. You’re an inspiration to many anyway!
I’m very interested in Google Classroom and Seesaw. They’re two things I see popping up in the classrooms of many teachers that I admire lately. So they must be good!
Talk soon,
Kath
I totally agree with you about the ‘limitless potential’ associated with blogging. I am always interested in new possibilities. I have captured my ideas and experiments here (https://readwriterespond.com/2016/06/a-blog-for-all-seasons/). In my recent deep dive into Global2, I was amazed at the aspects that I had never even considered, especially in regards to adding plugins and so forth.
Hi Aaron,
There are a lot of tools around but I think blogs have stood the test of the time. And as we know, WordPress powers more than 25% of the web, so it’s not going anywhere!
That’s a great list of how blogs can be used. Definitely something people should check out. As you say, a blog really isn’t a blog anymore. As I mentioned in a recent post, asking ‘what is a blog?’ is like asking ‘what is a classroom?’ It’s anything you want it to be really. Like inside, outside, flipped, rows, flexible seating, in a school, in the community. Whatever!
Kathleen
So glad you are back. I wonder if you can recommend some top kinder blogs for me to learn from? I want to try being a kindergarten teacher who has a class blog that parents can access. Being in NSW I’ll most likely use edublogs.
Hi Colette,
I love the idea of a kindergarten blog. In fact, you have made me think I should update this post I wrote years ago http://primarytech.global2.vic.edu.au/2011/07/19/blogging-with-very-young-students/
Here are a few ideas to check out and I’ll let you know if I think of more:
Aviva Dunsiger in Canada has an amazing blog for her kindergarten students (I think it’s more what we’d call pre-school) https://mrscrockett.commons.hwdsb.on.ca/ I like her family contributions page and her daily shoot page.
Swoop into Kindergarten is a great example. This is a US blog that uses Edublogs https://mdelwiche.edublogs.org/
Mrs Mooney’s Class Blog is another US example that uses Edublogs. I think they are grade 1? http://mrsmooney.edublogs.org/
KinderPals is a Canadian class blog jam packed with info for parents http://kinderpals.ca/
Side by Side is a prep class in Melbourne (what we call the first year of school in Victoria). They also use Edublogs (we have a CampusPress subscription here in Victoria called global2). http://sidebyside.global2.vic.edu.au/
Hope that helps a bit? I can ask my PLN for more examples if you need!
Kathleen