It’s New Year’s Day for me—the first day of pre-planning. I am teaching two sections of British Literature and Comp., one section of American Literature and Comp., the Hero with a Thousand Faces elective, and Journalism/Newspaper. Newspaper is new for me. I have sponsored a newspaper before, but it has been a few years. I think it’s going to be a good year. Of course, a new year is always exciting for teachers, or at least it is for me.
In addition to the wiki I have created, I decided to use BuddyPress for forums, blogs, and class groups. Jeff Utecht discussed BuddyPress the other day, and though I’d seen it mentioned other places, I finally checked it out after reading Jeff’s tweet, and I have to say I think it’s going to be a really powerful extension of my classroom. Plus, I have my own domain, so why not?
I’m going to have trouble getting used to this back-to-school schedule. I am NOT looking forward to school-supply shopping. Poor Maggie has been bugging me to do it for weeks. She wants a new, more grown-up backpack. I’m just glad I don’t need to get anything for my own classroom—for a change. My own children don’t go back to school until the 23rd. Almost all the other school systems around here started today. I think their system just decided to shorten the year by starting later—systems all over the state are doing it to save money. Sad they have to.
More soon!
photo credit: TANAKA Juuyoh (田中十洋)
Hello! Thanks for all the work you put into your blog. I've been looking at your wiki page and have created one of my own for the upcoming year. I am starting at a new school that does not have Edline. In what ways do your students contribute to your wiki?
Hi Clarice. As of yet, they don't, but once school starts, it is my hope that they will add materials they find useful to the site and use it to obtain useful information gathered both by me and their peers.
Ha, my girls want new backpacks too! We still have a few weeks before the year starts, but I need to get started on pre-planning also, especially the all important calendar and the course that was just added to my schedule (gulp).
Seems like almost everyone I know got something they weren't expecting to teach in their schedules this year. I blame the economy. All the teachers being laid off. Not good. We'll pay for it more dearly later.