About Me
My name is Nedra and I teach in upstate NY in a rural district. After teaching K-2 for over 20 years I decided I was ready for a change and a new challenge. I am now in my second year as our district’s elementary tech teacher. I teach K-5 in two elementary buildings. I see each of my 36 classes once every 6 days for 40 minutes. I will admit that I have no special training for this position. However, I have always tried to integrate technology into my regular curriculum and I am willing to learn. I am new to this whole new exciting world of Web2.0 tools and I find it an exciting place to be.
My blog is a place where I ramble about topics that are important to me in education. I might be talking about a challenge in which I’m participating, a new tool, or just whatever is on my mind and I happen to take a few moments to put it down in writing. One thing to note is that the views I share on this blog are my views and do not necessarily reflect the views of my school district.
You can contact me at: hockeymom1788(at)gmail(dot)com
Welcome to the tech world. You have great instincts and absolutely great teaching skills after 20 years.
I started out in tech after many years in special education. Now 12 years later I am at the head of our technology program in our school as the Collaborative Content Coach for Technology K-12. I am still learning. Again, Welcome.
Cheryl Oakes
Welcome to the internet and more!!!
I am so glad that you having fun with all the new tools — just don’t let them overwhelm you too much — just enjoy all the possibilities!
Jen
Hi Nedra,
I just tagged you for the passion quilt meme: http://edtechpower.blogspot.com/ I look forward to seeing the image you choose.
-Liz
It’s great to find another teacher who seems to have the same kind of crazy schedule that I do! I’m an elementary/middle school keyboarding (technically business education) teacher and I see my 6th graders for 10 days at a time, an hour each day. I see my 4th graders for 25 days at a time, 30 min each day. I travel to 11 different schools…….oh yeah, and I do that all in a half-day
I’m looking forward to reading more about your experiences!
Thank you all for your comments. I get so excited when I see that someone has taken the time to visit my blog and leave a comment.
Kate, my schedule is a piece of cake compared to yours! My biggest problem is getting to know the kids names. Do you have any helpful hints? I made seating charts with their pictures and that helps. I think I should start bringing them home and memorizing them or making flashcards. I feel bad when I can’t call them by name yet.
Thanks again for stopping by.
Welcome to our new world! I, too, switched from classroom teacher (English) to tech teacher, and just recently was named Campus Tech Spec. It’s a wonderful world, full of problems I never realized existed, with new puzzles every day.
I’ll be a first-timer at NECC this year, too. Let’s try to find each other for a glass of iced tea (at least!). I’m TXHeather on Twitter.
Looking forward to tweeting/visiting with you.
Nedra–Thanks so much for your comments on my students’ blogs! They were so excited to read them!
Nedra–I followed links from your icy photos on flickr tonight. I thought you must be teaching in Iowa because all of the schools in Eastern Iowa were cancelled due to ice today.
And I was so pleased to find that your are a tech. teacher! I have retired from being an art/tech. teacher only a year ago. I keep my hand in by maintaining three websites (one for pay and two as a volunteer). I, too, am doing the 366-1 project. I’ll be watching for your photos.
Smooth Sailing Nancy
Nancy-I’m glad you found your way here. My husband is actually in Eastern Iowa right now, he went back to visit family. He’s from Davenport.
Congrats on your retirement. What age level did you teach?
I’ll be looking at your photos as well.
Nedra,
I too teach technology to over 300 3rd through 5th graders. I can honestly say I know ALL of them by name by now. Several years ago our district had a retreat where we were encouraged to shake hands with our students and greet them by name. I promised myself I would commit to doing that this year. It has been tremendously helpful to getting to know the students. Sometimes I have memory lapses, but the students always forgive me. I am so grateful to have found your blog. This is my fourth year to teach technology, but my first year to attend the Texas Computer Education Association (TCEA) Conference. I returned from the conference with a new mission…to allow the students to learn technology by using technology in a project. Before I was using an internet based curriculum that I managed and facilitated.
Nina, Thanks for the suggestion on learning names. I always greeted my students when I taught in the traditional classroom but haven’t tried it in the lab. I’ll have to give that a try. I’m glad you found this blog and the ning. It’s amazing how one conference can change how and what you teach! I had a similar experience at our NY tech conference the last school year. Please share your projects on the ning. I’d love to hear about them.