Dear Teacher with Technology Woes,
I cannot stress this enough. You are not, absolutely not, alone.
Your keyboard is doing a funky thing. Been there.
Your internet speed is slower than pond water. I’m swimming in the same sludge.
The wheel keeps spinning in mockery. Profanity is not allowed in the workplace.
Today is a good day for a technology reflection. This time last year we were only three days away from being catapulted into a technological nightmare.
Remember our first TEAMS meeting. Boy, that was fun. We may not have known how to turn off the camera or audio, but we sure knew how to snap a picture of a colleague picking his nose on air in order to send that image to friends via text-- not that I did that.
Then came posting assignments to channels and grading work from kids who knew how to make it look like they had submitted the assignment but accidentally forgot to attach the work. They were wily ones that’s for sure.
And let us not forget the vanishing cyber hole where students went to hide. We became attendance bounty hunters.
Keep in mind, this was all while we were trying to convince our own personal children to shut the refrigerator door and ration squares of toilet paper.
What a bizarre time that was, and still is. As the slogan says, “We’ve come a long way, baby.”
This year alone, we’ve learned to put a piece of tape over the camera on our laptops just in case, and we’ve learned to double check the mute function. We also now know they most definitely understand how to attach the work, even if they say they don’t.
As for the future, I don’t know if education can handle many more surprises, but if more are headed our way, could we at least get a normal spring break, first?
-CDB
Commentaires