The document discusses the benefits of using social media as a pedagogical tool for teachers. It argues that using online networks can boost test scores and teacher satisfaction by providing access to innovative teaching resources and a supportive community of fellow educators. Teachers can improve faster by reading blogs and participating on Twitter, gaining ideas and inspiration while reducing feelings of isolation. The online teacher community acts as a world-class faculty lounge and can become a source of friendship.
On National Teacher Day, meet the 2024-25 Kenan Fellows
Summer 2013 mf a presentation updated
1. USING SOCIAL MEDIA AS A
PEDAGOGICAL IMPERATIVE:
THE MEASURABLE BENEFITS
OF USING ONLINE
NETWORKS TO BOOST TEST
SCORES AND TEACHER
SATISFACTION
SAM SHAH
6. Hopes and Dreams
1. You leave knowing about a whole new world
of amazing resources that you might not know
about. And that these resources will help you in
your classrooms.
2. You value your experiences as first-year
teachers enough to know that you have
something to contribute.
18. Take a short bit
1. Calculate your point total
2. Individually think of a couple interesting
things about the online community and
resources, or something they’ve found that’s
applicable to their classrooms, or an idea
they had from reading something online.
19. Take a short bit
With your tablemates, briefly share what you
thought about!
21. “I’m too new… I don’t belong.”
I’m not even a
one year old
teacher
22. reading blogs / lurking on twitter
Improve as a teacher twice as fast…
23. reading blogs / lurking on twitter
You don’t have to freaking
reinvent the wheel
24. reading blogs / lurking on twitter
this year is going to be hard. you’re going
to need to know other people are in the
trenches with you… commisseration.
25. reading blogs / lurking on twitter
Gives you something to strive for. Gives
you a window to tons of other teachers’s
classrooms. Gives you ideas of who you want to
be as a teacher.
40. Index Cards
On the front:
How did the sesh go? What worked? What
didn’t? Thoughts? A haiku?
On the back:
Any questions you have for me?
Name? Email? Blog? Twitter?
41.
42.
43. Benefits for You
1. You can get awesome ideas for the classroom (including for Common Core
and the Regents), without digging through a zillion books and a thousand terrible
websites. It's all at your fingertips once you learn where to look. And you can
share your own ideas with others.
44. 2. By seeing what others are doing, you will get your own creative juices
flowing. You will be continually inspired by others, and you will feel motivated to
get better at what you do. No matter where you're at as a teacher, you will get
better.
45. 3. You will have access to a world-class faculty lounge with colleagues who
care about what they do. During the day, or at night. They are there to support,
help, and laugh with you. Sometimes at you (grin), but mostly with you.
46. 4. If you love math, you'll be exposed to some math things that will blow your
mind! Problems, games, tricks, different perspectives.
47. 5. We're real teachers, in the trenches, with a common passion for what we do. We
don't work for companies. We're not consultants. We just do what we do, and now
we do it with each other. And over time, we have become friends and not just
colleagues. We want to be friends with you too.
Thank you for making me laugh, thank you for
helping me find a job, thank you for reading
my cover letters, lessons plans, resumes, and
this crappy little blog. Thank you for helping
me love my job. Thank you for being my real
life friends.
--Sophie Germain
Editor's Notes
How many of you have heard of Dan Meyer?
What have you heard about him? Seen from him?
He got me into this world, six and a half years ago when I was leaving grad school for teaching. I was reading his blog. There were maybe a dozen or twenty math teacher blogs that were all connected and I was reading. I joined in and started a private blog to reflect about things as I was ramping up to enter the classroom – and I continued since. I now have an archive of over 600 posts which document my evolution as a teacher.
Introduce myself – teach at an independent school in Brooklyn Heights. I finished my sixth year teaching. I love teaching. My first year was actually enjoyable. But hella hard. Emotionally draining. Physically draining. And I’m actually a pretty decent teacher. Not like THE BEST THING EVARRRRRRR (oprah!), but I’ve come a long way. But I’m not here to talk about teaching. I’m here to talk about a safety net for you. I’m here to talk about ways to keep yourself loving the classroom. I’m here to talk about ways to keep yourselves energized and excited about things when you might start feeling a little blah or some ennui. Which naturally means, I’m here to talk about the online math teacher community – the math twitter blog o sphere!
I’m not teaching at the schools you’ll be teaching in. So if I were you, I’d tune me out. So let me try to make an argument for myself before you tune out.
There is something universal about teaching. I mean schools everywhere are different. People are at different points in their career. But I’ve never met a teacher that I couldn’t have an awesome conversation with – and I often learned tons. Because there is something universal about adolescence. And something universal about the acquisition of math. The contexts are different, but I’d bet we have more similarities than differences.
I’m pretty beautiful. I mean, yeah, don’t people pay attention to beautiful people?
Some of the schools you’re going to be at, the turnover is high. You might not have teachers with more than 4 years of experience. I’m letting you know that in addition to MfA, you can find tons of teachers who can help you, inspire you, guide you. I am in a department with a bunch of teachers, all of who have more teaching experience than I do (just not all at my school). I absolutely love my colleagues. But I find more value in the people in this online world than I do with them. Which I never ever ever would have thought was the case. It blows my mind that I can say that. But it’s true.
I wanted you to have lots of choice in what you looked at, but also guide you to some places that would showcase some of the neat stuff out there, and help you learn to navigate it all. So sorry about the point values. You have ____ minutes to explore. The ones with higher point values are the ones that I think are important.
FLESH THIS OUT!
This is pretty much the transition I think all teachers make as they go from being a novice to being a sorcerer… I mean, adequate, teacher. You start teaching and much of the way you think about teaching is TEACHING. That switch where you start to think less about TEACHING and more about LEARNING. And that’s really what the conversation is in the online teaching community.
THE LESSONS ARE VETTED… and there are tips for things to look out for, from real teachers! FOR US BY US!
You’ll have an archive of your teaching!
Be bigger than yourself and your classroom. So many opportunities come out of this, because you are going to be considered a valued contributor. May opportunities have arisen from this. People have gotten jobs. People have been asked to sit on panels. People are being asked to lead real and useful PD. It’s a big deal.
TMC13. These are real people. They are real COOL people. It’s not all virtual and abstract.
Last year, we had a “new blogger initiative” to help people who were observing the online world jump in and start a blog. I was thinking maybe a dozen or 20 people would sign up. We had 140 people participate in the first week! This year in we’re doing something similar – an intiative called “exploring the mathtwitterblogosphere” – and we’re starting it in October. I really encourage you to join up and see how it can help you.
BEING A TEACHER IS HARD. Being a first year teacher is harder. We are here to make teaching awesomer and easier and funner and better. We’re here to get better and to be a super positive support network for each other.
