1st June, 2016
Adelle explores how creating a virtual network can benefit you as a new teacher when your teaching colleagues are busy.
Recently I have begun to create an online bank of connections, resources and useful information for teachers. At university, we are prepared for situations in the classroom and definitely not all situations. We are taught to collaborate with mentors and other teachers, form meaningful relationships with parents and within the community. We are taught to assess students for, of and as learning and to constantly update our own professional development. With all this in mind, life as a teacher can be extremely busy. You are not the only teacher in this situation especially at the beginning of the school year. The reality is a lot of teachers spend a lot of time alone in their classroom planning, marking, assessing and preparing. So how can we as graduate teachers use outside resources to support us in the classroom during this important first year beyond the four walls we may find ourselves alone in?
An online community is constantly updating and you can choose who you wish to subscribe to, to be in communication with via newsletters and alike. Personally, I have subscribed to MVteachers through museums victoria, TES Australia and ALEA, the Australian Literacy Education Association. These virtual communities have thousands of resources that you can read, use and modify to suit your classroom needs. We don’t need to reinvent the wheel every time we plan a lesson or unit. Use resources out there and adapt it to suit your needs! Most networks send an e-newsletter through email to let you know of news things or upcoming events you may be interested in. As Will has mentioned, teachmeet is also a great way to network with people.
Your network should include more people than just your school and teachers within that school. I’d suggest branching out and finding some online resources and connections to be informed by. You may find some new ideas, engage your students and become a better teacher yet.
Here are some links to resources you could bookmark or put onto a symbaloo page as teacher resources to remember. Some are for lesson plans or units, some are useful for professional development or excursion ideas, Some are just general interesting information.
Also, I will be moving to France tomorrow for a year and it will be challenging rewarding and amazing experience. I will continue to post from there about my experiences with English as a second language instruction.
- Au revoir, Adelle.
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