Edubloggers!

Trying to decide on edubloggers to respond to was rather daunting. Simply Googling "edublogs" was overwhelming; I had no idea where to start. Also, I felt like every time I came across someone promising, the blog hadn't been updated in 2 or more years. While that doesn't negate the quality of the existing content, if I'm going to become invested in a blogger enough to follow them semi-regularly, I'd like them to be someone who updates more than once in a blue moon...

(Visual representation of updating frequency)

After some searching, I came across some edubloggers that I think are worth checking out. The first is Shelley Wright, from Wright's Room. She's a high school teacher from Canada, and shares some interesting perspectives from teaching in all grades K-12. I particularly liked her most recent post, about the importance of "Why," and why it is that we should always make our lessons purposeful and challenging. She offers some "As a Teacher" goals, including striving to be less helpful to students. And I see where she's coming from on that. Constantly giving students the answer doesn't really help them learn. It's ok for students to struggle a little bit in the process of coming to an answer. Not automatically offering assistance doesn't mean you're a bad teacher. Obviously, there's a time and place for all strategies, but in the case of the unchallenged high schooler that Mrs. Wright details in this post, NOT being given the answers is what leads to more involvement on the part of the student. 

So far in this program, I've read countless articles and posts and whole books on policy and strategy and method. And they're all incredibly valuable. But, it was refreshing to look through Mrs. Mimi's "It's not all Flowers and Sausages"blog. She's an elementary school teacher, but a lot of the issues she encounters are applicable across all grade levels. While I don't think it's productive to always be complaining about things out of your control, it's nice to read from someone who is being "real" about her practice. She talks about "classroom juju," which means that for every bad day you have, there is almost guaranteed to be a better day around the corner. Because, let's face it: in the classroom, you WILL have bad days. The lesson you carefully crafted might fall flat, the internet might go down and ruin the chance for you to lead with some great clips, etc, etc. We're all in this because we love teaching and want to be the best educators that we can be, but I think it's also useful to be reminded that it's ok if things don't always go perfectly. Also, as someone who is still student teaching, it's nice to hear that even experienced teachers have "one of those days." All that matters is how you bounce back from them.