I am so excited to share my week with you. I really wish it was a week of crafting to share but instead it is a week of training. Training? You ask? Why yes I was at professional development trainings for most week... I will tell you all about that in a minute. However, lets get right down to the
First things first, I attended my lovely sister-in-laws bridal shower. It was so nice to see her so happy on her special day. I hear there are lots of good pictures of this event I however have not been privileged to see them.
Speaking of cameras, the camera on my phone (droid) is acting really odd. It isn't letting me take pictures. It says it is saving it, but then when I go to look at the pictures later it just says it just a media file with no image. Then I have to pop the battery and restart the whole darn thing, and then I can take pictures again. Which means half of the pictures that meant to post and share, just did not happen.
Well, anyhow, on to the training aspect of this week. I participate in 4 days of training/professional development. See that whole thing about teachers having summer off is a lie... a big fat lie. It turns out that we attend professional development and get ready for the next school year. Now I am not saying that we don't take a vacation at all, because of course we do, but to think that we sipping mai tai on the beach the whole time and not doing any work just because we aren't in the classroom with our students is just not true.
During these four days of professional development, I was the trainer for two of the days, and the other two days I was the trainee. I have to tell you, teachers are the worst students, myself included, and I like being the trainer better than the trainee.
Day 1 - School loop
I taught teachers how to build web pages and create/use the grade book function in the school loop program. It was a lot of fun and went pretty well. I was lucky enough to work with a great bunch of techex teachers (teacher tech experts or so we are so nicely called), and of course the wonderful edtech department, who work really hard to make sure that our schools have technology in the classroom along with making sure that teachers are trained to use the technology provided.
Day 2 and 3 - Treasures Training
This is where I sat and learned about our new Language Arts curriculum that our district adopted for K-6 grade teachers. It looks pretty good, but all the new materials are pretty overwhelming. Plus some of our teachers are worried about the way the district is asking us to do differentiated instruction instead of what they are used to doing with small groups. I have been attending many trainings on California Treasures and I think I am on overload. Too bad I have another training on it later this summer.
Day 4 - 21st century: iLearn with iPods summer session
Yeah, back to me teaching the training. Myself and two other techex (teacher tech experts) help 18 teachers learn as much as we could teach them in one day about using an iPod touch in the classroom. We talked about setting them up, the benefits of using iPods, fluency, story telling, imovie, QR codes, socative (a free audience response program) and much more that I can't remember right this second. It was great bunch of teachers and our survey concluded that we did pretty well with the training. So that made me really happy.
I also stopped by the farmer's market this week, but as I said camera, on my phone, isn't working too well, and I took pictures only to find out after I had left that it didn't actually work.
So that was my week at a glance.
However, if you ask my husband I am leaving off the most important part about the week - the LA Kings won the Stanley cup! We are originally from LA and he has been a huge fan since he was a kid. So this is pretty special for him and therefore for it is special me too. It was very fun to see how excited and happy he was about this.
Here he is watching the final game! Of course Gus had to join him.
And here is the picture from when he went down to LA to attend the Rally, while I was attending/presenting professional development trainings.
He had a lot of fun and I am so happy for him, all the Kings fans, and of course the LA Kings for winning the Stanley Cup. Way to go LA KINGS!
Few, I am just getting this done right before midnight, so I can truly still say that this is an Insta-Friday post :)
First things first, I attended my lovely sister-in-laws bridal shower. It was so nice to see her so happy on her special day. I hear there are lots of good pictures of this event I however have not been privileged to see them.
Some how I got put on both flower arranging duty and photographer. By the way I didn't mind either job they were both a lot of fun :) However, I think as the photographer of this event I should be able to see the pictures also. Too bad I wasn't using my own camera, I mean I didn't know when I left the house that I would be chosen as the photographer, or I would have used my camera instead.
Well, anyhow, on to the training aspect of this week. I participate in 4 days of training/professional development. See that whole thing about teachers having summer off is a lie... a big fat lie. It turns out that we attend professional development and get ready for the next school year. Now I am not saying that we don't take a vacation at all, because of course we do, but to think that we sipping mai tai on the beach the whole time and not doing any work just because we aren't in the classroom with our students is just not true.
During these four days of professional development, I was the trainer for two of the days, and the other two days I was the trainee. I have to tell you, teachers are the worst students, myself included, and I like being the trainer better than the trainee.
Day 1 - School loop
I taught teachers how to build web pages and create/use the grade book function in the school loop program. It was a lot of fun and went pretty well. I was lucky enough to work with a great bunch of techex teachers (teacher tech experts or so we are so nicely called), and of course the wonderful edtech department, who work really hard to make sure that our schools have technology in the classroom along with making sure that teachers are trained to use the technology provided.
Day 2 and 3 - Treasures Training
This is where I sat and learned about our new Language Arts curriculum that our district adopted for K-6 grade teachers. It looks pretty good, but all the new materials are pretty overwhelming. Plus some of our teachers are worried about the way the district is asking us to do differentiated instruction instead of what they are used to doing with small groups. I have been attending many trainings on California Treasures and I think I am on overload. Too bad I have another training on it later this summer.
Day 4 - 21st century: iLearn with iPods summer session
Yeah, back to me teaching the training. Myself and two other techex (teacher tech experts) help 18 teachers learn as much as we could teach them in one day about using an iPod touch in the classroom. We talked about setting them up, the benefits of using iPods, fluency, story telling, imovie, QR codes, socative (a free audience response program) and much more that I can't remember right this second. It was great bunch of teachers and our survey concluded that we did pretty well with the training. So that made me really happy.
I also stopped by the farmer's market this week, but as I said camera, on my phone, isn't working too well, and I took pictures only to find out after I had left that it didn't actually work.
So that was my week at a glance.
However, if you ask my husband I am leaving off the most important part about the week - the LA Kings won the Stanley cup! We are originally from LA and he has been a huge fan since he was a kid. So this is pretty special for him and therefore for it is special me too. It was very fun to see how excited and happy he was about this.
Here he is watching the final game! Of course Gus had to join him.
And here is the picture from when he went down to LA to attend the Rally, while I was attending/presenting professional development trainings.
He had a lot of fun and I am so happy for him, all the Kings fans, and of course the LA Kings for winning the Stanley Cup. Way to go LA KINGS!
Few, I am just getting this done right before midnight, so I can truly still say that this is an Insta-Friday post :)
Great pictures all around. My husband and older son were also at the Rally! He's been a die hard Kings Fan since tickets were $4 at the Forum. Was a thrill for him that they won too. My younger son starts HS this fall and his school will be using iPads and if I get the time I'll share with you what that experience is like. As I am (hopefully) a future teacher, I always love your teacher talk. :)
ReplyDelete