Digital practices that are promising for my own teaching? Not everything? No, not everything. I can see educational applications for these skills, but I still feel it’s too early to know where and how far I can develop them. Besides that, without a class of my own to experiment and get them to help create the learning, there is no way I can guess. I need students for all of this to matter, to expand my learning in context with theirs.
However, the skills I’m most excited about and will practice on my own are the web page building and editing and the blog. I will keep working on who I am as a student and as an educator, and the web site is a great way to give myself a creative and reflective forum. The blog should be similar. I have some creative writing/feedback ideas to try with my cohort. We are also progressing toward Candidacy exams and are trying to stay in touch and support each other as we study. With a blog and the community/no walls feeling it creates we can work at our own paces and answer each other’s questions or whatever as we move forward.
The challenges of learning how to create digitally have been some of the most exhausting and rewarding days of my career. At no other time have I been able to focus only on what I can do, what I can imagine, and what product I show the world. The next step is visible, too, because I feel empowered to continue creating and trying new things. I also feel there are resources out there, or with my fellow students, to foster whatever creative vein I follow.
I agree that I think there is a lot here that could be used for creative writing in particular! And yes, all of this is a lot of work, and I hope I can continue to remember and use the skills I’ve learned. My fear is that I will be so busy with classes this summer that some of it will fade before fall, but I suppose I can always go back and review my notes.
It’s been exhausting, but rewarding, hasn’t it? I’m amazed at how much we’ve all accomplished in just a few short days.
Exploring these tools with a live class will be a little intimidating, but I think we’ll all find it rewarding; surely we can each find unique ways to use these skills to help our students. It’s exciting!