Thinking About Learning

Over the weekend I went to see the movie Bucket List. No deep thinking was required; it was just a “feel good, appreciate life” kind of movie. The premise of the movie is that 2 old guys find out they have less than a year to live, so they make a list of all the things they want to do before they “kick the bucket.”

This was not a new concept for me. About a year ago, I read Kris Radish’s book, Sunday List of Dreams. This book has a similar premise, but the main character is a middle-aged woman looking to live a meaningful life after years of fear and disappointment. After finishing the book, I composed my own list of dreams and came up with a top five list. Since that time, I’ve actually fulfilled two of them and have added a couple more.

After watching the movie this weekend, I started thinking about my work. My first year as a TIS is half over. What dreams do I have for the remainder of the first year? Here’s my list of dreams or my “bucket list” for the rest of this school year (not in any particular order):

1. To have several teachers from each grade level regularly contributing to our school’s Diigo social bookmarking site as a tool for collaboration.
2. To get all 5th grade students regularly blogging.
3. To see all our Smartboards hung and teachers using them daily.
4. To engage more teachers and students in podcasting.
5. To continue monitoring the needs of my teachers and provide whatever support is needed to enhance and improve instruction.

It’s easy to lose focus when entrenched in the pressing needs of each day, but I heard in church yesterday that in order to live fulfilled lives, we must organize our lives around the most important things. I’m going to try to focus on my list of dreams.

Curriculum Connection:

Literacy/Science: Research volcanoes (Diigo volcano bookmarks). Use Open Mind 2 to collect and organize data such as location, size, history, and volcanic activity. Export to HTML to create web pages for sharing. In my opinion, Open Mind 2 is one of the best graphic organizer tools available.