Another academic year has finished in the Northern hemisphere. Teachers and students are enjoying a well deserved rest and it is time for me to take a look back at 2007/2008 and reflect upon what the last academic year has meant for me. If I were to pick just one thing to take to the eponymous island it would have to be this:

The single most important thing I have achieved in 2007/2008 is improved communication with my students and my peers.

This past few months have seen a sea change in how I approach my own learning and evaluate my teaching. Gone are the days when I just sat in the staff room with a cup of coffee at break and discussed which lessons went well and which were awful. Now, as well as the staff room natter (and plenty of coffee!), I go home and blog about my experiences in the classroom.

I started writing Box of Tricks in October 2007, just a couple of months into the new academic year, to help me review my own teaching and learning and to explore new ways of using technology in the classroom. What naïvely started off as How can I use this new tool in my classroom? quickly turned into Will this new tool enhance the teaching and learning in my classroom? Late 2007 was marked by a transition from Technology at all costs to Technology only when it’s useful. 

Don’t get me wrong, I still think that technology, if used appropriately, has a hugely important role to play in education. I have simply become more thoughtful about it and less gung ho. 

Writing a blog has given me the opportunity to reflect, review and share and has become a place where I can expound my thoughts and ideas in a considered manner. It is a means of self-reflection and, dare I use such long words, meta-cognition.

After all, in the wise words of Master Oogway from Kung Fu Panda: 

The mind is like water. When it is agitated, it becomes difficult to see. But if you allow it to settle, the answer becomes clear.

Looking into my own teaching practice and the tools I use using a blog has completely changed my perception of what good reflective practice ought to be: thinking reflectively and engaging in a process of self-review have become objectives to be sought, not just the fortuitous outcome of my actions.

I have come to inhabit a new world which refers to itself as The Blogosphere. I have become a digital citizen and this new world is my conscience and my friend, as well as my fiercest critic.

It would be unfair not to mention Twitter when it comes to improved online communication. Who would have thought that so much could be conveyed 140 characters at a time? Twitter has put down the mallet and picked up the sledge hammer when it comes to knocking down walls and bringing people closer together. 

Early in 2008 I decided to follow the steps of other teachers who blog for or with their students and I started my own subject blog El Blog de AsíSeHace.net because, frankly, I get the subject blogging business now and I didn’t get it before.

Blogging about my pupils achievements and showcasing their work to a potentially global audience has given my pupils a focus for their efforts and added an extra dimension to the relationship between teacher and student. I am no longer just their teacher, to them I am now the teacher who cares about their work and has an innovative way to go about it.

Technology and the internet have changed the way I communicate. Not only am I now in regular touch with hundreds more people than I was a year ago, sharing, reflecting and collaborating all the time, thanks to the likes of WordPress, Skype or Twitter, but also the planning and implementation of my lessons now incorporates this enhanced communication between my students and I.

Desert island? Yes, of course… but does it come with WI-FI?

Photo from Flickr

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