Every couple of weeks, we get a new topic with #etmooc a recent one was about the meaning behind the buzz words like digital literacy, media literacy...you know what I mean...

I thought a lot about it...what does it mean to me?  And is it important?  And why?

And I realized that my whole transformation as an educator is because of my digital literacy.  Two years ago I began a quest to improve as an educator.  I wanted to take my teaching to the next level.  I thought that meant integrating technology and so that is what I aimed to do...I was going to be a fabulous teacher because I was going to do all kinds of awesome, techy things with my class!  I signed up for twitter, registered for the ITDA program at SFU and started this blog.  And amazing things happened.  I became more digitally literate, but more importantly, I met all of YOU -- I became a connected educator. 

And so, I think what I have come to realize, is that it is not digital literacy that makes us better and stronger educators (people?) but it is the amazing connections that we can now make because of our digital literacy that is really more important.  

Thoughts?

So, should I change the name of my blog?

About two years ago when I started this blog, I meant for it to be a journal of some sort about the things I was learning to do in my graduate diploma course, ITDA, at SFU.  I was determined to figure out how to integrate tech in meaningful ways and wanted to document my journey.  Hence the title, "Integrating Technology: My Journey".  Well once I started the program and started analyzing my practise to see where tech needed to/could be integrated, I actually began an amazing journey which didn't only involve integrating tech, but rather I started truly reflecting on my practise and looking at WHY I was teaching the way that I was.  And I was examining everything!!  It wasn't just about integrating tech anymore...it became much, much more.  

I started thinking about student centred and project based learning.  I completely changed my math, science and social studies program in order to make them more hands on.  

I fell in love with Genius Hour and Passion Based Learning and now offer my students an hour each week in which they can learn about anything they want.

I partnered up with Hugh McDonald and we took down a wall in our school (one of those sliding ones, no hammers needed) so that we could team teach all the time!

We got rid of individual desks and were lucky enough to have our school get round tables for us so that our students could collaborate on everything.

With the support of our principal, we brought in alternate learning spaces and set up a couch area and bean bag area, giving students choice about where they wanted to learn.

We cut our boring spelling program and now teach it as needed.

I gave complete control of my the bulliten boards to my students. They own their learning and their learning space now. 

And we haven't even got to the technology integration yet!!!  Which has been fabulous (students are able to create amazing projects using iPads, we blog, we have ePortfolios, twitter, and so much more...the tech has been fantastic!  But certainly not everything.

I started this journey thinking that all I needed was to learn about some great apps...but it turns out my journey has been much, much more than that. And I am so thankful and I look forward to where the journey will take me next...so it is about my journey...but more than just tech.

So, should I change the name of my blog?  Hmm...