PLN

5/28/2012

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I think podcasting definitely has a place in the educational system.  It is a great tool that can be used effectively.  If a student is away on athletics or misses class for any reason, they can simply listen to the podcast and not miss anything.  Even if they do attend the class, they can listen to the podcast as a way to gain further understanding of the knowledge or as a way to study before a test.  The only concern I have with podcasting in education is the idea of what it might lead to down the road.  Bruce Thornton mentioned this in the Fresno Bee article when he discusses the idea of "podcasts being one more technological change pointing to a future where students are not in the classroom with a professor."  Podcasts are a great tool, but I think it is important to remember they are just a tool.  People learn in a variety of ways and it is the job of the educator to teach to the different modalities so that students have every opportunity to learn.  I, for example, do not learn very well audibly, I am more of a visual learner. 
 
I believe that advancing my knowledge and skills in technology will help me in my career as a coach and teacher.  The main thing I've enjoyed about this class so far, and the thing that I could see myself doing on a permanent basis is social media.  I made a facebook fan page for my teams.  Through this type of media, I can get information out to my athletes, their parents, as well as to anyone interested in our team.  This is a great venue for people to see how our season is going or our upcoming schedule.  As far as PE is concerned, I think a lot of what I've learned in this class would be very useful in certain units, such as nutrition, where it is very cognitive in nature.  Learning how to make a good slideshow presentation, or how to use videos or pictures for educational purposes would be very helpful.
 
 
I created a Google doc that organizes all of the lockers in our locker room at Sanger High School.  It is set up like an excel doc and has the locker number, the locker combination, as well as who the locker is assigned to.  Google docs are great because they allow more than one PE teacher to access the locker room files at a time.  Also, when one person makes a change to the document, it is updated for everyone that the document is shared with. 

 
One thing that I have discovered in this class so far is that I am not the biggest fan of blogging.  I think it's cool to learn how to do all this stuff, but it's all just a little too much for me to handle at once.  I can maintain one or maybe two microblogs at once, but more than that, and I will just lose track of them.  I think the facebook fan page is a cool idea, especially because most of my players are on facebook.  It is just one more way to get the information out to my players.  I look forward to learning more things online and becoming more connected with others.
 
http://www.flickr.com/photos/78573882@N07/7199169874/
 
Picture


This is a picture of myself and my two assistant coaches after the division 2 valley championship match.  These two coaches put an enormous amount of time and effort into our kids and our season.  I have a blast coaching with them and I can't wait until next season!
 
The most interesting thing that I thought about as I read this article was how blogging can be used in education.  I always thought of blogging as something that high school and college kids did, using it as a way to get some feelings written down.  As I read this article, I realized that blogging can be used for educational purposes and can be quite productive.  For example, a while ago I came across a strength and conditioning coach's blog.  He had a very interesting article on his blog about why the main lift in his strength and conditioning program is the front squat as opposed to the back squat.  When blogging is used for purposes that I find interesting, or for purposes that are beneficial to others, then it becomes something that I would be interested in.  As the surveys in the article clearly show, blogs can be an effective aid in both teaching and learning
 
I'm pretty new to microblogging in the form of Twitter.  I've had a Facebook for several years now, and I've found that it can be used as a great tool to make connections with others in my profession as well as keeping in touch with old friends and players.

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