Chats, and podcasts, and webinars, oh my! - Aka PLN Update :-)

Finally my schedule worked where I tried to participate in my first #scichat this week.  I didn’t realize at first that I had to use TweetChat.  Once I did I found that the chat goes so fast, and is a bit hard to keep up with all the posts.  I tried to post quite a few times, but I never saw my posts show up, so don’t know if anyone else saw them then either??  Oh well, it was neat to see all the great ideas, questions, and answers.  I also learned something really cool called “The Marshmallow Challenge” too.  Cool!

I watched a ton of podcasts from the Chemical Demonstration Series on iTunes.  Two professors from Writhgt State University perform a bunch of demos for high and middle school students.  Although one of the profs is pretty dry, the demos are cool.  Most I have seen, but a few I have not.  For example I am going to make my own “Burning Book” for the first day of school.  Awesome!

I found lots of great webinars, but because of my schedule with my family, I could not find time for most live webinars.   I did participate in a Introduction to Prezi Webinar, but I ended up leaving the webinar early, as it was way to basic for even me.  I did; however, watch two chemistry webinars from the ACS archives.  The Kitchen Chemistry webinars were topics that I found interesting.  One was called The Chemistry of Cheese and Why We Love It and the other was Cheers!  The Chemistry of Wine.  This last one is not quite appropriate for the classroom J, but I learned so much and found it really fascinating.  It discussed molecules like Resveratol and other aspects of the chemistry of wine and also health benefits.  It really makes me miss having a glass of wine, since I’m pregnant right now.  J  I looked up other webinars and have actually signed up for one on Blood Spatter on August 11th through Ward’s Free Webinars.  It is great to know about all of these good resources out there!

Teaching 2.0 Updates

Like the youtube video we watched on uwoteaching20, I realize that "Kids like learning from other kids."  So, to help this I would really like to create something like a facebook page, where I can monitor it, but the students would have all the interaction between each other about chemistry.  It would be really cool to be able to have my students do something like the teacher did in the first video with his math class.  This would come in especially handy with content like stoichiometry and even sigfigs!  I would also really like to set up a Wiki for my courses.  Here I could put assignments, worksheets, labs, calendar, etc for the students, and then link the facebook page.  I've been exploring Moodle, but it's a little heavy for me.  I do know that my colleagues are setting this up too, so I figure I can help with small things from my end, and also get myself more comfortable with how Moodle works, so it can be beneficial to my students.  Eventually, (down the road after my daughter is born and I can find a little more time...) I would like to set up podcasts (which I could link on my wiki) of my lectures, so if a student missed a day of class they could watch the podcast, get the notes, and then come to me with any other questions. 

On the webtools front, I've now joined edutopia, looked around at classroom 2.0, and joined a hschem listsserv.  I will say this, I am feeling overwhelmed that there are so many sites, and things that I have signed up for like Blogger, Twitter, Edmodo, Edutopia, Moodle, chem listserv, and more...  Don't get me wrong, it's nice to know that these things are out there, but I just don't feel that I have time to keep up with these after this class is over.  I am always, always looking for new labs, trying new demos, and as of Sept I will be a mom of a 2 year old and a newborn.  For me, I feel that the things I will definitely keep up with are the NAHSTOFS, the chem listserv, the moodle (b/c others are really doing the dirty work), the possible chem facebook pg and a wiki if I get the chance to make one.

Oops, this kind of turned into another venting blog....sorry!  :-)  

Twitter challenges

Well, I'm trying to figure twitter out.  I'm having a hard time seeing the real point in just seeing what people are doing on a daily basis.  I kind of feel that I don't have time to just learn that they are taking their children to swim lessons, yadda, yadda.  It's getting a little frustrating.  I have found a couple of good ones that I'm enjoying like Steve Spangler's twitter.  Most of his is science related.

I'm also having some trouble figuring out how to "chat" on twitter.  I can't quite figure out how to join into a chat.  I've been trying to look for #scichat on Tuesdays.  This week I missed it, but I can't figure out if its every Tuesday or every other Tuesday.  Oy vey!  I really wish I could find a forensics science chat too.

Lastly, I am going to look for a chemistry list serve and a forensics list serve.  From what others have told me this can be very beneficial.

You know, it's kind of nice to have a blog where I can vent a little!  LOL  :-)

First Tweet!

So, I just sent out my first tweet!  I really had no idea what to say.  I mean how do you start a tweet, especially when you have no followers...  LOL  :-)

I'm also not sure if I'm only supposed to tweet about professional stuff or if I can tweet about things I'm doing with my family?

From failure can come success!

After I graduated from college in 2002, I could not find a chemistry teaching job.  I applied to tons and tons of jobs all over the Madison and Milwaukee areas, but I heard back from no one.  I finally applied for a job as a chemist at a Biotechnology company called Genencor.  I worked here for two years.  It was a very good job and I learned a lot, but I really missed teaching.  How could I not, when I knew that if I blew something up at Genencor, I would most likely get fired; however, if you blow something up as a teacher you usually get cheers!  J  I liked my chemist job, but I knew that it was not the place for me.

So, I again started my job hunt.  I applied for a number of chemistry teaching positions, but I only heard back from one school and it was only for a part time position.  I figured I would try for it anyways, and felt the interview went well, but in the end I did not get the job.  I felt pretty deflated after that.  This was in August and I was pretty bummed.  I found a listing on WECAN for a physical science teacher at South Milwaukee High School.  I was really not familiar with the Milwaukee area and thought that it was a Milwaukee Public School, until I did a little research and found out that it was in a suburb called South Milwaukee.  I really did not want to teach physical science, but figured I would go in for the interview, but if I didn’t get the job I was going to look for a graduate school in England (I studied abroad here during my undergrad and feel in love with the country).  I had already started looking at schools when I received a call for an interview.

I ended up getting a call offering me the job that same day.  I was very excited, even though school started in only a few weeks.   I would be teaching all freshmen physical science classes, but I thought what the heck, maybe I’ll be able to work my way up to chemistry.  Because that call, I have met and worked with the most amazing colleagues, one could ever ask for.  Especially, my friend and mentor David Nelson, who passed away suddenly this January.  If it wasn’t for this great job and people at SMHS, I would not have been able to develop my own Forensic Science course from the ground up and also get to teach chemistry.  For the past four years, I have taught 3 sections of chemistry and 3 sections of forensic science each year and I absolutely LOVE it!!  Even though it was a struggle to get here, I know that I am where I’m supposed to be and doing what I love best, teaching science!