Mrs. Ruiz’s Blog

Today was our first day of school and it went very well.  I was excited to meet all my new students and I think they might have been a little excited to meet me too.  We spent the better part of the morning going over all the classroom essentials ranging from getting to know me and Fiona to supplies and textbooks.  We also spent a bit of time talking about technology of course and the kids were very excited.  I showed them our class website and our ePals SchoolBlog.  There was some minor technical difficulties getting everyone logged in at first, but it all came together in the end.  I hope to see more use of the class website this year, and this class seems to be just the kids to do that!

If you don’t know who Beverly Matheson is you should get to know her.  She is a 3rd grade teacher at Dorothy Grant Elementary School in Fontana, CA.  She and I are attending the Discovery Educator Network Leadership Council Conference at Discovery Headquarters in Silver Springs, Maryland.  Bev had I have known each other for a few years, but I have never had the pleasure of working with her as closely as I have over the last several days.  I have to say she is the most upbeat, warm, and welcoming person I have met in a long time.  Her enthusiasm for teaching is refreshing, and I am so glad our 3rd graders get to work with her.  What is interesting to me is that while I come to the Discovery conferences for a variety of reasons, networking with and learning from teachers is one of the most important ones.  I have been networking and learning, but I am surprised that much of this has come from the quality time spent working with Bev.  Just goes to show you that networking isn’t only to connect with teachers from across the country, but down the hall as well.  Thanks Bev for sharing with me, and for teaching me a number of things this week, especially the art of the self portrait.

I really enjoy this virtual reality for networking with other teachers.  It really has exponentially expanded my teacher network and the amount of resources and ideas I have to use in my instruction.  I have presented in SL a few times and found it to be awesome way to reach a variety of educators from all over the country, and even the world!

I love Discovery conferences!  I am always inspired to do more creative things with my students to keep learning fresh and engaging.  This morning I learned about how to use cellphones for instruction.  Can’t wait to try out some of these ideas with my class!