Holy 7th level of Dante's Inferno Batman!

Very warm day in the classroom- excited to do first project with Chromebooks tomorrow for the year.  I have so many great ideas to develop a paperless classroom- I just wish I knew the right way to implement them.  I am hesitant in today's day and age to make big changes- to be honest- I am scared to make a big change.  I am blessed to have a very supportive administration- to me it comes down to how do I change so much so quickly.  I have been reading all of these articles on the 21st century classroom- and have been following @thenerdyteacher on twitter while I consider myself a pretty modern teacher...I guess I fall short a lot of times and am still teaching like the 19th century.  How do I get over that hump and go full bore?  I guess I will be convincing myself to take babysteps and be there in a few years.

NEW THINGS I AM TRYING:

Remind101: utilzing this with my students and parents- hopefully this will be a hit on back to school night

Google Docs/Chromebooks:  I feel like a dinosaur that I am just starting to use this- but we just became a Google school.  Excited to utilize these tools to their full potential.

Polleverywhere.com:  Free site that allows for cell phone text polls in class- kids have enjoyed them so far and I hope to utilize them more when it comes time for classroom discussion.

I will be blogging as I go and hope to see improvement re: these topics.  in the future years I hope to develop a true 21st century Social Studies classroom and utilize flipped lessons, technology, go paperless, etc.  This is the only way we will prepare our students to use technology the correct way....and go beyond posting funny youtube videos and updating facebook.

It never gets old....

So, I am very new to this whole blogging thing.  I have thought about starting one for sometime and decided this has to be the year.  Each year before school starts, I have this strange excited feeling.  You would figure that after 5 years of this.....it wouldn't mean much anymore.  It still does.  I am so excited for this upcoming school year, and nervous, excited, etc.

Ask any teacher if they are ready for the first day of the year and they may say yes...but the real answer is probably no.  I feel like I have so much left to do....but still, the idea that I get to see my students (most of the Wednesday) is flippin' exciting.  I am excited to use new technology in my classroom such as:  chromebooks, remind101, and polleverywhere.com.  I've worked in a variety of school districts and it is awesome to be in one that wants me to utilize these new technologies in the classroom.  Only the year will see if the ideas I have developed will be successful or not.