Introductions

Please introduce yourself, let us know a little bit about you, and where you are from.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Noemi Szoychen on May 22, 2009 at 4:53pm

Hi Judy,
You are not alone! I've been trying to get in contact with other Jewish Educators throught different social networks but I guess there are still very few of us here.
My name is Noemi Szoychen, I live in Jacksonville, Fl and I've been in Jewish education for about 23 yrs. ( I am in my fortys), So it's been almost half of mylife.I am a very eclectic jew. I am sefardi born in Mexico, who lived in Israel for 2 years in Israel (I've got my certification as a Jewish Educator in Jerusalem at Machon Greenberg L]Morim) and who emigrated to the USA 15 yrs. ago. So this is the short story.
I am a passionated of integrating Jewish Education with Technology and Arts. You can visit my blog to have an idea of the different projects I work on: Jewlearn-it
I am teaching Middle School Judaic Studies and Hebrew at the Martin J. Gottlieb Day School, and also I am the Technology and art resources especialist for the Jacksonville Jewish Center Religious School. 5 years ago, I did not know much about computers but I am always willing to learn new things everyday and here I am.
If I can be of any help let me know!
Shabath Shalom,
Nomy

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Permalink Reply by Rabbi Spicehandler on May 25, 2009 at 3:53pm

Thanks Naomi. I had 2 days to play on the computer , since Sunday school is over for the school year and Monday the synagogue was closed. I feel like I have learned tons in the last 2 days. But
as with all learning the more I learn the more I know that I don't know! So yes- I can use all the help I can get! I will follow your blog and see where it leads! I too have a blog but it is on Wordpress and it is more about Judaism and Education than it is about technology (although I can see that technology is going too infiltrate my blog any day now).Take a look if you like. It is at http://rabbijudy.wordpress.com/.

Darim is a great Jewish Education place to go for tips on all things 2.0. I subscribe to Jew.0 . Do you know about them?

Judy

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Permalink Reply by Noemi Szoychen on May 25, 2009 at 5:14pm

I can not believe I did not know anything about Darim! Thank you for sharing this place. I will check it out!
Also, I did visit you blog and I love what you write in there. I started my blog more than a year ago, but it has taken me a lot of time to give it a personality of it's own. I think of it as a work in process. My thinking process is extremely agile and sometimes I can not even catch up with it, specially when I am thinking in Spanish. So, hopefully I'll get better in blog posting one day.
Pleasure to meet you and let's stick together in this journey~
Nomy

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Permalink Reply by Jessica Tipton on May 18, 2009 at 12:05pm

Hello! My name is Jessica Tipton. I am a 7th grade math teacher in Winder, GA. I have been teaching for five years, and I am certified to teach K-8 all subjects, but my favorite is math. I am our school's professional learning coordinator. I integrate a lot of technology into my classroom instruction (as much as I am technologically capable at least). Plus, I am in the process of writing a number of grants to gain more technology for our school. I am currently taking a Web 2.0 class taught by Caroline O'Bannon, and that is how I became aware of Classroom 2.0.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Leventhal on May 18, 2009 at 3:24pm

I am organizing a web collaboration to assemble the first Consumer's Guide to Technology used or proposed for use in educating children on the Autism Spectrum. To be created by the people who use technology with children: parents, teachers, related service providers, clinicians. Created for the same people.

This zagat-style guide will offer an easier, more informative means of comparing DVDs, programs, sites and other technology. We will explore current uses, providing standardized objective measures as well as accurate, anecdotal information such as: Is it useful? Does it work? How well? How would you improve it?

A network of classroom teachers, parents and other caretakers in a testing/reporting network would will demonstrate the power of the Web work for autism and education.
More information @ http://tech-in-ed.ning.com/group/TechInSE

Length of Project: 6 months

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Permalink Reply by Debbie Jones on May 18, 2009 at 11:43pm

Hi - I'm Deb Jones from Brisbane, Queensland in Australia. I'm very intrigued with the Classrom 2.0 Community and since joining, have thoroughly enjoyed the amazing range of topics, discussions, resources, webconferences etc. I'm very interested in digital pedagogy, but specifically along the lines of teacher professional development - my role is to co-ordinate and support professional learning for teachers with digital pedagogy! Looking forward to great collaboration here :)

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Permalink Reply by Ian Carmichael on May 19, 2009 at 2:23am

G'day Deb,
Nice to hear that Aussie accent - have fun here.

Ian - from Tasmania

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Permalink Reply by Daniel Bassill on May 19, 2009 at 9:20am

Ian, it's great to see the crossover from Fireside Learning to this forum. Maybe we can draw some folks back the other way. My own goal is to draw people to the Tutor/Mentor Leadership and Networking Conference in Chicago, which will be May 28 and 29.

Since most people on this forum cannot get their in person, we need to find ways to share ideas about ways to reach kids in the non-school hours, and via the Internet, who live in high poverty and isolated areas where the don't have access to most of the great ideas being shared. There's not a lot of discussion of volunteering on this site, or of ways to connect youth with business volunteers who might mentor uses of technology, and provide work opportunities where kids can apprentice and learn on the job.

I hope we can stimulate that and show how kids, using web 2.0, can be the leaders who mobilize such resources for their own communities, and for disadvantaged communities.

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Permalink Reply by Heather Horton on May 19, 2009 at 7:11pm

Hello Everyone! My name is Heather Venable. I currently teach biology and chemistry at a high school in North Carolina . However, I have recently taken a job as the Middle School instructional Technology Specialist in my district. We are in the process of implementing a 1:1 initiative with our 7th grade. This semester I began working with the seventh grade teachers (introducing them to some web2.0 tools and ideas on how to integrate them into their curriculum) after school. It has been challenging for me to keep up with them (around 70 teachers at 4 different schools) and finish out the year in the EOC classroom! Next year I will leave the classroom and begin the instructional technology specialists job full time. I am very excited about the opportunity to be a part of this initiative but also anxious, nervous and scared! I am really concerned about the fact that my teachers are in a thousand different places as far as their technology experience and ability levels. I am looking forward to getting some advice from all you excellent educators out there!

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Permalink Reply by Karena Zdeb on May 20, 2009 at 9:16am

Hello, My name is Karena and I'm from Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. I am the program coordinator for the Master of Science in Instructional Media at Wilkes University. The program is a collaboration between Discovery Education and Wilkes. I'm so excited to work with the program and learn more about everything from digital storytelling to PBL collaboration via the web. Great to meet everyone! :)

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Permalink Reply by Ursula Schroepfer on May 20, 2009 at 4:31pm

Hi my name is Ursula I am from Bellingham, WA and I'm a Junior at Western Washington University in the Early Childhood program. I'm in a technology class right now and just found out about this networking site through a project I'm doing. I'll be heading into student teaching Fall of 2010 and as of now I would love to be a preschool teacher!

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Permalink Reply by Mary T McCullagh on May 22, 2009 at 10:23am

Hello, I am Mary T McCullagh, and I teach AP European History and AP and Honors US Government in Miami, FL.

I love web 2.0. I have had fun sharing these tools with my classes this year. We have had online community-building and cooperation with students and teachers in Israel and Germany. The students have enjoyed getting to know their peers in those settings, especially sharing their lives, ideas and curricular explorations.