Tim Wilson Blog ePortfolio

My personal leadership style is one of empowerment.  I believe that as a leader, to be effective, I must be deeply involved with the change, programs, and culture that I am seeking to engender in my organization.  By experimenting with new technologies, systems, and teaching methods in my own practice I embody the “Continual Learning” atmosphere that I believe is necessary to create in order for all stakeholders to feel fulfilled in the work that they contribute to our community. I understand that all new ideas or teaching practices are not going to be perfect or even effective, but it is the pursuit of personal and professional betterment that I have seen to be the outstanding trait of highly successful schools.  It is my strong belief that employees have an inherent desire to work towards excellence and contribute to the community.  When individuals are respected for their contributions and are in an environment where they are free to express their ideas, the s...

Current Event Paper Background The article What is virtual reality’s role in education?: An interview with Nearpod cofounder Filipe Sommer, written by Blake Montgomery and posted by www.edsurge.com on February 24, 2016, discusses a new addition to the Nearpod educational toolbox.  Nearpod is a web-based presentation tool that pushes the presentation directly to the students’ devices allowing for the teacher to pose questions and set tasks for the students to respond to within the presentation.  The presentation can be given in a live session or sent as homework in a flipped classroom setting.  Nearpod presentations can include text, audio, video, weblinks, polls, quizzes, and drawing content.  Nearpod allows teachers to create their own content as well as provides numerous pre-created model lessons for teacher to use.    Summary The article is an interview with Nearpod cofounder Filipe Sommer about the company’s latest release on February 17th o...

Personal Technology Reflection I use technology almost constantly in my home life as well as my educational life.  I have always been someone who takes to new software and advancements in technology quite quickly.  I credit my father for always buying an Apple computer every time the version was released.  He was always excited to see what the new computer could do that for the lay person was not possible before, even if those advancements had no practical value.  I think that may be the difference between teachers who integrate technology into their classroom easily and those who are resistant to change.  It’s the difference in mindset from ‘If I’m going to use this technology, it better make my life way easier.’ and ‘Wow, let’s see what this piece of science can do!’ As far as using technology in my educational setting goes, I don’t really have a choice.  Using technology is the facet of my educational setting that I fill.  I am the Educational...

Lewin’s work on change theory states that for real sustained change to occur three areas must be adhered to.  The three areas are creating a safe environment that supports the desired change, involving all stakeholders in the planning of the desired change, and then re-educating the stakeholders to understanding of the desired change. (Calabrese) A leader can create a safe environment to support change in several ways.  By listening to opposing points of view without showing judgement, laying out in manageable steps how the organization means to achieve the change, provide training and coaching to individuals who need help with the knowledge.  In creating this supportive environment the leader is seeking to reduce, as much as possible, the anxiety that naturally comes along with change in any situation. (Schein) For change to be lasting, the constituents who will be affected by the change, must be involved in the planning of how the proposed change will be implemen...

Assignment 3: Personal Family of Models Unknowingly, I have been utilizing the personal family of models to my teaching greatly this school year.   Most of this has to do my view on teaching and learning being more focused on the concepts and skills that students will carry on into other and future areas of their lives rather than on content.   Coincidently I have had the opportunity in my Design class to developing students’ metacognition, self-reflection, and ownership of their learning through the creation of Learning Blog Portfolios.   I have also been modeling some of the strategies they can use to take on self-directed learning.   Next term, designing their own learning will be the objective of their project.   The whole purpose of creating the Personal Learning Blogs is to give the students a sense of ownership of their learning through giving them the individual choice of how they want to demonstrate what they have done and who they are.   In...

We are social beings.  As social beings we create our understanding of the world around us through the social interactions and experiences that we encounter.  To not utilize the inherent nature of human beings to be social in education would be negligent.  Although, teachers, up until now and some still teach in this manner, teach with the ‘Sage on the Stage’ method.  We, on the other hand, want to empower the community to be innovative through collaboration.  The group is wiser than the individual. Reasoning for using The Group Investigating Model in our school : As you know our school is an IB world school, meaning that we employ all three divisions of the IB, PYP, MYP, and DP.  The IB has a strong focus on learning through inquiry.  In the PYP we follow lines of inquiry in each unit to develop understanding.  However, what we have been finding is that when our students move from PYP to MYP they are having a difficult time adjusting to th...