Technology surprises

I have been thinking about all the available technology in the classrooms and schools these days. It's amazing how much is out there. Unfortunately most is out of our price range. When I was looking at the budget and the availability, it hit me that the most important piece I use is free. I discovered the amazing uses of Twitter about a year ago. I joined Twitter because my children and students were always talking about it. I stumbled upon "Twitter chats" and #satchat. I was hooked! I cannot even tell you how much I have learned through my own personal professional development on Twitter. I discovered I could fix a cup of coffee, sit in my pajamas, and learn a plethora of information on how to make my school even more amazing, help my teachers with new ideas, and make sure my students are receiving some of the newest strategies.  Twitter is where I learned about Standards Based Learning and Standards Based Grading. I learned about ZAP and why it's important to make zeros a behavior not a grade. I discovered Failure WAS an option and how to fail forward. Genius hour was explained and so was what great principals do differently. I met amazing authors who turned me on to amazing books. I learned about Voxer and Evernote; although I'm still learning about those. I found so many super educational chats that I often find myself following several at one time. Every day of the week has a learning opportunity. Just a couple are #satchat, #sunchat, #iaedchat, #aledchat, #nbtchat, #apchat and many, many more. I have even been challenged to write all my ideas down into a blog. I could go on and on because of the amazing information available. So, for me, Twitter is the foundation of all my technology. It got me started, it's keeping me going, and I look forward to seeing where it will take me.