Meeks Week 1 F5F

F#1 A resource that I found by using #PBL, was the PBL Works Twitter page and site. All of the classes I teach involve some sort of project-based learning. I feel the site has some valuable articles and information that could be useful in my classroom.

F#2 I have had a difficult time finding much information on Twitter that is really relevant in a Building Trades classroom. One area that I am able to find an abundance of information is for coaching. A coach that I began following was Steve Magness- @stevemagness. Steve is a track coach at the University of Houston. I have been using his books and website as a resource for a number of years. I felt that this Tweet he recently posted has relevance not only in coaching but in the classroom. We often try to fill all of our students/athletes' time with us. Some of the best creative moments/team-building moments occur when students/athletes are allowed to fill a little technology-free downtime.

F#3 After a 4 year hiatus, I will be teaching 1 class of civil engineering this year. I followed PLTW- @PLTWorg, to try to get an idea of what curriculum updates will be occurring for the upcoming school year. The PLTW network will also help with connecting to other CEA instructors throughout the state and country.

F#4 I am continuing to try and expand my PLN for resources as I move back to the engineering classroom. I added a PLTW instructor from a local school, St. Charles East. @STCEPLTW is a master teacher for PLTW and trains new PLTW instructors during the summer. I feel he will be a great resource if I need help troubleshooting throughout the semester.

F#5 As I was looking through the Autodesk Twitter feed I found an article they retweeted. The article is about a pedestrian bridge in LA that was designed by college students and assembled by robots. The bridge was designed for minimal waste, all of which would be recycled. I thought this was an awesome example of project-based learning with real-world application.

Week 1 Summary

This is the first time I have ever used a personal Twitter. All of my previous work on Twitter has been through my class or cross country team twitter. I tried to focus on new, relevant people and organizations to follow. I was actually pleasantly surprised that I was able to find quite a few.

Beyond following people on Twitter, I was also able to find a few relevant hashtags to follow- #CTE and #PBL. These hashtags connected me to various career and technical education classes throughout Twitter. One of the more valuable connections I made was with other engineering instructors. I have been out of the engineering classroom for a few years and will need some guidance from my PLN as I return next year.

Next week I hope to explore some of the different trade schools and union training centers in Illinois. I hope to gain some resources to use in my trades classes and make connections to organize training center tours for my students.