The Internet is about… People

If, for many reasons, you view the Internet in a guarded manner and hold some negativity towards the advent of social media, you might feel anxiety surrounding these thoughts.

Many face-to-face discussions that I have been involved in recently, suggests just this. Some colleagues and friends frown upon my idea of having a class in school surrounding the teaching of social media. Please read Nicholas Bramble’s article entitled Fifth Period is Facebook These same friends and colleagues seem to think that I have my head in the sand or maybe the clouds - and yet…

I have developed a close relationship with a network of people residing around the globe and view the evolution of Social Media as a tool that assists me in engaging with these people, strengthening my beliefs, broadening my perspective and intensifying my commitment to personal and professional growth and I choose to use it as such, in what I see as a positive endeavour. Because of this, I would like to find out from youth, how they are using social media and encourage and teach them how to continue to use it in a beneficial manner…

Being that I have taught for the better part of the last twenty-three years, I believe that education is the key to learning about… changing, and/or strengthening our views and our actions. If the powers that be who make the decisions in education, would “stop thinking about how to repress the huge amounts of intellectual and social energy kids devote to social media and start thinking about how to channel that energy away from causing trouble and toward getting more out of their classes” (Bramble, 2009), then we may just create the opportunity to break down that wall that stands between many educators and students and see the Internet for what it truly is…

…Ellyn

Thoughts About A Woman I Called Mom...

Books are made so differently now… This once dark green, now faded, copy of The Pitman Advanced Dictation Course, found its way into my hands this morning as I marveled at our little home library that my thirteen year old decided to organize yesterday.

The course book has no publication date stated in it and yet I know that my mother used in it 1957 when she attended the Oshawa Young Women’s Business College, also referred to as secretarial school.

As I leaf through the pages of shorthand squiggles that mean absolutely nothing to me, I wander back to the opening page where my mother has written her name, address and phone number. These are the squiggles that hold me captive. Repeatedly, I run my fingers over her first name… Now that she has left this earth, any scrap of who she was here, is what enthralls me.

I knew her as mom but she was more than just that, she had to be!

I invite you to engage in dialogue with me about your loved ones who no longer walk this earth... Hmm - or do they?

…Ellyn