Spinning less plates.

Time is an issue with me and probably most teachers as we never have enough of it!
Having spent the weekend on Twitter following edcahtnz it opened my eyes up to a lot of things. More positive's than negatives and even some 'pat on the backs' when I realised I was already doing some of this stuff already.
Oddly enough the negatives had nothing to do with words like 'I can't so that' or ' my school won't allow/go for that' ' we have always done it this way!' but more 'where am I going to find the time?'.


I work full time (which I love!) and have two small children but sometimes juggling both can be extremely hard. One of the reasons I made the decision to drag my husband (who is from South Africa) away from the UK to NZ was because we (more him) had no work/life balance. We were out the door by 7am (navigating the M25!) everyday and not home until 6pm ( or even later) most nights. Not great when you also had two children under the age of 4 and no family support network! Although the move here ended with us moving to Christchurch and my family lives in the North Island!


Now this is not a cop out for me but a reality. I am not limiting myself but instead taking smaller steps rather than huge ones! Something that we need to also teach children to do. You are the only one who limits yourself. So rather than just make the excuse 'I have no time' I have readjusted. I know time is my Achilles heel but I have found a way around it - less is more. Spin less plates rather than a lot!


At the moment where I work, we are going through the process of moving into a MLE so we have already done a lot of work with Core Education. We are also going through a whole different mind set in the way we see teaching and learning. I already do a lot in my classroom and tend to 'jump' on new concepts/ideas all the time. Therefore, that is covered - a compulsory PD requirement from work. So what could I do myself beside just follow people on Twitter without feeling like I was spinning to many plates and unbalancing my 'work/life balance?


One thing that stood out for me this weekend was all the things I was already doing. I realised from a few tweets that 'talking tins, kung fu punctuation, post its, questioning, peer evaluation are being used a lot by others but there are those who had no idea about them. Most of those mentioned have been part of my everyday teaching for the last 10+ years.
So, I decided to try blog a few of these things and how they have worked for me and in the past. I am no expert but one concept that came from the edchat tweets was about sharing and letting others know what you are doing. This is a BIG step for me as I always think others do it better and it also means letting my guard down and accepting that not everyone will like my ideas and thoughts.


Heck, it will take me at least a week to plan out one blog! I am very envious of those who seem to do it with such flair!


Other things I want to try and do:
Connect with other Chirstchurch teachers via this
I think by doing this, I will probably end up spinning a few smaller plates as well.
Learn more about Google Doc thanks to @chasingalyz blog
So thank you EdcahtNZ and everyone who was there tweeting. You have given me a lot to think about.