Day 11 of #AprilBlogADay asks, “What are you reading, either professionally or personally? Why?” So much of my experience thus far in April is connected to what I’m currently reading. Right before Spring Break, I saw the April #TBookC selection was What Connected Educators Do Differently and was intrigued. I purchased it with a vision of copious free-time over Break to spend reading. The free-time did not exactly materialize but I did begin the book. In the introduction, that explores what is a Connected Educator, the authors state that “Our view is that serving as a connected educator is a mindset more than anything else; a connected educator tends to adopt and live out a mindset that believes…”1 and then continues to list a variety of connected educator actions. Reading this statement caused a major lightbulb moment for me. Being a connected educator is first and foremost about mindset. It’s the actions that follow the mindset. So when I came across #AprilBlogADay challenge a few days into April, I jumped in and haven’t looked back. Prior to engaging in the book, I would have not joined the blog challenge because my mindset was that I didn’t have much to contribute.
Having now shifted my mindset, my experience with the #AprilBlogADay has been extremely fruitful and rewarding. I appreciate the comments and tweets and push my thinking or just confirm that I am not alone in my thinking. I also participated in my first #TBookC chat on Thursday and the experience was great though slightly awkward given my surroundings. I was participating waiting for a School Board meeting to begin following closed session. The irony of being completely immersed in a chat about connected educators sitting in our city hall chambers as they filled up with educators who were seeking to connect face to face was not lost on me. Next time, I need to find a better balance between participating in the chat online as well as participaing in what was happening around me.
I’m only two chapters into the book so far but it is full of resources and ideas. Even if I read no further, the connection that first and foremost being a connected educator is about mindset has been huge.
1Whitaker, Todd, Jeffrey Zoul, and Jimmy Casas. What Connected Educators Do Differently. Routledge, 2015, xxiii.