I always hate it when bloggers start a post with, “It’s been forever since I posted anything!” Because the truth is, I never notice, and wouldn’t have noticed if they hadn’t pointed it out to me. I could say the same thing here: “It’s been forever since I’ve published anything!” But number one, I know that most of my readers probably haven’t even noticed.  You’re probably seeing this post in your inbox or Feedly and thinking, “Oh yeah, I forgot about that Technology In Early Childhood blog I subscribed to months ago. Number two, technically, it’s not actually true that I haven’t published anything in “forever.” The fact is, I’ve probably written more articles in the last 6 months than I have in the last two years. It’s just that I haven’t published those articles here.
I’m really excited about a new direction my life is taking. If you read any of my blog posts last year, you might have suspected that I was looking to move out of the classroom. I wrote a lot about learning to write code. In fact, I did learn to write code. I earned a certificate in JavaScript from the local university and built more than a few websites. I even built an app using the incredibly complicated JavaScript back-end server language, Node. (Computer nerds can be impressed here. Early childhood teachers: just know that it was very, very challenging and probably not something I’ll try to repeat in the near future. I need to get better at plain vanilla JavaScript before I try Node again.)
As I was pouring myself into learning to write code, IÂ stumbled upon what has turned out to be the perfect “next step” for me career-wise. Since March of last year, I’ve been writing for the website WeAreTeachers. (If you pop over there and click around the “blog” section a little bit, you should be able to find a few things I’ve written lately.) This new gig really couldn’t be more perfect for me right now. I am able to apply all of the blogging skills I’ve learned creating content for this website and I’m able to draw upon my 15+ years teaching experience to inform the articles I write. Want to know the very best part? I even get to use a little bit of the code that I spent the last year learning. I’m part of a large team of editors at WeAreTeachers and together we write articles that cover every subject and every grade level. Â I’m often writing about things completely unrelated to technology or early childhood, but I do occasionally come back to my roots and write about topics that fit this niche. When I do, I’ll be sure to share them on my Technology In Early Childhood Facebook page. Â (Stop by and “Like” it if you haven’t already.) Here are a couple of articles I’ve written for WeAreTeachers that do fit with either early childhood, or technology:
15 of the Very Best Apps for Education —Technology in Early Childhood readers will recognize a few of my favorites here.
50 Tips Tricks and Ideas for Teaching Kindergarten —An exhaustive list!
If you want to keep up with me on WeAreTeachers, you can follow the WeAreTeachers Facebook page. (It’s HUGE!) Every article that is published on the site shows up on Facebook too.
Rest assured that I won’t be ignoring this blog. One of the fantastic things about this new job is that I am still completely immersed in the world of education. I may not be in the classroom every day, but I still have countless ideas swirling around in my head regarding technology and the role it should play with young children. I’ve uncovered quite a few new apps, and I certainly still keep current with what’s new in early childhood education.
I’m excited to see what’s next! Watch your inbox or feed reader. I’ve got another new post mostly written that I’m excited to share with Technology In Early Childhood readers soon!