It is important that educators are knowledgeable, up to date, and resourceful when it comes to incorporating technology into his or her classroom. This also includes keeping up with current trends and issues in the health and physical education setting. It's one thing that schools and teachers have technology available to them but it's crucial that not only teachers but students have training with this new technology. Often times, technology is under utilized because that training is not present and/or trends are not adapted. Network sharing is also a great resource for physical educators. One organization, SHAPE America, offered another kind of PD using an online forum. This forum was open for PE/health professionals who shared ideas, suggestions, lesson plans, or issues within their content. These threads often included new technology used in their classrooms; what worked well, what changes could be made, etc.
I believe the idea of an online forum is a great idea and resource. This doesn't necessary have to be used only for PE/Health but in all contents. I often look for ideas and resources on Pinterest but that isn't always the best due to the fact that anyone can post on Pinterest. This same kind of idea has tried to be created on Twitter but it's not the same. I also think that I would get more out of this online forum than I do on most PD days at my school. For example, on our last PD day we had sessions that you could choose from but nothing was tailored for physical education. We often find this problem. If we could have a PD day where our department sat down and really looked at this online forum, I'm certain I would learn more of technology from just exploring as a team. We could them sit down and try out some of these new apps, etc. I often struggle including technology into my class due to some obstacles but I would feel more comfortable trying to implement these new technologies if I knew another PE teacher had success with it.
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