Fighting the Resistance

I procrastinate...a lot. I always have. I have been a last minute finisher since high school, throughout university and in varying degrees during my teaching career. It's not that I don't know what I need to do, often I spend a lot of time thinking and plannning what needs to be done - often writing a "To Do" list anywhere from three to ten times before actually starting it. I will agonise over the thinking processes behind things but then stay up till the wee hours of the morning the night before a big presentation to implement my big plans. A lot of the time this has worked for me, it's challenging and exciting for me to have to think quick and improvise. However, I must admit that there have been times when it's been an appalling failure and everything has fallen apart around me.

For example, the last three days I've known exactly what needs to get done before Wednesday (our first Student Free Day of the year, where I will be thrown into my new role with little to no preparation), I even had a colleague come over and help do some of the planning. I've written my list (three times to the count - once on paper, once on my touch and once on my igoogle page), I've got my random notations and footnotes to remind me what needs doing, I've had time...but nothing's happened so far. I literally sit down, open a word document, organise my notes and sit with poised fingers over my keyboard...waiting. As each day has ticked by I've gotten slightly more internally stressed about exactly how I make my rather long list get ticked off before the deadline.

The thing is this...I know eventually it'll get done but I need certain things to align and fall into place in order for it to happen. For example, the right mix of songs to flick through my playlist is essential to my productivity. The problem is I can't predict exactly which ones will work on any given day...what worked yesterday might not work today, then again, it might. Or I may have had just the right workout at taekwondo training - mind you, to hard a session and I'll be wiped, to soft and I'll have excess energy and I'll be squirming in my seat. Maybe I'm the Goldilocks of productivity.

Image: "Block it out" by dotbenjamin @flickr

In all honesty, I am making excuses. I am not being disciplined, restrained, focused and therefore I am losing a battle with the Resistance. I am resistant to returning to work, I am resistant to accepting a new role (I want the job, don't get me wrong - just nerves starting to hit), I am resistant to the idea of giving up some of the indulgences I've come to enjoy over the holidays (my pyjamas and I have never been so close). The Resistance is strong in me.

This morning as I wrote out my list in increased detail I realised I'm going to loose this battle and miss my deadline if I don't do something about it. So, it is now official - I am fighting The Resistance.

It started simply enough - I sat down and committed two nights a week to writing blog entries. I even have the topics picked out a week in advance with a vague outline of what I could talk about (my touch is synced and will remind me...it's so supportive). Now, I'm sure you'll realise how big a step that was for me - I _planned_ something. Guess what? Half an hour ago my touch buzzed me and I told the cat and hubby I had to go play blogger for a little while, plugged in my playlist and found a song that fired me tonight (it turned out to be Cake's "Going the Distance" tonight) and got on with the job.

I've broken my list down into smaller bites and with shorter deadlines - tonight it's the unit outlines and assessment planner dates (at the very least).

I am determined that I will win this fight. I started 2009 the way I intended on finishing it - ahead of the mad rush of an impending deadline, enjoying the creativity of those around me and the opportunities offered to me and this Resistance cannot be permitted to stop those plans.

So, what do you do to fight your Resistance?

Plans

Two and a half weeks out from the first day at school for 2009 and every now and again I find myself considering the plans for the year. It feels kind of strange to only be planning for two classes and worrying more about the staff side of things - I keep feeling that I've forgotten something.

As thoughts churn over in my head I'm starting to consolidate a few ideas. So, some of the tools I plan to use from day one this year:

Diigo - the more I play with this tool, the more I enjoy it and I find it frustrating when my colleagues do not use it. It seems so...redundant to Diigo it and then have to copy and paste the link into an email for them.

Netvibes - this one looks like a great way to collate information for different topics from across the web, lots of potential for the classroom and working with staff.

Jog The Web - One of the units I start the year with is a media unit (similar to the one I ended the year with in 2008) and one of the activities I'd like to do is create a track tracing how a global issue is reported across the globe so we can look at the similarities and differences it is reported from different perspectives.

I know I mentioned these three breifly last post, but the details are starting to flesh out and I wanted to share. Any other ideas I'm more to happy to hear them!

New Horizons

Okay, so I admit it...three days later and I'm still irked by the "need to broaden your ICT pedagogy" comment on my feedback. Now, I realise this is a fairly minor comment on an otherwise glowing report...but I've never been one to accept close enough as good enough.

As a result I'm left with a deep motivation to find ways to "extend" myself, and that's led to me playing and thinking a lot this weekend. And it's been productive. I've:

• Played with Audacity to finish off the first of the podcasts from the Year 8 classes...can I just say, the out takes had me giggling all night...hilarious! I've now also uploaded these to their secure podcast lounge so they can listen. I wish I was more involved in the actual teaching of this unit..it's driving me nuts
• Figured out how to use Studymate and Respondus to create flash games to include in my Blackboard virtual classrooms...and realised these can also be used to create activities for ipods...
• Figured out how to use these on my ipod (I know...I'm slow)

As usual I've done a lot of professional reading (blogs, links, articles, tweets) and as a result have a multitude of new possibilities twirling around in my head. Including:

• Using smsexpress.com.au or something similar to send reminders and updates to students
• Using utterli for audio blogging
• Investigating backchanneling options and the possibilities for my English classes (I'm liking the idea of something like coveritlive.com)

I've been having a couple of small issues with my Utterli blog posts - they haven't been cross posting automatically. Which is frustrating because I'm hoping to get it working before I head to Melbourne so I can still touch base daily. I played with some settings today and since I have to attend a very long after school planning session tomorrow night I'll test it all out then - fingers crossed it's sorted now...

In the meantime - what are your newest horizons? How are you going to be "broadening your use of ICT pedagogy" this week?