Getting connected professionally is important because of this great saying, "It's not what you know, it's who you know." Many people find this to be truer each day. There are many good reasons to build your Professional Learning Network, one is because the more people you know who can help you, the more successful you can become. This also applies to how much easier things will come to you, especially when thinking about all the "struggles" a first year teacher may run into. How can I connect with people to answer any questions and give me great ideas to help me become a great, successful and loved teacher.
Social Media is a great place to start. There are many different "boards" and "pages" for great ideas and helpful hints for you to become successful. Whether these boards and pages are from Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or even Pinterest, you can find many different things on all of these medias because they usually all come with an explore tab. This explore tab can help people find so many different things, whether it is by using hashtags or just key words. There are multiple groups out there for teachers to get ideas and create connections with.
I asked a teacher I know from back home about her Professional Learning Network. She said that she mainly uses Twitter and Pinterest and leaves Facebook for a more personal use. She can find a lot of different ideas and and share them with other coworkers by "tagging" them in a post. She loves to share ideas and try new things in her classroom, so it is a very helpful tool for her. It will be very helpful in the future to be able to share ideas and get ideas from other teachers in order to change it up in your classroom and find new ways for the students to be engaged and learn.​​

There are eight main components that help today's classrooms succeed. Voice, choice, time for reflection, opportunities for innovation, critical thinkers, problem solvers and finders, self-assessment, and connected learning. All of these challenge the students in different ways, some will challenge some students more than others, which is good for the classroom. Challenging students and letting them figure out how to understand and apply​ the information, will help them grow in many many ways. 
Students having a choice in their classes will help them become more interested in what they are learning. There are a lot of different classes that are available for high school students and a lot of classes needed in order to graduate, but giving the students the choice of what classes to take, will increase the motivation for their classes. Increased motivation will show improvements in their grades. It is really important and beneficial for the students to be interested in the content, it will make it easier on them and on the teacher.
Self-assessment is important and can hold students accountable for their learning. George Couros states on page 114 of the Innovator's Mindset, "Teaching students how to assess themselves, rather than just do it for them, provides them another opportunity for reflection. And they will take ownership of their learning." This practice will also benefit the students because they will have a better understanding of their strengths and weaknesses, which is very important for growth in the classroom. 
Technology helps with all of these main components because it opens so many doors for teachers and students. There will be so many opportunities to do any of these with all of the resources you can find on the web. Challenging students should be the teachers' main focus once mastery is accomplished, innovation, critical thinking, and problem solving and finding, will challenge students just enough for success.

The TPACK Framework is important to keep in mind while becoming an educator in today's world. Students these days grew up with technology ready for them by the age of two and three. By the time these students are in high school, they will already be ahead of me in the technology world that I grew up with, which I have seen for most of my life and the drastic changes that have happened with it. Most of the students today show signs of wanting technology in the classroom environment and wanting to use it to learn.
Technology knowledge, pedagogy knowledge, and content knowledge all go hand in hand when figuring out lesson plans for education. Keeping the classroom environment interesting and having a good sense of what your students love to do during class, will really keep them all engaged. We want to keep the students motivated in the classroom and making the information more accessible to the students. TPACK focuses on the "what", "how", and the "partner". What are we learning about, how are we going to learn about it, and the tool to which we will use that will reflect the what and the how. 
There are so many positive things that come out of using technology in the classroom, but there are also negatives. Teachers need to find a balance between using technology to keep the class motivated and engaged, verses using it as an "easy out". The TPACK Framework will help organize and balance these outcomes by helping you recognize where and when the technology will be useful or not for the content at hand. ​Technology integration is very important in today's classrooms because that is what the students are interested in, and using it in many ways for different lessons will be very beneficial to their learning. 

The integration of virtual field trips is very important in today's classrooms. All the different places you are able to visit and people you can Skype with, will impact the students and their learning. Using virtual field trips will help expand the class as a whole, it will especially help the visual learners that in the classroom. It will give a good variety in the type of lessons being taught and will help "change things up" because pictures will not do it justice all the time. 
In the Biology classroom, it will be fun to go see different ecosystems throughout the world. There are multiple websites that allow you to go to many different places to expand the horizons of students. In these classes, they will be learning about all these different animals, and it will be an advantage to the students to understand where these animals live. 
There are also websites that show many different jobs in the science world. Exposing students to these different jobs will help them in their future. Many high school students have no idea what is all out there for them to do in the future and where they want to do for the rest of their lives. The science realm in the real world is huge, there are so many jobs out there for people to do that revolve around science, and I believe it is important for my students to understand what they all can do and achieve with the subject.
I believe teachers should integrate virtual field trips into their lessons because it can show the students to a greater extent to which you will ever be able to tell them yourself. Also, having a change in instruction is also important for the students, it also allows for student-led instruction which is also important. Virtual field trips can really bring the curriculum to life. 

My name is Jill Ann Schroeder. I grew up in a small town in Nebraska called Davenport. I went to high school at Bruning-Davenport USD and graduated with a class of 15. I attend St. Peter's Lutheran Church and was a member of the youth group, that is also where I attended Pre-K through 8th grade. My father is a farmer, crops and cattle, and my mother works at the bank in Davenport. I have four siblings, three brothers and a sister who is married. 
I have always loved competing in sports. I participated in volleyball, basketball, track and field, and summer softball. Sports help shape the type of leaders people become, and have played a huge part in my life. I also love music. I played in the band and sang in choir from middle school throughout high school. Recently, I have taken up the art of painting, only for fun though.
My three older siblings are all teachers, so teaching runs in the family. My oldest two siblings have definitely been the ones that inspired me the most to be a teacher. Being a teacher means to care about your students' success, whether it is the subject you are teaching, or where they take their life after they leave your classroom/school. Helping them figure out the path of what they want to do with their life after high school, will be really fascinating. 
In five years, I see myself in rural Nebraska teaching secondary science classes while coaching volleyball or track and field. I hope my students will describe me as fun, caring, understanding, and motivational. I want the environment of my classroom to be fun and vulnerable, but still hold high expectations for all of my students. 
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