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Thursday 22 August 2013

Teaching and Learning in the Digital World

Today was the second and last day of Peel's first Teaching and Learning in the Digital World conference and it was amazing. 600 Peel Educator's gave up two of their last few days of summer to come together and learn, share and collaborate about teaching strategies and pedagogy for the 21st Century. The energy and enthusiasm that could be felt during the conference was absolutely inspiring.

We had two amazing presenters at the conference, Ruben Peuntedura and George Couros. Ruben spent the first day helping us to understand the SAMR model and he helped us vision what a classroom should look like in 2018. Ruben challenged us to understand the incredible possibilities that technology, used effectively, can create for our students. Technology can help students to explore, discover, create and innovate. Through technology we can challenge students to push themselves to discover knowledge, information and meaning far beyond what we may have previously thought possible. Ruben provided us a roadmap for moving forward and concretely demonstrated the SAMR ladder through simulated lesson plans. He walked us through how the classroom experience for students would differ at each rung of the ladder. Ruben challenge our minds, and our practice. George took over for day two and challenged our spirit.

George arrived suffering from jet lag and claiming to not be quite on his game. He had just flown back from Australia after presenting at a conference there. I have to tell you if that was George jet lagged then I would love to see him when he is fully rested. He absolutely fired up the group. He had the crowd laughing, crying (yes crying) and then cheering his ideas and suggestions. He built on Ruben's message from the day before by developing a compelling case for why the use of technology in the classroom is no longer an option. He likened not allowing kids to use their digital devises in the classroom to eliminating all of our libraries. We would never consider closing all of our libraries and yet we would forbid students from using their devises which have become their digital libraries. Why? George was so motivational.

I am sitting here writing this blog tonight because George inspired me to get back at it. Like the other 599 people at the conference I walked out determined to lead the change by changing. If I want my Principals to lead change in their schools then I need to model the change. If Principals want teachers to lead the change in their classrooms, then Principals need to model the change and if teachers want students to lead the change in their learning, then teachers need to model the change.

Computers will never replace Teachers, Principals or Superintendents but Teachers, Principals and Superintendents who use technology will quickly replace those who don't.



5 comments:

  1. Great post! I felt the same way after hearing George today and returned to my blog for the first time in months. I love how you acknowledge the need for leading by example.

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  2. Awesome blog entry and welcome back to the blogging world! Ruben and George were excellent and I feel honoured to be part of such an amazing conference. It also made me feel good to know that while I might not be always sure what I'm doing that I can never be "wrong" with taking the jump into 21st Century learning!

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  3. Thank you Hazel, for playing such a big part in organizing the conference and for sharing your thoughts here. The keynote speakers were indeed inspiring and so too were all of the organizers and attendees. I was able to meet and connect with so many inspiring Peel staff members who will continue to help me along this amazing journey. Thanks again for making this happen.

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  4. When a superintendent writes the following I am so excited!

    " If I want my Principals to lead change in their schools then I need to model the change. If Principals want teachers to lead the change in their classrooms, then Principals need to model the change and if teachers want students to lead the change in their learning, then teachers need to model the change."

    Congratulations on the work your team did to share the wisdom of your own teachers. It was great to see them connecting and learning together! I am looking forward to continuously following your journey!

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  5. Thank you Hazel, and George. It was a fabulous two days, and inspired me to begin blogging again as well.

    I agree that modeling is key. I plan to open Adobe Premiere for the first time, and put together a short video for my first staff meeting of the year.

    For our visual learners, I think that video is the next medium we need to "exploit", since there are many of our students who are not engaged by text or still images. And how much better would it be for a teacher to receive a video of a student's best performance of the b-flat scale, rather than hear her nervous, shaky performance in class?

    Looking foward to a fabulous 2013-2014 school year!

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