Teacher A I went to all of the plenary speakers and found them to be excellent – very motivating.
Breakouts I went to were:
Interactive and Engaging Learning Connections with Limited resources. – a very practical application session. Key point – Ignore graphics at your peril
Inquiry learning – A school wide approach. Key trigger – 80% of questions used by teachers are at a surface level.
Teaching in an Authentic Context.
Took the opportunity to have a Tutorial with the people on the Mathematics stand.
Thinkers in the classroom
9 in 90 minutes. Some very useful resources I have been able to hand around (to other departments as well)
Does content matter anymore. Key point – Each student’s ultimate learning success is more important than the covering of particular achievement objectives.
Some key quotes which I found very profound and motivating
‘Teachers MUST be 21st Century Learners’
‘If students are to grow and learn then Teachers must grow and learn first’.
The leaders job is NOT to make teachers happy but to grow teachers
We are change agents not facilitators
Who should own the Learning
In most cases – Teachers work harder than the students – the trick is to get the students to work harder than the Teacher.
One of the important roles of a Teacher is to build learning communities.
What have I bought back to the school and how have I used it.
I visited the Marvin stand at the conference and have been working with the IT person to introduce it into the school. We have a workshop organised for later in the year.
I have a class working on Mathletics. Because of the personal contact made at the conference I was able to set up a Skype link for training the 2 other teachers who have a class on this programme
I have been far more involved with the PD organisation and delivery in the school.
I have presented a PD session with the staff on ‘Learning Intentions and Success Criteria’ using some of the group selection techniques learnt at the conference.
I have presented a PD session on the use of Moodle to enhance learning. The motivation to become a 21st learner at the age of 62 was re-enforced, confirmed and implored at this conference.
In short, All teachers need the opportunity to hear and participate in such a world class conference that cut to the heart of what Teaching is all about – learning and encouraging students to become life long learners.
Teacher B The Learning@schools conference was fantastic. All the keynote speakers were excellent, especially Alan November. He made me think of ways to present information or get the message across. Dr Thomas Hoerr was the most realistic speaker, being a current principal he understood and relayed the stress of teaching. The two presenters that really altered my thinking was Tony Ryan (2 different sessions) and Karen Boyes. Tony Ryan was amazing, his ideas were short sharp to the point realistic for a classroom and also acknowledging teacher time and workload. He inspired me to pick up thinkers keys again. Karen Boyes made Habits of mind make sense.
Outcomes
It was clear to the point. I am now using habits of mind to complement my teaching.
ConnectIT group
The ConnectIT group (made up of 12 teachers) have been looking at thinking strategies term one and then applied different strategies with our classes .
Term two looking at the framework for the trial run end of term 2. We have looked at questioning and developing questions. The groups are developing their trial theme. June 10th we are having a day session I have a guest speaker coming in Carol Scarff from the University of British Columbia (Impressed) talking about critical thinking – looking forward to the trial (inquiry based) runs in week 8,9, 10.
Teacher C
The conference was useful in helping me focus on what the new curriculum meant and how it should be woven into the work we are doing and yet to do. The AOs of the curriculum are aided by the KCs. The last session I attended help focus on this and ended up being part of our dept discussion on how we use and integrate the KCs into our programme in English.
The conference also helped remind me of how ICT can be used throughout programmes of learning .
Useful Presentations Pam Hook and Julie Mills on Solo taxonomy and how to use different kinds of thinking skills to enrich the inquiry process. This is an ongoing discussion in our department.
Tony Ryan
The use of thinking keys
Thinking Keys – how to help students come up with their own thinking keys (purchased some material to use in class)
Dave from Hands on education
Used a powerful clip from Freedom Writers to illustrate his about talking past each other.
Very useful material for learning how to listen and question both in class and in staffroom discussions.
Alan November
Several useful websites and reminded us to make inquiries about where sites come from and the information they are really promoting
Also promoted the idea of using the work of students as tutorials for our students and giving students the opportunity to become tutors and teachers themselves.
Teacher C
Break out 1 I went to Responding to change by Tony Ryan and from this session I really liked the numbering activity where you have to interact with different person everytime my students have very well adapted that method and really like it ( we did it as at a PL session as well)and it was tips that can be pratically implemented that start enriching learning.
Break out 3 I went to21st century teachers and ICT - the way forward by Nathan Kerr and Robert Douglas and interesting to know the average age of a secondary teacher is 49 and that m learning - learning through mobile phone is very help ful as well so when I will be on the trip with my students to wellington they will be using their phones to capture important facts and they will use it during revision time before exams to refresh their learning. and also few things that may happen in the future such as m learning being the MOE pilot and Projector in the phone, computers as appliances, fold out screen ( e-ink) 3D video and television which the waikato uni in working on and also Holograms in mobile devices and learning. some website The film Archives gave presentation to the staff as PL last term, mlearnz.wikispaces.com , econschool.wordpress.com
Break out 4 went to Ten trends for 2010 by Derek Wenmoth lots of information on teachers roles in a network learning environment, Globilised Future, ubiquitous learning, cyber Citizenship, Digital literacy, open education resources, cloud computing Karen, assessment practises- E-asttle, wikis, online quizzes and surveys,E- portfolios and http://www.freefoto.co some of these are being used by my students and they love learning through doing online quizzes and stuff.
Breakout 5 complexities and challenge- developing the school curriculum by Lisa Morresy- critical thinking skills, integrated curriculum, why plan collaboratively, key competencies focus, formative assessment, effective questioning, survey monkey website
Breakout 6 inquiry learning what is good learning and what is good inquiry by Trevor Bond- hassles and issues with inquiry learning, opinions, values, attitudes, behaviours and skills discussed along with knowledge, understanding, world view and beliefs. Smart schools- book, primary learning goals.
All these have changed my why of inquiry teaching and student inquiry learning methods which influenceds my delievery of teaching to help engage learning for my students. I have also shared my some of this with staff, within a week I had an opportunity to do so in staff briefing! .
Teacher D
The conference was useful in helping me focus on what the new curriculum meant and how it should be woven into the work we are doing and yet to do. The AOs of the curriculumare aided by the KCs. The last session I attended help focus on this and ended up being part of our dept discussion on how we use and integrate the KCs into our programme in English.
The conference also helped remind me of how ict can be used throughout programmes.
Useful Presentations
Pam Hook and Julie Mills on Solo taxonomy and how to use different kinds of thinking skills to enrich the inquiry process. This is an ongoing discussion in our dept.
Tony Ryan
The use of thinking keys
Thinking Keys – how to help students come up with their own thinking keys (purchased some material to use in class)
Dave from Handson education
Used a powerful clip from Freedom Writers to illustrate his about talking past each other.
Very useful material for learning how to listen and question both in class and in staffroom discussions.
Alan November
Several useful websites and reminded us to make inquiries about where sites come from and the information they are really promoting
Also promoted the idea of using the work of students as tutorials for our students and giving students the opportunity to become tutors and teachers themselves.
Feed back on the conference in Rotorua
Teacher A
I went to all of the plenary speakers and found them to be excellent – very motivating.
Some key quotes which I found very profound and motivating
What have I bought back to the school and how have I used it.
In short, All teachers need the opportunity to hear and participate in such a world class conference that cut to the heart of what Teaching is all about – learning and encouraging students to become life long learners.
Teacher B
The Learning@schools conference was fantastic. All the keynote speakers were excellent, especially Alan November. He made me think of ways to present information or get the message across. Dr Thomas Hoerr was the most realistic speaker, being a current principal he understood and relayed the stress of teaching. The two presenters that really altered my thinking was Tony Ryan (2 different sessions) and Karen Boyes. Tony Ryan was amazing, his ideas were short sharp to the point realistic for a classroom and also acknowledging teacher time and workload. He inspired me to pick up thinkers keys again. Karen Boyes made Habits of mind make sense.
Outcomes
ConnectIT group
Teacher C
The conference was useful in helping me focus on what the new curriculum meant and how it should be woven into the work we are doing and yet to do. The AOs of the curriculum are aided by the KCs. The last session I attended help focus on this and ended up being part of our dept discussion on how we use and integrate the KCs into our programme in English.
The conference also helped remind me of how ICT can be used throughout programmes of learning .
Useful Presentations
Pam Hook and Julie Mills on Solo taxonomy and how to use different kinds of thinking skills to enrich the inquiry process. This is an ongoing discussion in our department.
Tony Ryan
Dave from Hands on education
Alan November
Teacher C
- Breakout 6 inquiry learning what is good learning and what is good inquiry by Trevor Bond- hassles and issues with inquiry learning, opinions, values, attitudes, behaviours and skills discussed along with knowledge, understanding, world view and beliefs. Smart schools- book, primary learning goals.
All these have changed my why of inquiry teaching and student inquiry learning methods which influenceds my delievery of teaching to help engage learning for my students. I have also shared my some of this with staff, within a week I had an opportunity to do so in staff briefing! .Teacher D
The conference was useful in helping me focus on what the new curriculum meant and how it should be woven into the work we are doing and yet to do. The AOs of the curriculumare aided by the KCs. The last session I attended help focus on this and ended up being part of our dept discussion on how we use and integrate the KCs into our programme in English.
The conference also helped remind me of how ict can be used throughout programmes.
Useful Presentations
Pam Hook and Julie Mills on Solo taxonomy and how to use different kinds of thinking skills to enrich the inquiry process. This is an ongoing discussion in our dept.
Tony Ryan
The use of thinking keys
Thinking Keys – how to help students come up with their own thinking keys (purchased some material to use in class)
Dave from Handson education
Used a powerful clip from Freedom Writers to illustrate his about talking past each other.
Very useful material for learning how to listen and question both in class and in staffroom discussions.
Alan November
Several useful websites and reminded us to make inquiries about where sites come from and the information they are really promoting
Also promoted the idea of using the work of students as tutorials for our students and giving students the opportunity to become tutors and teachers themselves.