Thanks to the Board members and school administrators who joined us for a demonstration and conversation about low-cost, no-cost web applications to help create quality professional learning. As promised, here is your "paperless" handout:
Sixty educators from around the Greater Cincinnati region gathered to create their own personal learning agendas and networking conversations. West Clermont participants included Julie Schneider, Tammy Marcotte, Cheryl Koehler, Kathy Stemmer, Joan Stear, Jeff Riel, Kendra Herdtner, LeAnna Webber, Joe Stahl, Alicia Walls, Scott Morgan, Matt White, Cheryl Turner and M.E. Steele-Pierce. Ask them about the day!
At last Friday's kick off of Powerful Learning Practice, Will Richardson asked the 75 educators in the room, "How do you learn?" He challenged us that no conversation about educational reform can begin unless the focus is on LEARNING. He challenged us to consider our own learning systems and styles.
This morning I ran across this Prezi with commentary by Dallas McPheeters, entitled, "A 5000 Year Timeline of Learning Theories" (don't worry, it's 5000 years in 13 minutes). It begins and ends with the question, "How do you learn?"
One other thing, you'll find this Prezi and many, many other resources, videos, topics, and conversations on The Educator's PLN. It's a wonderful site for those of you building your own personal learning network. If you haven't toured it yet, please do. I invite you to join the conversation, or just lurk and learn for a while.
M.E.
PS And thank you to Tom Whitby, a member of my PLN, for posting the tweet that led me to the video.
We'll be serving up some tech tapas to Ohio's English language arts supervisors during Thursday's fall meeting at the Ohio Resource Center. Tapas are appetizers, designed to encourage conversation. Legend has it that originally tapas were salty, to provoke thirst. We're hoping that some of the tech tapas served will make our colleagues thirsty to learn more.
On the menu board (all FREE or very low cost) Delicious: share you bookmarks, browse others by friend or topic Voicethread: interactive way to teach with images and audio Wallwisher: collect feedback Jing: capture whatever's on your screen Skype: use free audio and video conferencing Twitter: microblog (keepin' it concise) to learn, share, network Ning: network securely and share resources Google Docs: collaborate on all kinds of documents Bit.ly: shorten those long URLs Blogspot: blog from an easy-to-us template Animoto: create video from your images
"If you're doing a thing that you're passionate about, time takes a different turn entirely," said Sir Ken Robinson in his 2010 TED Talk. We'll begin our K-8 Fine Arts professional learning day with Robinson's talk, "Bring on the Learning Revolution!"
Robinson urges us to examine what we take for granted and to consider what we need to leave behind to teach and learn in a new century. He invites us to change our metaphor of education from an industrial model (one size for all) to an agricultural one (organic and adapting). He goes on to talk about customizing to our circumstances, quoting Lincoln: "Let us not rise to the occasion. Rather, let us rise with the occasion."
Rising with the occasion, our K-5 Fine Arts teachers began their 21C Skills conversation* on our September 1 professional learning day. We used the Skills Map for the Arts created by P21, Partnership for 21st Century Skills. We'll be joined September 24 by our middle school arts teachers as we continue our exploration.
As we gather again on Friday we will focus on two of Robinson's themes: sharing our talents and collaborating on lessons that customize to our circumstances.
We'll enjoy the morning with our teacher showcase—sharing our diversity of talent. On deck so far: Tim Kloth will debut his newly completed composition, Mark Messerly will play a piece from his Thursday night gig at Grammers, Jennifer Witsken will share her pattern designs for knitting, and Pam Hall will show her favorite jewelry creations.
Then we'll follow Robinson's second charge—to customize to our circumstances. We'll play, experiment, innovate, and adapt to redesign a current lesson plan or unit, customizing with two or more 21C Skills:
Critical Thinking and Problem Solving
Communication
Collaboration
Creativity
Innovation
Information Literacy
Media Literacy
Information, Communications, and Technology Literacy
Flexibility and Adaptability
Initiative and Self-Direction
Social and Cross-Cultural Skills
Productivity and Accountability
Leadership and Responsibility
We'll end the day collaborating and sharing our unit makeovers. Stay tuned for a showcase of lessons!
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*About 21C Skills and our September 1 Arts conversation, what's the word? See for yourself:
Amelia Middle School's 7th and 8th grade open house let parents meets their students' teachers and their classrooms' technology tools. Parents got a chance to sign in on interactive white boards and practice texting responses to teachers' questions. Classes across the district and across the country adapt to 21st Century teaching and learning. Take a look!
We are K-12 professionals passionate about learning together to teach students to thrive in the 21st Century. We form the Department of Teaching & Learning for West Clermont Schools, Cincinnati, OH. M.E. Steele-Pierce, PhD, is assistant superintendent for teaching & learning. Her areas of expertise are adult learning, implementation of school improvement plans, and instructional leadership. Cheryl Turner, MEd, is supervisor of instructional programs for K-5, ESL, and Title I. Her areas of expertise are early literacy, reading development, and brain-based learning. Tanny McGregor, MEd, is supervisor of instructional programs for 6-12 plus G/T, art and music. A national keynoter, she is author of Comprehension Connections (Heinemann 2007).
