#notatulearn15

Posted on October 8, 2015 by corney

The ULearn conference takes place annually and was this year hosted in Auckland. I attended ULearn 11 in Rotorua (for which I made a series of posts starting with this one ) but since it’s been difficult to attend with my basketball commitments always falling in the  October holidays. Similar to the GAFE summit this year (see previous post), I thought I’d again lurk on the social media channels. Always a great source of ideas and resources that you would not normally come across – this year I was not alone with even Twitter trending a hastag – #notatulearn15. Here’s some stuff I found useful:

  1. Agency and Ownership – An overview post from Cargill’s Classroom that includes a question grid that gives guidance on how students can improve their question.

This was taken from a presentation by @geomouldey.

Two slides focused on getting student feedback – Rose/Bud/Thorn & HAKRS

https://twitter.com/zacmills/status/651581744362188800

One slide had a continuum of ‘shared construction’ – this was the topic of a presentation I gave to staff earlier in the year and this provides a more detailed range than my one.

2. Breaking the Moulds – a quick 6 min video on how we seem to be in mould of education where the desire for constant improvement overrides the ability to be different.

3. Use of iPads with examples! – often you see app reviews of what you could do but this post has links to the actual products that students made.

4. Using Twitter for teachers – a useful, succinct resource on taking the leap into twitter.

5. Keynote by Grant Licthman – this keynote generate quite a bit of twitterness and re sharing of notes and resources (see this post for an example). One idea from him is that we should reject this notion of being a ‘guide on the side’ – teachers are right in the middle of the learning in a classroom. Here’s a summary of his view on 21C learning from a TEDx talk:

6. Most Likely to Succeed – this edu-documentary had it’s NZ premier at ULearn. Check out the trailer – would be worth a look.

7. Cool stuff  – Gotta love this production:

8. Maker – have been getting more into this in my teaching this year with making some bio-fuel powered steam boats and trying to teach electronics with students making something electronic (using a 3D printer). Link to CORE Educations list of resource. Some useful kits are Brainbox, Littlebits,

9. Kids write their teachers job description – would be interesting to see what would happen if we asked secondary school students.

10. Why guide to 21C learning – a great visual summary by ‘iPad’ Wells.

12. Failure – I’ve become more aware of the importance of failure in learning. The acronym – First Attempt At Learning.

13. Implementing Technology into learning – I’ve experience both ends of schools doing it well and doing it poorly. It is a current and constant challenge. Steve Wheeler has some good advice on developing a digital strategy and making sure that learning comes before technology. “Pedagogy is driver. Technology is the accelerator”

14. HPSS – since it started in 2014 with a Year 9 cohort, I’ve always been interested in this school to see if an Inquiry style learning programme can be upscaled for a whole school, rather than just one class of selected students like at TBC. This presentation gives a great overview of how they operate with thematic Learning Modules, have Learning Hubs with comprising of 15 students and one Learning coach, and make strong connections to a student’s interest and the community they live in.

Fourteen things has to be good value for a couple of hours on Twitter – and who says PD has to only happen at 8am on Tuesday mornings.

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