Another holiday, another trip up to Auckland to attend a conference.
This time around it was Google Apps For Education (GAFE).
Conferences have a two-fold purpose for me. The first is obviously to hear new ideas but the more important one is to renew links with all the teachers I interact with on a regular basis on twitter and also to connect with new people. GAFE definitely ticked both of those boxes however it would have been fantastic to have the event last longer than a day.
I hope that GAFE returns to New Zealand and will definitely be looking to apply to any Google Teacher Academy that comes close to New Zealand.
In the spirit of GAFE, I’m determined that my day at ASHS isn’t just a talk-fest but actually leads to some concrete actions.
So where to from here?
- Do a series of 1 minute ‘what’s going on in your classroom?’ video. Review with my tutor teacher to look for improvements in teaching practice. Post reflections to my blog for input from a wider audience.
- Contribute to the digital citizenship project.
- Institute a daily google challenge to improve my class’s digital literacy (thanks Wendy Gorton for the book, I also plan to write some questions relevant to my New Zealand context).
- Design an app for my class to communicate more effectively with my parents/students. Students and parents to have input into key functions.
- Use google maps to develop a virtual tour for incoming year 7s for next year.
- Hold an end-of-term ‘innovation day’ based on the principles behind google’s 20% time.
Term 4 looks to be a frantic one at just 9 weeks with camp in week 2 and my school undergoing a major refurbishment so perhaps this list is a bit optimistic and ‘go with the flow’ will definitely be my mantra but so too will ‘follow your passion.’
In the spirit of action, I am going to be of blatant self-promotion. The ‘learning to make a difference‘ project is in the finals for the New Zealand Interface magazine awards in the ‘best teaching with ICT’ category. I would appreciate your support by voting for the project here.
How do you implement ideas from conference into your teaching?
Do you engage with conference organisers about the effectiveness of the ideas you’ve picked up at a conference?
Teaching the Teacher 
One of the things that you have a huge advantage over is that you have a forward thinking school where you can use some of the practical tasks that you have been exposed to and use them positively… I can give you a negative example of that, I have tried to have a group of teachers this year do their meetings on Google docs and one is refusing. Another has lost their password three or four times and the final nail in the coffin is that getting a reliable internet connection to run the meetings is nearly impossible due to network issues….
It will be great to document the journey that you’ve been on with that and as you progress follow it. As for the Interface Awards, you are a deserved finalists and hopefully you will get the recognition that you deserve, having said that, public vote will depend a lot on the general public and whose got the most mates, so it will be interesting to see how that goes.
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Thanks so much for your comment. I do feel very lucky to have a school that lets me run with crazy ideas provided I can justify them!
Stephanie
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Stephanie
Methinks you can drum up mates to vote for you! I have!
Following on from NZWaiakto I have to say that sounds a hard row to hoe! I guess I find the fact resistance still exists hard to fathom.
Gafe conference sounds great and so does your plan for the term. Like you I know there is heaps to accomplish, but I still go for what sparks passion. I could never stay in teaching if I wasn’t trying something different – which is odd because basically I am a pretty routine kind of person.
Have a great camp.
Kathryn
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Hi Kathryn
Indeed this post was a plug for the entry! GAFE was fabulous and I would thoroughly recommend it to one and all. I hope I am always changing.
Stephanie
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