Celebration of Teaching & Learning -Day 2 Notes

Celebration of Teaching and Learning

Day Two

March 17, 2012

The Celebration of Teaching and Learning (#CTL2012, http://thirteencelebration.org/) took place at the New York Hilton in Manhattan. This two day conference occurred during the weekend of St. Patrick's Day. In a time when teachers and education are being spoken of frequently and many times negatively, it was interesting seeing how many dedicated professionals would give of their time to attend such a conference. As always the sessions were diverse and informative. I will attempt to share my notes from the weekend. There is no way to capture the true nature of the event if you weren't in attendance. But hopefully some of what I learned can be passed on to others.

Here are some of my notes from the second day:

First Session Attended:

Unlocking the Key Tools for the 21st Century

8:30 am

Apple itunesU ny now free

Contest harvard encyclopedia of life

Training for google available through NY Teacher Centers

Intel Teach: Professional Development you can take or deliver

http://www.intel.com/education/teachers/

• teach elements
• self paced modules
• get CDs of the instruction instead of online
• Register as trainer and a kit will come out for facilitated model
• Project based approaches available
• Offered via nyscate in facilitated model
• collaboration in a digital classroom module
• good pregoogle tool
• thinking critically with data module
• common core APPR alignment
• http://intelgrad.nyit.edu/
• free teaching tools for 21stobservation century teaching
• give students an id and password
• setup groups by teacher
• showing evidence tool elementary version
• intel help guide
• asessing projects
• engage community and share idea to be entered in kindle fire raffle
• http://www.nyit.edu/

Plenary Session:

10:30 am

WNET has an education deptartment

• free PBSLearningMedia.org, http://www.pbslearningmedia.org/
• video multimedia
• Mission Us - middle school history game
• Mission 2 - undergroundrailroad
• http://www.mission-us.org/
• http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/
• Michael Mulcrew uft, http://www.uft.org/news/teacher/top/mulgrew_elected_uft_president/
• Henry Winkler, I Can't seem to find a website regarding his being an author other than Amazon, but his bio is on http://thirteencelebration.org/blog/bios/michael-sandel/2862/
• 29 books written
• We talk about children but do little because they don't vote.
• Shocked we don't light incense to educators.
• Forced to teach same amount to child that gets it fast or slow.
• He stated that what we do is Herculean. In a time of negative comments on the rise directed towards educators this was uplifting and refreshing.
• If politicians spent the time and energy they spend on Women's Health issues on Education things would be very different in education.
• Slicing and dicing with words can leave a child left with scars that remain forever
• A certificate of appreciation for advocacy in children's literacy was awarded to Mr. Winkler.
• Michael Sandel
• http://justiceharvard.org
• Offering civic education broadly received
• Questioning perspectives and challenging ideas with justice education.
• Substantive discord

Celebration of Teaching and Learning

Celebration of Teaching and Learning

Day One

March 16, 2012

The Celebration of Teaching and Learning (#CTL2012, http://thirteencelebration.org/) took place at the New York Hilton in Manhattan. This two day conference occurred during the weekend of St. Patrick's Day. In a time when teachers and education are being spoken of frequently and many times negatively, it was interesting seeing how many dedicated professionals would give of their time to attend such a conference. As always the sessions were diverse and informative. I will attempt to share my notes from the weekend. There is no way to capture the true nature of the event if you weren't in attendance. But hopefully some of what I learned can be passed on to others.

Here are some of my notes:

First Session Attended:

• Common Core standards put good teaching in our heads uniformally
• Frederick Brown and Victoria Duff presented, http://thirteencelebration.org/blog/bios/panel-becoming-a-learning-school/2899/
• There should be protocols for professional learning
• Team based professional learning was discussed
• School should foster engaged learning tied to assessments
• Sharing expertise throughout the school
• Create a culture that collaborative learning is expected to take place
• Create community to leaders
• Can change behavior before changing thought and beliefs and attitudes
• Not just the leader alone but a leader is key
• Shared values and beliefs
• Innovation configuration map
• Behaviors that lead to success.
• Ideal to unacceptable...continuum
• Continuous improvement
• Collective responsibility
• http://www.learningforward.org/learningBlog/post.cfm/great-teaching-requires-great-leadership

Plenary Session:

http://thirteencelebration.org/blog/bios/opening-plenary/2857/

• Find and focus on “moments of inspiration and creativity”
• 20 countries attended
• John King, Commissioner of Education spoke
• Transformative power of classrooms
• http://engageny.org
• Professional Development video series on the Common Core available
• Write with evidence
• Metlife teacher survey was discussed
• http://metlife.com/teachersurvey to read the study regarding the survey
• Sal Kahn from the Kahn Academy shared his story
• http://www.khanacademy.org/
• The Kahn Academy is a nonprofit making educational videos available at no cost to students
• Engage students when they are ready for it
• But contain the virtual/live human connection
• I wonder if we can pull Kahn Academy videos into our google cloud?
• 5th gr teaching assistants (give students responsibility)
• Analogy shared: 80% foundation ..passed...80% first floor...passed...etc. By the time you reach the 8th floor construction quality will be down and perhaps whole building will fall
• Jim Steyer from Common Sense Media discussed the Common Sense Media Survey
• Schools are deeply uninvested in...We need to change...children should not be at bottom of totem poll just because they don't vote or pay taxes
• Everything is educational good or bad
• Fundamental social and emotional learning
• commonsense media survey
• “App gap”...less than 10% underprivileged download apps at home
• Commonsense digital citizen curriculum available
• http://www.commonsensemedia.org/about-us/news/press-releases/common-sense-media-launches-national-campaign-help-kids-%E2%80%9Cstand-not-stan
• Jim Steyer read A prayer for students... I think this one may have been it:http://jimkane.wordpress.com/2011/11/09/a-prayer-for-students-hump-day-prayer-for-11911/. It was rather moving talking about the weaker student and the promising student and was inspiring to help us all keep moving forward in our endeavor to educate today's youth and impact tomorrow's future.

Second Session Attended:

Tali Horowitz and Carla Espana presented on behalf of Common Sense Media

• SESSION TITLE: Digital Citizenship for K-12: Connecting Students, Teachers, and Parents
• A sample activity was shared. A digital image of a cheese counter...analogy drawn: favorites, try a new one, get sick from taking in too much... Then the question was posed what is your Digital life like?
• Some one shared their simile...fitness center...tools but chose a few...feel good after using
• 7.5 billon under age children on Facebook
• The book Thinking Fast and Slow was mentioned, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/books/review/thinking-fast-and-slow-by-daniel-kahneman-book-review.html?pagewanted=all
• Spring break is changing. Students don't want it showing up online...behavior changing according to NY Times
• Dana Boyd...youth media use
• digital footprints...create positive digital footprint
• Common Sense Media Toolkit is aligned to NET-S and Common Core Standards
• Rings of responsibility should be discussed with students
• Ponder with students – What do I want my digital footprint in 10yrs to reflect? What do I need do now to reach that goal?
• Rreal student vignettes included in toolkit
• tip sheets are bilingual

Third Session Attended:

• SESSION TITLE: Teacher Leadership is Key!
• Presenters:
  Julie Torres, NBPTS, Dr. Linda Wood, NBPTS, Dr. Eric Wood, NBPTS, Holly Gamble, NBCT, and Kevin Mixon, NBCT
• Video of Julie Torres from Arizona was shown
• Who will be leading?
• walk the walk...go through project yourself
• Teachers need to feel empowered to lead
• Mitchell20 project/film
• Teachers are at bottom of power pyramid
• relationships from teachers to central admin
• Impact policy....conversation to decisions
• Policy for our room
• *personal technology policy*
• shout it from the rooftops...What positive message do you wish your colleagues would hear?
• Stuck in traffic...How do we exit?...change around the standards
• Support to perform
• “It is educational malpractice to have ineffective teachers in the classroom”
• What 3 things will u try this week?...month?
• Stages in education: fantasy...frustration...master...impact teaching

Idea sparked from the conference:

• Embrace commonsense.org in New Rochelle... Former home of Thomas Paine author of Common Sense.