Seann Dikkers [Guest Blogger] In my first year of teaching a veteran leaned over during a particularly dry workshop and said blandly, “If you spend a whole day in these things and walk away with even one idea, it was worth the day… Today is not our day.” Cynical? Yes, but true. After 15 years...
Category: professional development
Connected Educator Month launches today
August 2012 is officially Connected Educator Month here in the U.S. Today is the first of the month and there are a variety of launch events occurring, including multiple keynotes, webinars, online chats, and panel discussions. My session today is titled Connected Education and Peer Professional Development. The people who are way smarter than me who...
Don’t waste your money on Common Core products and services
Don’t waste your precious dollars on the numerous Common Core products and services purport to help with your children’s college and career readiness. A better bet is on the people in your schools – spend the money on teachers and school leaders – excite them with opportunities and support for their innovation, inspire them with...
When it comes to educators and technology…
Part 1 … we have to answer the ‘why should we?’ before we answer the ‘how do we?’ Part 2 … if we’re struggling to meaningfully incorporate replicative technologies, what chance do we have of meaningfully incorporating transformative technologies?
Struggling with educators’ lack of technology fluency
It’s 2012. Technology suffuses everything around us. The Internet and Internet browsers have been pretty mainstream for at least a decade. And yet, I continually run into significant numbers of educators who still don’t know how to work their Internet browser. They struggle with copying and pasting. They get confused just clicking between 2 or...
EdCampIowa!
I am delighted to announce EdCampIowa, Iowa’s first cross-state unconference! EdCampIowa West will be hosted by Prairie Lakes AEA at the Buena Vista University Forum in Storm Lake. EdCampIowa East will be hosted by Bettendorf High School. Both locations will run on Saturday, February 16, from 8:30am to 3:30pm. Our hashtag will be #EdCampIowa. What’s...
Learning is the formation of connections
At its heart, connectivism is the thesis that knowledge is distributed across a network of connections, and therefore that learning consists of the ability to construct and traverse those networks. Knowledge, therefore, is not acquired, as though it were a thing. It is not transmitted, as though it were some type of communication. What we...
Learn about robust, technology-infused learning at the 2013 Iowa 1:1 Institute
It’s that time of year again… time to register for the 4th annual Iowa 1:1 Institute! The last two years of the Institute have averaged 1,200+ attendees. There are multiple reasons why the Institute is so successful. It’s a grass roots conference at which peers talk to peers. The focus is on learning and teaching, not...
When your workshop isn’t awesome
A few weeks ago my workshop should’ve been awesome. But it wasn’t. I thought it was going to be. I had three 90-minute sessions lined up – all of which I’ve done before – that I thought fit together quite nicely: Powerful technology, powerful students. The media focuses too much on students’ negative uses of technology...
For the purpose of
Here are a few session titles from some recent educational technology conferences: Google Apps in the classroom Free and easy screencasting tools Creating a classroom website using Weebly Edit video online for free with the YouTube editor Classroom blogging Google+ and Hangouts Minecraft in the classroom Video on the iPad Podcasting Let’s go for a...