IEF Day 3 - Post-Reflection
And so the good times end.
IEF has been, without a doubt, one of the best experiences I've ever had. I'm not particularly prone to hyperbole, but I am struggling to think of any experience I've had as an educator that comes anywhere close to how inspiring and wonderful this experience has been. To phrase it shortly, if I wasn't already positive being a teacher was the right thing for me, I'd have gotten all the affirmation I needed these past three days.
The core lesson I learned -- my big take away to share -- is that there are teachers out there that on a daily basis buck the common and scary trends we see in education and are openly embracing innovative ideas and diverse methods of collaboration. They face a spooky combination of accolades from their districts as well as fear because they bring in the unknown and challenge the majority. Some have been acknowledge by their great work by the people around them daily, while others had to get recognition from perfect strangers before those closest to them thought to care about the changes they inspire in their students. Many entered as strangers, but will leave as friends and life-long collaborators with educators around the world. Best of all, they all came loving being teachers and they left here loving the job even more.
Microsoft did a fantastic job putting this on. There weren't any sales pitches, no gimmicks, no forced product placements. They brought people together to let us know we were doing a great job and to keep it up, no matter what happens. For that, I thank them.
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Okay, on to business. Today was a very interesting day. Jane McGonigal ("Reality is Broken") did a fantastic presentation on the positive impacts of gaming on education. I recorded her presentation and hope to post it here and on YouTube later, depending on how the edits turned out. I sucked it up and asked her a question about applying MMO-type tools to education systems, admitting to the audience that yes, I was a gamer, and yes I do play WoW. Her follow-up question to me? What job/character did I play and what level my character was at. A Ph.D educator and game designer, asking me about my character? Needless to say, it elicited some interesting audience responses. By the way, her recommendation was using wikis to build collaborative knowledge communities in our classrooms and beyond and I agree whole heartedly.
Thus, my geek status fully reveled to my fellow educators (who am I kidding? Like they couldn't tell?), I went to the fancy gala dressed thusly:
Not only was I comfortable, but heavily complimented for my sense of humor.
I had a chance to go to the Global TeachMeet and mentioned it in an earlier post. This was a fantastic opportunity to meet teachers from around the world as they shared different lessons and tools they use with their students. Here's a list of the countries represented:
Vietnam
Hong Kong
Cyprus
Hungary
France
UK
Australia
Croatia
Pakistan
Mauritius, Africa
Serbia
India (Calcutta and New Delhi)
Austria
Kenya
Argentina
Thailand
Belgium
Lithuania
Portugal
Dubai
Germany
South Africa and Free State, South Africa
Morocco
Sri Lanka
Spain
Brazil
Azerbaijan
Estonia
Mexico
I had some fascinating conversations with several of them and have already set up connections for next year to collaborate on PBL and English projects. There were so many interesting tools and projects shared that it's hard to note them all, so I'm just posting a copy of my notes. The bullets didn't turn out well, so look for the country names that divide each section. One I do want to mention is iEARN.org, an international network for Project Based Learning schools. Over 100 countries, around 40,000 students, and all of them are PBL. They are looking for contributors, so if you do PBL and want to share your work, find an audience, or make a connection, check them out.
As far as other experiences, I've been introduced to people who want me to join other PD programs around the country, including MERIT, people who want to collaborate on new projects, and a few that might help me facilitate a local TEDx event. There was a competition and of the 9 winners announced so far, I am not one, but that wasn't my intention for going so it's no big loss. One more winner has yet to be announced so I'm still in the running to go to DC for the Global IEF, but this experience was never for the competition for me. I'm already eagerly anticipating next year and look forward to cajoling some colleagues into joining me.
To everyone I met these past few days, educators and Microsoft folk alike, it was a privilege and a pleasure and I hope to hear from you all as the year continues.
