Power , Passion and ICT

Power, passion,promise and practice of learning through ICT 

It seems like a long time since I last wrote a blog that I have almost lost the habit!

My only excuse is that I have been busy working and have been away from my computer for two weeks. For the first week I was working with a secondary school trying to help them develop ideas to improve student learning and in the process make teaching more fun. I haven’t worked much in secondary schools so it was, and will continue to be, a real challenge; and one that will take time to realize. Changing the culture of a primary school is difficult enough but secondary schools are another thing. Secondary schools have structures and timetables that make developing shared ideas difficult – and, if there a number of students who seem to have lost the ‘learning habit’ which is the case where I have been working, more so!

It has been a learning curve for me! 'We' are working on a plan that provides short term non threatening changes while at the same time keeping a long term transformational vision in mind. Our latest newsletter on site explains this in greater detail.

That was the first week. The second week saw me presenting at the Ulearn05 Conference ‘Power, Passion, Promise and Practice of learning through ICT' held at Sky City Convention Centre in Auckland. Over 700 teachers attended!

This was an exciting learning experience for me and a great chance to catch up with exciting developments happening in education. Those of you who know me will wonder why on earth I was invited to present being a digital illiterate (so was I) but, as it turned out, the focus was on learning. ICT, it was pointed out, is just a learning tool; but powerful learning tool. In one of my sessions I talked about the need to develop a school vision based on shared learning beliefs and in another talked about such beliefs in greater depth. These ideas are on our site.

More importantly for me I had wonderful chance to attend keynotes and workshops to learn about what creative teachers were doing in their classrooms.

A couple of sites you might like to explore are Ian Juke’s site and Stephen Heppells. Stephen’s site takes you into some exciting UK schools. Both amazing individuals. See if you can find your way to the 'Committed Sardine' blog on Ian's site and join up!

I took the chance to attend two workshops on the exciting developments happening at Alfriston one of New Zealand’s brand new secondary schools. I thought it would give me some insight about secondary school education and I wasn’t wrong. Very exciting indeed.I will add their site when I find it!

With scores of workshops to choose from each day everyone will have their own highlights! There was plenty to be inspired about!

The strands that ran through the conference were:

1. The power to challenge existing beliefs, expectations and professional practices.
2. The passion to turn schools into inclusive learning communities.
3. The promise to use relevant learning data to make sound professional decisions.
4. The practice of integrating ICT into effective teaching.

Worked for me!