It is hard for me to believe that most of the cohorts in this fellowship have only spent a single week together. Friendships were formed and bonds created among the members of this truly amazing group! Over the course of the week, we spent the time talking, learning, experiencing and laughing together. While each of the cohorts is involved in their own internship and come from different backgrounds/schools, each member of our program seemed to instantly connect with one another. And for me, having already been with Team Nano for a week made it easier to feel comfortable around the new people I met at this first of three professional advancement institute.
Kenan Fellowship Cohorts
And, of course, it would be remiss of me not to mention the time we spent rafting together on Wednesday. What a great experience we all had on the Nantahala River! Talk about bonding time! Paddling along in small groups, we laughed and worked alongside one another with the common goal of surviving the rapids and making it to the end of the river, finishing the trip mostly dry. Our guide made sure we enjoyed ourselves, experienced new things along the way and learned about life on the river as we navigated the rocks and spun our rafts around in circles. We made a couple of stops along the way, grabbing a bite for lunch and listening to our chief guide explain the different plants that grow in this flourishing environment. For the more adventurous, we had a little fun jumping into the freezing cold water by running across several strewn together rafts that were flipped over to create what is known as a “troll” bridge.
Cohorts preparing to learn about how to raft safely
My group heading into the class III rapid at the end of the trip
Of course this week wasn’t all about making personal connections with other cohorts and play. We heard from a variety of speakers during concurrent sessions, where we could select from several options. The presentations I attended included:
- Using Project Management to Teach Long-Term Planning Skills by Paul Cancellieri
- Increasing Relevance and Engagement to Solve Classroom Management Problems by Justin Osterstrom
- Student Infographics: Teaching Metacognition Through Student-Created Visuals by Paul Cancellieri
- Capture Useful Student Data by Paul Cancellieri
- Increasing Student Engagement and Developing Problem Solving Skills through the Implementation of STEM Focused Instruction by Justin Osterstrom
- Over Time and Space: Visualizing Data & Documents for Inquiry-Based Learning by Andy Mink
Each of these sessions was great in their own way. The information in them was masterfully presented and I walked away from each with resources I plan to implement with my classes in the future. Some of these resources include:
- Trello – for managing and chunking up larger projects into more manageable components
- Various template sites for creating infographics – to use as layout references and examples as I have my students create their own infographics using Photoshop
- ChronoZoom – where students can make digital timelines with links to supporting information
The talks on increasing relevance and capturing student data presented intersecting perspectives on the importance of how I can relate what I know about my students and communicate better with and about them. While I have heard speakers in the past proclaim the importance of data collection, none made as much sense or illustrated how to accomplish this important task as well as Paul Cancellieri in his talk on capturing data. Paul broke data literacy down into four key components: demographics, student perception, process and student learning. Each of these play an important role in understanding your students and what works for them in learning the curriculum you share.
However, despite all of the great information I received from each of these sessions, the session I pulled the most from was the edcamp experience. Having attended conferences outside of education, I already knew the importance of the Rule of 2: if you are not getting what you need from a speaker or their session, get up and move. But, as I sat in the first edcamp option I selected, a session discussing differentiation, I had one of those a-ha moments.
For years, I have noticed that my lectures can be, well…a little, shall we say, dry and VERY boring. My students hate lecture days, as do I. I have wanted to change that for years but never really had a good idea on how to do so. I mean come on, lecturing is not thrilling: it involves standing in front of the class and basically regurgitating knowledge of facts and/or techniques that we already know about as teachers in order to introduce our students to something new:
[youtube https://youtu.be/uhiCFdWeQfA]
But between being inspired by how the excellent presenters at the PA institute shared their knowledge and learning about several tools, I think I can make this mundane task more exciting and useful for my students in the future.
First, I learned it is important to make some kind of a personal connection with the material before even starting to share the knowledge I possess. I need to get my students invested and drawn into what they are going to learn about before giving a single fact. Many thanks to Andy Mink for expertly illustrating this technique as he drew his audience in with personal stories prior to focusing on the tools for creating timelines. This creates personal investment in learning what is about to be explained and adds relevance for students.
Besides personal relevance, I don’t want my students sitting in the room like those who were listening to the economics teacher in the clip from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off above. Instead of lecturing from the front of the room from now on, I plan to sit among my students and keep them involved in the discussion. This won’t be easy in a classroom where the desks are built into the floor and unmovable, but where there is a will, I will find a way!
A number of presenters used a variety of techniques to keep the audience involved in their talks. During the edcamp session, this involved a shared Google document that each member of the audience could use for notes and sharing comments simultaneously. This gives the audience a sense of responsibility to continuously pay attention and become actively involved in the discussion. It also provides the students with a take-away of notes to use at a later time for studying. By grabbing these techniques, I believe I will be able to move away from how I would put a room to sleep in moments to becoming a much more engaging teacher!
All around, this professional advancement was an incredible experience! I can say with certainty that it was the best professional development I have attended to date in my career as a teacher. I am already looking forward to seeing everyone again for the reamining professional advancement institutes in July and October, as well as at the Durham Bulls ballgame!