ICT in Education conference 2015

The ICT in Education conference takes place on Saturday 25th April on the Thurles campus of LIT.  Our theme this year is “Make, Bake, Take” and we’re delighted to have a pre-conference Maker Meet on the Friday night.  It promises to be a fun 24 hours of learning, chatting and sharing 🙂

A call for presenters is currently open and will close on Tuesday 31st March.  Online registration is also open with a ‘bring a buddy’ reduced rate available to attendees this year.  As in previous years, the conference would be nothing without the teachers across the spectrum of education in Ireland who make the ‘Trip to Tipp’ to share great ideas, to learn from each other, to renew old friendships and make new ones.

So, if you have something good to share or if you want to come away with lots of ideas for your own classroom check out the conference website to submit a proposal to present or to register for the conference and Maker Meet.

Excited 2014

 

I enjoyed the Excited festival even though I didn’t get to see as much of it as I would have liked due to my commitments with the Youth Media Team.  What I did see impressed me though, as it seemed to be a genuine attempt to bring together many of the stakeholders in our education system – teachers, students, policy makers and industry.  It was heartening to see both teachers and students involved in a very real way across the two days of the event.  For me, the stars of the show were the BT Young Scientist former winners, Ciara Judge, Sophie Healy-Thow and Emer Hickey.  They reported back on Friday’s proceedings during Saturday’s event in a confident, articulate and kick ass way!

Photo from http://www.siliconrepublic.com

Of course, it was just my luck to be involved in a panel directly after their slot!  I was honoured to be included in a panel but, if I’m honest, I was frustrated at my input on the panel.  I find panels difficult to prepare for due to their diverse nature and it can sometimes be difficult to get in when you want to.  A perfect example of this was the topic of online safety and cyber bullying that was part of the discussion on my panel.  My tuppence worth on the topic is that this is not just an issue for schools.  Parents need to take responsibility for this crucial aspect of their child’s safety and we need to be careful as educators that we don’t allow parents to abdicate their responsibility here.  A tweet from a while back comes to mind!

As a parent myself, I take this aspect of my children’s safety very seriously and find it difficult to understand when others just seem to accept that they are completely out of the loop in this area of their children’s lives.  Schools aren’t expected to assume responsibility for children’s physical safety outside of school hours so I’m a bit baffled as to why they are expected to assume responsibility for their online safety.  I didn’t get a chance to say this on the day so I’m saying it now 🙂

 

Skyping with Commander Chris Hadfield

One of the teachers in my daughter’s school was lucky enough to organise a Skype call with the astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield.  She is currently completing her Masters and is researching the use of technology with her 2nd class students. They have been working on a cross curricular body of work centred around the topic of Space, the culmination of which was the Skype call with Chris. I was asked to come along on the day – thanks Leanne 🙂

1pm on the 9th of June was the appointed time and just before that I tweeted a picture of the girls waiting. When it was retweeted by the man himself I was more than a little chuffed 🙂

The next half an hour passed too quickly with the girls working in teams asking the questions they had already prepared. I loved their team names which included ‘Moon Stars’, ‘Space Buddies’ and ‘Sparkling Space Scientists’ among others. They asked fantastic questions too, ranging from Chris’s thoughts on lift-off through the availability of electricity in space, how they got rid of rubbish, his use of twitter and his preference for life on space vs earth. I loved the variety in the questions and the confident manner in which they were asked. But what I loved most about the call, was the thoughtful way in which Chris dealt with the girls. He was very careful to make sure he answered their questions thoroughly and to mention their team names throughout. I think there were a few starstruck adults (this one included!) in the room on the day not to mention the girls themselves.

ICT in Education conference 2014

The 10th ICT in Education conference took place on Saturday 10th May.  As in previous years CESI hosted a TeachMeet on the previous evening, and, as always, it provided attendees with a relaxing evening of catching up with old friends and new.  The sharing began on the Thurles campus and continued later in the Anner Hotel.  It was great to see new faces begin to share what is working for them in their classrooms.  All in all, a great kickstarter for the conference to come.

Saturday saw the busiest conference we’ve had with a vibrant exhibitor presence as well as an increased student presence.  LIT President, Maria Hinfelaar, welcomed attendees to the ‘Global Voices’ themed conference before handing over to Minister for Training and Skills, Ciaran Cannon.  We are very fortunate, to have a Junior Minister who is so interested and engaged in making progress in the integration of technology across all levels of our education system.  Next up was former Teacher of the Year, Evelyn O’Connor.  Evelyn’s heartfelt sharing of her experiences rang true for so many in the room.  Too often, people gloss over the difficulties when sharing their experiences.  It’s good to hear the a balanced view of the rough with the smooth to enable us to see the light at the end of the tunnel when it all seems to be going wrong!

Next came the experimental part of the day.  We decided, with some prompting from Conor Galvin and Bernie Goldbach, to try an open workshop format for a portion of the day.  This section was titled ‘The W@lk’ and our aim was to showcase some of the work that is going on in classrooms across the country allowing attendees to observe rather than participate.  We had six stations on the W@lk.

1. Bridge 21 – an education programme based in Trinity which can be adapted for use in secondary schools. The model is team based, technology mediated, project based and cross curricular.  On the day Kevin Sullivan worked with a group of local secondary school students to produce video clips on what students should learn in school and also a more frivolous clip 

   

2. MissionV – a creative, immersive games based learning environment for schools and industry.  On the day John Jennings and Esther Lambe provided attendees with an opportunity to try out the Oculus Rift as well as sharing the experience of Esther’s school while using Mission V.
3. CoderDojo Thurles – a free coding club for young people.  Jacqueline Humphries along with the team of mentors and Dojo ninjas showcased some of the projects the Dojo has been working on throughout the year including HMTL, App Development, electronics and so much more
4. Radio TY from St. Wolstan’s in Celbridge – a youth media team based on our own YMTfm.  Noeleen Leahy brought a group of students who shared their experiences of setting up a media team in a school.  They managed to squeeze in an interview or two along the way as well as take some selfies 🙂
5. Makey Makey workshop – Bianca Ní Ghrógáin assisted by Hassan Dabbagh led a workshop with some local primary school children in the use of the Makey Makey kit in conjunction with Scratch.
6. Project Spark – Stephen Howell from Microsoft demonstrated the Project Spark application

While the W@lk was a new departure for us, and there are definitely areas which need a little polishing, the initiative was very well received by both participants and attendees alike, with many commenting that it was a timely reminder placing students at the centre of what we as educators do.

In his own inimitable way Stephen Howell pulled many of the mornings strands together in his plenary session, before attendees got to choose from a wide variety of workshops led by educators across the levels.  The hum of conversation at lunch time was an indicator of the level of engagement and enthusiasm from the teachers who came from far and wide on a Saturday to keep themselves up to date on the use of technology in the classroom.

After lunch saw a continuation of the parallel workshops before the closing session with Julie Cullen and Helen Keegan.  Julie is the Young Advisor to Neelie Kroes, Vice President of the European Commission, and she shared her experiences of EU Code Week which saw Ireland punch far above our weight with the most events.  Helen Keegangave the closing presentation of the day, sharing her global collaborations which she undertook with her third level students.

The Youth Media Team returned to their ‘home’ conference after a hugely successful year and under the guidance of Joe Dale, Conor Galvin and Catherine Cronin they produced an eBook of the days’s proceedings.  We’re currently in the process of getting it published.

It was a jam packed day of sharing, chatting and being happy 🙂

 

 

 

CESI Conference 2014

It’s been more than 2 weeks since the 2014 CESI conference and it’s only now that I’m getting to reflect on the event.  Because of my involvement with the Youth Media Team on the day, I didn’t get to sit in on as many of the presentations as I would have liked.  Having said that, working with the team was great so it was worth the sacrifice.

After CESI Chair, Adrienne Webb, welcomed us all to Galway Minister Ciaran Cannon then delivered his opening address.  He reminded us that we need to educate our students for their future not our past and spoke of the way in which technology will facilitate global collaboration in the classrooms of the future.  This really resonated with me as ‘Global Voices’ is our theme for the 2014 ‘ICT in Education’ conference.  He then spoke about a Digital festival of Learning to be held in Dublin Castle on May 30th and 31st May.  I’m looking forward to hearing more about this event and to being involved with the Youth Media Team.  There was a bit of discussion on the backchannel on Twitter about the Minister’s reference to coding.  My thoughts on coding are well known.  I lecture in a technology department to computing students and I’ve been involved in CoderDojo for more than two years.  I do however agree that coding must have a context in an educational setting and that it’s not just about teaching coding but about another way of thinking.

The theme of this year’s conference was ‘Spark the Imagination’ and I think it’s fair to say that Dr. Daithí Ó Murchú did just that! One of the things I most enjoy about conferences like the CESI one is the mix of inspirational keynote addresses and practical workshops and presentations.  Daithí’s keynote was certainly inspirational.

He asked us to look to 2050

Daithí reminded us of the need to develop coping strategies.  He spoke of Continuous Partial Attention as opposed to Multitasking. His parting shot was to remind us of the need to take time out.  Turn the phone off, meditate …  This is something that becomes harder to do but which becomes more and more important  in this ever changing, connected world.

Next up were Dr. Michael Hallissy and Dr. Deirdre Butler who spoke about the National Digital Strategy and the future of education.  Unfortunately I missed this session but judging from the proliferation of tweets they provided attendees with plenty of food for thought.

The packed schedule of breakout sessions provided lots of variety for attendees, so much so, that the Youth Media Team found it difficult to find people who had time to give their thoughts on the event, for  much of the early part of the day!

The closing plenary sessions were a great way to round off what was a fantastic day, of sharing all that is good about technology in education across all levels.  James Corbett, from MissionV, combined the past and the future in his presentation using the Oculus Rift.  Stephen Howell, from Microsoft, then took us on a tour of Project Spark.  Dave even got the chance to have a play

Sending people home with their heads filled with inspiration, ideas and lots of practical ways to make changes in their classroom is what you hope for as an organiser of any conference.  I think the organisers of the CESI conference certainly fulfilled this remit.  All I can hope for, is that we can do the same for the attendees of the ICT in Education conference in Thurles in May!

The full transcript of tweets of the event can be found here.

 

TeachMeet CESI 2014

Last Friday saw me make my way to Galway for the annual CESI Conference.  The event was preceded by a TeachMeet (replacing the previously held CESIMeets).  There was lots of information shared on the night.  Here’s a flavour of the night from Twitter.

As you can see there were lots of great ideas shared at the TeachMeet.  To see the full twitter conversation and to access the links shared check out the transcript here.   Well done to Helen and John for facilitating a great night of sharing ideas.

Due to some technical difficulties on the night it was not possible for me to login to show Flickr.  Check out my Prezi on Flickr here.

BETT 2014

I’ve followed the BETT story of many #edchatie teachers on Twitter over the past few years jealously.  It never seemed to work out that I too could go – that is until this year.  Anyone who had previously been, extolled the virtues of going to BETT, and I wondered if it could possibly live up to the hype.  Having now seen it for myself, I can categorically state that it did! BETT runs over four days and I went for the last two – the Friday which included a TeachMeet and the Saturday.

I had done a little bit of preparation before making the trip but it was of the download the app and the material variety rather than actually engaging with what was available.  On the Thursday night I had a look at the talks and made a rough plan of what talks I wanted to see over the following few days.  I figured that from an exhibitor point of view I would just wait and see what caught my eye.  It turned out that I was completely unprepared for the wide variety of exhibitors that were at BETT.  There was something for everyone, but I have to admit that I found the sheer volume a bit overwhelming, particularly on the Friday.  As a result I made the decision to focus almost entirely on the talks.  There was plenty to choose from with more than 50 talks on Friday alone!

First up for me was Arvin Ross talking about Digital Storytelling.  Arvin gave a very engaging talk and shared his pick of the best apps to help with Storytelling

The Puppet Pals app also got a mention as a great app for Story telling.

Next choice for me was Ed Cooke talking about memory techniques and how they can be used to super power student learning.  What struck me was how Ed got us all to remember 20 seemingly unrelated objects by weaving them into a story.  Seeing how we remembered the items both backwards and forwards was a revelation.  The final surprise was revealed when Ed told us that the 20 objects were in fact elements from the Periodic Table (the balloon representing Helium etc.).  Check out memrise.com for more information.

At lunchtime I decided to go to the Flipped Learning session in the main arena.  The session was given by Aaron Sams and Jon Bergmann, co-founders of the Flipped Classroom.  I’ve been toying with the idea of introducing some aspects of flipped learning so it was great to hear about how others have made it work and what their students have gained from it.  One of my takeaways from this session, was that the Flipped Classroom does not dehumanise the classroom, but rather that it places the teacher even more at the centre of the class  as the focus has changed.  The very strong message was the importance of relationships in the classroom, a point that was reinforced in the drawings that were to be found on the outside of the BETT arena

After a quick bite to eat it was time to go to Doug Belshaw’s masterclass on improving digital literacy among staff and students.  What I loved about Doug’s talk was that it was more of a conversation starter than a masterclass as it prodded us to consider a broad range of literacies as opposed to a single one.

I particularly loved this  proverb

I know which is my preference – what’s yours?

My final session of the day was Sir Ranulph Fiennes’ talk – ‘Beyond the Limits’. It was billed as an Inspirational Keynote and boy did it deliver!  Hearing Sir Ranulph recount his tales of crossing both the Artic and the Antartic was active learning at it’s very best.  It’s great to get a chance to hear people of this calibre speak at events like this.  I love to hear people from outside the educational domain speak at educational events as they often have a different perspective which challenges up to think differently.  

By this stage it was time for me to do a talk of my own.  I had been asked to speak at the OCR stand about CoderDojo with Mags Amond.  I wasn’t sure how it was going to work as it wasn’t a scheduled talk – it was more a case of start talking and hope that people would stop and listen.  It turned out to be a more enjoyable experience than I had imagined – Mags and I worked well together and a good few people stopped and listened.

The rest of Friday was taken up with the TeachMeet which I’ve previously written about here and the TeachEat, an opportunity to chat and mingle and generally relax after a long, busy day.

First up on Saturday was ‘Learning Science with iPads’ with Ed Walsh.

I was very interested in the next session ‘Analytical and predictive primary math teaching in Finland.  Finland is often held up as an exemplar regarding education so I was curious as to what we might find out from this talk.   I was a bit taken aback to find that the same issues around Maths education are to be found there

We heard about the emphasis on autonomy and teacher training that are so central to the Finnish education system but also the issues around integrating ICT into the system

It’s good to get this viewpoint and to see that teachers in many different countries are dealing with similar issues to the ones we face in this country.

One of the last sessions I went to was the Stemettes Hackathon.  It was such an enjoyable session and reminded me a lot of CoderDojo.  I loved how Anne Marie led the hackathon and used the example of making a jam sandwich to demonstrate the concept of an algorithm with the girls who had come to work on developing websites in real time.

The future is safe with these kinds of initiatives …

And so we come to the last session of BETT2014 – ‘The Great Education Debate – can technology ever replace the classroom?’  We heard short presentations from the panelists : Tim Rylands who stole the show in my view, Anne Lise Kjaer, Maggie Philbin, Ian Bauckham and Simon Milner.  I learned a new term from Tim – the elsie as opposed to the selfie.

One of the ideas that was reinforced during the closing session was the importance of the teacher in the classroom while recognising the power of technology to hook students and to facilitate learning.  It’s good to see that the emphasis on technology in education is entirely about its integration into the classroom, as an aid to teaching and learning, and not about it’s use for it’s own sake.  Plenty of food for thought until next year …

 While I’ve focused in this post on the talks I attended, the most important aspect of attending conferences for me is the opportunity to chat to other educators.   I was fortunate to spend the weekend at BETT in the company of Helen, Bianca, Mags and Kathleen as well as many of the #edchatie folk who made the trip to BETT.  Chatting about what you are hearing and seeing helps to process all of the information that is being thrown in your direction.  I definitely get more from a conference when I get a chance to discuss it with others.  It’s also good to hear about the work going on in classrooms across Ireland and beyond … hearing Bianca talking about “her” kids and the amazing projects that they are working on, hearing Mags and Kathleen talk about the importance of the relationships they have with their students, hearing Helen talk about the success of the How I Learn book all serve to invigorate you in what you are doing in you own classroom.  It’s also amazing to get the chance to catch up with people like Steve Bunce, Doug Belshaw, Helen Keegan, Dughall McCormack, Joe Dale and so many more.  It’s only when you get a chance to reflect on the overall experience of BETT that you begin to realise just how much you get from attending!  I’m looking forward to BETT 2015 already 🙂

My 2013 in pictures

On New Years Day 2013 I took a notion that I would take a picture every day in 2013.  As a non photographer, I’m not sure where this notion came from, but I’m so glad that I decided to do it, and even more glad that I put it out on Twitter that I was going to do it.  By the end of the day I was part of a Flickr group of more than 50 people, all of whom were taking on the 1 picture a day challenge.  It was an eclectic mix of people spread across the globe.  Through the pictures uploaded by the members of the group we got a window into each others lives which I personally loved.  For me, being part of a group helped me to keep taking pictures every day and I’m delighted to have taken a picture every day during the year.  There was more than one occasion where I realised after 10pm that I had no picture taken for that day so I found myself taking pictures of some of the regular items around my house! Notwithstanding the poor quality of some of these pictures I’m happy to have a series of summary pictures which evoke some very happy memories of :

– a very sunny summer spent traipsing the country

– the conferences I attended, spoke at and organised during the year

– my interactions with CoderDojo during the year

– some of the beautiful sunrises and sunsets that have obviously happened in previous years but which I wasn’t really that aware of

– the trips to the movies and other places I went went to with my son, daughter and nieces and nephews

… and so much more.

I’ve already signed up for the 2014 1 picture a day challenge which I am really looking forward to 🙂

You can see a snapshot of my 2013 below or you can browse the individual pictures at my year in pictures page.

January Summary

February Summary

March Summary

April Summary

May Summary

June Summary

July Summary

August summary

September Summary

October Summary

November Summary

December Summary

Maths Fest 2013

Back in April I was asked to speak at the Irish Mathematics Teachers Association conference which was to take place on Saturday 12th October.  Before I had a chance to talk myself out of it I agreed.  After all it was six months away, I’d have plenty of time to gather my thoughts and it would all be fine in the end wouldn’t it?  Natalie Noone, the National Treasurer of the organisation and the conference organiser mentioned CoderDojo when she asked me to speak so I decided to tie in a few strands that have been blowing in the wind for the past while.  As some of you may know, I completed a Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) module earlier this year where we looked at Learning Theories.  I was very taken by Seymour Papert’s Constructionist Theory , which contends that learning happens most effectively when people construct personally meaningful artefacts.  This is something I see happening at CoderDojo as children and teens learn to code prompted by a desire to create games etc. of interest to them.  This is something I have been keen to bring to my own teaching so my final assessment for the TEL module saw me looking at Robocode, a programming environment which allows the coding of virtual tanks which can then do battle.  I decided to tie the three strands together in my MathsFest presentation.

Fast forward to Friday October 11th and I find myself at the pre-conference banquet, chatting to some of the other presenters, attendees and exhinitors.  It was a lovely, laid back evening, a perfect pre-cursor to the very busy day ahead.  Natalie and the rest of the team had put together a great programme with a a wide variety of topics and presenters – the only problem was only being able to choose one presentation in each slot!  I was lucky to have my slot on in the morning session as I was nervous about how it would go.  My presentation had come together in a way that I was happy with, but I couldn’t help but be nervous, as my first trip to MathsFest had me speaking there, so I wasn’t sure if I’d pitched it correctly.   In the first time slot I went between two sessions – Catherine Kierans Autograph demonstration and Dr. Maria Meehan’s talk on  research about promoting conceptual understanding in the Maths classroom.  Catherine’s session was very hands on and practical and Maria’s session provided plenty of food for thought.  I particularly loved the idea of ‘convince yourself, convince a friend, convince an enemy’.  Next up was my session on ‘Coderdojo, Constructionism and Maths’.  My presentation can be found here.   Next up for me was Dr. Ailish Hannigan’s session on mathematical thinking vs. statistical thinking.   It’s interesting that traditionally strong maths students may struggle with statistical thinking and vice versa.  I’ve often seen this as students who may struggle in other areas of Maths have a keen intuition when it comes to Statistics.  The other takeaway from Ailish’s talk was the importance of getting students to collect their own data.

Next up was lunch and it was lovely to catch up with Paudie Scanlon (the driving force behind the Irish Maths Teachers Google+ community).   After lunch I found myself in James Grime’s talk on Alan Turing and the Enigma Machine.  As we started to look at some of the most basic cipher systems, I was transported back more than a  few years as my undergrad final year thesis was on the subject of the Playfair Cipher system.  James’s entertaining talk has rekindled a latent interest that I’m looking forward to developing.

The Enigma Machine at Maths Fest

The next session found me in Audrey Byrne’s talk on Digital Literacies.  Her research on the topic with 15-17 year olds offered many insights which again illustrates the point that

image credit: http://teaching.monster.com/benefits/articles/8742-powerful-quotes-for-teachers-printer-friendly-version

The really key point of Audrey’s talk was the need to listen to what students have to say, as opposed to thinking we know what they want and what works for them.

The final session of a busy day can be hard to present at but I have to say that Dr. Julie O’Donovan’s ‘Tale about functions’ was the perfect end to what was a very enjoyable day.  I loved the fact that we were greeted with the question

on entering the room.  It was refreshing to see functions front an centre like that 🙂

I wondered about how much there would be from me at a conference aimed at second level Maths teachers but I needn’t have worried.  There was plenty of food for thought for anyone involved in teaching Maths, regardless of the level.  Well done to Natalie Noone, the dynamo behind MathsFest, and her team.  I’m already looking forward to MathsFest 2014 🙂

Check out some of the tweets from Mathsfest here.   I’m hoping that there will be more tweeting Maths teachers at MathsFest 2014.

Personal Learning Networks and Organisations

Week 3 in the Exploring Personal Learning Networks seminar has us looking at PLNs and Organisations.  In some ways it’s dto ifficult to see where the overlap comes between the two.  PLNs by their very nature are personal.  They evolve and grow as a result of the interests and passion of the person involved so I’m struggling with how they fit with organisations.  There is however no denying, that organisations can and do benefit from the very strong PLNs of their employees.   My major concern is that, as so often happens, trying to fix something that isn’t broken can lead to smashing the very thing you valued.

Over the last few weeks of the seminar many of the participants have been grappling with defining PLNs and after a fashion we have come up with our definitions but they’re personal to each of us.  This makes it very difficult for an organisation to ‘adopt’ PLNs in my opinion.  For each persons  definition of a PLN, there is also a set of tools which helps them to connect with those in their PLN.  This can involve entirely virtual connections to entirely ‘in-person’ and everything in between!  I think it’s fair to say that for most people it’s probably a mix of the two especially in this connected world we now live in.  I know it is for me.

The biggest challenge for organisations as they look at adopting PLNs, is that there are so many ways for people to connect, that it can be difficult to be supportive without being specific about the tools which people could or should use and the manner in which they could and should connect.  What works for one person will not work for another when it comes to their PLN.  If we look at four of the many tools which can be used to facilitate connections: Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn.  For me personally, Twitter is my go to place.  I love the brevity of the 140 character message as it forces people to really focus on their key message.  I also love the open nature of Twitter, as, for the most part, you can dive into a conversation without even following those involved in the conversation.  Yet for others, Twitter is their worst nightmare!  I don’t see Facebook as part of my PLN for the most part.  I have an account but keep it mostly for personal use with most of my contacts on Facebook personally known to me.  Yet for others, Facebook is where most of their connections are fostered.  Google+ hasn’t lit the same fire in me as Twitter as a means of connecting with others.  I find the lack of brevity more overwhelming and find that I have to work harder to find the information of interest to me.  This has been helped with the Communities option but I worry that this is narrowing the focus as mentioned in my previous post. Yet, for a growing number of people Google+ is becoming their go to place for connecting.  Finally LinkedIn for me is just somewhere to have my digital CV of sorts but I haven’t leveraged the power of the discussions and so many other aspects of this networking application that so many others seem to use to their advantage.  What I am hoping to illustrate is that when it comes to PLN’s

So maybe the challenge for organisations is more to do with supporting the many different ways to connect rather than adopting PLNs …..

image credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/birgerking/4731898939/