I have decided to throw my hat into the Google ring and apply to the Google Teacher Academy (to be held in Sydney, Australia this May) for an opportunity to be part of their intensive, multi-day, professional development, tech event.  Applicants apply from all over the world for their chance to join this community of innovative educators.

Only 50 applicants will be selected.

google-certified-teacherEducators who participate in the Google Teacher Academy become Google Certified Teachers (GCTs).

The rigorous application process proved to be an excellent exercise in reflecting on my current professional practice.

As part of the application to the Google Teacher Academy, applicants conceive, create, and post a video addressing a pre-selected theme.  For my application I selected “Motivation and Learning”.  Below is my entry.

 

 

7 thoughts on “The Light Bulb Moment

  1. Shelley, your video entry is dynamite! Wonderful! What a courageous and exciting decision to apply to the Google Teacher Academy. Wishing you the best-keep us in the loop!

  2. http://ww3.tvo.org/special/tvo-road-learning-2030

    I spent part of my Sunday as a retired teacher watching Prof Fullan with Steve Pakin and some other leading lights in education in Ontario discussing schools in 2030. Of course it’s all about tech in learning and where everyone goes from here. What I found really curious is that Prof Fullan (also plugging his new book with words and pages, called “Stratosphere”) used the most traditional of education methods in his presentation: a lecture with a few slides. But the debate that followed was interesting and enlightening. Worth a look before you head off to Sydney, Shell, as most assuredly you will. Good luck with it all.

  3. Thanks for the link, Colin. A fascinating and rich discussion. Esp. Rutherford’s distinction between those who are “tech savvy” and those who are “tech enabled”.

    1. I think I am becoming increasingly redundant and unqualified in these discussions being neither tech savvy nor tech enabled. But there are three questions that Mike Fullan and the teaching profession might consider:
      1) Why are we so eager to accept results of “studies” in education that are funded by companies like Microsoft whose sole aim is to sell electronic devices?
      2) Why is “collaborative education” now equated with technology as if it never existed before?
      3) Is it wise, in the long term, to change education, and tell universities they must do the same, because students inform us they are bored (and is their boredom caused by or solved by their preoccupation with technology?)

      Okay, that’s four questions. But they won’t go away on their own. I wish I knew the answers to the first two.

    1. Domenica, I’m not wise just old, but thank you. The wise ones are the writers I taught to my students. I still admire the wisdom of Swift, Orwell, Bradbury and others who told us a long time ago that the masters of technology are also its slaves. I’m suspicious of adults who declare writers obsolete because they take too long to read. Anything worth knowing takes too long to read. More to the point: we didn’t all become teachers for the same reason. Ask yourself again why you did. If everything fits then you’re home free. If it doesn’t, question it, because it’s your life and your students’. I remember the fairy tale of the young boy who dared to announce that the Emperor wasn’t wearing any clothes. And I wonder if maybe the boy, like me, was short sighted. But the tailors made a hell of a lot of money off the Emperor’s purchase order without really caring what he looked like. And of course the whole event was a great diversion for the court.

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