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After spending a day with Cohort 21 at the MaRS Discovery District in Toronto, I am inspired by the action plans currently underway in our CIS Ontario schools. As a special guest at this F2F session, I was inspired by the innovative and meaningful work being done across the province by teachers and administrators committed to creating authentic and relevant learning experiences for their students. Good things are happening in our classrooms and MaRS Discovery District provided an ideal venue for creative collaboration and discussion about the convergence of technology and education and its impact on curriculum and pedagogy. Tech startups met with the Cohort to shop ideas and pitch their products in informal presentations. Developers and teachers swapped stories and refined and retooled ideas.
As always, Cohort 21 was rich with resources and connections and we left with a number of useful ‘loot bag’ takeaways from the day. Thanks to Cohort 21 facilitators Justin Medved and Garth Nichols for the invitation to participate in this rich PD.
A sampling from the ‘loot bag’:
1. A new Modern Taxonomy Wheel from Allan Carrington combines Ruben Puentudura’s SAMR model and Bloom’s digital Taxonomy to help teachers leverage technology in teaching and learning.
2. New ed tech startup WorldVuze creates a sleek and simple tool to connect classrooms from around the globe through an online platform to discuss events and make meaningful connections. There are infinite applications for inquiry-based learning as well as for teaching context in IB curriculum.
3. Create interactive images with thinglink.com and redefine science dissections. Checkout Tim Rollwagen’s post about its application in his classroom.
Shelley, it was so great to have you there at the F2F, and it is clear that you valued the time and space to think, breathe and dedicate brain power to such great ideas and thinking.
I want to get you more involved in Cohort 21…would you be interested in taking part in another Google Hangout in, say, early April?
Great post!
garth.
Shelley – I am thrilled to hear that you were part of this explosive day of creative collaboration and discussion. I so appreciate your acknowledgement of the “meaningful” work being done in our schools; I couldn’t agree with you more.
I echo Garth when I say please continue to be an active Cohort21 alum. Your insight of technology use in curriculum coupled with your knowledge of the culture and potential in our schools is invaluable!
Jan
Hi Jan. Thanks for your comments. It was an electric day and Garth and Justin are to be commended for their efforts. I was happy to share in the day. Infinite possibilities for innovation abound with Cohort 21.
You bet, Garth. Count me in.
And, thanks again for the invite last week. Congrats on a fabulous F2F.
Cohort 21 is thriving!
So nice to see you and have you share in the day. We need more keen and experienced Cohort-alumni like you to share their thinking and observations!
Shelley – since hearing about Worldvuze from you during our PD session in August, I did some more research, and recently registered to become a member of the online community. I’m looking forward to building the Worldvuze platform into my various units, and I’m eager to see how it impacts student learning!
Thank you for sharing!
Happy to hear that it’s working out, Allison. Please keep me posted on how things progress. I’d love to see your class in action.