ECIS Tech Conference Munich 2015 - Sessions

Here is a brief synopsis of what I found useful from some of the sessions:

Apps:

Doodle cast pro - Alternative to explain everything

Adobe Voice

Pic Collage

Voice thread

Croak.it

Vine

Skitch

Blogging by Tricia Friedman @FriedEnglish101

Excellent validations on why blogging has a place in the classroom. Have students to plan out what they would like to blog, could be in the form of mindmap ideas or digital drawings. Start with the name of the blog, the main question of the blog and if possible ask them to draw out the main question to make it visible.

Another good suggestion by Patricia was to bring the mentors and professionals to the students to get on the spot professional advice. Also to encourage the culture of Quad blogging and to teach kids how to comment on articles and blogs.

Google Educator and Google Education trainer: Apps Events

This session was very useful as it gave an in depth insight into the difference between a Google Educator and Google Education trainer. It is something that I have been very interested in and wanted to complete for some time now as we use Google apps at my school. I have set a target to myself to be certified as a Google Educator by August. I am also interested in doing one of the training sessions held by Apps Events in the use of Google Apps.  

Thinking more deeply about Technology Integration in the IB: @pilarqibo

I was very interested in this discussion as we have just embarked on managebac and all the teachers are in the process of rewriting the curriculum across all grades. After discussions with our MYP and IB coordinator this is going to be my focus next year at my school. It was interesting looking at the guidelines for tech integration when planning a unit of work. More information and training needs to come out from the IB to have these guidelines imbedded when planning a unit of work.

Slam Sessions: Cool ideas for everyone to know and try out

• Using Quicktime player to project or mirror from an iPhone
• Google Keep on the laptops has more features enabled
• Addon in Google sheets for Mail merge
• writenowbooks.org - is like a youtube for books
• slidescarnival.com - templates for google slides
• Horizn App - excellent to film on the iPhone as it takes out the black line spaces at the side when filming
• Google drawings - To create hyperlinks to various documents when doing a project
• Appear.in - to use like skype without the need to have to log in
• Video Notes - Addon to drive. Allows you to take notes while watching a video and saves directly to drive
• Quiet Tube - Video appears without all the videos and ads at the sides. Especially useful when teaching different kinds of learners

ECIS Tech Conference Munich 2015 - Keynote Speech

The last couple of months have been manic with planning for new units in the MYP, reporting, observations for Stronge standards, my ADE application, training for my Google and MOS exams coupled with our IT department not sorting out issues for staff; it just felt like I was getting nowhere. The ECIS conference was just what I needed - motivation and to take things into perspective of where we are as a school and what needs to be done.

The Keynote was given by Kim Cofino @mscofino and she talked about the different kinds of learning in the classroom. She made the point of how ‘education needs to learn with technology the way students live with technology’. A point so relevant to educators to keep up with the tech savvy generation of students that we teach. she focused on 6 main areas in her keynote which I will summarise.

Lets take advantage of being Mobile and get students out and about to explore new areas around us. Trust them to customise their devices and teach them to be responsible administrators of their devices. Using social apps that our students use the most such as snapchat and twitter. Using interactive and media rich resources to track progress and engage students. Motivating students to keep learning, allowing them to connect with others, and to actually “be” a part of the content they’re learning about. Applying a more “just in time” approach, and allow students to engage with the content within the context of their course learning.