professional learning

Scotland Meets Saskatchewan

Posted by Dean Shareski on in Classrooms, professional learning 12 Comments

I’m please to announce a great upcoming event being held in Moose Jaw, SK on Monday, August 25, 2008.

Our school division will be hosting a day long event with Ewan Mcintosh. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Ewan’s work, he is outstanding advocate of social media and has been involved with Scotland’s very progressive curriculum innovations.

Here’s a some more information about the day:

Scotland meets Saskatchewan Outline

9:00-10:30
Presentation: Scotland’s story: how curriculum meets innovation
The new curriculum, developed with the profession and parents over several years, has ‘allowed’ more teachers to break with tradition and take up new technologies to facilitate children’s learning. The curricular moves share much in common with Canada’s states’ and provinces’, so what are the similarities and differences in technology, professional development and the way students learn?

11:00-12:30
Roundtable:Assessment is for learning and making the links through new technologies – share experiences from both sides of the pond.

12:30-1:30 Lunch

1:30-3:00
Practical workshop:Thinking Out Of The (X)box
Scotland is leading the way in some respects of games-based learning. Experience some of the methodology and ideas in this practical workshop.

6:00-7:30
Focus on Leadership Dinner: Ewan will focus on leadership … Read the rest

K12 Online Proposals Launch Today

Posted by Dean Shareski on in Conferences, professional learning 0 Comment

The call for proposals for the 2008 K12 Online Conference is out today. The theme for this year’s conference is “Amplifying Possibilities“.

The growth of this conference over the past 2 years has proven its value ten fold.  We’re looking for creative, enthusiastic people to share their learning during this conference. While many of you share daily, the K12 conference offers a unique format and gathering of ideas that makes it a very easy place to both introduce and challenge each other with new ideas. Please consider submitting a proposal. You’ve got 6 weeks to put something together. You can do it.… Read the rest

Presentations are almost too easy

Posted by Dean Shareski on in Conferences, professional learning, skype, socialnetworks, workshops 9 Comments

Today I made 2 presentations entitled “Are you Published?” for Showcase 2008.  You can get all the details including the slidedeck and the video (posted below, so if you’re planning to attend this session on Tuesday, this may or may do it for you). In most cases, I rarely walk alone, whether it’s a pre-call out for ideas or links, or live appearances, I have a plethora of resources that I can tap into anytime. Today was no different.

I invited Will to return the favour (btw Will, you still owe me a few more appearances) and share some ideas (about the 14 minute mark) about publishing which sparked some great discussion and questions. So he gets in from sledding with his kids and chats with us for about 10 minutes. I carry on. Then David Warlick watches via Ustream and at just the right moment (35 minute mark), skypes in to share his thoughts on Lulu.com ( I had asked David earlier so it wasn’t a purely random interruption). So I went to the back of the room, grabbed a water and allowed David and Will to do their thing.  It’s been said often, that the … Read the rest

Online Class #2 and why I love it

Posted by Dean Shareski on in change, professional learning 15 Comments

I started teaching my second online class at the University of Regina.(in large part due to the recommendation from Alec Couros)  Last summer I taught my first, totally online save for an optional face to face meeting. This class was scheduled to be a face to face class, students thought it was going to be face to face and found out tonight, that was changed. (a strike late last year of administrative workers and others likely meant course offerings were not updated and thus the confusion). I didn’t know, they didn’t know but think I managed to convince them it would be a good thing and after some dry runs of the technology, establishment of their shiny new blogs, we’re ready to take off and learn.

I’m so looking forward to this. I love this stuff, I’m passionate about it and  I live it everyday. I’m excited to be able to watch and learn, share and teach with largely a group of first year pre-service education students. Here’s are the main themes of this course:

  • Learning is social and connected
  • Learning is personal and self-directed
  • Learning is shared and transparent
  • Learning is rich in content and diversity
… Read the rest