GOOGLE DOC LINK : goo.gl/Pwtzk
Will Richardson event, SLV, July 20, 2012.
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9.10-9.25am Arrival at door 3.
9.30am-11.00am Session 1 (Google Doc)
11.00-11.30am Morning tea served
11.20-1.00- Session 2 (Google Doc)
1.00pm-1.30pm - Lunch
1.30-3pm Session 3 (Google Doc)
3.00pm Close
Please help us shape the day by reflecting on these three questions, or suggesting any proposed
topics for the day. Some possible questions to answer are:
● What are the issues and challenges you would like addressed?
● What passions and skills would you be willing to contribute?
● What projects would you like to explore with others?
Insert a new table for your entry so things stay organised.
e.g.
Name:
Karen Dowling, DEECD
Questions to address
Issues to address: how do we empower and encourage school leaders to foster a culture of
innovation?
NAME: Miffy Farquharson
Q: Leadership is exhausting sometimes. How can we keep our candle burning without burning it out?
Thanks
Cameron
Name: Donna Benjamin @kattekrab kattekrab@gmail.com
Hats: Executive Director - Creative Contingencies donna@cc.com.au
-------- Treasurer - ICT in Education Victoria
-------- Board Member - The Drupal Association
-------- Learner - Facilitator - Leader
-------- Open Source Advocate
-------- Imposter & Infiltrator
Questions to address
● What are the issues and challenges you would like addressed?
- Why are great educators being held hostage by biz managers and technicians when it
comes to the use of technology?
- Why is the Internet still widely seen as so dangerous a place for young people they can’t be
allowed to access it
● What passions and skills would you be willing to contribute?
Education is the foundation stone of culture building. I’m a passionate learner, not a teacher,
not a parent, not a bureaucrat. We invest so much money in this, we spend our formative
years in institutions - they need to be the most wonderful inspiring rich and healthy
environments they can possibly be - and we need to build them in a spirit of collective
energetic optimistic enterprise.
I’ll tweet, I’ll connect, I’ll listen, I’ll talk, I’ll question, I’ll record, I’ll provoke.
I seek to be inspired.
● What projects would you like to explore with others?
- The Computer Science for High School Project #cs4hs
- A broad open far reaching and rigorous debate about the Australian Curriculum
#OzCurric
(would love to see that hashtag trend tomorrow)
- The OLPC Australia education program - http://www.one-education.org/
- Embracing open education resources, open source, and maker culture.
Name: Catherine Hainstock, Vermont Secondary College
Challenges to address:
● Blocking and filtering by the Education Depts. of social media tools (and other sites) that are
of value to 21st C learning and teaching.
● the erosion of the role and presence of Teacher Librarians in schools
● the corporate hijacking of education (see Warrick below)
Project/ideas to explore:
There is a student negotiated elective (Inquiry subject) now being offered in several high schools.
How can we better support this initiative to encourage more in the future?
Name:Joanna Durst, St Monica’s College Epping
Questions to explore: I’m happy to jump on board with many of the ideas / challenges that others
have mentioned. Our school has just issued a Social Media policy in order to allow and encourage
these tools to be used with classes so I’ll be looking out for how this can be done. Also curious to
share thoughts on apps to use in the classroom, apart from the usual suspects - I have opinions on
this.
Name: Annette Rome, Australian College of Educators
Questions to explore: How to best educate children in relation to appropriate use of social networks esp things like Formspring, privacy concerns.
How to best educate children re on-line social change for ‘good’ ie how to redirect the enormous time
spent by young people from trivial pursuits towards ‘making a difference’ in some of the things that
really matter
How to best appeal to school/system leaders to broaden their consideration re use of social media
and not listen only to the fear merchants
Have some concern that some on-line communities can adversely target intellectually and socially
vulnerable children. How best to deal with that? Should this portion of community have more
regulated access c.f. other sectors?
Interested in social justice programs that use technology platforms - am involved in a group that is
trying to tackle violence in our cities, but not sure how effective it actually is
Also interested in the growing body of on-line education opportunities that exist outside schools and
are being picked up by communities - eg Kahn Academy. How do the two (?) spheres best
complement each other?
Name: Kelly Gardiner, State Library of Victoria
Projects/ideas to explore: What role can Bright Ideas and the VicPLN course play in supporting the
PLN community? (eg we’re looking at offering more specialised stand-alone short VicPLN courses,
eg advanced social media, and research skills and tools).
The Library is investigating options for a submission to the ABC to provide content/platform/input to
its new Education portal (see http://www.abc.net.au/learn/proposals.htm). I’d love to talk about a
collaborative approach to this . Can we use this opportunity to produce and enable educational
content that promotes change and innovation - nationally? Our initial thoughts are around a platform
that provides interaction, connects existing web tools familiar to students and leverages the rich
media content of the ABC archives and the Library’s digital collections, and which can then be
replicated to apply to any subject area or community need. If anyone would like to work with us on it,
we’d love to discuss it as part of this broader conversation.
What synergies exist with colleagues facing similar issues and promoting PLNs/PLEs in TAFE and
higher education? With educators in other states/territories?
How do we energise the whole VicPLN community, and avoid the risk of dividing it?
Name: Judith Way, Kew High School
Questions: How can we get staff who are nearing retirement to get on board with learning
technologies (rather than just use 1:1 laptops as a $2000 pencil)?
Can we put pressure on to the appropriate authorities so that PLANE is available to all Australian
educators?
For those of us who are social media converts, how can we regulate the technology in our lives so
that we are not overwhelmed by information and FOMO?
Name: Penny Bentley, Self Employed (Registered Teacher)
Issues and challenges addressed:
Explore the reasons why many educators are reluctant to use technology for teaching, learning
connecting and sharing. Here’s 11 reasons, how can we help people to overcome these issues?
Passions and skills to contribute:
Already connecting with educators on Facebook, happy to contribute ongoing support here.
Facilitating webinars using Blackboard Collaborate, already happening in the Australia
Series....would plnlead like to be involved ?
My subject areas are Maths/Sci/Chem...would enjoy networking with teachers in specific subject
areas...be more explicit with demonstrating how online connections can be beneficial.
Projects to explore:
The ABC Education Portal
Networking with TAFE and HigherEd sectors.
Developing a pre service teacher network...say a #vicpstpln for mentoring.
Margo Edgar Essendon North Primary
Issues & Challenges
How do we avoid getting hamstrung by current practices - the challenge is to rebuild rather than
renovate,
Moving people beyond the ‘fear’ factor of social networking
Time - how do we create time for teachers (and others) to play and learn
(However when I read other people’s ideas for issues/challenges - chance are I will think they are
important too, I just hadn’t thought of them yet)
Passions & skills
I seem to have lots of questions
Willing to explore, try things experiment with using technology
Organised (like to see things through, if I start something will make sure I finish it)
Wouldn’t say I was creative and good at seeing big picture but can take other’s ideas and work out
how to make them work.
Projects
National curriculum - how we can use that as an agent for change
Networks - building networks of students that learn from each other - student empowerment
Have other ideas - but struggling to articulate them at the moment
Name: Celia Coffa – St Luke’s Primary Blackburn South
Issues and challenges addressed:
Addressing the divide between those who seem to understand the value of networking and those
who cannot see a personal need to be involved addressing their fears
Encouraging less confident people to take risks to ‘expose’ themselves within an on-line community.
Ensuring on-line communities are equitable and welcoming spaces
I think we need to work harder to increase general awareness of the positive side of Social Media –
too often the bad press gets the news. (feels like an uphill battle at times)
Passions and skills to contribute:
My personal experience of PLN has been hugely enhanced by the Face to face connections made
through gatherings such as conferences/unconferences and informal TeachMeets.
Like Margo, I have lots of questions and a very open attitude to seeing things change, but not just
for change sake.
Projects to explore:
Enhancing PLN’s through face to face gatherings
Encouraging our students to create their own networks and increase awareness of the positive value
of an online presence. (Positive digital footprint as well as connections to their learning and
passions) – Perhaps they will be easier to convince than some adults
Cameron Hocking- State Library of Victoria
Issues:
How do we reach out to graduates and beginning teachers to assist them with their craft and support
them through the difficult first few years?
How do we harness the transformative power of communication technology in education?
How can we all work smarter and use the unique skills and abilities of each member of this network?
How large can a network (such as VicPLN) become before it becomes either splintered or unwieldy?
Projects to explore:
Using members of the network to strengthen the Personal Learning Network program through
montor roles and more advanced courses.
Developing a PLN style course or resource for students-either through ergo or in another form.
Developing Bright Ideas to include more professional learning resources (in the form of user guides
& screencasts)
John Pearce @mrpbps
Issues and challenges
● Seizing the opportunity to turn the focus from “teaching” to learning and “learning how to
continue to learn”
● Promoting students as learning leaders as well as co-learners
● Avoiding the commodification of learning approaches and learning opportunities
● Recognizing the need to “lead from the rear” as well as from the front
● Promoting being happy in our learning
Passions and skills
● Attempting, (no matter how awkwardly), to “walk the talk”
● Reasonable longevity in the network
● Knowing where some good ideas, (read more cleverer folk), can be found
Projects to explore with others
● The Australian Curriculum offers the most current “in” to influence thinking in this are, (albeit I
may have significant questions about the whole notion of its present content and
manifestation)
● The ABC project offers a similar “in” opportunity
● Providing wider opportunities for students to network and interact
Name: Warrick Wynne (Methodist Ladies College)
Issues and challenges
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How to work with students to provide them with skills and strategies to cope with difficulties
online.
How to develop teacher expertise and confidence in taking up new possibilities in their own
teaching
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To what extent do schools have responsibilities to explicitly teach ‘technology skills’ in the
broadest sense, and how that’s best organised.
● How schools themselves might become confident and purposeful users of social networking
possibilities
● To make learning portals meaningful in an age of Facebook, or move them there or places
like Edmodo?
● The dangers around the ‘Microsoft’ classroom, Khan academies, the corporatisation of
schools and the hijacking of new technologies to anti-teacher and ultimately anti-student
agendas.
Passions and Skills
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1-1 programs
New tools for new kinds of classrooms
Possibilities around ‘the flipped classroom’
Passion for developing positive digital presence online for our students
Projects to work with others
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My PLN is Twitter.
Name: Bronwyn McLeod (Oatlands Primary School)
Issues and Challenges
● Inspiring staff to explore the opportunities an online networked environment can offers to both
themselves and their students
● Encouraging staff to see that by developing a PLN they can connect and learn together with
people that share their passions
Passions and Skills
● Information Literacy and life long learning
● Mobile Learning
● Encouraging others to effectively integrate ICT into their professional practice (This may be
more of a passion than a skill)
Projects to explore with others
● Projects that entice reluctant staff as well as skilling up the already enthusiastic.
● Projects that explore the reasons why staff are reluctant to change and works towards
overcoming those issues.
Name: Bethany Leong, SLV
Issues and challenges
● How do we deal with/filter constant information streams to not be overwhelmed?
● How can we distinguish between personal social networks and professional ones to keep a
work-life balance? Is this important?
● Creating digital clutter - user-generated content is good, but the more stuff we put out there,
the harder it is to sort through to find relevant information
Projects to explore with others
● Strengthening face to face connections from PLNs (like Celia)
● Enhancing digital literacy by encouraging reflection before reaction
● Networks sans technology - how can we take what we have learnt and use these skills in
places that are not as well-resourced as we are? (eg. Cambodia)
NAME: Brette Lockyer, Overnewton Anglican Community College @brettelockyer
QUESTIONS:
● How can I make the most of every learning moment for myself, including online and F2F,
within and outside my workplace?
● How can I help others learn, including students, workplace colleagues, families, leaders?
● How can the Australian Curriculum be harnessed to transform teaching and learning?
● How can I harness and enhance the playful nature of my students within their learning?
NAME: Megan Iemma, mLearn Consultant @megsamanda (Registered Teacher)
Issues and Challenges:
● How can I support the learning of others whilst not being in the school system? This also
applies to teachers who are on leave whether it be LSL or maternity leave.
● How can I mentor graduates coming out with information that sometimes gets left off the
teaching agenda...
● How do you create more ‘nodes’ for networked literacy?
● Does further study i.e. Masters in Education contribute to a better teacher?
● How can we hook into “experts” everywhere...tried and true is good i.e. perhaps authors,
scientists..shared knowledge is always good and you never know until you ask.!
● How can this knowledge be transferred over to the corporate world and vice versa?
Passions and Skills:
● Really enjoy Mentoring/Coaching teachers with technology and making the ‘personal’
connection with interests and learning.
● Mobile Learning- thinking outside the square with projects, ideas and resources.
● ICT Training/IWB
● Music Technology- making music accessible to all even those who don’t have a music
background.
● Presenting and developing curriculum/resources making knowledge accessible usually on
wikispaces.
Projects:
● Being used as a resource for teachers for researching projects. Love researching and
being an information junkie (thanks @jennyluca)
● Participating in “networked literacy” projects - connecting to people who have similiar
interests, not necesarrily subject areas.
Helen Otway
Principal - Debney Meadows PS
Vice president - ICTEV
What are the issues and challenges you would like addressed?
What is the purpose of education for us now?
What passions and skills would you be willing to contribute?
Happy to share my own challenges and successes in my own journey as a leader.
What projects would you like to explore with others?
How does narrative or story influence engagement? Affective or cognitive?
Mel Cashen
Quarry hill primary
questions - what came first the chicken or the egg? Is it our need to be reflective teachers which
came first or did we become connected first and then become reflective? Is there something that has
nothing to do with twitter that, something greater that puts us in his room. What else do we have in
common other than being connected?
something to think about - around the world people set up non profit and non government
organizations when they see something hey feel is not right and they wish to help/change etc. why
can we not do this with #vicpln. Andrew w made me realize last week that vicPLN is more than just a
hashtag. I is a community. It is cause.
why can't we turn this into something more. An organisation who works together to make change.
We meet regularly and discuss actions, we beat down the door of our govt depts, we work together
to make change.
Nyunkia Tauss DEECD
Issues:
How do we work with graduates and beginning teachers to help them develop their creativity, craft
and innovative thinking through their PLN and other connections? How can we support them in
learning about how to try new things, how to be responsible with students online, how to use their
online PLN constructively... mentoring? courses? PL? role modelling?
How can we work better with/ for connected, innovative, leaders (like this group) in addition to with
people who are just starting out in trying new ways of teaching?
How can we (in government) work better to ask you what you want and need, and how can we
support you in this?
Projects to explore:
Peer to peer mentoring of people/schools/networks who are trying new things, seed funding/ support
for innovative ideas, providing space (online? in person?) for networking, idea development, speed
collaborating, networking in and out of Victoria and Australia etc...?
Working on an innovation development course, for teachers and for leaders - like SLV’s VicPLN, like
the PLATO TPL course, but innovation focused? What about for leadership?
Developing Innovate Here and Innovator of the Month/ other online community channels and
activities to work not just with/for newbies but with early adopters and people further along in their
practice?