Just over 10 months ago I was sitting at O’Hare Airport in Chicago, on a four-hour layover. I emailed my supervisor, telling him that next year (this coming summer) I didn’t want to make the trip between my hometown of Fredericton on the east coast of Canada and Memphis alone again.
It wasn’t that I minded traveling alone. Rather, I wanted my colleagues to enjoy the same exposure to the vision, enthusiasm and knowledge that comes with enjoying conversations with fellow teachers and educational leaders. You see, I was on the way home from another amazing learning experience, my second Laptop Institute conference, hosted by Lausanne Collegiate School in Memphis, where over 600 people gathered to talk about 1:1 programs.
That I came to attend LI at all was a bit of a chance. As a lead teacher in a new 1:1 program four years ago, we were offered support to pursue personal PD. After originally missing an opportunity to attend FETC in Orlando, I chose to attend LI, a conference I had found on the Internet.
Two years ago my teaching partner and I attended for the first time. As a relatively new teacher piloting a new program, I was happily naïve in the fact that students seemed to be more engaged while using the technology, not realizing that we were just teaching the same old way using new methods of delivery.
That first LI was an epiphany. I met other teachers who were doing wonderful things, but the real shift in thinking came after hearing David Warlick speak. It didn’t hit me at first, but gradually, over the course of a few days and weeks – planes, airports and summer give lots of time for reflection – I began to realize that the key wasn’t the technology, but the opportunities it offers for shifting from teaching to learning.
That experience afforded me the opportunity to connect. I began to read blogs, connect with others by commenting, and then stepped out to start blogging myself. From there…well…the world awaited!
I am so happy that my district’s Technology Supervisor and my Principal agreed with me on the value of conferences for motivating and growing collective vision amongst teachers. I was able to work with both of them and our local and provincial teacher’s association PD funds to find the funds to send EIGHT teachers to Memphis – no small feat considering that will run us close to $15,000!! Our district IS Manager is supporting our school IS technician as well. In short, the count will be ten staff from our school, including our Principal himself. Needless to say, there is a lot of excitement among the staff who are attending.
That first Laptop Institute conference interrupted my personal narrative of education, shifting it onto a whole new track – from teaching to learning. Since then I have had the opportunity to return to LI, attend NECC07 in Atlanta and a couple of regional conferences. I have come away with a whole new appreciation of the value and power of conversations in learning.
I hope that this exposure will give our teachers the same excitement and enthusiasm for becoming learning leaders that attending that first LI has had on me. I believe we will see a huge return on this investment in leadership.
tags: technology, education, whipple, laptopinstitute
, warlick