I was so pumped after my 3rd teacher workshop of the year that I had to take a picture. 

Earlier this year I did my first math workshop.  Here was the description: 

Are your academic & applied grade 9s disengaged? Learn how other teachers and I transformed our teaching practice utilizing the spiral curriculum to increase retention of math. By using a combination of Dan Meyer's problem-based 3-act math, collaborative white-boarding, and Knowledge Hook's online technology, students are more engaged and rediscover an enjoyment of math. Come and learn how to efficiently implement one or any of these strategies to jump start your classes' retention and engagement! 

I checked quite often (even though I know it was unhealthy to) to see how many people were attracted to my description. It was crushing.  Even on the last day leading up to OAME, there were 3 people who signed up for my session. I managed to console myself by stating that it will be easy and having fewer people is  a good way to start one's first math workshop.  I also managed to convince myself that because it was on a Friday and it was the last session of the day...most people wouldn't come anyway.  So I managed to not take it personally.

Boy was I wrong about the number of people.  I had 30+ show up to my session!  Well, this OAME “Endlessly Spiralling  through Grade 9 Math” was much better than my previous two presentations on “To Blog , where No Blog has Gone Before”. 

There are a couple comparisons that are important to note here:

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• After two workshop presentations, I think I got the hang of it.  I went from a 1-way presenter of  disseminating information to an interactive teacher/facilitator that talked and listened to the audience.  I sometimes would lead a discussion with the audience but also lean on the experience of the audience as well for input or further expertise.  

• I’ve been using blogging as a tool in the classroom for over a year whereas I’ve been spiraling for only 9 months.  However, I am much more comfortable talking about spiraling in math than I am about the use of blogging in the classroom. 

• I used Pear Deck many times in the classroom before I did my math presentation vs my blogging presentation. 

Here is some feedback on my presentation.  Looks like about 7 people answered this first question, even though over 20+ attended.  Not everyone fills out feedback forms:    

Leading a discussion with fellow educators and administrators requires a very different than I had developed teaching teenagers. One of the biggest difference I learnt was that there was a curriculum when teaching the students versus no curriculum when at a workshop.  At a workshop, the content discussed better be useful for the audience or else it’s a failure.  In the classroom, the content discussed often isn’t the teacher or student’s choice, so we just have to make the best of it.  As a result, I started my presentation using Pear Deck to interact with the audience.  I used to only use it to get to know where everyone is from, which age group they most affect etc….

This time I used it to ask what they expected out of the workshop.  It became evident as I was browsing through their comments that some of my expectations and their expectations didn’t align.  I went through the list and acknowledged each one of their expectations; I would defer some, promising to get to it later in the presentation, and others I would answer on the spot.   A few questions I wasn’t within the scope of the presentation and I apologized but at the same time used this as a segue to the fact that I wouldn’t get offended if anyone left early.  This portion was informal in nature and opened up the floor quite a bit.  

I spent only 3 hours explicitly preparing for my OAME presentation whereas I spent days preparing for my blogging presentation.  It’s amazing that out of the 7 people that responded, 3 stated that I was ‘somewhat organized’ and 4 stated that I was ‘well-organized’.  However, upon reflection, I’ve actually spent a lot more time preparing for this presentation than the 3 hours beforehand. 

When I went to George Couros’s presentation back in October, he stated that he formatively spent 5 years writing on a blog getting feedback from all sorts of people around the world.  He would get his ideas refined and learnt how to wordsmith. 

Something similar happened to me here – I blogged about spiraling for 7 months beforehand, and I could whip together a presentation in 3 hours and then speak about it in an organized, confident manner the next day.  Normally I would have much trouble talking about my experiences, but blogging helped me refine my thoughts so that when I spoke, it wasn’t a big jumble.  

Wow.  I was thinking that OAME was hiding negative feedback at first here, because there seems to be only one person answering these questions now.  However, I looked back up and saw that there is still some negative feedback, so maybe? 

Nevertheless, I guess the respondents finished off the survey at the end, which showed I did an ok job:  3 people said it was ok, 3 people said good, and 2 found my session to be great!  I still have to work on things as only one person would recommend me as a speaker – now I have something to work towards.  Looking back – I have to work on my content.  I am not very knowledgeable about the changing math education.  My goal is to read Jo Boaler’s “Mathematical Mindsets” this summer and hopefully I’ll have a better scope and understanding of what her student Dan Meyer was going towards.    

Except….I forgot to apply to run workshops for 2016/2017 year as ultimate took up my entire life from May to June.  You live and you learn I guess.    On to the next year!  Can't wait to start tomorrow!

Presenting at YRDSB's Edtech Spring

Today I presented to a total of 3 people for the second iteration of "To Boldly Blog where No Blog has Gone Before".  It was quite the different experience compared to my first time I presented for my 2016 QUEST conference with 60+ people from all over the world.

That time I didn't have my slides organized, I was trying to use Pear Deck for the first time, and I didn't know exactly what I wanted to say.  Needless to say, it wasn't very good.

Today, I distilled the presentation down to some key concepts producing an overall better organization. I allowed for some genuine conversation and discussion among the audience (easy to do with 3 people)- which actually allowed me to learn quite a bit.  

I had a senior kindergarten teacher, an intermediate French teacher who is part of the ETFO executive, and a person from the Director's office.  The vastly different perspective on education allowed me learn so much outside of my secondary school niche and it was an incredible exchange of information (at least for me).

As for blogging, the needs of the senior kindergarten teacher were unique and I was able to help her out with the newsletters that will connect with parents directly instead of relying on 3-4 year olds who lose those pieces of paper between the end of school, daycare, and home.  Communicating with the parents who want the constant updates that they used to receive from daycare was another purpose of the blog that I was able to help her with.

                                          Caption:  Edtech 2016 first time presenters!

Overall, this was a great experience as I learned much through the informal conversations as well as trying to meet the needs of my 'students' as they tried to create their own blog that serves its own needs.

Earth and Space Science - my second year teaching

Second semester has arrived, and that means it's earth and space science time!  This is the second year teaching it, and my goodness, my comfort level with this course has skyrocketed.

It certainly helps that my wife is teaching the same course, and we are learning it at the same time.  On our road trips, we wouldn't listen to music - we would download audiobooks and lectures from Neil Degrasse Tyson and Robert Hazen and get the education we needed in space and earth respectively.  I have read most of Carl Sagan's Cosmos book (thanks to last year's students who bought me that book)  and the textbook that my students use.  I know...my wife and I are both geeks.  But, we both love learning.  Here is the comparison of how I feel from last year compared to this year:

• I can now elaborate on my slides as opposed to just reading.  
• I can answer a good percentage of questions that they have.  (at least thus far)
• The engagement level is much higher, even with a much bigger class of 27. 

It's weird - but I'm changing the way I will teach this.  I understand that the students mostly take this course for space - so I will put all the cosmology stuff at the beginning.  However, with the next 4 strands - I will be spiralling through the curriculum.  I will weave my way starting with a little bit of minerals, to touch upon volcanoes, geologic time in the first spiral.  My second spiral will weave through rocks, more volcanoes, geologic time and and planet formation.  The rest of the spiral organization is laid out with my thought processes here, with each column representing one spiral.

Now that I have tried the spiral curriculum when I taught grade 9 applied math, I know what advantages and disadvantages it has.  I know what content lends itself to each of the linear and spiral curriculum.  

One of the coolest things that I have been emphasizing thus far is the contribution of females to this science. Astronomy and cosmology is a science that we're still learning much about and we certainly don't understand much of it even at this point.  We are still developing tools to study what's way out there.  (Hello gravity waves!)  Females now have more access to education than 200 years ago, and one can see their contributions from Leavitt's discovery between absolute brightness and periodicity between maximum and minimum brightness to today's Lisa Randall's "Dark Matter and the Dinosaurs".  Now that women can touch telescopes and things are opening up for them a little, we will see more and more contributions like Lisa Randall's.  I certainly enjoyed her lecture at the Toronto Reference Library.  

I'll show the Cosmos reboot episode entitled "Sister's of the Sun" by Neil deGrasse Tyson later on this week to show other men and women's contribution to our understanding of space and stars.

My ultimate frisbee team is also asking for more practices and they're getting anxious because they're unfamiliar with the system.  Looks like more 5am wakeups for me!

York Region's Biggest Conference - QUEST - My Reflections as a Presenter and Delegate

Well.  Here I am, after I delivered a workshop last Friday  and spent some time on the playground, exhorting the importance of blogging -  and... I'm blogging.  Sounds very hypocritical doesn't it?

Except, I was mostly presenting "STUDENT" blogging.  I was trying to encourage other educators, even myself, to continue on this journey of student blogging so that my students wouldn't just be writing for me or for marks, but rather write for a global, authentic audience.

And yes, even my workshop contained a global audience.  I always 'heard' that QUEST was becoming quite an international conference.  I could see that it was from the keynote speakers that were invited, but how about the participants?  Well, I used something called pear deck, which allowed me to interact with my audience members as they moved their red dot on their device to where they lived - now granted, I had 41 responses out of 60, and some of those responses were apparently from off the coast of Antarctica and the north pole, but I would hazard that most of these responses were accurate:

I then outlined a few ways to guarantee student and/or adult comments and views.  This would then encourage some intrinsic motivation to write.  Here's the handout:

I went to George Couros' session at the beginning of the QUEST conference on blogging to see if my presentation would overlap and it didn't.  However, as he was speaking, I realized, I probably should present his point of view. 

You see, I'm an introvert.  And he's like an extrovert.

He's convinced me to blog about my teaching and to create a portfolio of my progress as a teacher.  I am now, putting on my mask of extroversion, as Susan Cain would put it so that I can champion the things that I value the most - education.

As I was presenting my workshop, I started to convince myself of George Couros' words and here I am executing it.  I am now blogging.  My own workshop transformed me.

I hope it changed others as well. 

EDIT:  I just received a general congratulatory note from the organizer of Quest:  "Numerous congratulatory emails sent to me internationally, nationally and locally confirm the excellent planning, preparation, and delivery of Deep Learning in a Digital World. Keynote Speakers share with me their ‘WOW’!!! "  It makes me a little happy to be a part of this conference.

EDIT2:  Here is my QUEST workshop description to save it in my portfolio