February 21st 2014 Professional Day

On February 21st, I attended Think Langley's #odyssey14 conference. I attended 3 sessions.

Daily 5: Question and Answer Session - I attended this session because I had read the book years ago when I was still teaching intermediate. Now I'm back in primary and reading The CAFE Book. I felt a refresher would be helpful as well as the time to look at the Daily 5 through primary eyes. I am happy to say that I did get some good ideas for "word work" apps as well as encouraging learning independence and stamina.

Explain Everything! Practical Uses and How-Tos For Screencasting on Your iPad - Kudos to Victoria Olson for being so organized. Here is slideshow that went with the workshop. We played around and got our hands "dirty". Originally, I choose this workshop because I'm interested in learning more about screencasting to present ideas on brain-based learning. However, I must say that I was impressed with the practical classroom applications that Victoria showed us. Having students read a passage or explain a math concept are the ideas that excited me most!

So You Want to Mystery Skype? - Okay, I have to admit, I choose this workshop by default as all the ones I was really interested in were full. I think Mystery Skype is a pretty simple concept and was pretty clear when Will Richardson explained it at the Learning in a Networked World (see earlier blog). This workshop was  facilitated by Victoria Olson as well and she gave us lots of ideas about what jobs there are for students to take on and then we actually did a Mystery Skype. So I do feel quite prepared to do this in the classroom and I've even found a class to do it with!