by Donna Miller Fry (@fryed)
If you were not at the ECOO BIT14 Conference, you may not know that OSAPAC has a new website. (A special thank you to Yves Mainville and Pierre Sarazin for their leadership in creating the new logo and design). It is worth checking out the four newest resources. 1. Mindomo Mindomo is a terrific […]
The very first article I read on Zite this morning was a blog post written by Dr. Chris Dede (incidentally the keynote speaker last week at #on21Clearn in Toronto). Dr. Dede begins by reminding us that the knowledge and skills of teachers and classroom educators are the most important factor in student learning. Having said that, […]
Part of my current role in Ontario is working with teachers and education leaders to dig into what modern learning really looks like at the level of the “student desk”. Much of the work in this province is informed by the thinking of Michael Fullan, particularly in his latest publications “Great to Excellent: Launching […]
We have problems. Big problems. Our world is warming up at an alarming rate. Child poverty is still a reality in spite of “promises” to end it. Who will solve these problems? What are we doing every day to move toward solutions? Commander Hadfield asked this question recently as host of the CBC Radio program […]
Professional learning now includes more frequent conversations about the needs of learners in our current world. Talking about it isn’t enough. We need to understand what learning in the world today is all about. This twitter post says it better than I can.
“I have a dream.” Millions were inspired by those words. Now if Martin Luther King had said, “I have a strategic plan” or “I have a set of performance indicators”, do you think the effect would have been the same? It is a dream, or a vision – a shared vision, that motivates groups of people […]
I wanted to tell a funny story on this Labour Day. I will share this entertaining piece instead: Teachers Don’t Sleep on Labour Day by @albertfong I have plenty of my own crazy tales, of course, having spent nearly 30 years of Labour Days ignoring my family in spite of it being my daughter’s birthday, our wedding anniversary, a […]
Why would we want to exclude other educators from our professional learning network? Stephen Katz, in his book Intentional Interruptions, discusses the problem of confirmation bias when it comes to professional learning. It is our tendency to “only look for things that confirm rather than challenge our beliefs and practices“. We need to make […]
She hated me. I didn’t know a lot about her, but I knew this for sure. She hated me with every stare down as I walked through the halls, with every glare when I entered one of her classes, and with every silent meeting in my office – me talking, and her projecting her hatred […]
It’s harder to follow than it is to lead. Leaders have passion for what they do. They have practiced sticking out their necks, taking risks, trying new things, and failing. For leaders, being the lone dancer in the crowd is their norm. Dancing to the music is the right thing to do, even if […]
