On June 4, we are not Kerrville Independent School District. We become Kerrville Personal Learning Community. Every person who attends Techpalooza has the opportunity to be a resource for someone else who attends.
It could be you who offers a question that someone else in the room is afraid to ask.
It could be you who takes on leading a small or large group on a given topic.
It could be you who knows more than the speaker and feels ready to share to the rest of the group.
The thing about Techpalooza is that it is WAY different than any staff development day where you have participated.
We start with a blank schedule. We ask the group "what do you want to learn today?" and fill up a blank board with the answers. We group these responses into session ideas.
And then we ask the entire group "who feels comfortable talking about ________" as we go through each session idea.
It is completely flexible, exciting and you get to see how other teachers in the district are experts in what they do with technology in the classroom. You get to ask questions and interact. And we implement the "2 foot rule" which allows you the flexibility to use your own 2 feet to walk out of any session you feel you aren't enjoying to find a session more to your liking.
No one is offended. Just go where you want to go.
Showing posts with label staff development. Show all posts
Showing posts with label staff development. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Tuesday, April 10, 2012
Techpalooza 2.0 date is SET!
June 4, 2012 - at Hal Peterson Middle School. We will rock your socks off! And if you aren't wearing socks, we will add you to the final number of those who had socks rocked off.
More details to come. Follow us on Twitter @techpalooza or by visiting our site www.techpalooza.net.
More flyers posted there if you want some printables.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
21st Century Moble Learning Event
On Wednesday, February 29, Kerrville ISD and the City of Kerrville are hosting a keynote speaker to share on the topic of 21st Century Learning in a Mobile World. We are welcoming Maria Henderson from Apple as our speaker to start a conversation with educators, parents, students, and education stakeholders about how mobile devices are transforming education.
Maria serves as a Development Executive for Apple and she is responsible for field marketing in Texas. She has over 20 years experience as an educator and advocate for Instructional Technology.
This event is about developing a starting point to discuss how mobile technology is changing education. This is not a sales pitch for Apple products or services, though their products will be mentioned and referenced as will other brand of mobile devices.
If you plan to attend, you are encouraged to bring your mobile device whether it is an Apple device or not.
Information is posted on http://www.techpalooza.net and we hope you plan to make it to this event. We are posting interactive moderated commentary on our site to share information with those who cannot make it.
Monday, October 3, 2011
A whimper and then a bang
We've got a problem.
Staff development. Committees. Meetings.
You could say all three of these are separate problems. I disagree. They all have a unifying problem and that is most people don't know how to manage these three things in order to make them effective.
All three utilize 3 common elements: people, time and space.
Quality staff development is engaging and uses the resources in the room.
Committees value the team members and allows cross-collaboration and interaction.
Meetings are interactive and engage the creativity of the people who attend.
Sound like your people-gatherings?
June 1, my district let me run an event called "techpalooza" and it sparked such conversation and idea sharing. Without a planned schedule, we let the participants develop their own schedule and set them about to self-learn. We provided interactive gamestorm activities and encouraged participants to share.
It was a successful event and the ideas behind it continue to spark different types of people-gatherings into innovative collaboration events.
Techpalooza is now a term for our district that we plan to use for featured staff development events that we know will be different than average. These are coordinated events of unplanned creative sharing. Techpalooza is removing the words "meeting", "committee", and "staff development" from our vernacular because of the negative connotation.
The brand is starting after whimpers of excessively controlled and boring methods of group sharing. This blog will be about our events and ideas for changing what we do with the people in the room. We hope you join us in this journey!
Staff development. Committees. Meetings.
You could say all three of these are separate problems. I disagree. They all have a unifying problem and that is most people don't know how to manage these three things in order to make them effective.
All three utilize 3 common elements: people, time and space.
Quality staff development is engaging and uses the resources in the room.
Committees value the team members and allows cross-collaboration and interaction.
Meetings are interactive and engage the creativity of the people who attend.
Sound like your people-gatherings?
June 1, my district let me run an event called "techpalooza" and it sparked such conversation and idea sharing. Without a planned schedule, we let the participants develop their own schedule and set them about to self-learn. We provided interactive gamestorm activities and encouraged participants to share.
It was a successful event and the ideas behind it continue to spark different types of people-gatherings into innovative collaboration events.
Techpalooza is now a term for our district that we plan to use for featured staff development events that we know will be different than average. These are coordinated events of unplanned creative sharing. Techpalooza is removing the words "meeting", "committee", and "staff development" from our vernacular because of the negative connotation.
The brand is starting after whimpers of excessively controlled and boring methods of group sharing. This blog will be about our events and ideas for changing what we do with the people in the room. We hope you join us in this journey!
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