Great Teachers Seminar Pictures

I've created a Flickr set of pictures from the GTS - you can check them out here. A visual look back at a great week...

A Few After Thoughts

I've been home from the GTS for four days now and back at work for two. If it is possible to describe your self as "mentally refreshed and physically exhausted", that is exactly how I feel.

My mind is full of thoughts and ideas that are racing around while I try to make sense of them and take them on board. The richness of the GTS experience is so great that I think I will be processing the week for some time to come so I will continue to post my thoughts about the GTS here.

Some of the conclusions that I have come to so far include:

• Attending the GTS was a great idea and I encourage any and all educators who get the chance to attend a GTS
• Enough "learnching" occurred to last a lifetime - the GTS does have an altering effect
• NSCC is where I want to be - the power, enthusiasm, attitudes, and joy of my fellow GTS attendees confirmed that for me (not that there was any doubt beforehand)
• I will be adding many of the tools, tips, and techniques covered, discovered, uncovered, and shared at the GTS to my professional practice

There are many other deeper thoughts still being chased down. Stay tuned for more...

The End Of The Beginning...

All great things must come to an end and the GTS is no exception. we wrapped up this amazing week and all of its great experiences by sharing a quote or passage from a book or article that we had been asked to bring with us. It was a quiet and subdued group that took turns reading (perhaps the end of the week, perhaps the going out of business sale at the Wooden Fish), but there were a lot of heartfelt and meaningful things said.

We then had our final exam - in small groups we did our best to represent what a great teacher is. Given no instructions and an hour to prepare, the results were amazing (BTW, this task with no instructions given idea is an amazing one that I will be employing in my practice).

So here is what we came up with:

A circle of great teachers looking in on each other

HMCS GTS to the rescue of learning

Celebrating great teachers in song

We wrapped up this amazing experience by telling each other what we were thinking - some amazing and powerful stuff. Our last acts were to thank each other by shaking each other's hands, and enjoying a group hug.

The last act of the GTS was to recognize and thank the man behind the GTS movement. Somehow just saying "thank you David" seems so inadequate, but we did anyway.


What an amazing experience - I will be thinking about and absorbing this week for some time to come. If you are an educator who has not been to a GTS, run, do not walk to the nearest one that you can attend. You will not regret it and you and your learners will be better for it. If you need any evidence of the effect of the GTS, just look at this great group of great teachers

And one more - the taker of the group photo, creator of "Jelly Time", and a big part of our Great Teacher group - Dave Jellicoe

This blog is not done, it's just the end of the beginning. Now comes the reflection on and the implementation of this mind, life, and practice altering AHA! event. That and trying to figure out how to come back next year, and the year after, and the year after that...

Helping, Advice? and Sorting

We spent Thursday afternoon in a series of workshops/presentations run by us (you knew you couldn't bring a group of educators together for a week without someone wanting to teach something). The power of the group came out as our peers passed on information and knowledge on topics as diverse as belly-dancing to golf, to the use of Facebook, the Faculty Learning College Portfolio (FLCP), learning games (or would that now be learnching games?), podcasting, and many other subject of interest. We even had the GTS Film Festival! Here, see for yourself:


The evening session kicked off with a "panel" discussion - the educators amongst us with the fewest years of experience formed the panel and the rest of us more experienced (vintage, used, old - insert your preferred adjective here...)educators formed the audience. Panel members then asked a question of us. The shared knowledge in the room was incredible - the truth be told, the audience learned more than the panel. Thanks David! It's a great device that I can see finding its way into my toolkit and classrooms.

Lastly we were well and truly sorted. All those with pets on that side of the room, all those with no pets on that side of the room, all those who are pets... (well you get the idea). Suffice to say that we all now know more about each other than we did before or may ever want to again. A great exercise and one that would be an incredible way to start any new learning experience.

Then, with the Sun setting slowly in the West we headed for the Wooden Fish and the going out of business sale. What will tomorrow bring?...

Engagement..., Recess..., My Greatest Teacher Is...

Engagement

How to engage learners has been on of the biggest issues discussed here this week at the GTS, so we began the morning with a large circle discussion of engagement. several tips and hints on how to engage learners were discussed. they included:

• Give someone 8 seconds to answer a question - the silence will engage the learners
• Don't react to "Silly" answers
• Say "And" instead of "But"
• Keep them busy - no downtime even if it doesn't fit with the curriculum
• Develop and environment of trust/self disclosure
• Stop teaching students about what to think and start teaching them about how to think
• Do homework in class - many have no time to do it outside of class
• Teach a concept, give 20 minutes to do an assignment - break them into groups, leave the room and get them to "fill in the blanks". Then all that is left is to go home and make a neat copy of the assignment
• Engage them with the learning, not you
• Coordinator of the New York GTS has a mantra that is repeated for students - "Do You Want Fries With That?"

There were many other suggestions, tips, and tricks from around the circle. Suffice to say, engagement will be an issue that will keep us engaged for a while to come...

Recess

We then went outside for recess, where we were presented with a series of activities designed to, well look for yourself:

Nothing like a little running around to get the blood flowing



















David - the calm in the eye of the storm
























The faces say it all








My Greatest Teacher...

We got in out of the cold wind (it was freezing) and settled back into the big circle. In turn, we told the group, by name, who our greatest teacher was - it was an extremely personal, emotional, and bonding experience. Lots of tissues were used. Ask anyone who was there and I am sure that they would say the same. Even if you don't believe in spirits, the room was full of them and their energy. One very interesting point that was common to us all is that our greatest teacher was not about the subject or the content, it was about the person - they cared, they went the extra mile, they were a positive influence, and had a life-long impact on who we have become. For me, this was the most profound activity of the GTS.

Who is your greatest teacher?...

The Field Mouse's View

Today was the field mouse's view of things - the details. Based on our discussions of the last two days, the following topics were listed and voted on for further discussion:


As we were almost unanimous is wanting to talk about engagement, it was held over until tomorrow for the large group discussion. David reviewed each of the issues on the list and had the following words of wisdom for us:

• Engagement can be taught and learned - motivation cannot. It's all about expectations. Call on ALL of your students by name. Use index cards or a similar process to keep track
  
• Making it real - relevancy - it has to make sense. Classroom to reality, reality to classroom. Don't call it the "real world" - classrooms ARE in the real world. Use another term like "the outside" or something
• High Touch Through High Tech - social networking tools
  
• Story Behind the Students - understand and know your students, it makes them human. Get your students to reveal more about themselves (and maybe I need to do the same - reveal more of myself to my learners?)
• Evaluating students - creativity, not just classic grading.Frequent and instant evaluation
• (Un)covering the material - you cannot cover the material. Decide what is most essential and teach that. The rest gets discovered by learners. Simplify the course and gain learning (another AHA!! moment)
• Collaborative Learning and Collaborative Teaching - working together, small groups, pairs, classes, programmes, teachers/students
• Students' responsibility in the learning process - (or "Get a Life"). Learning goes faster when responsibilities are given. Student to student learning
• Presumed Guilty - lighten up - do the best you can, can't get them all

We then created a rigid limited structure schedule of workshops and broke into small groups to discuss the issues.


I attended the "Collaborative Learning and Collaborative Teaching" and the "Evaluating Students" workshops. Both were great opportunities to talk with each other about what works, and what issues we have. Somme of the conclusions that we came up with include the fact that we as NSCC staff and faculty need to be collaborative across courses, programmes and schools to be better at what we do. Collaborative activities for students are great, but also need to be relevant too.

As for evaluation, there were some amazing ideas passed around - peer evaluations, rubrics, weighing peer and faculty grades, eliminating grades to get away from grades and go towards competencies, and may more ideas that I cannot remember (sorry but the conversations are so engrossing that I forget to take notes!).

The incredible journey that is the GTS continues. This blog has been a great tool for me to pull together my immediate thoughts on each day's events, but I think that it will be some time before I truly appreciate the magic that is happening here. Bring on tomorrow!!...

Evidence of Learnching

I thought that I would recap the last few days of activity here at the GTS with evidence of learnching (the con-fusion of learning and teaching). As a visual learner myself, I thought that the est way to do this would be through pictures (and sage commentary too).

Here is David, the master facilitator, taking us through an activity.

Here is learnching in action (or is it prayer?)

















There were also several other learnching activities that have taken place over the last few days:

David explaining minimal rigid structure with assistance from Lorraine

Cross- country driving
































Small Group, facilitated collaboration - note the collaboration occurring (the learning) and the supervised facilitation occurring up on the hill (teaching). Learning+Teaching = Learnching!

















Success!! Note the joy and happiness of the learnchers after a task well-done. Now it's off to the car wash...


More evidence of learnching - the return of the tools and resources to their pre-activity state

















Here is a great example of learnching in action - the creation of additional learnching activities from a previous one - follow-on learnching! In this case auto-landscaping.


Learnching is an energizing process and learnchers quite often develop large appetites (see the 5-7 pounds outcome in earlier posts). So a good meal and great company is always in order.

















Followed by a great dessert!!

The real evidence of learnching this week though will be if anyone can get Chris to tell us the secrets that go into his Pralines N' Cream cheesecake - YUM!

Another amazing day here at the GTS - the ideas, the passion, the learning, the teaching and yes the learnching - what a powerful experience. Oh, and dessert does deserve one more look...

Learnch

Another great day at the GTS, even if I spent most of it in a vehicle travelling back from Halifax. We made it back to Cornwallis in time for supper (the 5-7 pound weight gain learning objective is well under way), and the evening session.

Two great activities tonight. First we were broken up into four smaller groups and asked to discuss the following four questions:

1. Define Teach
2. Define Learn
3. How are they the same (if they are)
4. How are they different (if they are)

Our group decided to take the stream of consciousness route and here is what we came up with:

1. Teach
1. Setting stage for learners to uncover knowledge
2. Modelling
3. Creating the atmosphere
4. Providing tools to allow learning to happen
5. Sharing experiences
6. Supporting possibilities
7. Crafting the learning environment to allow for success
8. Loving those you are teaching (the Person Part)
2. Learn
1. Gaining skills
2. Changing your reality
3. Allowing understanding
4. Experiencing life
5. Uncovering the unknown
6. Thinking outside one's own box
   
7. Processing new information
8. Learning is irreversible
   
3. How are they the same / How are they different? (we looked at them together)
   
1. Not really - cannot do one without the other
2. No teach without learn
3. Learning cannot happen without reflection
4. Learn and tech are inseparable - it is a continuum

Turns out they were trick questions as David guided us to our next AHA! moment. Education is at its best when learning and teaching "confuse" - fuse together and become "LEARNCH" - some languages (Russian, Hawaiian, and Welsh were mentioned) don't even have words for learning and teaching, just education. As educators we need to negate the dichotomy of teaching and learning, fuse them together as one - hence "Learnch".

So simple and such a clear way to look at what they do - learning and teaching cannot be separated, they are in fact parts of the same thing - they are "Learnch". If we as educators can keep that in mind than we will go a long way towards truly being great teachers.

The evening's second activity consisted of folding a piece of paper three times to get 8 boxes or quadrants. The following words (in no particular order) were each placed into one of the quadrants:

1. Course Outline
2. Course Objectives
3. Motivation
4. Methodology
5. Student Goals
6. Faculty Development
7. Course Content
8. The Learning Process

We were then asked to arrange these eight phrases on their eight pieces of paper in a fashion that pleased us. Here is the layout of my brilliant friend and colleague Sharen:


It is so cool that she has linked together "Student Goals" and "Course Objectives" - what an amazing thing - without that synergy of what the learner's goals are and the course objectives, learning cannot occur. A very cool and very deep observation. We need to pay attention to the connections between student goals and course objectives to ensure that our courses continue to be meaningful and relevant

So what else did we discover - if you want creativity - don't give instructions - the eight pieces of paper were laid out in all sorts of different orders and patterns, and each pattern served the same purpose - to get us thinking. Tell what to do, not how (so cool - I do that now!).

So now when i get back to my learning environments, I will take eight pieces of paper, and eight related concepts and get my learners to interrelate them. Let the learnching begin!!remember to learnch from learners, they make connections we cannot. Hmmm...

Applause, Applause

This morning started with just that - applause, applause. A round of applause to start the session. As David puts it, applause is a great way to start as it draws people as they want to see what the applause is all about and if there is applause, it must be good. I think it's a great idea and well worth a try in my classes.

In the morning session, we broke into small groups to discuss innovations. Prior to coming to the GTS we were each asked to write one page on an innovation that we used in our own practice. Everybody had a turn to talk about their innovation (and there were some AMAZING Ones), and everybody had to comment or speak to the innovation - it was a very powerful experience - lots of free-flowing ideas and suggestions.

David kicked off the afternoon with more incredible words of wisdom (and I am paraphrasing because I spent more time listening than writing) - "If you want something to last, don't organize it. Use oral tradition and don' take ownership". It's worked for the Great Teacher Movement which is now 40 years old. The term David uses is "Rigid Minimal Structure" - less IS more and I'm going to try that too in my practice.

We talked a little about problem solving (one of my favourite topics) and some interesting points came up:

1. Have a well-defined problem (know what it is)
2. Define what cannot be changed
3. Recognize to what degree you are part of (or the whole) problem

In the afternoon we talked about issues that we were asked to bring with us - again a very illuminating and stimulating session - we may not have solved all of our issues, but we did come up with strategies that are worth a try - the power of the group. We talked about how to engage the learners we were not getting to, how to best implement technology, what to do when our passion may not be that of our learners, what happens when an icebreaker doesn't work the way we want it too, and how to engage online learners. While we had no definitive solutions we all left with lots of things to try.

End of Day One and my toolkit is bursting at the seams. Applause, applause - I can't wait for tomorrow...

Off To A Great Start

Well, we all arrived safe and sound in Cornwallis, got checked into very comfortable accommodations and were fed a great meal (this is not a place for dieters, and in fact one of the takeaways as we discovered at tonights' opening session will be an extra 5-7 pounds. The struggle will be keeping it that low). I think that morning "walkies" will definitely be in order.

Had a great opening session - David Gotshall is amazing (that's him on the left)! I could feel the stress of a long academic year melting away as he spoke. So much of what he said just made so much sense (I need to start taking notes). His premise of "Less is More" is so true - this week I hope to figure just that out - how do I cut out all of the extra unnecessary "stuff" and get to the core of the matter - the critical "Less" that is so much "More".

We did an interesting "ice-breaker" - we broke into pairs after some "structured rambling" to mix us up and then interviewed each other for five minutes to report back to the larger group, but with one catch - we could not talk about work! I now know things that I never knew about people that I have worked with for years - a VERY cool exercise.

We then adjourned to the Wooden Fish (I'll explain as the week goes on) for a social gathering - the energy and power in the room was amazing. I can't wait - I plan on spending the week CASEing the joint (Copy And Share Everything - thanks Libby!) - I have so much to learn from everyone and an amazing place to do it in. I cannot wait...

Welcome To The NSCC GTS 2007 Blog

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog about the Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) Great Teachers Seminar being held at the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre at Cornwallis Park Nova Scotia from 29 April- 4 May 2007.

I will be posting here about my thoughts and experiences at the GTS. I hope that you will find it of use and interest!