What I Learned at #RSCON4

#RSCON4 took place a little while back, in early October.  A whole weekend full of webinars led by some amazing educators around the world--I was excited!  And even more exciting--the webinars are recorded and you can still watch them here!  In fact, while this post is going to be about some of the highlights from the webinars I attended (or watched afterwards), I am still watching the recordings of some of the presentations that I missed so this blog entry is by no means a summary of all of my learning, since I know that I will learn more as I continue to watch the rest!

David Truss: Shifting Learning

This is a screenshot of one of the slides from David Truss' presentation on Inquiry Based Learning.  David is an administrator at the iHub Inquiry School (which I was lucky enough to visit last year-my blog about that here) and I absolutely love what his students are doing!  Learning is made meaningful because students get to develop inquiry projects around  things that matter to them (like Genius Hour on a whole other level).  

Anyway, what struck my about this slide was not only how cool their projects are, but the verbs that describe what his students are doing:

• designing
• improving
• developing
• inventing
• creating

He really sums it up well on this slide, when he asks the question: "What do students 'do' at school?"
Thanks for inspiring me, Dave!  Learn more about what Dave Truss does on his blog.

Joan Young: Facilitating “Wow” Learning through Humor, Novelty, Awe, and Fascination

Another fantastic webinar I attended was Joan's presentation on facilitating "wow" in the classroom.  Of particular note was her slide about classroom jobs.  I love these new 21st century positions:

• classroom environment engineer 
• class photographer (which can give the pictures to the class tweeter if you have a class twitter account)
• blogger
• music manager

I love these ideas!  And as Joan notes, it definitely fosters a sense of community.  Students love sharing their learning and being the class tweeter, blogger, etc.  

I also really enjoyed her advice about novelty in the classroom.  Reminds me of Imagination Education.  How can we engage our students through imagination?

Check out the rest of Joan's presentation here and her blog here.

Denise Krebs: The World Needs Your Contribution--Really! How my PLN Changed Everything

Another fantastic presentation was given by my friend, Denise Krebs.  She spoke about how her teaching has evolved over the years (and the role of her PLN in that).  Denise facilitated an excellent discussion around giving students choice.

Ideas that were discussed:

• inquiry projects
• concept based learning
• allowing students to create projects based on learning outcomes
• Genius Hour
• choice in presentation style

Another favourite slide was the one you see above.  Trust Children.  Such simple, but powerful words.  Thank you Denise for inspiring us all!  You can check out her blog here.  

Honestly, I could go on and on...but instead, I encourage you to check out the list of recordings here and watch some of the great webinars yourself!

Thank you to the folks at The Future of Education for putting on such a great conference!

Have you watched any of the webinars?  I would love it if you shared your favourite learning moments below!