Getting It Right: Aligning Technology Initiatives for Measurable Student Results

Getting It Right: Aligning Technology Initiatives is designed to help educational leaders and decision-makers wade through the complexities of technology planning. This presentation outlines a simple yet comprehensive multi-point strategy of alignment that will enable technology initiatives to become effectively linked and in tandem with instructional goals.

Participants will come away from this presentation with a clear understanding of how to address standards, improve test scores, meet their curricular requirements, provide relevant staff development, and provide measurable accountability for expenditures. They’ll also ensure that students are effectively prepared with the skills and knowledge they will need to cope with the new realities of the 21st century.

InfoWhelm and Information Fluency

Our society has been irreversibly affected by a new phenomenon in InfoWhelm—an unparalleled access to a wealth of online information, never before seen or heard of. Learning has truly become a lifelong pursuit, and it can happen anytime and anywhere in our Information age. But how do we determine good from the bad, interpret right from wrong, and distinguish complete, accurate and usable data from a sea of irrelevance and digital inundation? The skills to help us best understand and make use of the wealth of knowledge at our fingertips is essential to life and success both in the classrooms and workforces of the 21st century.

The presentation looks at the fluency skill that helps us to extract essential knowledge, verify its authenticity and to perceive its meaning and significance. You’ll learn about the aptitudes that help to discover and collect data and to explore it thoroughly, using the 5A’s—Ask, Acquire, Analyze, Apply, and Assess. This speech is based on Ian Jukes' recent book, Literacy is Not Enough, from the 21st Century Fluency Project.

Using Digital Games in the Classroom: Making School a Game Worth Playing

Digital games are everywhere in 21st-century culture. In short order, they have evolved from being childhood hobbies to powerful tools for learning in every aspect of our lives. Gaming is a phenomenon expected to reach over $100 billion in annual sales by 2015. How do we harness the power of gaming to bring excitement and engagement to our schools by transforming learning into truly unique adventures for students? You’ll learn the best ways to find, evaluate, and integrate digital games into classroom instruction at every level.

MythinformEd: Reconsidering Some of the Great Educational Assumptions

Over the course of the past 25 years, almost everything we have come to believe in about learning since we were young has gone under the microscope - how we teach, how we test and even how we perceive education. Is this really necessary?

Are we better off continuing to do what our personal experiences tell us is the best way? It's much easier to just keep going in the same direction than it is to stop and re-evaluate our beliefs and daily practices. Are our beliefs fact or fiction?

With humour and urgency, this presentation debunks many of the longstanding myths and misconceptions that have been traditionally accepted in education, and considers how we can re-imagine an education liberated from these assumptions.

Education in the Age of Disruptive Innovation

In today’s digital world, we are witnessing the evolution of an incredible and turbulent new age. It’s the Age of Disruptive Innovation—an age where every part of society is experiencing a complete upheaval due to the chronic and pervasive nature of change. Our schools, like our businesses, communities and families, must constantly adapt to these changing conditions to thrive. The Age of Disruptive Innovation examines the changing nature of the workforce; identifies the critical 21st-century skills not being addressed by our current educational system; and outlines how we can effectively engage learners so that they can perform exceptionally well on exams, while simultaneously learning the critical new basics needed to excel in both school and life.

Aligning Technology Initiatives

"Aligning Technology Initiatives" is designed to help educational leaders and decision makers wade through the complexities of technology planning. This presentation outlines a simple yet comprehensive multi-point strategy of alignment that will enable technology initiatives to become effectively linked with instructional goals. Participants will come away from this presentation with a clear understanding of how to address state standards, improve test scores, meet their curricular requirements, provide relevant staff development, and provide measurable accountability for expenditures. They'll also ensure that students are effectively prepared with the skills and knowledge they will need to cope with the new realities of the 21st century.