Hello! Welcome to the final blog post for GEN2018! I have learned a lot through this journey, and I am excited to be able to take the strategies and knowledge I have acquired here with me into my education career. This week, I will be exploring a couple of case studies from The Global Educator. There are a lot of amazing studies explored in this chapter from educators all over the world.
Case Study 4.2 The ‘Learning2’ Conference: Social and Global Learning
Check out Learning2’s website HERE!
Michael Weber and John Zurfluh created what is today Learning2 because they wanted a conference to be able to discuss strategies and ideas that educators could apply in their own schools. A face to face conference held in China, Learning2 aims for their conference to be different, and wanted it to have a primary focus on ‘student-centered classrooms’. (Lindsay 2016)
Today, Learning2 has become a global conference with face to face and online options. Educators who want to be a part of the conference can apply through the website, as well as check out interesting articles, ideas, and strategies through Learning2’s Online Threads!
The first conference was held in 2007 when the internet and its power players were just at the beginning stages of what it is now. What I thought was extremely brilliant and creative of the Learning2 Conference was that in the first two years, all participants in the conference had to make a twitter account. Twitter at that time having less than a million users (Lindsay 2016). It is amazing reading this now, knowing what a powerful global force twitter is today that these creators had the foresight to start getting educators comfortable with these mediums.
By 2010, the Learning2 Conference had changed its format a little more, opting for social built conference hours, where participants created sessions on the fly, and from it created great participation and learner-centered content. In 2011, the conference was changed again, now including sessions by educators in the region, librarians, scientists, and digital storytelling as well as a host of other topics.
The Learning2 Conference changed a little more over the years as it grew. Now a global non-profit, the Learning2 Conference stands on 4 ideas:
- create a conference experience that puts the participant first
- understand that learning is a social act and make socializing a key part of the conference
- create a conference that continues to change with the needs of participants
- create a conference that is ever-changing, takes risks, and uses technologies appropriately in the learning process. (Lindsay 2016)
Learning2 continues to grow and is creating more and more goals for their conference as time goes by. what was originally a face to face conference is now held annually face to face as well as through BlackBoard Collaborative. The Learning2 conference also has goals to expand their face to face sessions to other parts of the world. Hoping that one day Learning2 will have conferences not only in Asia but Africa, Europe, Australia, and the Americas as well.
Case Study 4.1, Lucy Gray and Steve Hargadon: The Global Education Collaborative.
Check out the Global Educations Collaborative’s site HERE!
What began as a small online hub in 2007 for educators to meet and talk, grew into an annual online conference for students, teachers, and edtech related learning. Known today as the Global Education Collaborative, the conference runs for 24 hours a day, for 5 days straight. (Lindsay 2016) Technology, students, and teachers can apply to become part of the conference and host a seminar. I explored the GEC’s page and found a lot of really awesome applications like using VR in classrooms, incorporating the SDG’s, as well as strategies for Global Competence and incorporating media arts into technology. Those proposals can be found here!
The GEC also provides weekly informational meet ups online for parents and teachers to meet up, provide support, and share ideas.
Case Study 4.4 Peggy George and Wesley Fryer: The K12 Online Conference
You can check out the K12 Conference more on their website HERE!
In 2006, Peggy George created and collaborated to make a series of video presentations for K-12 Students. The K12 Online Conference runs for about 3 weeks and is run by educators on a variety of topics. Over the years, the creation of these kinds of videos has continued and has created an online archive of educational content. The K12 Conference urges educators to incorporate flat learning creatively, and interactively.
Personally, as someone who loves to be creative and be hands-on to learn and create, the K12 Conference has a lot of ideas I found really interesting about how to incorporate it into a globally collaborative classroom.
The K12 Online youtube channel has a lot of great videos that they have archived over the years, one I really enjoyed was the Creativity Strand video, check it out below!