VermontFest 2019

I had the great opportunity to attend Vita-Learn's VermontFest once again this year, thanks to a scholarship from VLSA!  VermontFest is a fantastic tech-ed conference held at the Killington Grand Resort each fall.  There are vendors and presenters from all over New England and I always leave with new ideas and inspiration.

This year's conference had two amazing keynote speakers: Dr. Nathan Lang-Raad and Dan Ryder.  Dr. Lang-Raad has an extensive list of accomplishments for a guy who looks way too young to have such a long list!  According to the Vita-Learn website, Dr. Lang-Raad is an "Author, Google Certified Educator, Microsoft Innovative Educator, 2016 Apple Teacher, Solution Tree Consultant, Chief Education Officer at WeVideo." He led sessions on instructional coaching and using WeVideo in the classroom, as well as delivered the keynote speech on the first day. He is relatively new to the New England area and has a brown bear story that will leave you in tears!

Dan Ryder, the keynote speaker for Day 2, is a "Success & Innovation Center Education Director
idea wrangler, design thinker, improviser,  author, and award winning educator
Apple Distinguished educator, NEA Foundation’s 2018 Horace Mann Award for Teaching Excellence, and Co-founder of education consultancy, Wicked Decent Learning."  He led sessions on design thinking and critical creativity.  We had fun using Play-Doh, Legos, action figures, and other manipulatives to explore ways we can help bring creativity and whimsy into the classroom. I walked away from his Design Thinking session with a clear plan for handling one of my trickier classes!  Dan's keynote had us all thinking about ways we can implement change within our own environments using creativity and fun.

While there I also got some podcasting questions answered during Joe Bertelloni's podcasting session, learned about new AR opportunities from Maureen Yoder and someone from CoSpaces. I ended Day 2 with Kelly McGee and Linda Mullin, both from Rutland Town School, talking about incorporating STEAM in the library (McGee) and using PLPs in kindergarten (Mullin).  I got to use a 3D pen to make a cool snowflake, learned that I'm not persistent enough finish a Breakout box, and had my mind blown by the success Mullin is having getting her kinders using PLPs. I'm eager to talk to my kinder teachers about and share some of Mullin's tips and templates.

Modeling creative solutions to tricky problems.

Representing books with Legos!  Can you guess what my book is?  (Creepy Carrots, by Aaron Reynolds and Peter Brown)

Making 3D snowflakes to tie-in with the book Snowflake Bentley, by Jacqueline Briggs Martin and Mary Azarian.

Once again I had an enjoyable and educational two days at VT Fest!  I'm already looking forward to going back again next year!

Fun with paper circuits.. or in this case ribbon circuits!

VT Fest: Day 2

Day two at Vita-Learn's VT Fest started with a session by Rushton Hurley talking about taking your teaching to the next level.  In his presentation, Defining Amazing: Taking What You Do to the Next Level, Rushton talked about the value of increasing student engagement and authentic learning experiences. "When kids know others will see it, they want it to be good," he said."When they know just the teacher will see it, they want it to be good enough."  Rushton also pointed out that one way to increase greatness is to allow more time for teachers to creatively brainstorm together.  Wouldn't that be awesome?!  He is a very engaging speaker.  I signed up for his newsletter.  If you're interested in learning more about him and the projects he's involved in, check out his website. 

Rushton Hurley

I bought his books!  They will be in the DBS Professional Lending Library. Stop by to check them out for yourself. 

Next up: Google Tour Builder!  This is a cool tool that I've never played with before.  It's quick and easy to use and the presenter gave us several good ideas how to use it in school, such as creating a list of places you've been, or a 'tour" of the major battles in a war.  I made a quick tour of the Hartford School District.

I had a nice chat with a vendor there who had a 3D printer.  I've been fascinated by them for awhile now, so I was excited to see a session devoted to using 3D printers with elementary students.  The presenter showed us Tinkercad and talked about several projects she's done with elementary students, including an awesome collaboration project between kindergartners and 3rd graders.  Now I want a 3D printer!!  :)  Even without the printer I think we can put Tindercad to good use. Just the other day a 5th grade teacher came to me looking for such a project, and I know it will be helpful for my First Lego League team project as well.

Then it was time for lunch and a lunchtime keynote speech from Dan French, Vermont Secretary of Education.  He talked about the state of education in Vermont and urged creative collaboration throughout the state.

Thank goodness it's vegetarian!

VT Secretary of Education, Dan French

 After lunch I went to a super fun session called Using AR in the Classroom with Merge Cubes.  Merge Cubes were all the rage awhile back when Walmart was selling them for $1 each.  People were buying them by the shopping cart full!  I was not one of those people.  Oh well.  The presenter brought several Merge Cubes, including a DIY one, and he introduced us to a bunch of apps.  AR is pretty cool, but I wonder how long it will hold a student's attention.  I made a quick DIY one when I got home to show my kids and they were interested in the wow factor, but moved on quickly.  I'm curious to do more experimenting on how it can be used to extend learning.

Galactic Explorer shows you the whole galaxy in your hand. 

HoloGlobe shows you the Earth, in real time!

I spent some time in the Extended Learning area, playing with a Cricut vinyl cutter.  Check out this cool vinyl Karen put on her laptop!  When she opens the lid, the bulb "lights up."  I made a little decoration for my own laptop as well.

Laptop bling

Karen's bling is cooler, but I like my pink shiny too. 

We ended the day with big thanks all around, more raffle prizes awarded, and SNOW!  Eek!

I'm enjoying my weekend now, but looking forward to bringing some great ideas and cool tech to school next week.

VT Fest 2016 - Day 2

Another great day of learning with some pretty amazing people! I spent the morning talking about social media and the pros, cons, and challenges associated with it. Coincidentally I met another teacher from the district there and we had great discussions about the differences between how the schools operate and what we could each learn from each other. The long and short of it is that social media is necessary and expected, but so far most schools don't have a comprehensive plan to address it.

Then I headed back to the Innovation Lab to get my hands on some eTextiles! I quickly learned that conductive thread is hard to work with, but there are some really simple projects involving fabrics and electronics. I made a very easy flashlight and saw some examples of other eTextile projects. The woman I was working with kept stressing that when doing eTextiles with kids you spend most of your time teaching kids how to sew, which isn't always what tech people expect to be doing. It's certainly not what I had in mind, but as soon as she mentioned it I saw her point.

The battery and LED inside my flashlight.

Press-button activated.  I showed my daughter this evening in her dark bedroom and we were both amazed at how bright that tiny LED light shines!  It lit up her whole room!

They had a pretty comprehensive 3D printing project going on throughout the conference. I believe they started by printing the components to make a 3D printer. There was a kick-off on the first morning and a wrap-up at the end of the second day, but I didn't make it to either. I'm not quite ready to teach 3D printing yet!

I'm not sure what this is exactly, but I do know it's a functioning machine made entirely of 3D printed pieces.

For the last session of the day I went to a presentation about VoiceThread, an app that has been around for awhile but one that I don't have much experience with. I went with a very specific project in mind and I was pleased to hear one of the other attendees describe how she had done a very similar project using VoiceThread and it worked very well. I'm going to experiment a bit this weekend and hopefully use the app with my enrichment groups this week! I love when you learn something so practical you can implement it in a matter of days!

I didn't mention in yesterday's post that I had to leave the conference right at the end of the sessions and couldn't stick around for the doorprize drawings. I was really bummed because they had some cool products, like robots!, to give away.

Well, this afternoon I was able to stick around for the drawings and a woman ran in to there told me that they had called my name yesterday! Grrr... She didn't remember what the prize was, so I'm going to pretend it was a really boring thing and not the super cool bb8 that I really wanted!

Things turned around today though and right at the end they called my name and gave me a free Chromebook!! Not the robot I was hoping for, but you can't complain about a free computer! :) I'm really happy I got to go this conference, meet with so many cool people, and get my hands on neat new-to-me technologies! I can't wait to bring the knowledge and ideas back to the library and my kiddos at school.

VT Fest 2016 - Day 1

I had such a cool day today at Vermont Fest 2016 at the Killington Grand Resort. Vermont Fest is a chance for educators to get together and talk tech! I learned about paper circuits and I can't wait to make paper circuit holiday cards with some of the students next month!

So proud of my first paper circuit project!

Inside the card you can see the copper tape and LED lights.

Ooohhh.... fireflies!  :)

They have a great Innovation Space set up where you can check out the latest technology, including those paper circuits, 3D printing, green screen technology, and the latest robots on the market. Tomorrow they'll have a session on eTextiles! I'll be there! There are so many neat robots and STEM "toys" on the market. I pretty much want them all in the library!

These Ozobots look very engaging.  I'm sure the kids would love them!  I saw some cool Cubelets as well that I would love to have at our Makerspace table. 

I attended workshops about digital citizenship, technology integration, coding. We talked about how to introduce Scratch to students, how to "push" Hour of Code into all areas of school, includingn "unplugged" activities in the specials classes. I learned about a few grant sources from other participants, and got to try a few new apps. On deck for tomorrow is more coding, another paper circuit cards, building community through social media, and the "digital backpack," Stay tuned!

Using the "Design Thinking" process and a handful of random items, my team created an "usie" stand to take a group photo.  I also learned that "usie" is the word to use when you're taking a "selfie" of a whole group of people.  Learn something new every day!