if you went to iste this year you are probably not reading this blog right now, as you are still there or, having already left, are now in active recovery and trying to shield yourself from all external stimuli. iste is, in a word, overwhelming. with over 14,000 educators, what seemed like as many industry experts and vendors (don’t worry, it wasn’t actually that many!) and more panels, workshops and speakers than we could possibly count, there is an incredible amount to take in. and also an incredible number of things people might take away. and since my 21 hours there only included around 5 sleeping i thought i’d share just a few observations.
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it is no longer enough to be digital; you now need to be differentiated
(yes! this is a good thing). check out the expo floor and stop by booths like ed elements partners lexia learning (1110) to learn about blended learning vs. technology integration,
achieve3000 (2628) to learn about differentiated instruction or dreambox learning (412) to learn about using data to drive instructional choices. not there? you can also check out a case study about dreambox, ed elements and middletown and the use of data here.
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there are teachers who cannot wait to do personalized learning even in districts that are not yet considering making the transformation. in our session on how teaching practices change in a personalized learning classroom
over 25% came from districts that are not starting to move towards personalized or were only at the beginning stages of thinking this through.
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there are some incredibly smart and savvy district leaders thinking thoughtfully about how to make this as easy as possible for teachers, while making it as impactful as possible for students. i had a great discussion with one such leader around the challenges of doing this right, going slow to go fast, and what types of outside help a district can bring in (hint, we can help!).
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amy creeden and dana guardarramas of middletown are some of the best and most talented people out there.
when over 75 people showed up to our session and came up with around 150 questions about supporting teachers in a blended learning environment they easily answered them all.
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there is great interest of doing blended learning right. we loved the questions people asked during our session (we skipped the instructions to make it a panel and instead made it an interactive workshop) and got excited about what they took away as lessons learned on our exit ticket padlet. want to see what you missed? check out the slides and resources here (including a link to our blended learning rubric)
my last take-away? 18,000 attendees is a lot of attendees. it is loud, noisy and overstimulating. but that is 18,000 people who want to change education for our students. so the other thing i would call it? amazing.