Personalized Learning | Education Elements
If you wanted to, you could go to an education conference nearly every week of the year. But just like you, we don't have the time or energy to go to everything and we are pretty picky about which conferences we attend. So when the iNACOL Blended and Online Learning Symposium rolls around every fall we are all bursting with excitement, eager to share with and learn from others who are as passionate about personalized learning as we are. And this year was no exception.
On November 8th we arrived in Orlando, ready for magic that was less about mice, ducks and princesses and more about teaching, learning, and putting the students at the center.
It all started for us in an empty exhibit hall. Coffee cups in hand, we began unpacking our boxes. To be fair, everyone else was doing the same thing but while they were unpacking and unrolling banners we were pulling our foam core and starting to build our interactive wall. While they were setting up their brochures we had our markers and post-its and were building our booth from the ground up.
Here’s the thing about Ed Elements (for those of you who don’t know us). We don’t do the same things as everyone else. We don’t think you learn just by watching, we don’t think “interacting” means just having a conversation, and we don’t think personalized learning should be driven by a desire to use technology - we think it should be driven by passion. So our booth asked people to answer #whyipersonalize and put it on the board. We then let people tell the world through selfies and by the end of two days had a collection of over 200 reasons why people personalize. Every reason was a good one but we especially loved:
- "because it means equal opportunities for all students"
- "so each of my students achieve their own personal goals on their own path"
- "because it makes my students feel inspired and loved when you take the time to meet with them and plan for them"
And the pics people took? Priceless too. Because we need to all celebrate this great work and tell others about it.
Did I mention our booth was not just about personalized and pictures but also about prizes? This year we teamed up with Dreambox, Edgenuity, Fishtree and Lexia for a game of tradeshow floor bingo. We gave out 4 Fitbits because we know from Highlight and from classroom teachers that, just like in health, small bits of data can make a big impact.
Our sessions were not just about sitting and listening either. On Sunday our pre-conference session , “Don’t Reinvent the Wheel: 7 Districts Share Triumphs and Battle Scars from Personalized Learning Implementations” included 7 district leaders running a series of small group discussions. Participants experienced different learning modalities (independent reflection and work, collaboration, direct instruction, yoga... yep, yoga!) and exercised voice and choice. And each person left having had meaningful conversations, having made strong connections, and with a pretty awesome toolkit of resources from each of the 7 districts.
On Tuesday morning we walked into a huge room for our session, "There is More than One Way to Design Personalized Learning", and worried about filling the space. Minutes later the room was up to around 200 people and we realized our three “small group discussions” were going to be pretty big groups. But we are a group of educators which means we are masters of improvisation. Chairs were re-arranged, groups formed and we went ahead, allowing each participant to spend time with the districts and leaders that intrigued them most. And when it was time to rotate no one had to - they could stay where they were or talk to someone new. Because we know learning does not always happen in 15 minute increments. And when great discussions are happening we don’t want to stop them. So much of the focus for personalized learning is on how to teach students, but we also need to remember how to effectively teach the adults.
On Tuesday afternoon, we hosted a book signing for the Personalized Learning Playbook, by our CEO Anthony Kim, who has been listed on the list of the 50 innovative education leaders who took iNACOL "to the next level" this year. Missed the signing? Don't worry, you can still get a copy of the book.
This year at iNACOL we also had the honor of hosting and hanging out with 25 finalists for the Lexington Education Leadership Award Fellowship. Twenty-five amazing finalists. Our team truly loved the chance to spend time with a group of leaders so excited about personalized learning and we don’t know how the Lexington Institute is going to narrow the pool to just 10. What we do know? We can’t wait to start working with the lucky 10. We are so glad everyone found the experience valuable - we did too!
Finally - it was not just about learning in the daytime, it was about all the fun we had at night. (It is completely possible I teamed up with Gartner and in front of some of our friends from NewSchools, Redbird, Digital Promise and DCPS did a little bit of karaoke.) And we may have spent a fair number of hours at the dueling piano bar, dancing with some of our clients (they’ve got moves!). The photo booth at our Personalized Learning Playbook party? Let’s just say there were a lot of hats, wigs and silly faces. And despite the fact that there were only 2 seats in there, we crammed 12 of us in there.
On Wednesday we boarded the plane, smiled at how many of the passengers were colleagues from other CA-based organizations and districts and then, before the plane took off, promptly fell asleep. It was a great few days and we are so grateful to everyone who participated at our booth, came to our sessions, and joined us at the book party. We are so thankful for all of our partners who participated in our Bingo Board, for all the great keynote speakers iNACOL brought to Florida and for three days of inspiration and exhaustion.
Until next year….
