Unleashing Digital Learning

 This school year has been most unusual; that goes without saying. I guess, in a way, it's more surprising that certain things have continued in modified forms. Despite being a "new" classroom teacher, I've been able to present at a few virtual conferences. I was at the TDSB Beginning Teachers Conference and ECOO Camp in August, and gave my first keynote at the MTSPA Day Conference in October. I have slowed down in 2021, only speaking at the OLA SuperConference in February. I've got a few more presentations coming up in the summer (hopefully NAMLE - I messed up my notification dates, so I am unsure that I am still eligible to present - and definitely the ETFO Summer Academy 2021) but the one I am currently focused on is coming up this week: TDSB's Unleashing Digital Learning 2021 online conference.

I have been to the #TDSBUL conference in the past, but this year will be different for several reasons. According to my wiki, I presented at Unleashing Learning in 2018 with my dear friend Denise Colby on the topic of " Playing to Learn: Critical Exploration of Games Based Learning". I vaguely recall driving down to the Beanfield Centre at Exhibition Place. Denise and I were going to co-present something this year, but the deadline snuck up on us and we didn't get our proposal package submitted in time. This year's conference will be virtual, naturally, but the biggest change is that I will be presenting with my students. 

I have presented with students before, such as in 2011 at an OLA SuperConference session we called "Students Speak Out!". This time, the students were involved in all stages of the planning and preparation process. I wasn't going to apply to present, because I'm tired and teaching online has not always been joyful, but when I mentioned it to the students, enough of them were interested to make pursuing the creation of a proposal worthwhile. We were delighted that we were accepted.

We used a collaborative document to plan the overall topic and individual slide responsibilities. The students told me what images they wanted and together we populated the slide template we were provided by the conference planning committee. Part of last week and some of this coming week will have language class time devoted to practicing our speaking parts. We've got a nice mix of students ready to share. 

I looked through the list of sessions available and I think we are the only workshop where students themselves will be speaking. If you are a TDSB employee and have registered before 6:00 pm on Sunday, May 9, 2021, then you can attend our session, which will be held on Wednesday, May 12, 2021 from 5:00 - 5:20 pm.