Tuesday, December 8, 2015

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

Are you a Manitoba teacher using educational technology to enhance learning?
Want to share the good things you are doing and be an inspiration to others?

If so, consider sharing your work by contributing a chapter to an ebook of exemplary ideas from Manitoba schools. This purpose of this ebook is to share exemplars of technology infusion and how they make a difference to our thinking and pedagogy. What has changed? We would like a ‘reflective’ section (or it can be infused) where you discuss ideas like:

Neil Postman said:
"A new technology does not add something, it changes everything."

  • Who has benefited most from the tech infusion?
  • Who has benefited least?
  • Or - how do the benefits get distributed?
  • What has your classroom gained?
  • What has your classroom lost?
  • Does it change the power structure of the classroom (for the teacher and among students)?
  • How has your thinking about assessment changed?
  • Has ‘time’ changed in your classroom?
  • Has collaboration been altered?
  • Are any ‘new voices’ heard in your classroom?
  • Where are the relative values of the technology, the process, and the product?
  • Do you talk with students about issues such as tech design, mineral sourcing, manufacturing, reuse and recycling? How does the conversation go?

You certainly shouldn’t discuss them all - just 2 - 4 possibly.

The proposed e-book will consist of sections related to one of several themes;

  • One-to-one computing and/or BYOD
  • Social Media
  • Blended Learning
  • Multimedia/Digital Storytelling
  • Digital Citizenship and/or Digital Literacy
  • Games
  • Great ideas for Infusing technology into Manitoba Curricula
  • The Flipped Classroom
  • Makerspaces, including coding.
  • Community Building/Collaboration/Connected Learning Using Technology

Proposal:
Due date:  January 22, 2016
Please send a short (500 word maximum) double spaced paper (please use WORD or a google doc) with a description of your proposed chapter.
Include the theme(s) that best describes your proposal.
Include your name, school, and grade level(s). Note: collaborative pieces are also accepted!
Submit your proposal via email to NantaisM@Brandonu.ca

Guidelines:
Authors of successful proposals will then be asked to develop a chapter for inclusion in the e-book. As mentioned earlier, the chapter should include a reflective section that examines some of the ‘big ideas’ posed.
You are encouraged to include diagrams, photos, video, and links.
Ensure that copyright is followed and that the work is entirely your own.
This work will be published with a Creative Commons license.
In-text citations and reference lists should follow APA rules (we can help you with this!).
Use a 12 point Arial font and double space your submission.
Word count should not exceed 5000 words.

Any questions?
Contact either Mike (nantaism@brandonu.ca or Rennie ( rennie.redekopp@umanitoba.ca)

Editors:
Dr. Mike Nantais, Brandon University
Dr. Reynold Redekopp, University of Manitoba

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Facts to Thoughts to Wisdom?

Where is the Wisdom?

So informed and so unaware
So many accessible ideas and so caught in the ‘echo chamber.’
So superficial and so thoughtful
So technologically aware and so technically ignorant
So liked and so uncaring/uncared for
So free in thought and so bound by what bombards us.
So empowered and so used
So informed and so not wise
So fast and so thoughtless/unreflective/reactive/
there has to be a better word…..
So vocal and so unheard. 
So much noise and so little silence
Where is the movement from
Information to Thought to Wisdom?
(Redekopp, 2015)