#EdBlogNZ Challenge Week 2

#NotAtULearn15 - Get thinking Deeper!
So this week's challenge I've decided to do a bit of a combo and while I've done a few posts already on events that I've participated in during #ULearn15, for the majority of the week I've not been at ULearn15!  On the Friday morning there was a panel discussion that was streamed live facilitated by +Derek Wenmoth that I watched firstly on my phone then Chromecast to our 50" TV in the comfort of my lounge!  I love how Pam Hook challenged the status quo and didn't necessarily go along with the "group-think".  I'll add more detail of my points of highlight (when I find the notes I hand wrote at the time of watching)... watch this space



Here is the Twitter feed from the discussion that I kept an eye on while watching the video:

#EdBlogNZ Challenge Week 1

Inspiring Bloggers

The challenge is to write about a legendary blogger that inspires you or makes you dream bigger.  I am in awe at how some educators write reflect so frequently on their blogs.  Two bloggers that I follow and read regularly both bear the same name Stephanie Thompson!  I wonder if they are connected on line too?

First Stephanie who is the author of Four Seasons in One Kiwi I first met her at a two day Solutions Focus Coaching Master class. Stephanie is a primary school principal and as I aspire to be a principal I was really impressed with what she had to say about leadership and growing a coaching culture in her school.  Her blog posts reflect her leadership wonderings and I find them useful to read and reflect how her message resonates with me now (in my role as an acting principal) and to store for my future leadership experiences to come.

Second Stephanie who is the author of Train the Teacher I had connected with her many years ago on twitter and first met a few years ago at an Ignition Conference held at Albany Senior High School.  At the time she was a classroom teacher in Wellington, a tweeter and edu-geek.  I was impressed for a beginning teacher how she used blogging to collect evidence of her practice and labelled her blogs as a great filing system.  Now Stephanie teachers overseas and posts almost daily of her educational learning journey, whether she is reflecting on what is happening in her classroom or from one of the many conferences that she attends.  Her latest post about participating in a disruptive strand at a conference reminded me of the robust conversations I had at the Google Teacher Academy where we put our big ideas into an action plan for immediate steps in our learning community.

I often fear that my reflections will just be aimless ramblings and not worthy of the deep reflection I read in the posts of others.  I do believe in projecting positivity and continuous improvement, so to move forward, I feel you need the time to look back and reflect on your practice to improve. Like ripples in a pond, ideas can grow, reverberate and merge to create new circles of ideas.  I wonder if participating in the #EdBlogNZ challenge will help me get into a routine of weekly reflection (or at least fortnightly) for my leadership and/or education learning journey?  I hope so!

Connected Educators Month #cenz15

It's Connected Educators Month (#cenz15) and I've decided to be involved in a few ways. Firstly I am organising the #twitterdinner15 which coincides always with the ULearn conference.  This year it is being held in Auckland, so I volunteered to organise the evening.  It's no small fete organising something like this and having people pre-pay so that you aren't left hanging on the evening with unexpected expenses! I think in the last month most of my tweets have been to promote the evening! I'm looking forward to connecting face to face with many old and new tweeters!

Secondly, I've signed up to be a contibutor to EdBookNZ which is the brain-child of Sonya Van Schaijik.  This year's EdBook is based on unpacking the Practising Teacher Criteria, I'm interested in PTC12 - Teaching as Inquiry.  Below is Sonya's slideshare she presented at EduIgnite recently that explains the collaborative project.

Lastly, I've decided to be part of the #EdBlogNZ challenge, where each week 3 challenges will be posted to blog about.  I'm doing this because I've had an edu-blog for many years and would like to try and create a habit of posting more frequently my reflections about leadership, education and my edu-experiences.  There are three levels of challenges and you can choose any of the activities set from any of the levels - so I'm thinking I might ease into the challenge with this first post!  I'm hoping that I might get some comments and encouragement to make me think deeper or just encouragement to keep trying!