Building Futures

 Image from here.

Way back (what it feels like) in January, Building Futures visited the Brock University Hamilton campus for a professional development day. There was an assortment of workshops that we could attend, and our gift for the day was: a USB memory stick. I found it ironic that my first post, all about how memory keys are so 2000 had come around full circle, with a gift of a USB stick to place all the Powerpoint presentations we were to be seeing that day.

The first workshop I attended was Laying the Foundation for Effective Instruction in Literacy, while the last workshop focused on Assessment, Evaluation and Reporting in Ontario Schools: Policy and Implementation. I selected these particular workshops since English is my teachable and because I knew I had to tweak my assessment and evaluation knowledge and techniques.

The differences between these two workshops was night and day. The Effective Instruction in Literacy focused on working in groups, writing things down on chart paper, watching video clips and reflecting on them, and looking at official documents on literacy and numeracy. In comparison, the Assessment workshop did have a Powerpoint, but the speaker decided to focus on just conversing with us and having a nice, clear-cut discussion. Both of them had their uses - the video clips provided real-life examples of how effective instruction was used in the classroom, while just discussing allowed us to have an open forum to ask questions and really get to the heart of the matter. 

It is interesting, because I found the one that did not rely so much on technology more worthwhile; perhaps showing that technology can be used as an asset, but it might not always be needed. At the end of the Assessment workshop, the instructor said, "These slides are useful, so you can always download them after this workshop", so it was a bit of a 'souvenir' that we could take away with us. 

Overall, this was a useful Professional Development Day and I know that in the future I will try to find more opportunities to attend and really establish and find my way in the Professional Learning Community.