Looking Back at 10 years of EdCamps Oh how the time flies, EdCamp Madison is turning 10 this year! It will be held Saturday, February 3rd at Sun Prairie West High School. Which can be found at 2850 Ironwood Drive in Sun Prairie Wisconsin from 8:30 am - 3:00 pm. Get more information and register here: https://sites.google.com/sunprairieschools.org/edcampmadwi/home I will always remember sitting in my first EdCamp opening session at the very first EdCamp Madison and having no clue what I was in for. So, I’d like to take this space to go over some of the basic rules of EdCamp. No One Will Pitch It for You EdCamps are unconferences. By this I mean that they have a blank slate of sessions for the day. There may be a few predetermined sessions, but ultimately the session topics are determined by attendees during the pitch & plan session that opens the day. If an idea gets pitched there will be a session on it. If a topic doesn’t get pitched, there won’t be a session on it. So, it i
On Tuesday of this week, I was lucky enough to attend The Elmbrook Educational Foundation Circle of Friends Luncheon . The EEF does great work for our district awarding scholarships to high school graduates as well as innovation grants for learning within our district. At this event, several innovative educational practices were highlighted. One that tapped into something I've been considering was the incorporation of a Genius Hour at one our our elementary school. The poster below explains it better than I ever could have. It was exciting to see the work that these elementary students were able to accomplish from choosing a topic all the way to presenting their learning. The students were able to communicate eloquently about the process of learning. The idea that it is not always linear and that it can lead to bigger questions and new understandings. Sometimes I feel like when I teach a topic, the students are learning it because they have to and may not