In my learning about learning i am encountering many cool new tools to use. Today my classmates an I took a dive into an ed-camp, also known as an unconference. This is a method to make knowledge more accessible and less about a “sage on a stage”. The topics are decided on by the attendees and all the attendees are the presenters/experts. The process is less a presentation and more a conversation. We each proposed different topics which were then voted on, with the top three being discussed in three groups. I decided to join the group where we talked about our favourite teachers.

One of the nice things about this format is that it is easy to think of something to say. Because I chose the topic I knew I had something to share, as did everyone else. As each group member talked about their favourite teacher some themes quickly began to came out about what made them great. we also wend town the list of our worst teachers. Humour, flexibility of thought, challenge, and caring were all key components of the good educators with the bad ones not incorporating these principals into their pedagogy. The group settled upon respect as the most important feature of a good teacher. The best teachers that we had all treated us as a human being with our own interests and drives. They made us feel valued and we valued them in return. The bad ones thought that they deserved respect without earning it, they valued themselves far too highly.

Overall the ed-camp was a great way to share ideas, build consensus and build community. This is definitely something that I hope to incorporate into my learning as well as my students.

Thanks to my classmate Laura for the pic, check out her blog.