Presentation Title:

Large Scale Sustainable Transformation - Dan Buckley

Presenter Organisation:

Director of Research and Development Cambridgeshire Education, UK

Session Type:

Keynote Session

Presentation Description:

As five more countries embark on one to one national transformation projects next month our understanding of how to maximise the educational impact of such schemes is increasing rapidly. Most of the necessary ingredients for successful one to one implementations are the same at the classroom level as they are at scale, and few of them have anything to do with the laptop.

You will leave this presentation not only with convincing arguments about what works and what does not but also practical tools that can be utilised to start either laying the foundations or unlocking the enormous potential of one to one as a transformative tool whatever your context.

Three of the key questions this presentation will provide tested solutions for are

1) How to engage ALL staff and learners in the transformation process

2) How to reliably recognise progression in all of the 21st century competencies for all learners

3) How to reliably determine what works and what doesn't in the context of your own school and your own classrooms and share this at scale.

Presentation Title:

One to What? - Matthew Tuminello, Travis Smith, Sean Tierney

Presenter Organisation:

Toshiba, Expanding Learning Horizons, Microsoft

Session Type:

Keynote Session

Presentation Description:

For many years there has been debate and discussion around what sort of "device" we should be providing for our students. We went through the 90's with thin client, PDA's, and the like, before there was general acknowldgement that we want every child with their own fully functional, personal portable computer. Now we enter a new phase; we have tablets, netbooks and everything in-between including iPads, and the emergence of Cloud Computing . So where does this all fit? As we see new options and possibilities, how can we be sure we are making the best decisions for our students? This session will include an interactive panel discussion from industry leaders, educators and our audience about the realities of the options you are now facing, and will allow you to be better informed about the choices you make.

Presentation Title:

Riding the Waves - Mark Sparvell

Presenter Organisation:

Kadina Primary School

Session Type:

Keynote Session

Presentation Description:

Can I still be an effective leader if I have no friends on Facebook? and How is leading ICT Innovation like surfing?

Mark Sparvell is Principal of Kadina Primary School in South Australia, A Presenter on all things eCollaborative, regular Columnist for Australian Teacher Magazine, Microsoft International Innovative Teacher in Collaboration for 2009 and International Judge for the 2010 Microsoft Asia Pacific Innovative Teacher Awards held in Singapore.

Mark will draw from his experience as both leader and teacher to explore the ideal conditions to spark the kinds of innovation which lead to transformation and the varibles required to sustain a digital ecosystem. He draws on local and global examples which will both challenge, affirm and extend current thinking. Mark presents his audience with highly entertaining but deceptively practical information which delivers a payload of small achievable shifts within a broader context.

Presentation Title:

Start-ups' for Teachers - Ewan McIntosh

Presenter Organisation:

National Adviser on Learning and Technology Futures for Learning and Teaching Scotland, UK

Session Type:

Keynote Session

Presentation Description:

One (in)famous Australian recently declared that without content all our handheld computers, iPads, cell phones and desktops were nothing but expensive playthings. He has a point.

The world's fastest growing sectors are the creative industries, encompassing those who have great ideas and act upon them, working in mixed-skill teams and taking those ideas to the rest of the world in the form of tangible products. Failure is 90% the norm and something in which the workers rejoice. Often the highest technology used to generate those ideas is a Sharpie and block of Post-its. The latest technology is used in the creation of products that stem from that ideation and often in its delivery to the group formerly known as the audience. Being aware of the potential, if not how to use every emerging technology, is a given for these studios and the creatives in them.

This is also the methodology of some of our most successful classrooms and teachers.

How can we structure our ethos, planning and technology use better? Have we had enough of pigeonholing our ambitions with edujargon such as "ed tech" and "learner voice"? Are we ready instead to think of and talk more about idea creation, learning by making and creating 'real' (as opposed to school-based) content of which we will be proud in years to come?

Presentation Title:

Teaching toward 2015: Preparing students (and schools!) for the future - Nathan Bailey, Sean Tierney

Presenter Organisation:

Monash University, Microsoft

Session Type:

Keynote Session

Presentation Description:

Student expectations and demands continue to change faster than the education sector's capacity to adjust environments and teaching approaches. With typical implementation cycles of 3-5 years in most schools and universities, we need to consider today what the 2015 environment might look like and design our educational models, professional development and infrastructure implementations to support that environment.

For example, there is strong evidence showing teaching with a Tablet PC (pen based) is far more effective than with a laptop or other mobile device. Research conducted by Monash University across a range of faculties found that over 80% of students preferred an innovative tablet PC based instructional approach over traditional digital slide- only approaches in Science, Engineering, Economics, Medicine and Arts.

Yet many schools are continuing to invest in technology that is both unproven and possibly ineffective.

Drawing on experience and research from Monash University, Microsoft and others, Nathan Bailey (Monash University) and Sean Tierney (Microsoft) will explore the future of interactive learning and provide insight into how technology interfaces of today can best prepare a young person for the demands of tomorrow and best position a school for relevance in 2015.