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What a great idea this is - a way to get even more out of the conference. I always tend to focus on the points that interest me most, often the things that I agree with most, and it'll be very valuable to see what other people think is important. It's not a new idea to me - I remember at university as I studied for finals we sometimes swapped notes because it was helpful to see what classmates had written. It's the first time I've seen it implemented on this kind of scale though.
This is a great analogy. I never did that, swaping notes. At least I don't remember ;-) What a great idea!
This is similar to the idea of Note Mesh--has anyone had a chance to try it? I see it is only available to college students.--beth gourley
One point that has struck me so far is definitely one that resonated because I agree with it - how essential it is that we teach not just content but how to learn. Many years ago when I was interviewing for my first ever teaching job (as a teacher of French) I was asked, "Why French? Why teach this particular language?" My answer was that it wasn't particularly important whether we taught French or Spanish or any other language. What was important was to teach a language to give the kids the chance to learn how to learn a language - "Qu'ils apprennent à apprendre". State standards notwithstanding, what is really important is that our students leave us equipped to continue learning on their own.
You know, teachers are unique. The intent, for must of us, is that we will be teachers for the next 30 years. I do not thing that this is the case for most other workers. When I am with professionals, other than teachers, and I ask, how many of you are doing now, what you studied in college, almost no hands go up. Of my brothers (four), I am the only one who is still involved in the profession that I started in college -- and certainly what I'm doing is different from my notions of being an educator back in 1976. How did we get her. We know how to teach ourselves. This needs to be an integral part of our classrooms.