Bringing EdCamp Home.

What is EdCamp?

An EdCamp is an UnConference - an event run by participants. They set the agenda for the day, lead sessions and workshops, and create an environment of productive discussion.
EdCamps are teacher-centred, teacher-directed professional development that use conversation to inspire growth in teaching practice.

Video: EdCamp in under a minute

 

Question for reflection: What questions, ideas, or inspirations would you bring to this kind of PD day?

EdCamp and School Communities

EdCamps usually happen outside of school time and so not everyone gets to experience the power of participant-driven professional development. By bringing EdCamps to centres and school boards:

  • everybody can have a voice in their professional development
  • everybody can learn from each other
  • administrators can then design professional learning opportunities based on the real needs of their teachers and staff

Bringing EdCamp Home

Some school boards have experimented with EdCamp style professional development during their PED days.Reviews have been mixed yet, for the most part, positive.

Image of clock with text: Remember - allow time for change to happen! We are so used to attending workshops where we sit and listen so making the shift to participant-driven PD takes practice!

It’s a shift for consultants as well as participants. The most important part of planning for a school-based EdCamp is making sure that the day has purpose and that the conversations that take place throughout it will be acted upon.

EdCamp and Technology

Technology becomes a pervasive and seamless part of the process yet it is not centre stage. Instead of presenting a workshop about how to collaborate online, you just ask the participants to collaborate online. It is hard for a consultant to let go of the PowerPoint!

Facilitators can model using technology for collaboration (such as Google Drive or Office 365 for session notes), extrapolating data (Word clouds based on session notes), and generating instant artifacts of the day’s events for the closing session (slide show of images and word clouds from the sessions).

Technology use can also be an EdCamp’s main theme in order to bring educators together to talk about issues like cloud-based sharing, online quizzes, BYOD, video, or whatever else they are interested in exploring around technology and teaching and learning.

Most importantly, facilitators get out of the way and allow the school community the space to talk about what matters most to them.

See how one school board reacts to EdCamp style PD

Tools for planning a school-based EdCamp

Here is a planning guide for bringing EdCamp home. Feel free to use the PPT or Google Slide versions as templates for your own EdCamps.

EdCamp in Schools Planning Guide

 

If you are interested in EdCamp style professional development at your centre or board, please contact Tracy Rosen or Avi Spector. At all times, technology is integrated in ways that make sense for the learning.

Learning resources for this tile were developed by Avi Spector (RECIT Consultant, RSB) and Tracy Rosen (RECIT Consultant, CSSMI), 2016. They were based on EdCamps designed in collaboration with administration and consulting teams from NFSB, RSB, and LBPSB. Thank you!

All materials are expected to be reused and shared according to this Creative Commons license: CC BY-NC-SA 4.0