The Teacher Leadership Project met in December 2014 for a full-day collaboration session to highlight all the great technology projects going on throughout the district as well as to learn new 21st century educational practices.

We began with a teacher sharing session in which 5 participants shared some technology enhanced lessons with the group.

The meeting continued with several breakout sessions including Gaming and Comic Creation. Martha Walsh and Kari Packard demonstrated how to use comic creation to retell stories and assist with story creation. They highlighted software on both computers and iPads. Kyle Dunbar and Bobby Ofterdinger  demonstrated some of the educational games available to ACPS students such as DimensionU and MinecraftEDU.

After breaking for lunch, the TLP cohort continued their day of learning by celebrating Computer Science Education Week through participating in the Hour of Code initiative. We reflected on the importance of providing our students with opportunities to learn 21st century skills. After spending time learning the basics of coding, it was clear that coding could provide students with opportunities to develop problem-solving skills and foster creativity.

We concluded the day with our final breakout sessions. Participants had the opportunity to learn more about coding, the benefits of using Skype to have students communicate with authors, and how to build their Professional Learning Network using social media and blogs.