Four Lake Washington School District (LWSD) teachers, including one from Redmond, have been selected to attend the 2011 U.S. Innovative Education Forum on Thursday and Friday at the Microsoft Corp. main campus in Redmond.
Bret Crane from Redmond Junior High School, Robin Hoover from Finn Hill Junior High School in Kirkland as well as Matt Palmer and Kim West from the LWSD Technology Integration Team will be among 100 teachers from across the country representing the United States at the forum.
To be selected, the teachers showcased projects that demonstrate the creative ways they are using technology in the classroom. Ten projects will be selected at the forum to represent the country at the Partners in Learning Global Forum this November in Washington, D.C.
In Crane’s project, “Fairy Tale PowerPoint,” Microsoft Ribbon Hero is used to introduce students to PowerPoint. Students utilize PowerPoint to present a fairy tale to the class after developing an outline, background, story characters and props. Students then manipulate Clip Art to fit their theme and animation needs, cite sources used, and rewrite the story in their own words.
Hoover’s “Voices of Injustice” involves students researching and creating three unique voices from one global situation of social injustice. Students showcase all perspectives of the social injustice — including the human rights’ violations — by creating a fictional story for a victim, a persecutor and a neutral bystander. Students showcase one voice in a written narrative, another in an oral presentation and the last in a digital presentation.
Palmer and West developed “Changing Technology PD: It’s About Students Not Seat Time” as a three-year instructional technology integration training program to help teachers integrate technology and meet students’ needs. The goal is to have teachers stop thinking about technology as an “add on” and see it as a critical piece of good teaching.
The U.S. Innovative Education Forum celebrates outstanding school leaders for using technology in their classroom curriculum to enhance positive learning outcomes while increasing student engagement and success. Teachers were judged based on the learning philosophy and goals of their project submission, their use of technology in the project and their ability to demonstrate examples of student work and achievement connected with the project.
LWSD was selected by Microsoft’s Partners in Learning program to become a member of their Innovative Schools Program — part of Microsoft’s 10-year, $500 million initiative to help teachers and school leaders more effectively use technology as a tool for teaching and learning. The Innovative Education Forum is part of the Innovative Schools Program.
