Day Three #TCEA13 - Part 2

Wow.  I have just realized that I let this get away from me!  Sorry for the delay!  This will be my last post for TCEA 2013 even though there were a couple more fabulous sessions I attended and one I presented.  Onward and upward!

The second session I attended on Thursday was with Darren Wilson, who I got to enjoy during my volunteer time at the Assistive Technologies Playground.  During his session on Visionary Staff Development, Darren shared how Guthrie ISD combined both staff and students (all 92 of them!) for professional development during the regular instructional day.  Crazy, right?!

He started his presentation with these statements...

• What if professional development was more like a choose your own adventure story?
• What if professional development was less like a prescription and more like a gift card?
• What if professional development was less like a bus ride and more like a bike ride?

Love those!  Darren also said that many teachers are proud of their teaching abilities but their learning ability needs help.  :)  By combining students and staff for professional development, suddenly the teacher becomes the student and in some cases the student can become the teacher.  SO COOL!  The teachers learn right alongside the students and the students are presenting right alongside the teachers.

I am just dying to try this in BISD.  Any takers?!  :)