invited guests

Our third invited guest at ULearn08 is Tony Ryan, from Australia. Tony was a popular presenter at ULearn06 and ULearn07 and we are delighted to have him back as part of our conference this year. Tony will present a large group session during breakouts 1-4 and a smaller workshop in breakouts 5-7.

Transformational teachers

For some, the present exponential rates of educational change are a curse designed to overwhelm their lives. For others, this rapid reshaping of schooling is a powerful opportunity for redesigning the very essence of the classroom.

For those who are intent upon creating the very best that education can offer, this practical and entertaining session will clarify some of the facilitative skill sets necessary for redefining the 2014 classroom.

These transformational learning environments will be facilitated by teachers who have developed personal and professional skills for:

1. initiating valued-based and ethical learning opportunities
2. encouraging creative thinking intent within everyday interactions
3. offering solution-focused inquiry-based units of work within personal, community and global contexts
4. providing students with the capacity to manage their own learning and their self.

Most importantly, this session will help you to believe in the worth and power of teaching.

A former teacher, Tony Ryan is an educational consultant and writer, and offers professional support to school organisations throughout the world on issues such as change leadership, lifelong learning and quality classroom practice. He has presented numerous keynotes and workshops at state, national and world conferences in the past 10 years.

He has been engaged as a teacher-in-residence in over 400 schools throughout several countries. In this role, he teaches extensively, and offers guidance to teachers with their everyday practice. Many of his ideas used in his work can be found in his blog at http://tonyryan.edublogs.org

Tony is a prolific author of books on effective thinking and learning. These books include The Ripple Effect, Thinkers Keys for Kids, Mindlinks, Brainstorms, Thinkfest and The Clever Country Kits. His latest CD-Rom features a comprehensive update of Thinkers Keys. His site at www.tonyryan.com.au contains numerous free downloads of his material.

Tony is a director of School Aid (www.schoolaid.org), a non-profit organisation that co-ordinates post-tragedy fundraising and social justice programs within 10000 schools around Australia.

We are pleased to have Dr Rosemary Hipkins, a special invited guest, present at ULearn08. Rose will be presenting during breakouts 5 and 7. Her abstract and bio are as follows:

Assessment issues associated with the implementation of the New Zealand Curriculum

Rose Hipkins, New Zealand Council of Educational Research (New Zealand)

In this talk, Rose will address debates about assessment of newer aspects of the curriculum – in particular the key competencies. Should we do this, and if so, for what purpose? She will link these questions to the challenge of so-called “21st century learning” and introduce some possible strategies for addressing assessment issues that arise.

Dr Rosemary Hipkins is a chief researcher at the New Zealand Council for Educational Research. She works in a range of projects, and is currently serving on two national advisory panels with a focus on assessment, as well as another two focused on New Zealand’s curriculum reforms.

Rose has a strong interest in science education, and is currently working on two assessment projects in this area. These are part of a future-focused programme of work investigating how the OECD key competencies (as described in the revised national curriculum) might help transform teaching and assessment practice.

We are thrilled to have Bruce McIntyre give a response to our first keynote by Will Richardson and Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach. Bruce will be speaking on behalf of the business sector as part of our collaborate key theme.

Bruce is also one of ULearn08’s invited guests and will be giving a presentation entitled For which master? His workshop’s abstract is as follows:

Education is increasingly structured to serve the economic construct. We know that economic wealth is centred in a few hands, while our planet is being stripped of its life support systems and species, while our environment is rampantly toxic and stressful, while people are turning off or lashing out. What role does education NEED to play in today’s world if humanity is to have a desirable future?

Bruce McIntyre is known for starting Macpac at age 19 in 1973. Macpac became one of New Zealand’s early export success stories. Today, its innovative, high quality products can also be found in shops and mountains around Australia, UK, Europe, Scandinavia, USA, Japan and Asia.

In the late 1980s, disillusioned with traditional business culture, Bruce instigated a prolonged cultural and organisational reform project which transformed the workplace into an open, highly participative, team-based, human-oriented environment. These reforms were presented at the two Workplace NZ conferences.

Currently, Bruce is working on education reform, developing a model school, which has the intention of developing the innate, holistic potential of every student. Bruce comments that, “current education is openly focused on providing workers for the economy. But the base cause of our social, environmental and economic woes is that our society limits human potential to an estimated 10% of its capacity - the other 90% of us is shut down.”