Hack the Classroom: September 2016

I was very fortunate to be invited to present at Microsoft's first Hack the Classroom event in January 2016.  It was an inspiring event that involved thousands of educators from around the globe, so I was really excited to register as an online attendee for this fall's event!  With a line-up of passionate presenters sharing today, Hack the Classroom again inspired me.  I'm excited to see what another year will bring in our connected classroom!

John Kao of Edgemakers shared about his passion for innovation in education.  According to their website, "EdgeMakers offers an interdisciplinary practice-based and purpose driven, challenge- and project-based learning system currently delivered to students in grades 5-8, high school, and institutions of higher learning in The United States, Brazil, Colombia and India. It consists of five core courses..."

What is innovation?

Kao asserts that innovation is "developing capabilities to achieve a desired future" which means we need to narrow the gap between what students are learning in school and what they will need to be successful in their futures. 


What if the world's young people learned how to be innovators and entrepreneurs?
At Edgemakers, they ""assert that the idealism and passion of the young are one of the most underutilized resources on the planet."


I strongly agree with Kao's belief that young people can make a contribution to the world and solving our problems.  As an educator, I think an important role of education is to foster the development of citizenship skills.  I make an effort in my own classroom to let students tackle real world problems that they have identified as important and encourage them to take on projects that help others.  Some such projects have included teaching others to code, purchasing school supplies for a partner school in Africa, volunteering at an animal rescue, promoting sustainability with reusable bag use and reducing our classroom trash.  

Lauren Pittman is using the OneNote learning tools to help her students with special needs become more successful readers.  I am definitely going to be investigating these tools further after watching this powerful video featuring her classroom!



Dyane Smokoroski is a Microsoft Expert Educator and Skype Master Teacher.  She believes that teachers are in the business of inspiring students.  She uses Skype to play Mystery Skype, connect with experts and take her students on virtual field trips.  She even took us on a brief Skype virtual field trip to the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences! 

Dyane also allows students from all over the world to showcase their creativity through her Awesome Squiggles collaborative art project.  Registration is closed for this year, but I'm looking forward to "unofficially" trying the project with students and sharing it through social media!

Patricia Romero is using Minecraft to engage her learners at the American Institute of Monterrey .   She shared her tips for using Minecraft in the classroom:

• don't be afraid
• start small
• get organized
• plan ahead
• empower students
• set rules
• build a team
• share work
• grow your program

The 2016 Skype-a-thon is coming up on November 29th and 30th.  Sign up to connect your classroom!

Check out the Hack the Classroom Sway and sign up to watch the recorded webinar on the Hack the Classroom event website. 

Hack the Classroom: An Inspiring Event

Yesterday was one of those incredible days that I'll remember for a long time.  I was inspired.  Excited. Energized.  Motivated.  Proud.  Empowered.  Being invited to be part of Microsoft's Hack the Classroom was awesome! 

I was invited to this education event to share the story of how my students are learning to code.  Microsoft in Education filmed this video featuring our class and it was shared during the event.

I also had the privilege to be in the studio to hear messages from a group of passionate presenters, including Dale Dougherty, Rafranz Davis and Hadi Partovi.  We were also joined by fellow educator, Jeff Kash, whose classroom was also featured at the event.  

Hadi Partovi is the founder of code.org and he spoke about the need for schools to teach computer science.  An increasing number of jobs require people trained in computer science, but very few schools prepare students to enter post-secondary programs in this area.  Hadi shared about the growing Hour of Code movement and the need for us to teach coding as a basic skill.   Listening to his message live at #hacktheclassroom was SO inspiring and being invited on stage with him was a huge honour for me!

Dale Dougherty is founder and Executive Chairman of Maker Media, Inc. which launched Make: magazine and Maker Faire. He shared his passion for the maker movement and encouraged everyone to discover the joyful process of making.  Maker Faires are hosted all over the world and many schools have created a makerspace for students.  Education resources are available at makered.org

Rafranz Davis is passionate about the power of Minecraft in education. She works as the Executive Director of Professional and Digital Learning for Lufkin School District. She shared examples of how schools can hack the classroom and overcome obstacles to using Minecraft in schools.  One of my favourite parts of her message was when she explained how STUDENTS taught teachers how to use Minecraft as part of their district PD!!  I'm signing up for Minecraft tutoring with one of my grade 1 students ASAP :)

Jeff Kash is a middle years teacher who is using OneNote Class Notebooks in his classroom.  Using this tool, Jeff has made a shift to grading for mastery and has helped his students become more organized.  

If you didn't catch the live event, you can still sign up and watch on-demand here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/events/hack-the-classroom/default.aspx

Hack the Classroom: Microsoft headquarters & Rehearsal

 I was fortunate to have some time to explore before heading to the Microsoft headquarters on Friday morning.  It was green and rainy and beautiful as I strolled around Redmond.   Near the end of my walk, I discovered the nearby Sammamish River trail. Unfortunately, I didn't get to see much of it as I had to get ready for my day at the Microsoft headquarters.  

The Microsoft “campus” is like a small city.  Along with the many offices and work areas, there are shops, services and restaurants.  The place is so vast that they run a company shuttle service for on-demand transportation.   Our shuttle got Jeff and I to our first stop very efficiently and we began our tour shortly after.  It was exciting to meet people from a variety of the Microsoft teams.  There seemed to be a really positive energy in each building we toured and it was fascinating to see the variety of workspaces and amenities available for employees.  We visited the Commons Mixer to eat some lunch before meeting with a member of the OneNote team. 

Next, we rehearsed in the studio so we knew where to sit, when to move and how the event would run.  It was pretty neat to see all of the people contributing to this webcast.  It was interesting to witness all of the details involved in a rehearsal for an event like this – I’m not even sure I can explain the process.  Speakers and production team members went over order of events, movements on and off the stage, polling questions, panel questions, microphone levels, camera angles, media to share and so much more.

 After rehearsal, I had enough daylight time left to further explore the river trail I discovered this morning.  The sunshine had even appeared, which made my evening hike even more beautiful! Hiking trail adventures plus walking all over Microsoft headquarters made for a big step day (yes, I’m a FitBit fanatic)… 22,000 steps wasn’t quite enough to win my workweek step challenge, but I suppose it was good for me anyways… 

Hack the Classroom: Arriving in Redmond

I've been fortunate to have a number of extraordinary professional learning opportunities as a Microsoft Expert Educator.  Currently, I'm in Redmond, Washington for Microsoft's Hack the Classroom event.  I'll be sharing about coding in the classroom and there is a great line up of speakers for the event!  You can still register here and stream live on January 30th or watch the recorded event at a later date.

After I arrived in Redmond yesterday, I was fortunate to visit a school in the area, accompanied by Microsoft team member Sonja Delafosse.  I visited teacher-librarian and fellow Microsoft Expert Educator Julie Hembree at Cougar Ridge Elementary School in Bellevue, WA.  Julie and I met at the Microsoft Global Forum in Prague, Czech Republic in 2012 and saw each other again at the 2014 Global Forum in Barcelona, Spain.  Although we follow each other on social media, it was really nice to reconnect in person.  Julie started an amazing project with her students, Books to Africa, and they had just completed a coin drive to pay for postage for their next shipment of books. They were tallying up their funds and celebrating that they raised over $1000!

Check out the beautiful library Mrs. Hembree works in!

It was exciting to visit another school.  It is interesting that, as educators, we often don't have the chance see other teachers and classrooms during school hours, so this was a special opportunity for me.  I enjoyed sitting in on Julie's library class with one of her Grade 3 classes, who were working on researching weather in different locations.  I enjoyed interacting with some of her students and watching them work on their assignment.  I was also able to do a school walkthrough and visit a few other classrooms and classes.  The staff are really positive and welcoming and their school building is very bright, beautiful and open.  They even have a rock climbing wall in their gym since that is a common activity in this area!


Before we headed back to Redmond, we stopped to see the picturesque Snoqualmie Falls. The view was absolutely breathtaking.  

During supper, I met the other educator presenting for Hack the Classroom, Jeff Kash from Kindle the Passion Academy at Maddison Middle School in North Hollywood, California.  Jeff’s classroom is being featured to share his use of OneNote class notebooks.