Spotlight Sessions

Wesley Fryer, Director of Education Advocacy (PK-20), AT & T Oklahoma, accomplished blogger and author, educator, digital storyteller, change agent and former elementary educator shares his insights as he explores how web-based collaborative technologies can enhance opportunities for students to develop digital literacy skills alongside traditional content area knowledge and skills.

Lucienne Sharpe, of Touch the Sky, Ltd shares her passion, interactive learning and therapy for students of all special needs, gifts and talents. Lucienne is a well-trained and experienced international advocate of innovative techniques that enhance student communication through the application and use of the performing arts. Lucienne has been working with students with learning differences for 40 years.

Learn practical uses and strategies that

• build student engagement and communication
• increase inquiry and student research opportunities and skills
• utilize the community as a classroom
• instill life-long learning skills among students

DiBlasi discusses strategies and tips that appeal to the learning preferences and communication needs of digital learners, while at the same time honoring the traditional practices and assumptions related to teaching, learning and assessment.

Explore unique, real-time online group activities and collaborative techniques for the live classroom. Look at innovative learning activities and facilitation approaches that harness a group’s collective energy to achieve a learning objective in a social meaningful way.

Join Deneen Frazier Bowen as she shares facts and demographic data gleaned from research, interviews, and observations. Deneen brings to life the contextual reality of today’s students as she portrays student characters, drawing on her in-depth knowledge of the digital generation.

Discover new applications and resources that

• foster collaboration and communication in the classroom.
• build engaging collaborative learning environments.
• provide unique learning experiences for student.

Outlines simple strategies that educators can use to transform the learning experience, while at the same time addressing the new emphasis on teacher and administrator accountability. Looks at current teacher practices and explains why they are becoming increasingly out of synch with our changing world.

Learn practical techniques to establish successful partnerships:

• Minimum requirements for a successful partnership
• Process of creating a successful parntership
• Challenges to building activities into courses

Learn practical uses and strategies that

• Foster collaboration and communication in the classroom
• Build engaging collaborative learning environments
• Apply a variety of free collaborative tools