VSTE

Virginia Society for Technology in Education

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Schedule Available for Leading Ed Forum Including Workshop on Equitable Technology Use

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The schedule for the Leading Ed Forum 2019 is available now.

October 9, 2019, includes topics of concern for school division technology directors, presented by leaders from the department of education and school divisions across the Commonwealth. Learn more.

The half day workshop on October 10 will include Dr. Scott McLeod and National Teacher of the Year Rodney Robinson discussing equitable use of technology in classroom instruction. This workshop is designed for school division teams including technology and instruction and time will be provided for in depth facilitated discussion.

Check out the full schedule here: https://lef2019.sched.com/

Register here: https://events.vstereg.org/events/lef2019/

Additional information here: https://vste.org/lef2019/

Data-Informed Equity Workshop, September 26, 2019

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You are invited to join American Institutes for Research, BrightBytes, ISTE and your local peers and colleagues for lunch and discussion on taking a data-informed approach to equity and student success initiatives. The day will feature presentations, panel conversations and interactive sessions focused on equity in early warning systems, approaches to digital initiatives, and understanding the data necessary to support educators and district leaders in this work.

Thursday, September 26
10:00am - 2:00pm
American Institutes for Research Offices in Crystal City
1400 Crystal Drive, 10th Floor
Arlington, Virginia 22202

Register now at: http://pages.brightbytes.net/2019-09-26AIRLunchandLearn_01RegistrationPage.html

*This event is free to attend and lunch will be provided.

VE PLN Meeting, September 23, 2019: Virtual Reality in Schools

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logo for VE PLNWilliam Schmachtenberg, chair of the Virtual Environments PLN, will lead a session about Virtual Reality in Schools on September 23, 2019 at 8 PM ET.

Join us on VSTE Island in Second Life to learn more about how students are learning to create VR content.
The essential questions are what VR will look like in schools. Will it be multiuser or single user? How will students create in VR? Come to the presentation and Bill will share projects that have already been done by students at Franklin County High School just South of Roanoke. We will also discuss Alt Space.

Join the VSTE VE PLN on VSTE Island in Second Life: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Soulgiver/170/144/58

You will need a free Second Life account as well as the free software in order to participate. We recommend setting one up at the Rockcliffe University Consortium's Gateway here: https://urockcliffe.com/reg/second-life/ Download and install the software. While your Second Life viewer (software) is open click this link http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Soulgiver/155/144/58 and voila! Look for an avatar on VSTE Island and say, "Hey, I'm new!" We will take care of the rest.

Rodney Robinson, National Teacher of the Year, Joins Leading Ed Forum 2019

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VSTE and the Virginia Department of Education are pleased to announce that Rodney Robinson, 2019 National Teacher of the Year, will join us as part of the Leading Ed Forum 2019, being held October 9 and 10, 2019, at Longwood University. 

The event is designed to support instruction and technology leaders from CTOs to Superintendents with presentations and conversations related to broadband connectivity, physical security, cybersecurity and student data privacy, digital equity, and 1:1 planning and implementation. Registration is open now.

Robinson will join Dr. Scott McLeod for a workshop on October 10, 2019, to focus the lens of equity on technology and the classroom. Essentially, we will be asking the question: How can we ensure technology is being used equitably across classrooms, schools and divisions to support personalized and culturally responsive instruction? Teams of educators will work with Rodney and Scott to identify their division’s needs and next steps in the area of technology, equity and instruction. 

Rodney Robinson is a 19-year teaching veteran. He became a teacher to honor his mother, who struggled to receive an education after being denied an education as a child due to segregation and poverty in rural Virginia. In 2015, Robinson started teaching at Virgie Binford Education Center, a school inside the Richmond Juvenile Detention Center, in an effort to better understand the school-to-prison pipeline.  

Learn more here: https://vste.org/lef2019

 

Back to School With Minecraft

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Minecraft Place Back to School Event

September 9, 8 PM Eastern time

Join us for the first Minecraft Monday of the new year.  We have a whole new creative world that has  barely been touched! Come build and explore anytime that is convenient for you! 

On Monday, September 9, at 8 PM, we will meet in Minecraft and Discord to play together and talk about our plans for using Minecraft in instruction. We have members who have experience with this and would love to share our experiences and ideas. Tell us what you are teaching and we will  help you construct a Minecraft experience to help your students with mastery!

How to Connect:

In order to participate, you must have a computer Minecraft account from https://minecraft.net/en/ to join. There is a one time fee of $26.95. Download and install the software. Choose multiplayer and add a server: Name VSTE Place IP 69.175.17.26:25565 Our server is protected. If you want to be whitelisted to enter anytime you want to continue building this, or anything else, email Kim Harrison at K4sons@gmail.com from an educational email address with your real name and Minecraft name.

Discord is a voice and screen sharing application that will run on your computer or mobile device. Download and install it for free. Create an account. Many of us use the same name for our Discord account as our Minecraft account to keep things simple. Our channel is https://discord.gg/nDX4mZv It helps us to be able to play Minecraft in one screen and listen via Discord with earbuds or headphones.