Presentation Description: Join Dr. Z in the journey 6th graders took into the Crazy World of Rube Goldberg. You will experience the fun they had developing complex chain reactions to accomplish simple tasks. Using a Problem-Based Learning format, these students explored physics while they built contraptions to drop a marble in a bucket, dip a chip in salsa, pop a balloon and even create a banana smoothie. Dr. Z shares how the inventors expressed their experiences through KidBlog and how these activities aligned with Common Core Standards in Science, Technology and Writing. It’s 20 minutes of fun and exploration into exciting ways to learn.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://tinyurl.com/Rube6thGradeResources

Additional Information:
Dr. Z Reflects – http://drzreflects.com

Presentation Description: To create high quality STEM learning opportunities several factors must be considered. Is it hands-on? Do students have the opportunity to collaborate? Is significant content and conceptual understanding uncovered through the activity? Join us as we talk about these factors and others, their importance, and explore STEM activities that exhibit them at work.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://rethinkredesign.org/stuff-weve-done/k12-online-2014/

Presentation Description: Being a maker educator often requires developing a new mindset; a new set of skills and roles. Discover, through this presentation, first, why we are in a perfect storm for maker education in both formal and informal learning environments, and second, through a self-assessment, the characteristics and qualities of the mindsets of an educator who is embracing making education.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://usergeneratededucation.wordpress.com/2014/10/08/the-mindset-of-the-maker-educator/

Presentation Description: This presentation will illustrate how I transformed my library, creating a learning space for exploration and invention. The video will highlight the steps I took to make this change, from rearranging the physical space to the creation of an after school STEAM club/MakerSpace. I will explain the rationale behind my plan, objectives that guide the program, and explain what STEAM means to my students and me. I will share the planned calendar of topics, resources for activities, and show how easy it is to create a space and time for students to explore and engineer. I will also include tips for gathering materials. The video will include links to files, photos, and audio reflections from teachers and students.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://techtinkering.weebly.com/k12-online-conference-resources.html

Additional Information:
http://techtinkering.weebly.com/

Presentation Title: Coding/Making/Writing with Connected Learners

Presentation Description: An overview of how to use Mozilla’s Thimble with students for creative approaches to writing. Thimble allows for easy website building and fun remixing of existing website templates. Following the success of Webmaker events with teens at the public library, Melissa Techman shares her forms, templates and methods so you can experiment with Thimble in the classroom. This creative approach to writing builds interest in coding and allows students of all abilities to have fun and experience collaborative and connected learning. While intended for grades 6 and up, the approach and the templates can be simplified for younger students.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://mtk12online.weebly.com/

Presentation Description: The Tinkering Studio is a public space within the Exploratorium in San Francisco, where we design opportunities for people to “think with their hands” in order to construct meaning and understanding through STEM-rich learning experiences. In this talk, I’ll touch on some of the underlying ideas behind this work and hopefully show why a constructionist theory of learning is ideally suited to maker-centered education.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
http://tinkering.exploratorium.edu/coursera

Additional Information:
http://tinkering.exploratorium.edu/blog

Presentation Description: If we truly believe that teachers teach how they are taught, then our professional learning should look radically different than most inservices and workshops currently do. This presentation outlines one approach to helping teachers learn and experience what a MakerSpace might look like inside either a STEAM classroom or as a club outside the regular school day.

At our STEAMmaker camp, students and teachers become true learners, as they experience a hands-on learning environment unlike their traditional school classroom. Here, they get to think, ideate, prototype, test, and publish answers to challenges that are issued to them, all while working on self-designed challenges. Students and teachers work in teams as parallel learners to create solutions to various challenges, all while fostering a sense of independence and joy inside collaborative learning. And as a result, both students and teachers develop understanding and leadership to be a core member of a STEAMmaker movement in their own schools/districts, should they choose to take summer camp back home!

If you want students and teachers to learn how to be risk-takers, to be hands-on tinkerers, to be active builders and growers, then you want a STEAMmaker Camp.

Presentation Description: Join Sam to talk about how we can start in k-2 teaching students to program using blockly code. Sam will demonstrate using Scratch Jr and Hopscotch on the iPad to support content area learning.

Link to presentation’s supporting documents:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1nfS5lcuEprkIZHMV0jWiU3H4_Wl8Pe8MshXJIWElj5I/edit?usp=sharing

Credit: Jen Collins

There are many people and organizations who contribute to making K12 Online happen. Here are a few we’d like to acknowledge:

• Naomi Harm for flyer creation
• Edublogs and James Farmer and Sue Waters for hosting
• Learning Revolution and Steve Hargadon and the team at Connected Educator Month for helping with publicity
• Arizona State University and AZ IDEAL iTunesU for hosting our  videos in the K12 Online Collection
• Our tireless committee members
• All our presenters
• Everyone who’s helped spread the word about K12 Online through social media and their other networks

Thanks to all of you for making this special event possible.