I’m just home from Austin, Texas after attending the 2018 Worldwide Apple Distinguished Educator Institute. I had a wonderful time and I’ve so many thoughts in my head that I’m sure there will be many blog posts this week!
Last year I had the absolute delight and privilege of being welcomed into the Apple Distinguished Educator programme, a member of the class of 2017 (which I’m sure I will say is the best class ever once a new class comes in behind us!) Attending my first event in Windsor last July was utterly brilliant. It was amazing being surrounded by the people who are the ones like me in their schools. The ones who are excited about innovations that will make a difference to the learning and teaching in their classrooms and settings, the ones not afraid to fail up as they try to make a difference to their pupils. The buzz of meeting a group of like minded educators from parts of EMEIA was immense. I had found my tribe, it really felt like coming home.
At the start of July I messaged Simon Pile (@mrpielee) , my board member mentor from 2017 and now friend, to ask if he had any advice for a worldwide institute newbie. His reply was “simply be prepared to have a lot of fun!” It was a pretty good tip to be honest!
If going to London felt like coming home to family, going to my first (hopefully) worldwide ADE Academy felt like a family reunion. Having the opportunity to meet with ADEs from other classes and regions and those from my own class of 2017 who went to a different Academy from my was brilliant.
The theme for the Institute was Everyone Can Create and it permeated through every facet of the week. Everywhere you looked there were people sketch noting, magic moving and animating line drawings, using the tools we were exploring to release their most creative selves. If you want to see, look on Twitter and search the hashtags #everyonecancreate #appleEDUchat and #ade2018
The showcases shared inspirational stories of creative learning from all over the world, presented in the most creative of ways, a magical hand drawn keynote from Simon Pile (@mrpielee), to a Hamilton-esque musical showcase from Katie Morrow (@katiemorrow) and a wonderfully seussical presentation from Angela Norman (@85angelao) . I’ve learned that the showcases are a highlight of any ADE event. This year I was particularly glad though that the countdown clock wasn’t ticking down for me! I loved doing a showcase last year but it is very nerve wracking in the lead up to it!
The general sessions where inspiring and eye opening to just what can be done with the updates to keynote and pages as well as GarageBand. I could’ve listen to each presenter for a whole day and still not feel ready for them to end.
The workshops helped give us ideas of how we could bring the learning home to other educators in our schools and communities.
Going to an ADE Institute is not like attending a big educational conference where everything is impersonal and you are just another delegate. We talk about the ADE family and that’s really what it is like. This year I felt it from the moment of registration when an Apple employee noticed I was from Northern Ireland. She mentioned she had met with teachers from Northern Ireland last spring when they were in Hong Kong – I responded, yes, I know, I was one of them! Then at the social media interactive #everyonecancreate wall I was talking to a different member of staff about where I was from. The lady beside me overheard my first name and what region I was from. She turned round and said Pamela Algie from Belfast?! It was Sara Malchow (@smalchow) who I have been chatting with and collaborating with on twitter for the last three or four years. Once the screaming and hugging stopped, we chatted for a little bit and discovered we were in the same homeroom group. Getting to know Sara more in real life was just wonderful.
Learning new things is brilliant at institute but forging friendships and building community is the thing that makes institute truly special. It was an absolute joy to finally meet people in real life who I’ve only spoken to on Twitter, people like Sara Malchow, Dustin Carlson and Gerard Greally.
But it was also wonderful to reconnect with ADEs I met last year in London but hadn’t seen since; Simon, Claire, Rachel, Andrea, Bronwyn, Sari, Lyndsey, Miriam, Catherine, Faye, the list goes on and on!
Meeting new people is also a highlight of a worldwide institute, homerooms where a great way to form new friendships as well as get clarity and support with developing our ADE projects.
Heather, Charlotte, Gillian, Kate, Gillian and Tami- I know we will stay in touch.
Unexpectedly over the week I needed the support of my ADE family. I got news from home on the Wednesday that my dog, Max, had had to be put down. He’d been a part of our family for ten years and recently he was diagnosed as a diabetic, which led to blindness. Unfortunately I had chosen to phone home just after lunch on a WiFi call so was rooted to the spot at the top of the escalators outside the lunch room while I got the news. The support of ADE friends and Apple staff, especially Lyndsey, Sara, Ed and Eanna that afternoon and the days to come made being away from home much easier. Support I wouldn’t have gotten at any other big education conference. ADEs are a family. We hold each other up and cheer each other on, laugh and cry together, we ask challenging questions and spark off each other’s creativity.
I feel like I could share about institute for the longest post ever, but last week we were reminded to simplify simplify simplify so I’m going to post this one overview and deep dive into a bit more detail in thematic posts to follow.
My three word summary of ADE Worldwide Institute is: creative family reunion because while we learnt lots of tips, tricks and workflows really it’s about the spirit of the event- creativity and the community of people that made it special.
MissPCA's Classroom 