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When you have been truogh three days of plenary presentations and workshops from morning to late afternoons and early evenings even, you ask what more can happen now! How much more inputs can I handle! And to use a qote from one of Carolines student in maths: “You teach me maths in a way that makes my brain transpire”! (A big hug to ya´sweet Caroline – we miss you and ICOT misses you. Look at the picture with the dancing ladies – five minutes of fun – no imbarassement at all – you would be disappointed in us! By the way, there were a guy, a man, from Austrailia who performed the song “Sweet Caroline” (Neil Young) and did it great, and of course we all thought of you!) Anyhow, we went to David Perkins and listend to him sharing his thoughts and work on “Educating for the unknown”. I can honestly say that I was not at all in the mood for that, I was to busy worrying about our own workshop. But he was great, had just the right tone in his voice, just the right pace and above all he had a number of points really worth listening to! One of them was about different kinds of gaps in education and learning and another was about the importance of flexpertice. I totally forgot my worries – thank you very much Professor Perkins!
Listening to Perkins and all the other speakers here at ICOT one thing bothers me a lot. I feel as if the direction theese conferences are taking is the total opposite of the one the minister of education, Jan Björklund, and his office and governing are striving at. Do politicians around the world even now about this conference!!? At our school we have for some time now talked about inviting the Minister to see that what he calles “bull bull” (I dont want to write the word for cow-crap, it can be offensive) is what we here at ICOT would call, and again I refer to different presenters: “flexpertice”, “emotional smart”, “somatic intelligence” “succesful intelligence” or why not chumbawamba:-)
By the way – the workshop went well… and for now I will leave you with theese words:
You must be the change you wish to see in the world (Mahatma Ghandi)
Read what others have to say about skola, skolutveckling, Thinking Conference, Pedagogik
…with a Cappuchino!
We are all sitting in the café right now – happy, relaxed ande very pleased with ourselves:-) But after a quick conversation and evluation we are already talking about the agenda for the next ICOT.
happy and relaxed...
Yesterday was really a day of wonderment and awe. Here are a cupple of favorite quotes and comments from some of the best thinkers in the world:
Colin James talked about Adaptive Thinking and used a qoute from Einsein (another of our favourites:-) “The world we have created is a product of our thinking, it can not be changed without changing our thinking”. C. James was fantastic and some of us got a real haleluja moment!
Another fantastic performance was given to us by Glenn Capelli and from him we got a new word: Chumbawamba (don´t you just love the way it roles in your mouth.-), and learnt how to say “I have a magic brain” in sign laguage as he was talking about the importance of Emotional Smart! Thank you for that.
Both John Edwards and James Nottingham talked about Vision and mental models and how cruicial it is that we understand and work with theese things so that we do not delute ourselves as leaders, wether it´s in the classroom as a teacer or in an organisation as a “boss”. Thank you for always pushing us into the pit:-)
Now I must hurry to attend at Art Costa, our absolute number one hero!
Now it´s time for Pelle Holmén and his Peer-Reviwed session titled: ”Improvement of Problem Based Learning with the Aid of Thinking Skills in a Cross-Curricula Teaching Enviroment”
(This text is written in real time experience even if it isn´t published since there´s no inernet connection in the session) As so often the unexpected happens – the presenter preceding Pelle doesn´t show up! But that´s not really a problem for Mr Holmén, that just gives him more time to put up the hexagones and to connect the computer. Right now I´m listening to a wonderful piece of music called ”Frösöblomster nr:8” by the famous Swedish composer Wilhelm Pettersson Berger as background music while the audience enters Pelles session…
Pelle Holmén at the 14th International Conference on Thinking
And now: Take Off! He starts off cautiously but it doesn´t lasts for long. He looks good up there! Like a number one superhero. I´m proud of him. Perhaps I´m too subjective so I turn to the masses and their facial expressions confirm my initial feelings. When Pelle shows a picture of a cute duck on a pond the audiences interest level peaked. As is typical of Pelle he uses analogies to help people understand and in this case the duck is a facilitator. Off course - Finding Humor is important!
Another important Habit of Mind to possess is Thinking Flexibly, which Pelle experience when the “girl-with- the –time-signs” all of a sudden shows him a sign saying that he only got ten minutes left to talk! His professional skills are challenged – trying to manage the session in speed while answering questions and keeping the red thread (quote from Pelle himself). I know him well and is not at all surprised to learn that he did it splendidly!
It´s quite a job to find wireless internet here at KLCC. We found one spot at level 1 but the whole idea of getting you readers to follow us during the conference is harder to get to work than we expected. So here´s what we´ll try to do: we write while we listen and then run down to our spot between the sessions to get to publish it. Hopefully we´ll keep you informed more often than we´ve managed to do so far.
We do have to make one ore excuse. Our English might not be perfect….but still- it´s far better than the translation you will get when we write in Swedish, so you will have to bear with us.
At this moment I´m waiting for Pelles presentation to start. Actually we´re all waiting – because the lecturer before him has not showed up yet.
We´re soon going to update you on what is going on – meanwhile here are som pictures
Marie Pelle and Annika in Kuala Lumpur
We are up and running and the preparations are vigorous! To put thinking into action is the keyword for today. Susan is struggeling with our misspelling and pushes us to think and communicate with clarity and precision. Marie sneaks in small comments and corrections, of course, always striving for accuracy. Pelle is constantly trying to get the rest of us on board by questioning and posing problems. Malin is the glue, gathering data through all senses, and I, Petra – I´m all over the place, running up and down the corridoor.
We can hardly believe this is for real – we´re leaving in two days. Midsummer on an aeroplan – I wonder if Malaysian airlines serves “sill & nypotatis”!?
