What Is EdCamp?
The ultimate un-conference, EdCamp is a national movement that recognizes teacher expertise and encourages teachers to participate in educational reform. EdCamps offer an opportunity for local K-12 teachers to gather and problem-solve the issues they face in the workplace. The philosophy of EdCamp assumes that teachers together have great expertise and can solve issues as wide ranging as curriculum difficulties, classroom management, and providing instruction in resource-deficit environments. Consequently, EdCamps do not feature keynote addresses or imported experts. Instead, EdCamps are structured to allow teachers an opportunity to think with others about the issues that they face and solve them within the realistic circumstances of their professional lives. Typically EdCamps follow this basic structure:
--An opening time (generally an hour) when teachers mingle and raise issues they face in their professional lives. Topics that arise in the course of these conversations are then forwarded to the EdCamp facilitators who look for similarities or patterns and organize breakout sessions based on the topics. This time is known as “Building the Board.”
--Topics for break-out sessions are identified and assigned a space to which interested participants gravitate. Teachers meet in the sessions to share ideas with the goal of developing several possible solutions so that teachers can return to their schools with some practical ways forward in overcoming that hurdle.
--A gathering of all participants at the end that celebrates the discoveries and solutions offered in the break-out sessions.
MTWP EdCamp Schedule:
8:00-9:00 a.m. Build the Board and breakfast snacks
9:00-9:15 a.m. Welcome and announcement of break-out sessions
9:15-10:30 a.m. Break-out Session #1
10:30-10:45 a.m. Break with snacks
10:45-12:00 a.m. Break-out Session #2
12:00-12:30 p.m. Closing and door prizes
What EdCamp Isn't
EdCamp is not a gripe session or a pity party about the circumstances of our professional lives.
EdCamp is not a requirement or obligation that one fulfills by sitting in the back of the room and grading papers.
EdCamp does not insist that there is only one right answer.
Benefits of EdCamp
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Teachers network across schools and districts.
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Teachers share the expertise that is often developed in the isolation of individual classrooms.
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Teachers have their professional expertise validated as their ideas are confirmed and valued by other professionals.
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Teachers solve problems that hamper their teaching and their students’ learning.
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Teachers leave EdCamp rejuvenated and with more confidence in their professional abilities.
Certification for PD hours available.