This week in Canadian EdTech MindShareTV Podcast with Order of Canada Recipient, Educator, Author, Speaker Armand Doucet, Anglophone East School Board, NB

 

Dear Thought Leader,

 

Happy New Year! We're excited about 2023 as we see it as an opportunity to redefine the future of learning to harness the best digital tools and resources to help all students thrive.

 
To support you in achieving your goals, we are thrilled to share our Top 10 EdTech Trends for 2023 that we trust will provide you with a spark or inspiration for the power and potential of technology infused pedagogy. 

 

As we move beyond the crisis, we're witnessing learning redefined. What is the role of the teacher? How do we avoid the 'Great Snapback' to keep moving the innovation needle forward?

 

While I'm a BIG fan of EdTech, we do need to balance and get the kids active and outdoors to nurture their well-being. 

 

We are blessed to live in Canada, one of the most desirable countries in the world! I commend and congratulate you for doing your part in creating a world-class education system. Let's collectively strive to make 2023 the year of deeper learning to help all students thrive! 

I welcome your comments and feedback on our Top 10 EdTech Trends. We look forward to connecting with you through our various service offerings and events for 2023! Please don't hesitate to reach out to me if we can be of further assistance. 

 

We look forward to elevating our game in 2023 to deliver you more diverse perspectives, insights on emerging trends and stories from across Canada and beyond that will help define the future of learning.

 

As part of our mission, we're excited to be hosting our 14th Canadian EdTech Leadership Summit, October 25-26 in Ottawa. Stay tuned for more details! 

 

In closing, as part of our crowd sourcing exercise to craft our Top 10 Trends, I'm grateful to our team, MindShare Report advisory board, C21 Canada family, our valued clients, colleagues and mentors, who inspire my thinking daily. 

 
All the best for a healthy and impactful year of learning ahead! Until next time, keep the digital learning curve steep for 2023! 

P.S. Future of Ed Conference organizers have informed me that there is a large contingent of education and EdTech Colleagues attending FETC, January 23-26 in New Orleans! We are proud to host our 25th CanAm EdTech Celebration of Excellence Reception! Invite below in this email. I hope to see you there!

 

Robert Martellacci, M.A. EdTech
President, MindShare Learning Technology™
Chief Digital Publisher, The MindShare Learning Report™
CEO & Co-founder & C21 Canada™

Follow us on Twitter @MindSharelearn

We've long talked about the power and potential of AI in education. However, only in recent weeks has it taken education by the storm with the popularity of Chat GPT. Not since the launch of the iPad and smartphones has a new tech innovation caught the imagination of students, teachers and industry leaders. While we grapple with the merits of OpenAI and the pros and cons, we found a great teacher resource guide that we've shared below. 

 

What is ChatGPT and why are schools blocking it? Writing essays in seconds is one of its talents. Read more. 

One does not have to look far into the record books to uncover the last ransomware attack in education. Case in point Durham District School board in Ontario. While the breach was acknowledged little more was shared about the District's shutdown for two days with no phones, internet. We are far from being out of the woods yet. The government of Canada has an excellent resource website to support all Canadians through the Canadian Centre for Cyber Security. In the U.S. CISA leads the Nation’s strategic and unified work to strengthen the security, resilience, and workforce of the cyber ecosystem to protect critical services and the American way of life.

 

EdTechs are on notice when it comes to respecting student data privacy as contacting kids or parents is NOT an option.  

 

There is a silver lining, the explosive field of cybersecurity cannot find enough skilled labour to meet the job requirements. Programs like ICTC's CyberTitan help to generate teacher and student awareness in this burgeoning field that has made it into the Top10 of most demanded career opportunities.

 

I'm pleased to share a timely recorded webinar courtesy of C21 Canada and the CIO Alliance below that takes a deep dive into their world and how they are grappling with the challenges of keeping systems fully operational.  

Teachers and students continue to make progress in settling back in classrooms with a lens on well-being. A notable report released by British researchers highlighted the importance of getting outdoors as a means of nurturing well-being and healthy active living. Another trend we see is the emergence of active learning that puts students in game-like activities thereby contributing to healthy active living. The example below highlights a 'Made in Canada' product LU that incorporates learning activities in a school gym. Whether it's yoga, or a nature walk, both teachers and students need to be on the move throughout the day to optimize their teaching and learning abilities. 

The notion of future proofing systems and developing teacher & student skills is vital to our country's success and well-being. 

 

C21 Canada, a not for profit, develops tools and resources to assess school-wide and system-wide indicators of change and growth. Shifting Minds 4.0: Shifting Systems for Learning and Innovation offers new ways to empower change in your organization. 

Having come through the most transformational period in the history of modern education  many new forms and models of online learning emerged. While it wasn't always elegant, learning in a crisis left very few options to sustain learning leveraging digital tools.

With many lessons learned we see online learning as a viable option that will only continue to grow and become more immersive and engaging for the student. 

 

Thanks to Dr. Ron Owston, Dean Emeritus, York University for sharing 7 models of online learning below and to Dr. Tony Bates and ContactNorth for sharing the updated version of the book, Teaching in an Digital Age. 

 

As we shift beyond COVID, developing an agile learning mindset will be key for professors, teachers and students alike to leverage the right tool at the right time. For excellent FREE resources to optimize online professional learning, go to teachonline.ca.

There were great strides made during COVID that inspired school districts to provide students in need with devices and internet access at home, achieving virtually a 1:1 ratio. Sadly, the majority of devices needed to be returned. The Digital equity gap requires creative problem solving to help sustain learning and bridge the digital divide. The key is to design sustainable systems through strategic community partnerships. One creative solution involved a school district in Texas that had poor rural internet access. The District forged a partnership with Elon Musk's StarLink to hover over the region to provide sustained bandwidth for their students. 

 

There's a lot to unpack on this trend. It all begins with knowing your student and leveraging the right tool at the right time to ignite the spark. Engaging students by meeting them where they are most passionate is well documented. STEM and STEAM continue to gain traction in helping prepare the next generation of leaders that will pursue careers where these skills are highly sought after. There are excellent FREE STEM programs such as CanCode. 

 

The exponential growth of eSports in education as a student engagement platform is also gaining a lot of traction in Canadian education, where students are competing as they would on other varsity teams. Dell Technologies has very much been a leader in this space. eSports Canada, recently founded by educators, is a great resource to help you dip your toe into gaming and is focused on K12 and post-secondary. 

 

We're BIG fans of 'Challenge-Based' learning aligned with the UN's Sustainable Development Goals where students solve 'real world' wicked problems locally in their school, community and beyond. With the 15th Canadian Schools of the Future Challenge launching in March, what a great opportunity to engage your students with a chance to WIN awesome tech prizes for your school! 

 

We cannot ignore teacher PD and the role of faculties of education in preparing teachers for the emerging digital classroom. McGill University's launch of the 'EdTech Office' at last year's Canadian EdTech Leadership Summit set a high bar for what's to come across Canada to help support teacher professional learning. 

Digital transformation in education will see an acceleration, driven by cybersecurity challenges and expectations from the customer (educators, professors and students). 

 

This presents interoperability system challenges that will be streamlined through the rise of cloud computing that will presumably also add cost efficiencies. The key is to take the lessons learned from the past couple of years and draw on the expertise of leaders who have transformed other sectors. Organizations like 1EdTech has emerged as a not for profit to support education and edtechs in deploying standards that will streamline processes to allow for great cohesion in deployment of edtech services to teachers and students.