Friday night:
Orientation & Introductions - This session was held here at the Mercure Grand Hotel in Warsaw. It was so very nice to finally meet the people behind the photos and biographies I have been reading. I am so honored to be a part of this great group of teachers from all over the world! Everyone brings a wealth of knowledge and a desire to learn more and improve teaching, and that common purpose certainly unites us. I hope some of them will comment here or maybe even "guest blog" for me sometime!
Dinner: After the orientation, we had a buffet dinner. The food has been delicious so far. . .I haven't had anything wild and crazy - it's all just good!
Overnight: I came to my room totally exhausted last night, but by the time I actually got settled in and ready for bed, it was hard to fall asleep. I tossed and turned for several hours, of course until the hour and a half prior to waking up! So, getting up was hard!
Saturday:
Morning: Morning was tough. I had not pre-tested my flat iron with the adapter/converter I have, and I learned this morning that it does not work. Yikes. That wasn't the best start to the day. I guess I'll be trying a new approach to my hair in the morning.
Workshops: We spent the day at the Polin Museum of the History of the Polish Jews today. This morning, we had several workshops dealing with overall approach to using testimony, specifically using the IWitness tool, and integrating technology and promoting literacy via IWitness and Discovery Education. I have sat through MANY, MANY professional development workshops over the years, and these are definitely some of the best sessions I have ever been a part of, and I cannot wait to share what I've learned with my colleagues and students back home.
Here is a video my small group created. The lesson is called "Paper Story" and our prompt was to tell how we got to Warsaw. Our group chose to each tell our own story as part of a greater story. It was fun to see the ways other groups created their projects, too. Unfortunately, I only have a digital copy of mine.
Lunch: We had a working lunch, and i spent some of that time working on a lesson using the activity builder in IWitness. Tomorrow, we are going to do a "shark tank" style pitch of our ideas to the group. I am really glad that I've already been using I witness in my classroom, so I have a pretty good idea of what I'd like to do. I need to work on that a little more tonight. I am excited to introduce my students to the IWitness Video Challenge. I know we have some great students who will want to take advantage of this opportunity.
Afternoon: After our workshops, we spent the last part of our afternoon touring the museum. Please take a look at it. It was one of the most amazing museums I have ever visited. There were so many hands-on exhibits, and there was an amazing level of technological integration. It was a top notch museum! Our guide was excellent, and I really learned a lot about the origins of Jews living in Poland, centuries of life in the region, modern Jewish living prior to World War I, during the interwar period, and after World War II. We didn't spend any time in the Holocaust/World War II area. I am going to include some photos below, but I do hope you'll look around particularly at the exhibits portion of their website. Our tour was somewhat hurried, so I don't feel like I could do total justice.
Evening: This evening, we returned to the hotel and had a nice dinner in the restaurant here. I was able to distribute the gifts from Orbix, and I hope everyone liked them. It certainly was a great project to be a part of!
Tonight: I'm going to wrap up here, get my bags packed and items ready for tomorrow and head off to bed.
On the agenda for tomorrow:
Workshops back at the museum, lunch, and a late afternoon driving tour of Warsaw. We will have to have our bags packed and on the bus first thing in the morning, though, because we will leave from the museum for the driving tour and then directly on to Krakow for tomorrow night.
Again, I cannot fully express how overwhelming it is to be part of such an amazing and talented group of professionals as we work to commemorate this important moment in history and ensure that the past is ever present for our students - and our world - today.
A few pictures from today:
 |
| Buffet lunch today - pasta, grilled chicken, and broccoli soup. |
 |
| The entrance to the exhibits at Polin Museum. There is an interesting story to go along with it, but I will not risk retelling it inaccurately. |
 |
| Artwork in the gallery |
 |
| This is an interacttve table where you cold create your name in Hebrew on a "coin." The keyboard was different, and I was hurrying, so it's not exactly correct, but it's an interesting exhibit. |
 |
| I cannot remember all the detail here, but this was a rendition of a Jewish printing process/company?? |
 |
| A book with illustrations of children learning scripture. |
 |
| One of the most beautiful exhibits was the recreated synagogue. |
Thank you so much for the nice gifts from you and your community! It's great that we are together here in Poland to experience this special educational opportunity! ;)
ReplyDelete