Dominic P. Tremblay

I’m finally getting around to debriefing on the MacWorld 2011 Expo held in San Francisco this past January. Having attended last year’s event, I was looking forward to seeing a showcase of the latest Mac/iPhone/iPad accessories, applications and devices, as well as attending some demonstrations and workshops on getting the most out of these new technologies.

As an educator, it was a special honour for me to attend as an international guest member of the CUE (Computer Using Educators) team. CUE is a US-based nonprofit educational group whose goal is to advance student achievement through technology. As part of this team of dedicated K-12 educators, I had the opportunity to make a contribution to the K-12 Education Strand at MacWorld. It was also my chance to be a “Rock Star,” since the teachers of CUE were all given this honorary designation during the event! The night before the big event, the Rock Star teachers all convened for a celebratory dinner, and I got to know some very inspirational educators who are truly pushing the boundaries of technology in the classroom.

I may be biased, but I really thought the Education Strand was the most engaging and exciting of all the disciplines featured at this year’s event. I was so impressed by the sense of energy and fun the group created through audience participation and community-building activities. For instance, attendees were encouraged to use Twitter to answer questions and share comments, with contributions being instantly displayed on a giant screen. Audience members could also play games together through their Twitter accounts or using the SMART Response PE Interactive Response System for Education. These new SMART systems use handheld wireless remotes to create and administer tests and manage, track and evaluate the results. Thanks to the event’s generous sponsors, game participants got to compete for some pretty incredible prizes, such as a wireless web cam, a full class set of SMART Technologies Senteo clickers and more.

The event that garnered the most attention was an Iron Chef–style competition called “Iron CUE,” in which the contest creations were cutting-edge tech tools instead of haute cuisine. As a special international guest, I was given the honour of adjudicating this lively and fast-paced event. The CUE participants were split into two teams—representing Southern and Northern California—and given just 15 minutes to use technology to solve a specific problem. This year’s challenge was to create an online professional learning community (PLC) to encourage teachers in the same school to share learning, collaborate with and support one another. As with the Iron Chef, each group had to incorporate a “secret ingredient”: the secret ingredient being that the online tools used to create the PLC had to be free.

In a desperate attempt to sway me, both teams resorted to flattery, with one team including my photo on their website, and the other team adding my Twitter name to theirs. In spite of these temptations, I kept my objectivity, and ultimately chose the Southern Cal team, who built a simple, elegant solution in record time using some pretty amazing teamwork.

I came away from this event with some great memories, new connections with tech-savvy educators across the border, and a renewed excitement for the potential of this year’s new wave of online and mobile tools inside the classroom and beyond.

Many thanks to Jon Corippo, who did an incredible job of organizing the event. I can’t wait to attend one of the CUE Rock Star Teacher Summer Tech Camps!