AFRICA TREND

Recently on 16 – 17 November the inaugural BCX Disrupt Summit took place in Johannesberg, hosted in collaboration with BrainFarm, with the exhilarating Kyalami racetrack as the backdrop. Omashani from SchoolNet attended. The BCX Disrupt website advertised the event saying: “ For the first time in Africa, the world’s greatest thinkers gathered on one stage, giving us a glimpse of a future brimming with opportunity.”   Listen to will.I.am announcing this inspirational event in this short 49 second video There was an impressive lineup of speakers: If you missed the summit but you’re keen to be exposed to some of the great talkss, the best of the videos are available to watch on YouTube at:  http://bit.ly/2A30Z9o    Here are some examples:  BCX Disrupt also has an interesting Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/pg/BCXworld/

The SchoolNet SA conference  covers   a number of themes that focus on digital learning in the Foundation, GET and FET schooling phases. Delegates can expect to attend three days of professional development, hands-on workshops and inspiring keynotes – all of which are all covered in the ticket price, inclusive of te as and lunches and a special birthday celebration event. Whilst we are sure that the conference is going to be excellent value for money, we know that many schools battle to fund professional development for their teachers, and teachers often struggle to fund conference attendance themselves. To try to make the SchoolNet SA conference affordable to as many teachers as possible we are able to   make the following offers: Buy four – get one free SchoolNet SA is offering schools, organisations or groups of teachers who would like to attend the conference discounted tickets. For every four tickets you buy at the same time you will get one free – or put another wa...

We are thrilled to announce that Ollie Bray from the UK, has been confirmed as a keynote speaker for the SchoolNet SA conference. Ollie's career in education spans over twenty years. During this time he has been a teacher, head of department, senior government adviser and school leader. In recent years this has included a four year secondment to the Scottish Government as their National Adviser on Emerging Technologies for Learning. He is currently Headteacher at Kingussie High School located within the Cairngorms National Park. He is also a Member of the Board of Management at Inverness College: University of the Highlands and Islands as well as well as serving on several other advisory boards including the BBC’s Educational Broadcasting Council for Scotland. Under Ollie's leadership Kingussie has been rated one of the most improved schools in Scotland. At a systems level, most recently, he has been responsible for co-designing the deployment of 22,000 Chromebooks across his e...

We are thrilled to announce that Peter Rafferty from the UK, has been confirmed as a keynote speaker for the SchoolNet SA conference. Up until 2016 Peter Rafferty was a primary school teacher and digital leader at Green Park Primary School just outside Liverpool in the UK. As well as being a successful and enthusiastic teacher, he was at forefront of educational blogging in the UK starting the www.greenparkschool.org.uk blog in 2005. This early adoption of technologies to support teaching and learning continued with the introduction of G Suite (then Google Apps for Education) in 2010. With a strong background educational digital strategy, Peter moved from being a full time teacher to teaching part time as well as using his skills and experience to work with schools and teachers in the UK and across Europe. He still supports Green Park on their technology adventures as well as Redgate Primary School in Formby. The continuing and infectious enthusiasm for technology and digital skills ...

The SchoolNet SA ICT in the Classroom conference is just over two months away. If you have not registered yet, please do so as soon as possible to get the discounted price. Please note: Delegates who register before 31 August 2017 will pay R1 000 per person including VAT. Registrations from 1 September 2017 will be at a rate of R1 140 per person including VAT. Presenters, whose speaker proposals are accepted for the conference, will have their conference fee waived. So if you would like to apply to present a session at the conference, please do so as soon as possible as we will be finalising the program by the end of August 2017. Register or apply to be a presenter Don’t delay - register or apply to be a presenter for the SchoolNet SA ICT in the Classroom Conference here .

We are thrilled to announce that Stephen Reid, director and creative genius of Immersive Minds has been confirmed as a keynote speaker for the SchoolNet SA conference. Stephen ​will be presenting the keynote address entitled “Emerging Technology in Education” at the conference opening on 5 October 2017. This session will explore how teachers can use a range of tools including Minecraft: Education Edition, Sketchfab, TinkerCAD, 3DPrinting, VR, 360 cameras, OneNote, 3D Paint and more in creative and engaging ways. Across the three day conference, Stephen will also be offering a number of breakaway sessions including the Problem-Based Learning Course which encourages students to think more critically and to work collaboratively through being faced with solving ill-structured, open-ended, messy problems. Minecraft novices and experts will also have opportunities to explore Minecraft: Education Edition and the “Small South Africa” world which Stephen created for use by teachers and learn...