Vermont Fest 2024

In this session, we will explore how artificial intelligence is transforming the educational landscape. Educators will gain access to a practical toolkit filled with AI-driven tools and resources that can enhance and streamline instruction to foster student engagement. As we navigate these new technologies, we'll also discuss the magnitude of change required—rethinking traditional teaching practices, integrating AI into everyday learning, and ensuring equity and access for all students. This session is designed to empower teachers to confidently adopt AI, transforming their classrooms for the future. 

A real challenge, and opportunity, for educators, is to learn how to use AI thoughtfully, safely, and productively.  Hear about concerns and cautionary tales, as well as ways to address the challenges. The primary focus, however, will be on the positive ways you can use AI.  Using AI to summarize the vast AI offerings, this human will add current research, teaching strategies, and a comprehensive overview. See AI apps that will save you time, and quickly create teaching materials that supplement your current curriculum.  Other apps will demonstrate how AI can be used for brainstorming, creating first drafts and editing.  There will be an overview of amazing apps that assist children and adults with special needs.  A collection of anecdotes, research findings, and interviews will provide examples of successful uses of AI for professional productivity, instruction, and activities that will stir your imagination.  Come be amazed, inspired and informed.  Bring your spirit of adventure and sense of humor. At the end there will be a light-hearted summary and raffle prizes.

Do you want to give your students an authentic opportunity to develop their information literacy knowledge and skills? Empower them by making them the teachers at a school-based Media Mentorship event. In this session, you’ll see examples of past events where students have engaged audiences like their families and local senior citizens around how to recognize confirmation bias, consider the impact of social media algorithms, and investigate questionable claims and sources. Leave with the lessons used to prepare students for these teaching moments and event materials you can adapt to fit your community’s needs.

Unfamiliar with the new 24-25 Red Clover list? Looking for ways to spice up your teaching with the Red Clover list in your school? Come to this session to share ideas and hear ideas about innovative ways to use this year's Red Clover list in your setting. From high tech to no tech to everything in between, this session will give you practical ideas to apply to your teaching.

Explore strategies to bring invention design into your learning space (both in and out-of-school) with an introduction to the Young Inventors' Program and Vermont Invention Convention. This K-8 project-based curriculum is divided into grade level units, meets core standards, including the NGSS, and provides hands-on STEM activities to take students on an invention journey through the design process, culminating in a showcase of original inventions that may lead to local and national competitions, including the Vemront Invention Fair on February 8, 2025. Learners will have an opportunity for expression and creativity as they develop and practice higher-order thinking skills. This workshop will provide you with all the resources you need to bring the Young Inventors’ Program to your classroom, after school progrmak, library or other learning enviroment – all for FREE!

Middle school teachers hear it all the time: “You teach middle school? Wow, how do you do it?” Yes, middle schoolers are hormonal, immature, wacky, awkward, and kind of all over the place. But, they are also hilarious, creative, and enthusiastic learners, if you can just tap into their energy and engagement! Join a panel of seasoned middle school librarians to discuss the unique issues facing those of us who teach this age level. We will discuss library collection development, events and activities, and developing engaging lessons.

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Teachers will learn how to effectively use tools like Gemini, ChatGPT, Bing AI, and Magic Schools AI to enhance lesson planning, curriculum development, and classroom instruction. Discover how these tools can work for you to create differentiated lessons, generate lesson summaries that meet IEP accommodations or provide summaries for students who miss class due to illness, adjust reading assignments to appropriate Lexile levels, create newsletters for families, brainstorm project ideas of various DOK levels, and even provide feedback on simple formative assessments.

These tools can also be valuable for generating and proofreading email responses to challenging interactions. Beyond being a search engine or a tool for asking questions, AI can serve as a collaborative partner, helping teachers continually evolve their lessons to be more engaging.

By the end of the session, participants will gain valuable insights into how to make these tools work effectively in their specific educational areas. They will also have a better understanding of why these tools should not be blindly banned and how to incorporate them into lessons to demonstrate appropriate AI usage.

While most students may not have direct access to these tools at school, the reality is that they are likely using them on their personal devices and accounts. As educators, we can teach and model appropriate use of these tools to help students understand how they can be used to assist learning. For example, we can demonstrate how to ask effective questions to AI to get started on a large research project, such as "Gemini, can you provide me with a list of 10 resources to help me understand the use of electromagnetism in MRI machines?"