Successful First Day for the 3rd Annual Colorado Summit on Blended Learning

Almost 100 people discussed opportunities and barriers to blended learning at the first-of-three Colorado Summit on Blended Learning (CSBL) meetings this year.

The day was designed as a conversation for practitioners around what digital learning they’re able to integrate into the classroom and the opportunities that are still out of reach. It took place at the University of Colorado Denver, and for the first time, the conference was available live via webinar too, opening access to educators across the state.

The CSBL opened with a keynote by Anthony Kim of Education Elements, who shared some how his company is trying to streamline student logins, teacher access to data, and content platforms for blended learning.

Kim prompted participants in the room and online to design their own blended classroom, based on a number of diverse student profiles. DK Executive Director Tony Lewis and Brent Wilson from the University of Colorado Denver School of Education and Human Development paired up to sketch a rough blueprint (photo below).

 
Every group drew pictures on chart paper and then taped them to the wall for display. The ideas included a wide array of classroom designs, most concerned with creating different modalities for learning (one example below).

 
After the small group exercise, four teachers from across the state gave presentations on how they use blended learning in the classroom. Science teacher Kristin Donley showed the variety of tools she uses to instruct Monarch High School students; Jennifer Goodnight talked about the flipped classroom and how that works for her at Bennett High School; Buena Vista School District’s director of online education Mike Post presented, followed by Jason Shiroff from the Odyssey School in Denver.

The day closed out with a discussion around barriers to blended learning, moderated by Amy Anderson, assistant commissioner for the Colorado Department of Education’s Division of Innovation and Choice.

The foundation is compiling notes, links and other information from the day’s activities. We will post it all next week, along with a link to the webinar in full, where you can catch up on everything that was said at the blended learning summit!

Plus, save the date for the next two events: April 24, when we’ll convene to talk about blended learning quality, and May 17, when the focus will be policy.