Emanuel School hosts two innovative conferences for educators
Sydney’s Emanuel School has hosted two educator conferences attended by over 120 teachers from all over NSW.
Delegates
It was an inspiring few days at Emanuel School, with two educator conferences hosted and attended by over 120 teachers from all over NSW.
The Project Zero PuzzleMeet saw like-minded educators openly sharing educational challenges and collaboratively solving issues such as recognising and encouraging critical and deep thinking in the classroom.
The Project Zero Sydney Network (PZSyd) is a network of Sydney educators inspired by Project Zero ideas from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Emanuel School is one of two Jewish Schools on the Steering Committee, led by Deputy Principal (Teaching & Learning) K-12, Adam Majsay, who is also one of the founding members of the PZSyd Network.
Adam commented: “PuzzleMeet is such an inspiring and innovative professional learning event. Having teachers from so many different contexts come together to share insights gleaned from their experience and to learn from each other really highlights what teacher professional development can be like. Our guest facilitator, Cameron Paterson, from Shore School, captured it so succinctly – ‘the knowledge is in the room’ – and that knowledge was so generously shared. One of the participants summed it up perfectly when he said, “It’s actually a gift to have that feedback from your peers”.
The Project Zero Sydney Network Steering Committee, comprising nine schools, continues to share their passion for education with others by providing free professional learning opportunities to teachers in public and independent schools in NSW. In 2020, Emanuel School will host the Project Zero Sydney Network annual conference.
Another exciting opportunity at Emanuel for educators was the iTaLAM Hebrew and Jewish Studies Conference for Hebrew teachers. iTaLAM, is a leading developer and implementer of cutting-edge, technology-supported curriculum for teaching Hebrew language and Jewish heritage. The organisation invests in teacher training, ensuring that educators working with the curriculum are familiar with the material and motivated to ensure its success in their classrooms.
Hagit Bar-On, Head of Hebrew Years K – 6 at Emanuel School and the iTaLAM liaison in Australia and New Zealand, worked with iTaLAM to organise the day to ensure that Hebrew teachers are given the opportunity to collaborate and provide students with engaging, dynamic and creative lessons. She hopes it is the beginning of an ongoing relationship between the Hebrew and Jewish Studies teachers at schools throughout Sydney and was thrilled with the interactive participation of attendees through the day.
Attendees of both conferences provided positive feedback, expressing how the conferences provided them with tools to optimise their student’s learning experiences.
