Keeping up with your own classroom can be a daunting task. Keeping up with the changes happening in education can be next-to-impossible. Education is changing at such a rapid pace. How are teachers supposed to keep up?
One way that you can keep up with innovations and and changes in education is through webinars. Webinars are seminars that are conducted in an online environment. There are webinars offered by companies wishing to showcase new products and organizations wanting to share information. Some webinars are free; others carry registration fees.
The biggest webinar attendance obstacle for most teachers is time. Oftentimes these webinars are held during the school day when teachers are in class.
I have two pieces of good news for you if you're interested in participating in webinars but are unable to attend due to time conflicts. First, some organizations are starting to offer webinars after school hours. iNACOL (International Association for K-12 Online Learning) offers monthly Teacher Talk webinars. These are usually held from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m., allowing teachers to participate. There are fees attached to the iNACOL webinars, but they are usually worthwhile.
The other piece of good news is that many webinars are being offered for archived viewing after the webinar takes place. Webinars are recorded and then offered for playback at your convenience. Time conflicts disappear when you're able to view webinars at your leisure.
There are benefits and drawbacks to viewing archived webinars. The obvious benefit is that you don't have to view them at their originally scheduled time. The drawback is that you can't interact with the presenters or other participants. You'll need to determine how you like to learn and choose the option that best suits your style.
Below are some sites that are offering webinars. Feel free to investigate one or several of them. I'll be updating you on any high-quality offerings that I see. Feel free to leave a comment below or email me (patty.ferrell@omeresa.net) if you see other webinars that you think might benefit online teachers.
• iNACOL (fee)These Monthly Teacher Talk Webinars focus on online learning or online resources for the classroom teachers. Past topics include working online with at-risk students, online resources for various subjects, project-based learning, Google tools, and more.
• eSchoolNews (free)These are held at least twice each month. Past topics have included incorporating technology in today's classroom, becoming a tech-savvy educator, serving students on the Autism spectrum, using mobile technologies, and more. You can view many of the archived webinars on the eSchoolNews website.
• Michigan Virtual University (free)These monthly webinars feature online learning experts from all over. Past topics include how students perform in online courses, the process of processing information, engaging online students, teacher tone in online learning, the National Technology Plan, and more.
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