One of the best Teachmeets ever, and that is saying something in this past year, as Ireland really gets the hang of it, with TMs popping up in all corners.
Bianca Ní Ghrógain, at the behest of the Head of Education, Seamie O’Neill, sort of “asked” her buddies in CESI, and the Froebel College in Maynooth, to help her organise a TeachMeet Froebel. Well, sure who could refuse?
Even our UK buddy @Dughall (he of the one name, whom we refer to as Teachmeet Royalty) answered a request for a video or Skype call – by flying over for the evening to join us in the Iontas building of NUIM on April 29th.
All nighters were pulled in preparing the “swag bag” (erm, envelope full of mini-Tarsia, Bingo card, Plicker), prompting my own favourite tweets of the week from Leanne Lynch and Bianca:
"Come to Dublin", she said. "We'll have the lols", she said. Felt like TP all over! Great craic 😁 #tmfroebel! https://t.co/kW31x4pbXr
— Leanne Lynch (@leanne_lynch1) April 29, 2015
TeachMeet Prep in action!!
#tmfroebel #edchatie
@magsamond @snicreamoinn @leanne_lynch1 pic.twitter.com/5jzT417gRW
— Bianca Ní Ghrógáin (@bnighrogain) April 28, 2015
This TeachMeet had a great all round buzz – maybe because both presenters and audience were a really diverse mixture of educators from all sectors, with a really great representation from the student body, especially the Dissolving Boundaries elective group. A full list of all presentations and resources will be posted on Bianca’s blog, keep an eye out.
My total and absolute favourite moment of the evening was when 1st yr student Shane Brennan got us all on our feet, as a choir, more or less conducting us by his jumping left and right in a prearranged order….hard to explain, sort of “you had to be there” thing, but really, really cool. Here it is described by @donenda
Activity Based Learning here at #tmfroebel with Shane Brennan – great fun!!! pic.twitter.com/6Rwwvgneub
— Enda (@donenda) April 29, 2015
#tmfroebel we love it!! pic.twitter.com/eyNZRtY8t2
— Enda (@donenda) April 29, 2015
. @magsamond declares Shane's singing activity to be "the coolest thing we have ever done at a TeachMeet" – and she'd know!! #tmfroebel
— Enda (@donenda) April 29, 2015
There were chuckles heard when @_conorgalvin outlined his Bucket List for the student teachers – they recognised almost the same list I had discussed with them some months ago. Hope they take the hints from us two old salts, Conor!
Although Danny McFadden from Donegal is neither a teacher, nor is he even in Ireland at the moment, he is becoming a real TM regular – we ran his @dantartic Antarctic video again, it is simply wonderful.
Special mention to Susan Ni Reamoinn for bringing a whole new dimension to the timekeeper’s role with her plush giant soccer balls! Between that, and Bianca’s strict control of the display computer, there was no dallying of any sort tolerated. Well done to the two of them.
Best words of the evening came during Seamie’s closing remarks, a sort of summary of the whole TM cooperative philosophy “none of us is better than all of us”. LIKE!
I had to leg it home straight afterwards, but I heard rumours of a great apres-meet charity fundraiser at a local establishment, with some superb music. Ah well, next time! ‘Cos without doubt, there will be a next time for #tmfroebel.
The #tmfroebel dream team 🙂 @snicreamoinn @magsamond @leanne_lynch1 @seaoneill #edchatie pic.twitter.com/hRelbWEmOe
— Bianca Ní Ghrógáin (@bnighrogain) May 2, 2015
Leave a Reply