POPtalk

**UPDATE – September 2011. We no longer offer sponsorship for TeachMeets, sorry. You can read why on our post “Moving on from TeachMeet sponsorship“. We will honour all sponsorship commitments made before 26th September 2011.**

We get asked a lot to sponsor TeachMeet events, which we are very happy to do, where it’s appropriate and we’re able to constructively contribute.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidgilmour/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

There’s nothing official or organised regarding sponsorship or external support. TeachMeets are generally non-commercial and we respect that.

But, still, we also recognise that it’s difficult to get people to an event and raise awareness.

So if you are holding a TeachMeet, no matter how big or small, no matter where or when, and need a bit of help we want to offer a simple BrainPOP UK sponsorship package, if you want it. The following is ALL included in the sponsorship:

Your very own version of our TeachMeet movie

We will create you one of our special TeachMeet movies starring Tim & Moby to help advertise your event and describe TeachMeet to those who want to know what it’s all about.

We’ve adapted the movie for the Scottish Learning Festival, Blackpool (twice as their first was so successful!), Perth, Yorkshire and Humber, Hampshire, Norwich, Clackmannanshire, Northamptonshire, East Lothian, Falkirk and…well, you get the idea. To make the movie we need to know:

• The name(s) of the organiser(s)
• The location and date/time of the TeachMeet
• Any hashtag you have created e.g. #teachmeet
• A link to your TeachMeet wiki page
• An address to send the goodies to
• Expected numbers (just have a sensible guess)

We can usually get it ready in a few days and you can then embed it into your TeachMeet wiki page or in whatever digital space you are using to promote your event. Normally the movie is played at the beginning of the TeachMeet to set the scene and help anyone new to TeachMeet understand the concept. Remember to turn up the volume!

Freebies*

We can also supply you some goodies to give out to attendees. How you use them is up to you – maybe as a reward for attending or an incentive to go in the first place. If you don’t want these freebies please let us know.

• Badges: We now have a special TeachMeet badge that we will always supply as part of the sponsorship. This is only available to people who have attended a TeachMeet and should be worn with pride!
• Poster: We can send you a batch of posters to give out as gifts. They make any classroom wall look good.
• Mugs & Tshirts: As a special gift the organiser(s) will get a much coveted BrainPOP UK mug or VIB tshirt.

A prize for a competition

We know that you want as many teachers as possible to come along and experience this unique form of CPD. So we’re happy to offer your attendees the opportunity to win for their school 6 month’s free years access to BrainPOP UK.

We will supply you free trial sign up cards that attendees must fill in to get entry into the competition. The organiser then picks one of those cards out of a hat and that school wins a free subscription. Hoorah! Everyone else at least gets a no obligation free trial to check out BrainPOP UK.

So that’s our sponsorship package for TeachMeets. All you have to do is contact us. We can also put you in touch with other TeachMeet organisers who have run successful TeachMeets whose brains you can pick for advice and tips, though the community in general is very helpful.

All we ask in return is that you add BrainPOP UK as a sponsor (logo and homepage link ) to your Teachmeet page/blog/communications etc where appropriate.

Other places you might want to approach for support include Scholastic, Rising Stars , 2Simple and Vital CPD, who, amongst others, have all historically shown strong support  for TeachMeet events.

*All freebies are subject to avaliablity and we reserve the right to amend the pack without notice. But we will try our best to provide a good selection!

Related Posts:

• Moving on from TeachMeet sponsorship
• Help us pick!
• Sharing the TeachMeet Takeovers from BETT 2012
• BETTer late than never – highlights from BETT 2012
• Doing the conga with King Moby

Last night, something rather special happened. Teachers came together from all over Oxfordshire to transform the way that they plan at the first ever TeachMeet Fishbowl.

This all began in a meeting between James Bird (Oxfordshire Primary LA Advisor) and me (BrainPOPper), at the Rusty Bicycle, where we talked for a long lunchtime (over soft drinks!) about the joys of being inspired by innovation, at events like TeachMeet, and the challenge of making that transferable to the schools and teachers we worked with.

James had the idea to use an adult training method (andragogy) called Fishbowling, where a small group take on the role of ‘experts’, and engage with a real life problem, whilst a wider group watch and contribute. This is how it was set out (see the annotated version on Flickr courtesy of Leon Cynch for more detail):

http://www.flickr.com/photos/learn4life/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

This event needed to focus on the one aspect that all the TeachMeets, conferences, and workshops we had been to sometimes lacked: practical steps to improve planning.

How could we change that moment when a teacher sits with a blank sheet of paper – and turns it into a plan!

We hoped for three outcomes:

1 – That participants would be able to get engaged with planning in a way that they could take away ideas to apply to their schools immediately

2 – That we would inspire each other and share new ideas, tools, resources

3 – That we would create a local and powerful learning network which would have life after the event.

James has written more about what we planned and hoped for in a blog post:  TeachMeet Fishbowling

I set up a Ning space, we invited folk in, most of whom had not really used online spaces in this sort of way. Fishbowls are not about ICT or technology led. We made the event invite only and kept the proceedings closed (not streamed) because we wanted to test this model and allow people to be open and honest, without fear of colleagues, parents or looking daft!

I invited Tom Barrett and Dawn Hallybone to help us, as great friends of BrainPOP UK (they are both VIBs!) and experienced TeachMeeters (Tom was so inspired that he filmed himself at the beginning of his planning process for his Superheroes topic last term) and Leon Cych, of Learn 4 Life offered to come and video the event.

We were also lucky to be joined by Mark Berthelemy who has years of experience making CPD work, both on and offline.

The hardest thing to do in any walk of life, is to bring about behaviour change. Even in those who want to change, or believe in it, acknowledge that making change happen is difficult and rare.

Last night we got some talented and skilled practitioners to share, think, and do in a slightly different way. We set in motion something that was unique in all our experiences of CPD.  Questions of how we sustain this, and the ways this fits with policy and in practice are hard. But I have no doubt in the abilities of the people in that room to find the answers – together!

Is this way ‘better‘? Can I make a value judgement of the efficacy of this model, just because people did something different from normal? I know that we captured the ‘Aha!’ moments that make traditional TeachMeets so inspiring, but also grounded them in practice. We demonstrated the power of social learning – something we all believe in with children – and established network based on trust.

BrainPOP UK was involved because we believe in local CPD networks. Which is why we support TeachMeets.

There are lots of great posts already, talking about last night, if you want to read more about it, try these starting points:

• http://twitterfall.com/?trend=%23tmfishbowl!%231F3547
• http://buzzinged.wordpress.com/2010/02/25/reflecting-on-teach-meet-fish-bowl/
• http://www.learningconversations.co.uk/main/index.php/2010/02/25/reflections-on-the-oxford-teachmeet-fishbowl?blog=5

Finally, can I thank:

• Oxfordshire County Council who supplied the the venue
• Tim & Moby for providing the food, drink and nibbles.
• Joe, Victoria W. ,  Lizzie, Rebecca (who came despite being in the middle of an Ofsted inspection), Mike, Row, Joan, Dawn, Mark, Tom, Nick, Matt, Leon, Carol, Carolyne, Victoria S. , Amy, and James (did I miss anyone?).

Related Posts:

• Scotland gets POPteach
• Fishbowling… a night to remember!
• Small is beautiful
• April is National Pet Month
• Lesson ideas and activities for Starship BrainPOP