Hāpara: World Class

In 2010, when we piloted the idea of every child in the class having their own netbook and their own Google account, we did not factor in how much more content these engaged and enthusiastic young people would generate! Early estimates were that they were completing three times as much work.

There were two immediate consequences:

The teachers' Google Drives were flooded with documents, and they struggled to locate their own content, let alone sort out the students'.

Too much valuable teaching time was being spent on checking up on basic functions, "Have you shared your Doc with me?" "Do you know where you saved that Doc?"  "Do you remember what you called that Doc?"

Sharing this with a new friend who lived in our part of town, over dinner and red wine at La Vista, we discovered that Jan Zawadski was not only very clever with tech but was also a design thinking genius.  Some jottings and diagrams on a paper napkin (why did we never photograph that artefact?) led to many sessions gathered around whiteboards with groups of teachers and friends of Manaiakalani. And one momentous day Jan delivered a working model of the solution to our challenge - Teacher Dashboard.

Fortunately, I did have my phone handy when Teacher Dashboard went live in Toni Nua's year 7/8 classroom. You can see the record of that moment in the video.

Fast forward a decade, and in December 2019 representatives of the Global company Hāpara, operating in 64+ countries around the world, rocked up to honour us with a recognition for the part we played in the birth and development of Hāpara Teacher Dashboard.

I am deeply honoured to be designated a "Hapara World Class Educator" along with Russell Burt and Lenva Shearing.

Making Learning Visible

This is what spins my wheels :)