Once (and only once) a year do teachers come together from all sectors of education to share ideas and resources on teaching. You don’t get paid for attending, you don’t get a day off school and it doesn’t count as in-service training (although that wouldn’t be a bad idea) so the only teachers you will meet there will be enthusiastic and hard-working. Just like you.
CESI (the Computer Education Society of Ireland) is holding its annual conference next weekend (5th and 6th of February) in Portlaoise. There will be a highly-energised Teachmeet on the Friday night followed by a full day of presentations, workshops and seminars on Saturday.
Teachers are renowned for hoarding their resources, but here you are quite likely to see the swapping of usb files and at the very least the swapping of email addresses.
The theme for this year is Creative Technology in Challenging Times but don’t worry if you are a complete novice when it comes to technology – the very fact that you will make the effort to turn up means that you are a teacher keen to see what’s out there, and that’s all you need.
To find out more (including how to register, but you can also just turn up on the day), see the CESI conference page at http://cesi.ie/conference-2010
And to find out more about how CESI can help you why not sign up to their discussion forum (it now contains over 400 members, again from all sectors of education) at http://cesi.ie (look for the “Join the CESI mailing list” heading at the bottom of the page).
See you there.
Think for Yourself 
