GA Conference 2019 - Post #14 - Thursday

A chilly start, but ideal for walking across the city as it woke up.
A busy day ahead, and it started with what is always a highlight of the conference: the session by Sharon Witt and Helen Clarke. In previous years, we have explored the journeys of Eric, and the geographies of pigeons and gnomes. This year we were set to go batty.
As always, Sharon and Helen wove a tapestry of ideas around the geographies of bats, which was excellent. In the next room, Tim Marshall and Alex Standish had drawn a large crowd.


Image copyright: Shaun Flannery / Geographical Association

I was interested to catch up with
This was followed by a session that I was running with TUI, around the work I'd completed with  others to create the Better World Detectives resources(see previous blog posts for more details on this session, and an exciting competition with a chance to travel to Mexico)

David Alcock from Bradford Grammar School did a session on optimism and progress, to counteract some of the more negative geographies we see in the news regarding climate change.

Over the morning break, Susan Pike - current GA JVP brought the Eccles Cakes, and a packed area of the dining hall saw a Twitter Tea and Cake session, with people putting a face to a name or a Twitter handle. Over the conference as a whole, I gained 30 new followers, so a reminder that various forms of networking are possible at the conference.

Over lunch, I was asked to chair a session by NQT Oliver Boyde, who shared some ideas that he had been trialling using technology in the classroom. There was a positive atmosphere in the room, and it was good to see that Oliver's PGCE tutor Sue Bermingham had come along to give her support too. A reminder that we need to encourage NQTs to participate in the conference.

I finished the conference with a look back at some opportunities for 'writing the world' from Liz Taylor.
I left slightly early as I had a long journey back to Norfolk, ready to head for New York, the next day. Watch out for more New York posts coming up over the next week or so.

Details on how you can get involved in the next GA Conference will appear in a post later....

And more session downloads are now appearing over on the GA website.

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