I have got to say that I've never been to a PE conference before or any type of CPD for PE before, but this exceeded any expectations I had. I did participate in the physedogy online conference before but that was only for a couple of sessions.
I particularly liked the flexibility of the conference, where there were options to choose workshops that were fit for your needs. The main reason I came to the conference was to see and listen to the guys who I have been following for a while online. Andy Vasily and Nathan Horne, helped me so much, through their websites, when I first started teaching IB and although it didn't make much sense to me at the beginning because of the IB terminology, it did once I was familiar with it all. Likewise for Dale Sidebottom and Jarrod Robinson, where I have pinched ideas or used apps based on their recommendations that have improved my teaching practice.
I have a website (still building it), twitter and Facebook, but to tell you the truth, I've been a silent follower with little input to the community. However, I know I need to make more effort reaching out and as Naomi Hartl and Dr. Dean Dudley said in their keynotes, we all have a role to play in developing physical literacy and that should be our purpose as physical educators.
It was also comforting to hear how many people started their online journey because they felt lonely. That's exactly how I felt when I first began, but I only ever researched when it was convenient for myself. I know I need to do more. I've always questioned how these practitioners have the time and energy keeping up to date. After a full day of work, all I want to do is switch off, exercise, eat and sleep, but I suppose this is where passion and dedication is needed.
One of the main reasons I don't contribute to the online community is because I feel I don't have anything to contribute or that what I do have to contribute is obvious to all practitioners, but what the workshops at the conference taught me is that it is a space to share. There were some workshops that gave me lots of ideas and some that were similar to what I already do, but there were still things I learnt because I was looking at it from a different perspective.
So here I am, a few days after the workshop feeling inspired and already have tried out a couple of things in my practice already, I'm going to make a positive change and get involved more in the PE community. I'm going to dedicate a couple of hours a week to my website, to share ideas and practice that have worked for me, but also get involved more on the social media side of things. I was also inspired by many heroes at the conference, that I would like to present a workshop of some sort in the future, but let's see how this goes first. One step at a time 😀