KQED Education joined forces with BAVC, ITVS, and San Francisco Film Society to present Media Innovators in Education at The Lab in the Mission last Thursday Sept 8th. More than 100 teachers and educators attended the event which was produced collaboratively by these Bay Area media organizations to inspire and support educators who are doing cool things with media or who would like to get on board.

Four educators were invited to showcase their work and take part in a panel: Liza Mathews a 4th grade and Kindergarten teacher and PBS Innovation Award winner from Larkspur-Corte Madera School; Elizabeth Jackson, a 4th grade teacher at Bacich Elementary School; David Maduli, a 9th grade English teacher at Nea Community Learning Center in Alameda and Toby Rugger, an ESL teacher at Oakland International High School.

Panelists talked about challenges they faced - technical and administrative – in integrating media and media literacy into their curriculum. They also discussed using media in interesting ways to stimulate dialogue and develop critical thinking skills in students. Educators clearly felt it to be important to use media creatively in order to engage students and maintain currency and relevance in today’s media savvy culture.

Eager for resources, teachers visited the resource tables offered by each organization, asked questions and networked enthusiastically with media makers, keen to share what they are doing and find out about exciting new media tools. KQED Education showcased multimedia resources, introducing visitors to our table to the wealth of lesson plans and educator guides, as well as the media training programs offered at the station.

Since this event was so appreciated by educators, our organizations are exploring ways to offer further resource sharing opportunities for teachers and educators in the Bay Area.
For KQED Educator Resources visit http://www.kqed.org/education/