I have to admit I was a little intimidated to share this story. Intel has some of the most dedicated and intelligent educators I have ever met. Another admission is that someone who worked closely with me through one of my Intel trainings reminded me that I had a story to tell. Journey Number One - The very first Intel Teach training I conducted made me feel like, “This training is a piece of cake!” The participants were all tech-savvy facilitators who were hungry to learn. Any skill that was introduced, they knew how to do it, the lessons they created were well thought out and planned, and they were a pleasure to work with. Although this was a great bunch of dedicated educators, we each walked away with a sense of accomplishment that even though we were out of the classroom, we were still continuing our learning journey, empowering ourselves so we could help others, and it felt good. So, I planned my next journey. Or should I say it was planned for me by my superintendent. Since he had recently been through the Intel Leadership Forum and was impressed with the content, he decided every teacher at one of our optional schools should go through Intel Teach Essentials Online Course. Begin journey number two. Just as before, I prepared my information, gathered my resources and got into my teacher mode. Two days before my training, the assistant principal called me to tell me that the faculty was already angry with me because they are being forced to take the training. I told myself this will pass, and I will win over each and every one of them with my “charming” personality. The day their training started, I had chocolate and donuts waiting because we all know how teachers are at meetings. If snacks are provided, you are good to go. Needless to say, the snacks did not do the trick. Before any introductions were conducted, they were approaching me and telling me they were not going to do this course. Still smiling, I told them it would be fine and we would conquer this together. I had so much to teach them and was so excited about the Intel tools and project-based learning, so they should be too, right? When one participant asked me how to find the Internet, my smile began to fade. How in the world am I going to get through this training with teachers who cannot navigate the internet, and who are already screaming at me? I told myself to start slowly. So I talked about project-based learning and the benefits it had on student achievement, real world connections, and student interest. The teachers looked at me like I was crazy. I wanted them to let kids do what? They were not going to lecture? Had I completely lost my mind? Continuing my presentation about the Intel Essentials model, I began to see a few heads nod. At this point I am thinking if I have one survive, I will have accomplished something. Throughout our discussions about Essential Questions and alternate forms of assessment, I was winning over a few more. They were scared of change, and needed to know how to go about changing. I was there to help them. After the first face to face day, I have to admit I went home in tears. I took it personally that I did not reach all of my participants. I wanted everyone to leave as happy and excited as I am about technology and effective lesson planning. After my pity party, the hardheadedness in me kicked in and I made up my mind. I believed in the Essentials information, I knew these teachers needed to change, and I knew we could do it. The online portion of the course was difficult. There were times that the course would lose the information the participants posted, and no one knew what was happening. The participants had me on speed dial and would call me in a panic. Working closely with teacher training, we were able to resolve the problems and calm the participants. There were days I opened the lab to the participants to come in so that they could be trained in basic skills and tasks such as working in multiple windows, creating folders, etc. They were thankful for the one on one help and the “lagniappe” they received. The journey finally came to an end, and we all survived. I am happy to say that twenty-one of the twenty-four participants completed the course. What an accomplishment for all of us. The even better news is that many of them have come back for more of my trainings and have actually began implementing the skills they learned in their own classrooms. Will all of them use what they learned? No, but each of us had to step outside of our comfort zone and tackle a task that was new to us…and I feel we all walked away better educators. Thanks to programs like Intel Teach, I have to stay on top of things so that I can still make a difference.

My Intel Teach trainers used a very different approach to teaching teachers to use technology. It’s not about mastering the technology. What matters, they emphasized, was our desire to translate what ‘little’ we could learn into magic tricks in the classroom.

At 50 years of age, I did not know how to work a computer. Now, at 60, I can not only communicate with it, but have trained over 500 people.

Travel through Time and Space – Dialoguing with Su Shi As a Chinese language teacher in the Beijing Information Management School, I had long been bothered by a problem: vocational students generally lack long-term interest in study, and can easily acquire a long-term weariness of study and a capacity for troublemaking. In August 2000, after receiving training in the Intel Teach Program, I realized that students’ initiative must be motivated. I wanted to apply inquiry-based learning, group cooperative learning, and framework design strategy to teaching in order to help address his long-standing concern. In the second semester of grade two in senior high school, complex and even contradictory ideas contained in Nian Nujiao · Chi Bi and Former Red Cliff, two works of the great writer Su Shi of the Song dynasty, had long presented difficulty in teaching. Young people today often lack an interest in classical literature and may find it difficult to understand and therefore fail to recognize the beauty of the works. Understanding that today’s students have a strong sense of expression and group identity, I began my attempts in teaching reform, and changed the way I taught these two literary classics – away from the traditional way of giving instructed classes to brainstorming-style discussion classes. I raised several well-designed questions that interested students. For example, “If you passed through a time tunnel to meet Su Shi, what question would you want to ask him most?” Or, “What emotion of Su Shi was expressed in Nian Nujiao · Chi Bi and Former Red Cliff? Was this emotion truly shown?” I then asked the students to work within their own group to study and demonstrate their findings. As a result, laziness was reduced. The students not only gave personalized names to their own groups and put great enthusiasm into investigating and making presentations in their spare time, but also displayed results in the classroom and participated in some heated discussions. The difficulty of teaching was successfully conquered. Meanwhile, I was delighted to find that the modern young people’s passion of exploring and imagination was far beyond my imagination. It was the Intel Teach Program that has enabled students to travel through thousands of years and have a passionate dialogue with Su Shi.

One of the key moments in my professional development was learning from the Intel Teach Essentials Course («Design activity in the information educational environment of the XXI-st century») .The big thing, I consider, is the leading idea of the Program - effective use of information and educational technologies. Technologies which we practiced using during the course, I now use effectively in my pedagogical activity. Intel Teach has allowed me to understand this success: inner confidence that my pupils will live in life with values, knowledge and the skills that really are necessary for the person in the 21 century. It also is the most important thing - achievement of internal success, satisfaction and the professional work. The lessons of the Intel Teach course is an open door in new understanding at higher level of life, a new educational system, overall objectives and problems.

The future is not simply near – it looks at me every day through my students’ wide-open eyes. It’s not me who is leading children, it’s they who stretch out their hands to me. The Intel Teach Program gives me a chance to reach them.

My comprehension of Intel Teach was very vague and I used to hear various controversial opinions as far as this course is concerned. I was therefore hesitant at the beginning. However, a person can’t form his particular point of view about any issues at all until he tries it, so I decided to register for the course, giving it a try hoping to accomplish my goals. I consider this course as an entrance to a small kingdom, which may seem small to some in terms of area; however, it is tremendously big in terms of being rich in outcome. It serves as an entrance and a channel to the world of knowledge and science, which I would like to transfer to my students for their benefit. This course provides wider opportunities, broadening horizons for our students. I can imagine myself being in the outer space which, however, is not a real one, but the space of knowledge; it’s my students and myself being there together hoping and planning for a brighter future.

Technology brings students from behind closed doors into a world of knowledge. I began work at the eMINTS National Center in Columbia, Missouri (USA) in 2000 and since then I’ve been training and coaching classroom teachers and I am amazed at how much has changed in that time!! An eMINTS classroom looks like a regular classroom except that it has lots of cool technology for students and teachers. Each room has an interactive whiteboard, scanner, camera, internet connections, a printer, and computers for students and teachers to use at any portion of the school day. I am currently providing professional development to 7/8th grade teachers in my portion of the state that are a part of our I3 validation study. These teachers want to enrich the learning in their classrooms by integrating technology in meaningful and purposeful ways. They will do this using a 1:1 classroom laptop environment in combination with eMINTS and Intel Teach Thinking with Technology professional development programs. _____________________________________________ [Intel editor's note: Intel Teach Thinking with Technology is course designed to help teachers learn instructional strategies for addressing and assessing thinking skills, using technology to support deeper understanding of core content. The goal is for teachers to leave the course with a standards-based unit plan, support materials, and implementation strategies to improve and assess students’ higher-order thinking with the use of free online tools.]

I feel responsible for the future of my students. The 21st century is here, and I feel that being involved in the Intel Teach Program has helped boost my competence as a teacher to start on a more challenging teaching/ learning process where an aware and wise use of technology makes the difference!

There are many doors in life; some bring us peacefulness, others open new horizons to us. Intel Teach is one of the doors that helps teachers and students master technology, the skills of 21st century and even the key to success.

Thanks to the Intel Teach Program, my professional and personal growth has taken off. I’m not only a teacher, but a methodologist and a postgraduate student, where the subject of my dissertation is deeply connected to Intel Teach. Project-based learning, information technology, WEB 2.0—all help my students be more successful, compatible and competent.

It was the best day, when I was informed that I have been selected as a Senior Trainer for the Intel Teach Program. Today, I can say I enjoyed my 11 years journey of learning with the program. It has enhanced not only my own learning, but also that of teachers and students. I see change in teachers, they now give me their email and blog addresses, they introduce each topic through presentations. Intel Teach changed the Pre-service syllabi; a two credit course of computer application was revised as 4 credit course. Intel Teach course is included as reference for B.ED courses. I co-authored a research paper “Understanding the Practices of Teacher Educators in implementing Intel Teach” with senior educationist, available at www.intel.com/cd/corporate/education/APAC/ENG/pk/ The credit to the program were the words of the provincial minister of education, ”Intel has taken and delivered what should have been the responsibility of the Government.”

Intel Teach course transformed my outlook for the student teacher relationship. It relates to the current needs of the times. It helps in Project based learning and provides a platform for the students to develop holistically. Nowadays there is increasing need of technology-based learning that brings the practical approach to the classroom. Intel made me think that Change is possible and The students can be the change in today’s times…

I have participated in the Intel Teach program for seven years. During this time I have trained more than two thousand teachers. Graduates of the program are characterized by a project-oriented culture and a spirit of research and cooperation. This is our common success!

Intel Teach has brought new life to my teaching career. The use of technology in classroom teaching has given a new meaning to teaching and learning. My school is in the rural area and mostly girls from minority communities are natives of the school. The importance of education is very meager in the community. Something was needed to get the girls to school and make them continue their studies -- which could act as a catalyst to ignite the fire of knowledge in the girls and then later be reciprocated through the girls to the community. After being trained as a Master Trainer under the Intel Teach program, the first thing I did was to get the other staff members to embrace the new methodology and technology in their teaching, followed by getting girls involved in learning through project-based approaches. I taught them how to make use of technology

The teacher training program in the Municipal School of Basic Education “Francisca F. P. Saile” has motivated significant actions, such as the initiative of some teachers to immediately apply their new abilities on their classes. In the computers lab, as they interact with different softwares, they discuss the use of them in the classroom and the related concepts from different subjects, always towards a solution of a certain challenge. This is the Educational Computers Lab's door, which opens a world of possibilities! On it, there is a piece of work made with a 4th year group with satellite images, that allowed the construction of New Perspectives.