Our Target

All Invertebrate Olympic training events are aimed at reaching one target: to provide participants with a training experience that is top-notch so that they can implement a "customized" version of the Invertebrate Olympics in their classroom, school, or district.

Our Approach - Balance, 3 R's, and Setting Limits

BALANCE - Like most things in life, balance is key.  The same is true in planning an agenda for a top notch training.  Too often, professional developments are very unbalanced with too much of one element (i.e. lecture, theoretical, inspirational talk, etc.) and not enough of another element (experiential, practicality, transferability, etc.)  Ultimately, great ideas and concepts don't get transferred to the classroom to impact student learning.  Therefore when planning the agenda for an The Invertebrate Olympics Training Event, we have attempted to provide a balanced training agenda - one which we are confident will impact student learning.

 Balanced Training Agenda

**To view a more specific description of the training's agenda, click here.

3 R's - No, we're not talking about reading, 'riting, and 'rithmetic but Rigor, Relevance, and Relationships - the contemporary 3 R's. 

*  Rigor - our training will require participants to perform a wide range of actions - from evaluating an activity from various roles (as student, teacher, administrator) to modifying a task to meet diversified needs. 

*  Relevance - in addition to the relevant subject matter (olympics) that will be watched, followed, and discussed by most of the world, this training will incorporate ideas, tools, strategies, and best practices that are relevant to all classroom settings.

*  Relationships - what is the old adage - two heads are better than one?  Well, we believe that will be the case at our training - that you will learn more through interacting and collaborating with other education professionals than you would from listening to one trainer.

Setting Limits - That's right, we have set a limit on the number of participants that can attend each training to 30.  Why would we do such a thing when it would be more profitable to accept as many participants as possible?  Because just like limiting the class size has been shown to lead to better learning, we believe that limiting the number of participants to 30 will allow us to meet the needs of all participants and thereby achieve our target - to provide participants with a training experience that is top-notch so that they can implement a "customized" version of the Invertebrate Olympics in their classroom, school, or district.

Warning:  As you can tell, this is not the type of training where participants sit on the sidelines to "sit and get." To benefit the most, be prepared to "sit up," "lift your own weight," and "stay up to speed" on all activities.

Sounds like this training will really "work out" well in my classroom, school or district.

This top-notch training was developed by the professional development experts at: