About+BCT

= About BCT Network =

The ** Building Community through Telecollaboration Network (BCTN) **is a province-wide initiative with educators from English school boards across Québec.

The BCT initiative aims to offer teachers ways
 * to participate in professional development while engaging in communication-based projects in order to acquire the skills to enable them to network with teachers using ICT,
 * to provide experience in projects that have a communication component in which classes or teams work with authentic audiences, and
 * to put them in contact with like-minded colleagues and learn from each other’s experience as well as from members of the support team, thereby creating the basis of an active on-line Professional Learning Community which would live beyond the project initiative.

The purpose of the **BCTN** is to encourage, facilitate, and support collaboration among students, teachers and educational leaders to enhance //ICT-supported learning// across the community. //ICT- supported learning// refers to the use of information and communication technology (ICT) to facilitate learning in personal, classroom and network situations based on state-of-the-art pedagogical and learning strategies.

In 2012-2013, the objectives for the members of the BCTN as a community of practice are as follows:
 * To encourage the use of QEP-based, ICT-supported learning in classroom and online settings,
 * To encourage the creation, implementation and evaluation of new activities, projects and practices based on ICT-supported learning principles,
 * To facilitate the learning, use and evaluation of ICT-supported learning tools,
 * To provide professional learning opportunities within and across schools to share and reflect on ICT-supported teaching-learning activities supported by a community of practice.

**Related Publications and Presentations**

* Heo, G. M. & Breuleux, A. (2013, April). BCT Network: Developing a professional learning network for effective ICT-supported teaching and learning. Poster presented at the AERA 2011 Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA, USA.
 * Abstract: ** // This paper introduces Building Community through Telecollaboration (BCT) Network that consists of two school-board professional learning networks (PLNs) for teachers, describes the key features and development processes of the PLNs based on the conceptual framework of communities of practice (CoPs) (Wenger, 1998), and discusses considerations and implications for developing PLNs for teachers, particularly at the school board level. //

* **[__BCTN E-Booklet__]** Promoting ICT-supported Learning: Lessons from the BCT Network //This eBooklet shares the lessons learned on six themes that proved to be important to the promotion of ICT-supported learning based on the experiences of teachers, administrators, consultants and university colleagues involved in the BCT Network over the past five years. The six themes are: shared vision, professional learning, leadership support, community of practice, IT support and ICT infrastructure and tools. URL links to examples of student and teacher projects, as well as, related resources are provided.//

* Wall, A. E., Breuleux, A., Heo, G. M., Rye, K., Goyetche, M-H., & Lemay, V. (2011). Teacher-based inquiry in the BCT Project. Learning Landscapes, 4(2), 325-344. [Link] @http://www.learninglandscapes.ca/images/documents/ll-no8-final-lr.pdf

* Heo, G. M. & Breuleux, A. (2011). Online communication and collaboration in a community of practice for teachers professional development. Proceddings of the 9th International Conference on Computer Supported Collaborative Learning (CSCL) 2011, Hong Kong, China.
 * Abstract**: //The purposes of this paper are (a) to introduce our BCT (Building Community through Telecollaboration) project that aims to encourage, facilitate and support collaboration among students, teachers and educational leaders to enhance learning across the community in Quebec; (b) to present a conceptual framework forming the basis of our participatory design research approach; and (c) to report our study of teachers’ communication and collaboration in this community.//

* Heo, G. M. & Breuleux, A. (2011, April). Participatory design research in Building Community through Telecollaboration (BCT) project. Paper presented at the AERA 2011 Annual Meeting, New Orleans, Louisiana.
 * Abstract**: //This paper discusses participatory design research as an innovative research approach and demonstrates its iterative processes through its application in Building Community through Telecollaboration (BCT) project, a province-wide initiative with educators from English school boards across Quebec, which aims to encourage, facilitate and support collaboration among students, teachers and educational leaders to enhance learning across the community. It will present the potential benefits of the application of participatory design research for designing and developing an innovative learning environment, namely a community of practice for teachers in Quebec. The learning environment designed and developed through the participatory design research can offer a model of design with practical implications for other educational researchers//.

* Heo, G. M., Anderson, D., Goyetche, M-H., Taker, D., & Breuleux, A. (2011). Distributed leadership facilitating collaboration in a teacher community of practice. Proceedings of the Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference (SITE) 2011, Nashville, Tennessee, US.
 * Abstract**: //Building Community through Telecollaboration (BCT) is a province-wide initiative with educators and administrators from English school boards across Quebec. It aims to encourage, facilitate and support collaboration among students, teachers and educational leaders to enhance learning by using ICT. In this paper, we present (a) a conceptual framework for the BCT project based on the participatory design research approach and (b) teachers’ collaborative activities and collaborative student projects in three teacher groups, which are divided according to the cycles they are teaching in. In addition, we highlight the roles of cycle group leaders as teacher leaders and teacher researchers for facilitating communication and collaboration among teachers in the teacher groups.//

* Breuleux, A., Heo, G. M., Wall, T., Morgan, L., & Flores, L. (2009). Building community through telecollaboration (BCT) project in Quebec. Proceedings of the SITE 2009 (Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference), Charleston, SC, US.
 * Abstract**: //The purposes of this paper are to introduce the Building Community through Telecollaboration (BCT) project, a province-wide initiative with educators from English school boards across Quebec. The BCT project is a design research (Bereiter, 2005; Brown, 1992; Collins, Joseph, & Bielaczyc, 2004; Schoenfeld, 2006) to develop collaborative classroom projects by using ICT and to create a community of practice (CoP) (Wenger, 1998) for teachers’ professional development. We will share lessons learned from phase 1 (2007-2008) of this project, and then discuss further plans for the following phase (2008-2009).//

= Video Clips (YouTube) on BCT Project - April 2010 =

1. BCT Teacher Interviews: The Learning Journey (9:36) @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZhI9SLVhKA

2. BCT Support: Administrative/Recit/Parental (7:56) @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JINoa6nmjJk

3. BCT Success Factors: Discussing what made the BCT project work at St. Johns and advice for new members (9:14) @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFVhlLG03_A

4. BCT Classroom Practices: Integrating the Technology into teaching practices (8:24) @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kz7JVnOu_E

5. Outcomes of BCT: Outcomes for teaching staff/students (8:22) @http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcVPosoWTUg