MACUL Conference 2023 Reflections and Resources

It was fabulous to attend the MACUL (Michigan Association of Computer Users in Learning) conference this week! Here are a few of my highlights:

The opening keynote was from Austin Kleon. I have read several of his books and followed him on social media for many years. I love his reflections on the creative process and the simple way that he creates visual drawings to capture ideas. Here is the sketchnote that I made from his keynote "Creative is Not a Noun."

The highlight of this conference is always being able to reconnect with Apple Distinguished Educator friends and Apple staff. This year ADEs helped with 2 sessions of an interactive learning "Safari." There were stations around the room with short hands-on activities for drawing, photography, AR, video, and GarageBand on the iPad where we assisted. I enjoyed working with at the drawing station where participants created logos in Keynote.

I also gave a personal presentation on one of my favorite apps, Procreate. I shared a lot of creative ways I have used this app with students, as a teacher, as a professional, and for my own personal creativity and pleasure. Then I led the participants through a hands-on lesson where they created a logo. The lesson highlighted a number of skills and tips in Procreate including brushes, layers, quick shapes, shadows/blur, adding text, and exporting as a transparent png or video. It was exciting to have some students share their logos on Twitter and communicate that the session really helped them gain the information needed to get started with Procreate!

Here is a link to a video with the tutorial that we did in the session if you would like to try to the logo lesson!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KGkPYmXFrqE

If you are interested in learning more about Procreate, here is the link to my resource page:

https://sites.google.com/view/creativeapptitude/procreate

It contains a link to the slide deck and links to tutorials, brushes, and other helpful tips and tricks.