2025 MET Summer Institute on GenAI and AR, VR, and XR in Education
The year of 2025 introduced two courses for the Summer Institute. The MET Summer Institute on AR, VR and XR in education led by Dr. Keri Ewart explored many extended and mixed reality applications to equip educators with the skills they need to implement the tools in their own learning environment. The MET Summer Institute on ethical and professional use of generative AI in teaching and learning taught by Dr. Teresa Dobson, Dr. Jen Jenson, and Dr. Sam McCready examined the potential applications, challenges, and ethical considerations of using GenAI in educational contexts.
2022 & 2023 MET Summer Institute on Makerspace and Inclusive Implementation
Returning to a hybrid format, the MET Summer Institute on Makerspace and Inclusive Implementation explored constructivist and cultural theories in education and digital engagement and their significance in designing dynamic learner-focused environments that support 21st-century modes of making. Learners explored the history and design of makerspaces and maker projects and provocations from Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, Decolonization, and Anti-racism (EDIDA) frameworks using no-tech, low-tech, and high-tech tools (Kafai & Jayathirtha, 2020) all through an interactive, inclusive, and technology-supported learning environment.
2021 Virtual MET Summer Institute on Anti-Racism in Education
The MET Summer Institute on Anti-Racism in Education focussed on addressing anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism in education. The questions that surrounded the reflection and learning in this course centred on educators’ individual responsibility to facilitate and support anti-racist approaches and strategies throughout their online and technologically-supported practice.
Instructor: Dr. Kisha McPherson
2021 Virtual MET Summer Institute on Digital Games, Learning & Pedagogy
Instructors: Dr. Jen Jenson & Dr. Suzanne de Castell
The MET Virtual Summer Institute Digital Games, Learning & Pedagogy ran for a third time in 2021. Another fifty students participated in an intensive week of synchronous online activities that offered participants the opportunity to explore the pedagogies that support playing and making digital games for the classroom.
2020 Virtual MET Summer Institute on Digital Games, Learning & Pedagogy
Instructors: Dr. Jen Jenson & Dr. Suzanne de Castell
Given the success of the 2019 MET Summer Institute and many requests from the MET community for a repeat offering, the Institute on Digital Games, Learning & Pedagogy ran for a second time in 2020. Fifty students participated in an intensive week of synchronous online activities that offered participants the opportunity to explore the pedagogies that support playing and making digital games for the classroom.
2019 MET Summer Institute on Digital Games, Learning & Pedagogy
Instructors: Dr. Jen Jenson & Dr. Suzanne de Castell
The summer 2019 institute offered MET students an intensive opportunity to explore the pedagogies that support playing and making digital games for the classroom.
Digital games – the creative medium of the 21st century – are played on phones, tablets and dedicated desktops and consoles by millions of adults and children worldwide. They are also the single fastest growing creative industry on the planet: in North America, the digital games market is expected to grow up to 10% (across all sectors – mobile, PC and console) in 2019 alone. Concomitantly, education authorities, and teachers in particular, have been slow not only to understand the educational value of digital games but also to integrate these media in teaching and learning ecologies.