The keynote speaker for the conference, Anne Looney, is an inspirational educational expert well known in Ireland and beyond for her contribution and thinking on curriculum reform. Her speech on “Convictions and connections” was very engaging for teachers as she defined how teachers networks are changing the way we change "In e Twinning, teachers connect with teachers so that students can connect. Already, eTwinning leaders are thinking about how students might be innovators here… to explore ways in which they might be innovators, and might learn to connect with each other and propose their own projects in student led, teacher supported work."
 
Another highlight of the first day was the prize-giving ceremony for the winners of the eTwinning Prizes 2012 competition. From over 300 project submissions, the winners of the three age categories and three special categories were awarded. This year for the first time a new prize was instituted: the best eTwinning project. The winner of this award was chosen by a vote of all the National Support Services and the winner was the project ATOM.

On the second day, participants broke up into thirty six workshops that ranged from a view of Teachers’ profession in 2025 to ways of building Effective School Teams.
 
Many other activities happened to make the Conference a great opportunity for a fruitful exchange between teachers such as the exhibition area which featured stands showing eTwinning activities in a range of themes as well as displays and demonstrations of eTwinning tools and activities.

The last day opened with a keynote speech from Marc Durando, Director of the European Schoolnet on the topic of eTwinning a model for future schooling. “In the classroom of the future learning will take place in a media rich environment where teachers will guide their pupils to develop, exchange, and create their ideas by interaction and collaboration with flexible learning spaces and innovative learning scenarios comprising inside and outside school learning processes” 
This was followed by an interactive discussion that took place between a panel composed of teachers, experts in the educational field and Adam Pokorny from the European Commission. Have a look on the results !

For more articles, photos, links to the videos and commentary from participants have a look at the http://conference2012.etwinning.net/
 
PRESS: The European Commission released a special press release on the weekend’s events. Please feel free to share it with your local, regional and national press.