Presenter Profiles

Ian is the former Principal of City Beach High School in WA and now works as an international consultant in gender and education. He is recognised as a leader in the field of boys' education worldwide and provides seminars and professional development to teachers, parents, parenting and sporting groups around Australia and overseas.

In the year 2000 Ian was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to further his research in boys' education across Europe, the United Kingdom and North America. In 2005 Ian became the Travelling Scholar of the Australian Council of Educational Leaders - a most prestigious and honorable accomplishment.  

Ian is an advisor to the NSW Department of Education and Training in the areas of Gender Equity, Middle Schooling and Boys’ Education. He is also a presenter for the Australasian Boys Education Network and a keynote presenter for the Federal Government initiative ‘Success for Boys’.

Visit Ian Lillico's website

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Greg has been engaged in the world of education since he was four years old, when he started kindergarten! Since then he has been a student, a parent, a teacher, a writer, a cartoonist, an assistant principal, a university lecturer and a consultant.

A 'hands-on' practical facilitator, Greg has delivered workshops for parents, carers, pre-primary, primary and secondary teachers. He works in classrooms and staffrooms and has also delivered keynote addresses to state and national conferences. Greg is adept at delivering entertaining presentations that are practical and particularly relevant to those people working in high-stress situations.

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Kath Murdoch is an experienced teacher, author, university lecturer and popular consultant who has worked for many years in schools across Australia, New Zealand, Asia and Europe.   She is widely respected for her work in the field of inquiry based learning and integrative curriculum in which she has researched and published for over 20 years.

Kath is passionate about planning and teaching using inquiry based, integrated curriculum with a particular interest in supporting teachers in their professional learning journeys. She regularly  teaches in primary classes so the examples she shares are real and recent.  She also specialises in supporting teams of teachers to work and plan together and to build professional learning into their daily practice.

Kath is known for her dynamic, practical and interactive sessions and for challenging teachers to think about what, why and how they support students in their learning. 

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With more than twenty years classroom teaching experience, Michael now runs training and development sessions for classroom teachers in thinking skills and in meeting the learning needs of gifted students. He has run more than 1,000 workshops on the teaching of thinking for teachers and Principals in China, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Vienna, Singapore, and across both New Zealand and Australia.

Michael has a Masters Degree in Gifted Education and is a member of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children. He regularly presents at local, national and international conferences on issues concerning giftedness, creativity and thinking.

Michael works with many schools an on-going basis, assisting teachers as they create a culture of thinking in their classrooms.

Visit Michael Pohl's website

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Dr Christine Richmond is a highly sought after and dynamic speaker in the field of behaviour management.  She is an experienced teacher of students with severe behaviour challenges in clinical and school settings and has also worked as a senior school counselor, family therapist and academic.

Dr Richmond has become well known in Australian education circles through her work in schools and as a speaker at regional, state, national and international conferences. She was the traveling scholar for the NSW Chapter of the Australian Council for Educational Leaders during 2003, and was appointed as the national traveling scholar for 2007. Christine held academic positions at both the University of New England and Bond University before branching out into private practice. Her book, Teach More, Manage Less: A Minimalist Approach to Behaviour Management  was proudly published by Scholastic Australia in 2007.

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A teacher by profession, Bill Rogers now lectures widely on discipline and behaviour management issues, classroom management, stress and teaching as well as colleague support.

Bill has worked with over 500,000 teachers (across Australasia, New-Zealand, Denmark, Germany and the U.K) in the past sixteen years. His work is well known in Australia, especially for his commitment to a skills-based approach to discipline and behaviour management and his emphasis on the development and maintenance of positive behaviours.

Bill is the author of numerous resources including books and DVD support programs that have been published both in Australia and the United Kingdom.

In 1995 was awarded Educator of the Year by the Australian Council for Educational Administration (Victoria). In 2007 he was made an Honorary Life Fellow of Trinity and All Saints College (at the University of Leeds U.K).

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Tony Ryan is a former teacher and prolific author in the area of effective thinking and learning. Tony consults to educational and corporate bodies throughout the world on concepts such as innovative thinking, life-long learning, change management, and enthusiasm for daily work.

He often acts as a teacher-in-residence in schools throughout Australia, in which he provides support to teachers with their everyday practice. In this role, he has been directly engaged with over 300 schools around the country.

Tony is the chairman of the board of School Aid – a non-profit organization which encourages schools around Australia to co-ordinate their fund-raising activities for major local and global disasters. School Aid also provides invaluable assistance to schools in encouraging active citizenship opportunities.

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Tony Stead is a highly sought-after international speaker and consultant in the area of literacy education. His energetic and powerful presentations are known for making a profound impact on educators around the world.

Tony has 14 years experience in teaching Grades Prep to 6 and has also lectured in Language and Literacy at Melbourne University. Tony lived in New York City for eight years where he worked with school districts across North America and Canada leading workshops, conducting classroom demonstrations, and giving keynote addresses.

Tony is an author of many publications including Is That a Fact?: Teaching Nonfiction Writing and the video series Time For Nonfiction. which highlights his recent work with several teachers at the Manhattan New School. Tony regularly works with kids in the classroom and his greatest love is learning from children.

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Eric Frangenheim is an educational consultant and author, who is committed to providing teachers with the skills and strategies to create thinking classrooms and learning environments.

Eric presents workshops to educators, government departments and corporate bodies throughout Australia and New Zealand to assist with thinking strategies for the classroom, staff meetings, staff planning days, team teaching, board meetings and more. He is a presenter at state, national and international conferences focusing on the promotion of effective thinking and learning strategies.

Eric has published such books as Reflections on Classroom Thinking Strategies now in its 7th edition and is  co-author of the Innovative Teachers' Companion, a diary for primary and secondary teachers that incorporates a vast range of educational ideas and literature on classroom practice (now in its 4th edition).

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David Hornsby worked with the Victorian Ministry of Education for 28 years and taught at every year level from Prep to Year 6. During that time, he also lectured at Melbourne University and the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. For 4 years, he was an education department curriculum consultant in primary and secondary schools and then returned to the primary classroom. He was the principal of Ringwood Heights Primary School for 5 years.

David is now working as a private education consultant. He is invited to work with teachers and to present at conferences both interstate and overseas. He has completed many lecture tours of the United States and the United Kingdom, and has also worked with teachers in Indonesia, New Zealand and Singapore.

David has written and co-authored many books on the teaching of literacy.

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As an Educational Consultant, a major aspect of John’s work is supporting educators and trainers to further develop skills and knowledge of teaching practice based on the latest research into how people learn.

John Joseph left school at age 14 and worked in the family business for eleven years before returning to formal education where he graduated from the University of South Australia with a Masters Degree in Science and Mathematics Education. He taught across all year levels and then went on to lecture in teacher-education at university.

John’s vast experience with young people with challenging behaviour and poor attachments to school underpins his desire to formulate change.

Between 1997 and 2007, John Joseph presented keynote addresses, conferences and workshops sessions to more than a quarter of a million people representing more than 3,000 schools across 16 countries. Week after week, he facilitates full-day workshops for student groups where he challenges young people to learn about learning, behaviour and emotions.

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