Monday, June 30, 2008

Apple's Big Splash at NECC

I am ready to go to the Apple reception this evening. Part of the festivities will be Apple's big splash at NECC. That splash is iTunesU-K12. iTunesU-K12 should debut within the next few hours with content from between 7 and 9 states. Utah is one of the states that will be debuting on iTunesU-K12. I have been working with the Utah group that has been putting together the states efforts on this project.
I believe this project will be somewhat of a game changer. Here K12 ed will have a central gathering place for resources, be they audio, video, text-based, etc. Now I can hear the catcalls and boos coming already. "Here's Apple trying to take control of our content!" I don't believe that this is what it is about at all. Look at what iTunesU has provided for Higher Ed. There are many prestigious universities sharing their content. It is not under Apple's control, they are merely providing the vehicle. Such is the case with iTunesU-K12 as well.
Go to the iTunes store, click on iTunes U, then look for the K12 listing in the bottom left column.
I personally can't wait to see the resources gathered there.

Social Networking in PD

Get the Audio Here!
Recording from the Social Networking in PD session at EdubloggerCon08, held on Saturday, June 28th, 2008 in San Antonio, TX.

Monday, June 02, 2008

Catch the Fever: Viral Professional Development–Add your voice!

Viral Professional Development is emerging in education as a viable method of increasing teacher engagement and learning. Using tools such as Twitter, rss readers, blogs, educational networks, and wikis, educators are collaborating on a grassroots level. This year at NECC, a panel discussion of educators on July 2nd at 1:30 pm CDT will be discussing and live Ustreaming a session to discuss viral professional development.

How did this panel discussion originate?

On Monday, September 17, 2007, Google launched the Google Presentation web application to their suite of services. News of this new service spread quickly through the blogosphere and Twitter and soon more than fifty different people made over 500 edits in a twenty-four hour period to one Google presentation. Since introduced, this presentation has been used by hundreds of people to begin conversations centered on free online tools used to weave a web of connections between people around the world.

As a result of this transformational experience, educators begin discussing the importance of sharing the changing nature of professional development and documentation of best practices in VIRAL professional development. The proposal was written in Google docs and since acceptance, an expanded group of educators around the world has used a wiki, elluminate, and a variety of tools to bring a collaborative, immersive viral PD experience to NECC and to people around the world.

Presenters
Vicki Davis, moderator
Darren Draper
Kelly Dumont
Kristin Hokanson
Robin Ellis
Ryan Bretag
Beth Ritter-Guth
Carolyn Foote

Backchannel Presenters/ Moderators
John Maklary
Stephanie Sandifer

How can you participate?

At 1:30pm CDT on July 2, we will be participating in a NECC panel discussion that centers on the power of the network. During our presentation we hope to demonstrate to all those attending our session in person (and virtually), just how powerful global collaboration can be. Hence, we are asking for your participation in our presentation as well.

1) Join our Ustream


We will be streaming the presentation live on the Open PD Ustream channel at 1:30 pm CDT on July 2nd. You may watch here and participate in the conversation (and even ask the panelists questions).

2) Leave a comment on our voicethread


One way that you can participate now is by adding your voice to the VoiceThread below. Please take a few minutes and add your thoughts about the different tools depicted through images in the thread. We would truly like as many voices possible, offering a wide range of thought on the usefulness of the common tools we all use in our collaborations.

How do you use these tools? How are they important to your professional development? Please add your voice.

Insert embed code for the voice thread from this page - http://thewallscamedown.wikispaces.com/Join_In








3) Join the conversation on the NECC Educational networking site


We've created a discussion thread to converse on this panel discussion at the NECC educational networking site.


Follow our most recent announcements.

All announcements and events pertaining to this session will be announced at the Walls Came Down wiki.