Final Day of the 2013 Conference

Final blog for EdMedia 2013 in Victoria, BC

Thursday, June 27, 2013

When the regular presenter was delayed by weather, we did not get to hear on the addictions of the digital age. Intstead,   Rod Sims spoke on design alchemy transforming the way we think about teaching and learning and using technology. He recommended that we create a whole new online pedagogy for teaching where 

1  The student needs to be active.

2  The learning needs to be learner centered. 

2  The learner lives in their own particular context. 

3  There  needs to be a Problem-based model

And students need to hypothesize, modify, experiment, manipulate

Compare, and choose      This all enables critical thinking. 

It's a social world;  we need to work with others and learn from them. 

While working together we have a series of collaborative roles as 

Teacher

Writer

Builder

Learner

Designer 

Anyone in a learning space can take on any of these roles.

Rod showed some nice info graphics to help get his proposed concepts across and had a very effective format for his presentation.  It was easy to follow and ideal to emulate. As an alchemist he set a clear outline for how to design a course and it's assessments and activities.  

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During the second session, I used the hotel computer to write my blog for yesterday. The computer was laggy, but I was able to complete my report.  Plus, I was beginning to reach critical mass and let like I was get inning the trends at this conference, something I felt I needed to be a part of to k now I was being current in my studies as an emergent excellent teacher.  It was clear that the flipped classroom model for sure had an overwhelming emphasis at this conference. Getting the student involved is key. 

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The next presenter, from Hawaii at Manoa , was focusing on the Emerging scholar stream at the conference, but she spoke  about preparing a CV.   Everything she said was consistent about what I k now. It just had a slightly different focus for an academic resumes for people applying for professorship positions. 

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The next session I chose was from a former Ottawanian Nw in Austrailia: Encouraging senior university faculty members to move their teaching content online: we CAN teach old dogs new tricks!

Carol Miles, University of Newcastle, Australia, University of Newcastle, Australia

Carol was a great presenter and talked about the evolution of teaching and teaching theory and how some professors who have been teaching for a long time are not embracing technology. She showed the famous model of the early adopters right to the laggers   As a learning and teaching centre director, she says we cannot expect everyone to embrace technology. She also talked about the historical development of the learning and teaching centre and how sometimes they don't have the budgets they need and are different from the skillet of the IT departments. 

When I asked her about Lisa's suggestion that I present my evolution as a TEK opportunities and how I've changed my teaching practice since attending EdMedia. I thought that might b the perfect story. There are l it's of new up and comings and they might want to hear the benefit of me attending so that they can establish benefits to schools sending their department staff to EdMedia.  One of the EdMedia tweeters for the conference told me that he'd l I've to hear a strategy for how to l is ten at EdMedia. I'm going to do a little more canvassing to build the right content for a specific audience and apply for special PD funds so that I can attend EdMedia in Finand nex year,  Maybe I will have a story to tell.  

Wednesday, June 26, Day 2 of the Conference sessions

The first presenter for the keynote was Sidneyeve Marix of Queen’s University, Canada

She shared her slides via Slideshare on twitter:  Sidneyeve Matrix ‏@sidneyeve 3h

Your Digital Impact: Online Professional Branding Tools & Strategies for Academics [slides] http://ow.ly/mr67z  Did you know only 5% of professionals do microblogging (twitter?)

She shared so many technological applications for us to control our brand on the ‘net.  My Notes file crashed so I lost all the notes, but luckily for twitter, I can pull back a couple of key notes I took.  The apps I’d like to challenge myself to look into more are as follows in this tweet:

Thanks #sydneyeve New sites for me to connect to: Academiaedu.Newsle.Pingraphy.Scoopit.Scribd.Socialsafe.Twittercounter.Hootsuite. #edmedia

I’d like to add tweetdeck to that and I set a goal to look into instagram who does not, it turns out, own your photos once they are posted unlike facebook.

My reflections:  What kinds of constant maintenance needs to be done by these presenters who are clearly specialists in their field and are asked to present by conference organizers, and can continutously produce inspirational materials?  I wonder how this works ?

NEXT SESSION

At 10am I attended the Poster Session with the intent of networking with Western Washington University presenters Peter Agras, Kevin Dixey, Karen Hoelscher and Paula Dag.  Unexpectedly I learned about the software their institute has implemented instead of D2L called Canvas and invented in Utah. This course management tool includes social media capacity that the students love and the instructors are trying get up to speed with.  Presenter Kevin told me about the program for file storage called “COPY” that he uses in addition to dropbox.  I’m glad to learn about this because my dropbox is full.  Another tool to add to my toolkit.

NEXT SESSION

For the 11:15 session I attended the 25th Anniversary Invited Fellows Speaker:  Thomas Reeves, from the University of Georgia, He was entertaining and gave a history of the conference locations and showed cute graphics on the differences between Canadians and Americans.  There is a lineup behind me so I am feeling the need to rush through this reflection.  He showed a wonderful evolution of technology since the beginning of the Edmedia conferences 25 years ago.    I searched for the graphics and will hopefully add them here later as I enjoyed relfecting on the stereotypes.

BOOK - the book Thomas recommended was 6 Secrets of Change and Strotosphere by Michael Fullen.  I had a book list going yseterday, but it is gone :(

LUNCH was with five other colagues at Pagliacci’s, a Victoria mainstay.  I had a delicious italian-influenced salad with seared scallops, bacon, and sundried tomatoes, with a vinaigrette.  They had delicious breadsticks.

After luch I attended Sarah Duke Benson’s workshop on making more use of the EdiTlib website http://www.editlib.org/  Today I saw HR accessing a tutorial for producing a poster session.  I may be able to use this for my students.  I also learned that we could store a list of readings for our courses, but I fear that that would be yet another place for students to go.  I am really looking for a one-stop -shop concept and need to figure out how to do that.

NEXT SESSION

at 1:30 I enjoyed meeting Jamie Elbert and Jillianne Code from the University of Victoria.  They work with Valerie Irvine who was away due to some food poisoning. (I’m sad to be connecting with Valerie less this conference less than I had expected, but I wish her and her family well as they are putting down their dog today.)  Jamie’s research is entitled Integrating iPads: Perspectives and Possibilities in a High School ELA Context.  While the audience was different than mine, I did get from her poster session a list of Apps for the iPad that I’d like to know more about:

Showme

Evernote (I’ve now downloaded the app which is stored in the cloud so should be my new note-taking software for the iPad).

Simplemind

Dropbox/Copy

Adobe Reader

Bamboo Reader

NEXT SESSION

At 2:45 I attended Bonnie Stewart’s Invited Speaker keynote called:  “Networked Educators and Learners:  Who are We Now That We’re Online?”  Bonnie was well received and comes from the University of Prince Edward Island.  The slides are available through HK’s twitter post

Helen Keegan ‏@heloukee 19h

Beautifully considered/articulated presentation from @bonstewart - could listen to her all day. Slides here: http://www.slideshare.net/bonstewart/ed-media-june-13 … #edmedia

Bonnie talked about our impact on teh web and controlling how was set it up and evolve in it.  She described us as four different “Selves” on the web:

1. The quantified self - how popular and how many replies we get

2.  The asynchronous self - what we do when we are not “online

3. The surveilled self - giving passive data all the time

4The Me Inc. Self - how we are marketing ourself.

She introduced us to the concept of “context Collapse when we speak in some contexts,but others seeing our conversations have no idea to what we are referring.  Being on teh web is like constantly having an “open door” - anyone can “listen in “ to our conversations.  We must make decisions on what face to wear

Bonnie spoke of developing a digital identify because of what she gets out of it:

1.  She has an impact

2. She improves her skills at new media (and after this conference, I see I could spend oodles of time developing yet even more skills and I am an “early adopter!”).

3. She develops her writing skills and practices with “real” audiences by engaging in public conversations.  (like her tweets to the Guardian)

4. She has deeper conversations with people in her interest area than she would with her friends and family.

A question arose about intellectual property and she encouraged us to keep sharing because our ideas were datestamped; however, someone in the field of certain sciences, for example, might be making discoveries that are not yet patented, and she cautioned some people in some disciplines to be careful.

Heather Ross ‏@mctoonish 23h

@rjhogue writers have been known to make print copies of work, put in envelope and mail to self for post mark with date of writing.

Reflection:  I was watching Bonnie and wondering what it took to be a  presenter  in contrast with being a lecturing a teacher.  onni was very comfortable up on the stage and seemed very “real”  I had the wonderful opportunity to dialogue this experience with her later over supper, and she welcomed my feedback even though I had no tips for her.  For myself, I would like to one day be able to create infographics of my thoughts and practice and experiences and growth and share this with other sat future conferences.  Since I am surrounded at EdMedia by many Instructional Design Consultants (IDC) at this conference, I have been encouraged to look at my work from support BCIT has given me since our TeK initiative in 2006 and where I am today.  That will take some deep thoughts and good intraspection.  Will people attend a workshop like that?  Learning from Lisa O’Neil, there is special PD money for this kind of work, so I am happy to liaise with knowledgeable colleagues like her and grow in my personal and professional growth.  

NEXT SESSION

At 4:00 I had the pleasure of attending the poster sessions by my new friend Heather Ross with Ryan Banow from the University of Saskatchewan.  Their research is on the “Role of Faculty in the Use of Twitter in Large Lecture Courses”    I would like to have my students tweet so I am very interested in learning more about their successes and recommendations on this topic.  

Here is her tweet inviting people to look at her poster:

Heather Ross ‏@mctoonish 26 Jun

Anyone know how to add my slides to Academic Experts? Already on Slideshare #EdMedia http://www.slideshare.net/mctoonish/ed-media-twitter-presentation-june-2013-slide-share?from_search=1 …

View media

An unexpected benefit was reconnecting with another former colleague, David Kaufman from Simon Fraser University.  I once saw David present how to use humour in teaching. (  have always tried to emanate his concepts from that presentation I saw in the early 2000s.  Kaufman et al. presented on research being done “Using Digital Games to Enhance Older Adults’ Cognitive Skills and Social Lives”.  He’s going to put me in touch with the researchers and maybe get my parents involved in a study [like].

My Reflection:  

What a full day that was, so when I was invited to join colleagues at the “Bard adn Banker” on Goverment street, I jumped at the chance adn enjoyed some deep dialogues continueing what we learned in sessions today.  To keep up the momentum adn also find balance in life will be the challenge.  Striving for excellence is for sure, a goal of mine.  Being at EdMedia, I believe, will contribute to my goal.

Gjoa Andrichuk ‏@gandrich 1

Part of what I love about #edmedia every year. The engagement, the conversations, the debriefings, the comraderie and the f2f friends

Day 2 Report

Day 2 of  conference reflections

I sit at a workstation overlooking Victoria Harbour.  When I registered for the conference and hotel stay, I wanted to be sure I could cancel should things change in my life.  As a result I booked my room under a “government rate”.  WHen I arrived at the Empress, to my wonderful surprise, I had been upgraded to a Suite!  How sweet.  I feel like a spoiled princess staying where royalty stays.  These accommodations certainly support my teaching and learning, the reason for which I have come here to AACE EdMedia 2013.

On my first evening after collecting my conference package,  began to follow tweets for what’s happening amongst conference delegates.  Luckily for me, I made new friend, HR, with whom I shared teaching innovations and we had a long walk through Victoria’s beautiful streets and gorgeous seaside paths.   

The next morning after a standard continental breakfast (with delicious chai tea!), we all attended a standing room only plenary talk given by Mitchel Resnick from IT.  He shared software MIT has created to promoted teaching creativity to elemengary school students (http://scratch.mit.edu/)  The purpose was for the MIT team to “create technologies that can make connections to powerful ideas and people’s interests”.  They encourage students to remix what’s there, give credit to the originator, and build ideas.  He was a very engaging presenter.

MOOCs

The next session I attended was regarding MOOCs (Massive Online Open Course presented as research results by Martin Ebner from Austria.  There are courses schools offer which can host up to 100,000 participants!  The benefits to students is that it’s free, they can learn, and network with others.  Benefits to teachers are that they can do marketing for their institute, their publications, and there is no marking required!  Assessment is by quizzes and group projects.  Instructors hosting the course choose how much to interact with students in the discussion forums.  Most students and teachers are “Satisfied” with these courses, but I would think that it would be pretty clear for anyone signing up  would already be kind of one of the “coonverted” and wouldn’t mind this self-regulated learning model. Ebner recommends having TAs in the course.

KEEGAN

The next plenary was delivered by Helen Keegan from the University of Salford, UK.  She was an innovative and brilliant speaker.  She shared with us a project she had done trying to inspire creativity and educational risk taking with her students.  SHe reported that since education costs so much, students place value on their education only when they get excellent grades. To change this model, she worked with a BBC reporter to build clues to her course getting students dialoging and problem solving and speculating on the meaning of the course and the process.  She engaged the students with outcomes such as “the harlem shake” and Britney anda for her #dudesdoingthebrittneypanda.  They watched the power of the hashtag and the trust the students had transforming in her course.  

When I see teachers come up with creative and innovative ideas and then present at a conference,I wonder where my niche will be.  Right now I am ageneralist, but would like to be a specialist where I keep honing my skills where not only students benefit, but colleagues do as well.  There seems to be a huge energy from these few people who are creating great projects.  Keenan reported she was sleeping only four hours per night.  Very rewarding, but a cost to one’s family if one has one.  She recommends making learning experiences that are not constrained, yet I wonder how to do this when one has a specific curriculum within which one has to deliver outcomes.  She also recommende creating a culture of “Let’s” and have students problem solve together.  Perhaps this can be achieved with a flipped classroom model.

FLIPPED CLASSROOMS

A friend of HR was introduced to me at lunch and as a result, I was able to learn about his field of expertise as an (Learning and Teaching Centre) LTC consultant.  Ryan Banow, from U Sask told us the results of his flipped classrooms project.  Students are to watch pre-recorded lectures before coming to class where they are tested and tasked with problem solving activities.  I know students are supposed to do pre-reading activities before class, but the flipped model seems like it would increase their class hours and wondering how practical it wld be.  Would students also read the required chapter before coming as well?  I still have a lot of questions about this model.  Ryan recommended using Camtasia to record the lectures, but then how interactive can they be?  They can’t.  It’s a very passive model.  I like the idea in theory, but I would like to dialogue this with my LTC rep at BCIT to see how I can make it work.  Maybe just ensuring the students are doing the readings before coming is an answer.

OPEN SCHOOL BC

Well I knew coming to this conference that I would be learning, and while this next piece I feel I should have known very well about before coming, I am now grateful for knowing about it now. www.openschool.bc.ca is and OER: Open Educational Rescoure for people who want to take courses.  I’m wondering if it is a MOOC or how much interaction there is with a teacher.  Monique Brewer from the BC Government presented the site and its features.  I have shared the link with my sons’ Grade 10 planning teacher becasue there are modules that I think highschool teachers can access and have students use in their face-to-face classes. I think as a parent in the district parents advisory council, DPAC, I should get to know more about Open School BC and potentially share it with other parents and teachers as well.

Other presentations that I had wished to attend had room mix ups, so I guess I should be grateful for all the knowledge and networking and multitasking I did get to do.  Listening to presentations, taking notes, tweeting and following tweets, checking out referenced websites are  activites I never did at the same time while I was a student.  It feels like a lot to focus on at once and, one certainly needs time to have time for the results of all the input to settle down in one's brain to see what it means and repurpose it for some purpose! Today I want to know more about learning how to incorporate twitter into the classroom so students can learn from each other, and communicate with me, and also network in their industry.  

Books

Throughout the day, I have begun amassing books for my reading list:  

Net Smart.  by Howard Rheingold on digital literacies.  

I kill giants.  Graphic novel for coping with adversity.

Day 1

Looking forward for the Edmedia2013 conference to start. Had a wonderful start to the day by getting the last seat on the plane: next to the pilot!  How thrilling!! Looking down on the islands I am more accustomed to sailing by. When I arrived at the Empress they upgraded me to a suite. Beautiful accommodation. Now enjoying lunch with a beautiful view of downtown Victoria's gorgeous flower baskets. Also perusing through the conference materials and tweets to begin learning and making connections. I've connected with a presenter http://www.mctoonish.com/blog from Saskatchewan who is experimenting with using Twitter in her course. She's presenting her observations and ways she's making adaptations to what she's learned. Looking forward to discussing this concept with her and other conference attendees tonight over dinner in this quaint city.