So much has happened in this corner of the ed tech world this past week.

On Wednesday, June 25, we welcomed 50 new talented educators into the Google Certified Teachers group. It has been great hearing about their experiences in Mountainview, CA and the knowledge and enthusiasm they bring to our group.

On Friday, June 27, I welcomed 24 New Jersey educators into the Center’s 21^st Century Learning Initiative. Teachers from Chatham, Hamilton, Spring Lake and Camden school districts met at our Center on Rutgers’ Busch campus to discuss what we need to prepare ourselves to teach students in the 21^st Century. I introduced the teachers to Twitter and Diigo and asked that they spend the next month immersing themselves in developing a personal and professional learning network and giving some thought as to what they would like to gain from their networks as an individual.

We meet again at the end of July.

Today, as I finished my Flipcharts for NECC, I watched the UStreams and backchannel chats of EduBloggerCon in San Antonio. I also procrastinated and it’s now almost 11pm and I have still not packed.

Tommorow – Texas and NECC 08!

My husband and I had grand plans to celebrate our 11th wedding anniversary this past Friday night at a quiet, pricey, romantic restaurant. Our plans were squashed when my brother-in-law called early Friday morning to inform us he had the flu. Both grandmothers already had plans that night - and mysteriously the next night as well. I called the babysitter and left a message on her cell asking if she was available that night and waited all day for her to leave school grounds so she could turn on her phone and retrieve it. (Why can’t highschoolers check their voicemail during studyhall?)

It was a no go. She wasn’t available to watch them on Saturday night either.

Saturday morning I called the back-up sitter. She was unavailable as well. I even called the back-up to the back-up. She was unavailable too. I went out to run errands.

When I got home, my husband recommended that instead of staying home and he and I having to cook, that we change the reservations and take the kids out to a more family-friendly locale.

On to the reason why I’m blogging about this meal…
When we entered the restaurant (we were in the Atlantic Highlands in New Jersey, about to sit on the deck overlooking the Sandy Hook Bay) my two daughters, ages 4 1/2 and 6 were asked if they wanted to make some wikis.

MAKE SOME WIKIS? This fried seafood restaurant that was going to supply my girls with hotdogs and chicken strips had wi-fi? My kids don’t even get technology at school and my full-day kindergartener is right across from the computer lab all day long.

It turns out that there’s another kind of wiki I was not aware of. But my girls loved them. They used their Wikki Stix to make all sorts of creative creations: dogs, people, microphones, lolipops. They had a blast. They hardly ate. They requested more Wikkis (which fortunately for us the kind waiter didn’t even blink at) and while they collaborated with each other on how to use the tools they were given, my husband and I talked about our eleven years of marriage - and yes, wikis and blogs and all things ed tech.

Wikki Stix can be found at http://www.wikkistix.com.

Well I had registered for Shutdown Day on May 3. (The link for http://shutdownday.org seems to be broken now)  I successfully stayed off my computer, e-mail, Twitter, all my online networks for 24 hours. I enjoyed the time with family, friends and the outdoors so much I decided to extend the day a little longer and did not connect again until Sunday evening when I needed to complete a project for class and finish researching something for work.

I could do this again. I’m sure I missed something important, but knowing the wonderful people I’ve met in my network - they’ll fill me in.

Can you survive 24 hours without your computer? Unless there’s a beach vacation involved, it’s a stretch for me, but tomorrow - I’m going to do it!

An experiment is going on to see just how many people can go without using their computers tomorrow, Saturday, May 3, 2008. To be part of the experiment, just register online, consider advertising Shut Down Day on your blog or website, and maybe even create a short video of what you did with all the extra time you had with family and friends while you weren’t on your computer using all that electricity. There’s a contest you can enter to win some great prizes.

What will you do with your time?

Tomorrow David Gordon and I present at PodcampNYC. We will be presenting about a project we have been working on for months now.

We’re still not really ready. We had been hoping to have edited more video and published all the video podcasts to Rutgers iTunes U and secured more funding, but best laid plans…

I spent some time today finalizing our presentation and realized it will be very difficult to summarize in an hour (from 1-2pm) what has taken us many months to put together. But I am very excited to share what our vision has been to help children, parents, classmates and teachers of children re-entering school after having been treated for cancer.

David and I (and everyone else involved with this project) are hoping that after today we’ll be able to forge ahead.