LisaThumann

Thinking Inside the Box

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boxesThis Tuesday, July 14,  will be the second of three keynotes I will be presenting for the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA). As I mentioned in my post about the first keynote , I’ve set aside a section on my wiki for the slide decks and resources I’ll be sharing and I will be embedding the UStreams there as well. I’ve established #NJEA as the Twitter hashtag already and on 7/5/09 Tweeters in the Twitterverse began using the hashtag in any conversation related to these Technology Institutes.

Please consider joining the UStream one or both of the remaining Institutes. They begin on Tuesday mornings at 9:15AM EST. I truly feel these New Jersey educators would benefit from your input on how you use portable devices in the classroom.  Tweet a link using the #NJEA hashtag, leave a comment here, join us in the UStream.

Thanks for your support. –Lisa

We’ll be trying:

Poll Everwhere
http://chacha.com/

We’ll be watching:

Did You Know 3.0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL9Wu2kWwSY

Abbott and Costello Video
http://teachertube.com/members/viewVideo.php?video_id=3963&title=Abbot_and_Costello_Maths_Problem

Intel Commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypEo7uCUXA8

We’ll be talking about:

How to use the wealth of material available to educators and students in iTunesU, on sites like Teachertube.com, and many others. We’ll also be taking a look at boxes like the iPodTouch and netbooks.

My Plan for a Pocket Clone at NECC09

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No Foolin’

She'll be my Pocket Clone during NECC09
She'll be my Pocket Clone during NECC09

This will be my solution. I have been talking with many folks in my personal learning network lately about how to stay on top of things and have been mentioning that I am interested in the concept of cloning. Well…this is my temporary solution.

Don’t judge me.

Think of her as my version of Flat Stanley. I may send her to sessions with a few of my friends and ask that she be photographed so that I know she was there and then view the UStream later so that it was as if I was there soaking up the knowledge myself.

I may keep her in my laptop bag as a backup in case I have over committed myself. I may ask her to hold up my end of the conversation. I’ll just let everyone know that I’m feeling a little tired and quiet ahead of time (like right now).

The point is that we could all use a little help. I’m looking forward to being an observer, a participant, an assistant this go around. I leave tomorrow morning and arrive in DC by mid-afternoon. As I spend my time at NECC and Edubloggercon, these are the things I’ll be thinking about:

July 7, 14 and 21     Keynote for the NJEA Technology Institutes, Stockton University, NJ

July 15 and 16          Google Workshop for Educators, CMSCE, Rutgers University

July 28                       Edubloggercon East, Boston, MA

July 29-31                 Building Learning Communities 2009 (BLC09)

August 5                     Google Teacher Academy, Boulder, CO

What will I take away from the time I spend face-to-face with so many from my PLN in Washington? How will I use what I learn to enrich what I share with other educators over the next few months and beyond? What can I share with them? What can I share with you?

But, please, don’t forget my Pocket Clone.

Pick one new skill and give it a try

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images.inmagine.com/img/image100/10086/10086059.jpg
Source:images.inmagine.com/img/image100/10086/10086059.jpg

Late this past Tuesday I was asked if I would put together a presentation for a group of high school teachers. The high school administration is working on making better use of the hardware and infrastructure already set in the building and they have set up a professional day with some 90 minute workshops on how to integrate web resources into the content areas as a way of renewing the buildings interest in matching the students needs. To kick off the day, the technology coordinator asked me to make a presentation to the 150 or so high school teachers that would “get them excited” about using technology.

If you’ve met me, follow me on Twitter or read my blog, you know it doesn’t take much to excite me about technology. This stuff is my passion. So I immediately recognized that what might be really engaging for me as a member of this audience on a Friday morning at 8am, might bore the heck out of a high school biology teacher who has no interest in technology whatsoever. Thanks invance for your continued support and assistance.

This I found a bit unnerving.

The other issue I was having was that I found out about this presentation Tuesday afternoon and was due in another district on both Wednesday and Thursday. So there wasn’t much time to prep anything. I mostly planned my slide show in my head and wrote notes at red lights while driving. And then finally, Thursday evening, was able to put my presentation together.

I’d like to share it with you. I wish it were later in the day so that I would be able to invite my PLN to join a backchannel and present with me, but I realize that 8am is very early. I may try to set something up on UStream if I get the chance once I am there. I will definitely be on Twitter, looking for moral support as I have to say that this is the largest group I have presented to.

Did I mention that this is the first district I ever taught in?? No, I guess I didn’t happen to mention that.

As Liz Davis I had great fun asking session attendees to dance with us at Educon2.1, I decided to play some music while everyone is settling down. I don’t quite have the nerve to ask 150 people to get up and dance.

I will introduce the video Pay Attention and then use this slide show to lead my discussion. If I’m not able to record it using UStream, I’ll have my iPod Classic with me so that I can record it that way as I’d like to go back and hear it myself. I’m very curious to see what improvements I can make on this particular presentation having had so little time to prepare.

21 Ed Tech Leaders You Just Have to “Meet”

Lisa Thumann, , , , , , 34 Comments

Tomorrow, October 14, I’ll be making two presentations at NJAET‘s Annual Conference. Their theme this year is “21 Years Growing Up Digitally”, so I was asked if I was willing to make a couple of presentations related to that theme.

I’m fortunate to be co-presenting one of the presentations tomorrow with a friend of mine, Heather Sullivan. Heather and I have presented together before on Web 2.0 and I’m sure we’ll present again as we have a good time. We created a wiki for this presentation, 21 “Must See” Web 2.0 Websites for Educators. You can view the wiki at http://web2pointo.wikispaces.com/.

Click on the image to view the presentation.

The other presentation is 21 Ed Tech Leaders You Just Have to “Meet”. When I agreed to present on this topic I had no idea how small the dumber 21 was. I Tweeted out a link to a Google Form I created (thank you again to those who submitted) along with a link to the published results here. I read through my Google Reader and looked at who was in my PLN.

Speaking of my PLN, I talked to a few of my Ed Tech buddies about the list I was putting together. Actually, Liz Davis alluded to our conversation recently on her blog when she wrote her Ten Tips for Growing Your Learning Network post. Everyone I spoke with had some similar variation of the list I was thinking of using. We all agreed that goin g back and reviewing my subscriptions was a good place to see where I got my most valuable information from.

So, you ask. What’s the problem?

The problem, for me, was that in the last 18 months I have met (virtually and face-to-face) so many intelligent, generous, and enthusiastic educators, that I hate to limit the list to only 21.

So, I decided to begin the presentation with six or so names the attendees might have already heard of.

I still needed more.

So I added another dozen names to the end of the presentation.

I still needed more.

But I am only really supposed to present information about 21 ed tech leaders who are advocating for the education community to effectively use technology to improve teaching and learning.

Theses are the 21 Ed Tech leaders I included in the 70 minutes I was given to present:

Larry Ferlazzo
Peggy Sheehy
Chris Lehmann

Lucy Gray
Steve Dembo
Darren Draper
Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach

Patrick Higgins
Kevin Jarrett
Liz Davis
Bud Hunt
Bob Sprankle
Kim Cofino

Darren Kuropatwa
Tom Barrett
Sylvia Martinez
Dean Shareski
Lisa Durff

Cathy Nelson
Joyce Valenza
Mark Wagner

If you don’t see your name there, I sincerely apologize. I really am sorry.

Add it here by leaving a comment.

If you don’t see the name of someone you feel should be on the list, feel free to leave a comment with their information.

I hope someone shows up to hear me present. 🙂

Project 10 to the 100th

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www.flickr.com/photos/81035653@N00/2242177289
http://www.flickr.com/photos/81035653@N00/2242177289

“New studies are reinforcing the simple wisdom that beyond a certain very basic level of material wealth, the only thing that increases individual happiness over time is helping other people.”

Project 10100

Project 10100 is a call for ideas to change the world by helping as many people as possible. Google asks that if you have an idea that you believe would help somebody, to submit it to them. They are committing $10 million to fund up to five of the final ideas.

To submit your idea, complete this form and upload your 30 second video using YouTube or Google Video.

You can submit as many entries as you want.

Ideas must be submitted by individuals, not organizations.

Submit your idea focused on one of the following 8 categories (Pay attention to #8):

1. Community: How can we help connect people, build communities and protect unique cultures?

2. Opportunity: How can we help people better provide for themselves and their families?

3. Energy: How can we help move the world toward safe, clean, inexpensive energy?

4. Environment: How can we help promote a cleaner and more sustainable global ecosystem?

5. Health: How can we help individuals lead longer, healthier lives?

6. Education: How can we help more people get more access to better education?

7. Shelter: How can we help ensure that everyone has a safe place to live?

8. Everything else: Sometimes the best ideas don’t fit into any category at all.

On January 27, 2009, the public (THAT’S YOU) will select twenty semi-finalists from 100 of the project submissions. An advisory board will then choose up to five final ideas for funding and implementation.

What will the Advisory Board look for in your idea?

Reach: How many people would this idea affect?
Depth: How deeply are people impacted? How urgent is the need?
Attainability: Can this idea be implemented within a year or two?
Efficiency: How simple and cost-effective is your idea?
Longevity: How long will the idea’s impact last?

What will your idea be? How can you use this with your students to make the connection between their lives and their community, their country, or even the planet?

There’s about 20 days left. Click here to read more about Project 10 to the 100th.