NECC 2008: San Antonio Recap (and Yes, the Alamo Really is Smaller Than it Seems)
Without questions the
greatest highlight of NECC this year was the fact that one of the exhibitors
had a mechanical bull on the trade show floor. I'm not at all sure what they
were selling, but it was a mechanical bull that you could ride! Okay, maybe
that wasn't the "highlight" of the conference but I think it speaks to the
extent to which the exhibit floor has changed over the past few years; gone are
most of the booths with current or former educators as they've been replaced by
a much more aggressive sales and marketing cadre.
Generally speaking, I tend to think of NECC as primarily a conference about two things: (1) A hardware show where developers show off their latest gadgets and gizmos; and (2) A shared learning event where (typically) educators show off strategies and stories as to how they are integrating technology into their classrooms. Of course, this can vary from year to year but, for the most part, I think those two categories hold true.
This year the one new-ish trend within those categories was the extent to which participants (be they principals, teachers, or vendors) are grappling with Web 2.0 technologies. Walking through the hall it was difficult not to find a vendor who wasn't selling something that was "Web 2.0 savvy." Sadly, most of what I saw was solutions that have a Web interface but don't really allow for much user interaction or collaborative knowledge-building.
Attending conferences is also a process of meeting up with old acquaintances that you might not have seen in quite some time (or only happen to connect with once a year). In my case that occurred when I bumped into a fried who works with the Oracle Foundation (www.oraclefoundation.org, www.thinkquest.org, www.think.com). He is also involved with the Partnership for 21st Century Skills (P21 - www.21stcenturyskills.org) and we had an incredibly interesting discussion about just what 21st Century Skills are (and how things like the NETS standards do and don't capture them). One very interesting thread of the discussion centered around just what it means when educators talk about the project-based skills of working in teams, collaboration, etc. That is, from my experience we often have students work in teams but that sort of engagement doesn't really model how teams really work. I can recall textbooks from my teacher-school days which talked about how student teams need to be organized into groups like "facilitators" and "note-takers" but they tended to miss the point of working in teams; that project plans need to be developed, roadmaps charted and milestones created. Too often, the teacher creates that backbone and all the teams are left to do is connect the dots. Anyhow, I found it interesting and am looking forward to discussing the P21 initiative more.
I also managed to meet with Mike Muir who runs the Maine Center for Meaningful Engaged Learning. He shared a number of great insights into implementing 1:1 programs both in Maine and a variety of other locations. He is also heading up the ISTE Special Interest Group on One to One Learning. One item I found particularly interesting was a 1 to 1 Success Model his team developed.
Additionally, I attended a number of presentations - some of which were very good and some not so good - and have a few items that I think are well worth sharing. First off is what the American Film Institute is doing to support film and video education. They have a rather extensive library of online tutorials (a "virtual film school") to help teachers get their students doing more with project-based videos.
A second very interesting tool I came across during a presentation by folks from Discovery Education was www.polleverywhere.com. I have a very strong dislike of audience response systems (aka "clickers") that teachers can use to get feedback from students. For the most part I think they are a huge waste of money and a tool that has very limited value. The Poll Everywhere site underscores that; meaning, it allows you to create online polls that users can respond to by sending a text message from their cell phone. It gathers (and displays) real-time information. Nice!
What would Texas by
without Bar-B-Q? Wait. Don't answer that. On Wednesday night I managed to get
out of San Antonio and headed southwest about 30 miles where a couple of
friends and I found the "Bar-B-Q Patio." As Jed Clampitt would say,
"Woo-doggies!" That was some good eats. Also, one of my dining companions, Tim
Wilson, is in charge of Apple's conference podcasts so if you've got a
hankering to listen-in on some of what happened at NECC, check them out .
Other Items to Watch
ISTE maintains a nice list of bloggers who are posting items about their conference experience. I'd recommend the following sites as ones I generally pay attention to and provided some good coverage into their NECC experience:
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