Notes from Millie D

Tonight, my head is hurting.  No, my head doesn’t hurt because I have an idea but due to the fact there is so much information I’ve uncovered it will take me some time to truly put my hands around it.

On the heels of ACTEM’s MAINEducation06 is the K-12 Online Conference that got underway today with David Warlick’s keynote.  David alluded that his keynote was going to be random thoughts captured during the course of a day.  He did not disappoint.  While I was listening to the keynote I stumbled upon a fireside chat with David.  Fortunately the family was cooperative and I was able to sit in on it with a who’s who with Web 2.0 technology.  There are too many names to mention.  I noticed that Alice Barr made her way in for a short time.  Here were the moderators:  David Warlick, Wes Fryer, Darren Kupotowa, Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach (she was the ring leader keeping people on task).

This fireside chat was interesting.  It was done using a service called Elluminate.com.  Elluminate is a java based tool that enables audio conferencing, text chats, and a virtual whiteboard.  David was featured in a video feed.  At times I was following the video feed and got drawn to the whiteboard.  Then I would be drawn to the text chats and fall behind in the video feed.  At the end Wes mentioned that everything was archived:  whiteboard, text, video, and audio.  Sheryl mentioned it would be archived in “real-time” so that we can watch everything as it happened in one piece.  How cool is that!

Back to the K-12 Online Conference, did I mention this is free for people to be involved in?  Sessions start next Monday and run over the next couple of weeks.  There is a conference wiki to help document the material.  Check out the volume of material that is covered through the agenda.  I’m already starting to clear my schedule to get involved with some great professional development for myself and my school and I don’t have to go anywhere to take advantage of it!  Cliche moment:  Professional development has truly become flat, like the world we live in.

Just a note on the agenda, all times are listed in Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).  We are currently 5 hours behind GMT. 

Now I’ve got to get the caffine going it may be a late night digesting all of this goodness.

technorati tags:k12online06, k12online

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