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#ISTE13 Saturday Reflections

First big conference tech conference I've attended since AACE in 1997. Had dinner with some old friends, and made some new friends. Talked with Tom Brandt about a kind of facilitation strategy he is using to draw out learner experience in the form/context of a superhero narrative. A rather clever way of having a learner revisit their own backstory, consider present actions, and describe a possible future. While learners themselves may see their own personal narrative as banal, couching it in a fictional context allows for more exploration - permission to consider and explore points of divergence. Where have you come from, where are you now, and where do you want to go, where could you go.

It is humbling to be amongst so many innovative people - so many that are not just thinking and planning, but actually doing, reflecting, and sharing. Re-entering the academic world of research and study with my graduate degree, I'm appreciating more and more those innovators who aren't just playing with new technology and pedagogies, but really reflecting and communicating. Collectively, those experiences can be used as case studies with which we can identify affordances and constraints, develop taxonomies to frame further study leading to research that determines best practice and then instructional design guidelines that best leverage the unique affordances of the technology.While I have been sharing some anecdotal experiences on my blog, they could be more useful if the planning process were more fully described, data gathered and shared.

As for ISTE, I'm in awe of the enormity of the conference. Overwhelming, to be sure, will have to employ some of the strategies described elsewhere: make some connections with attendees, pick a theme to pursue, recognize you can't do it all, but you can do some.

Posted by milesmac on June 23rd, 2013 Posted in Pedagogy Tagged as: ,,,

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