Month: July 2013

ISTE13 – Adam Bellow

Adam Bellow

Thankfully, I was able to see half of this keynote before I had to go to the airport. Powerful stuff. I had seen him throughout the conference with the Google Glass — very fun to see his video of his experience — and a video of his experience delivering the keynote!

The messages from the keynote were obviously powerful for his fellow educators — the tweets and blog posts following the keynote are amazing.

For me, the important pieces were:

  • The Scantron video (Adam with a “new” machine to read Scantron tests — a shredder!!!) This starts at about 39:40. He has a strong anti-testing theme.
  • His admission that he new little about Minecraft until this conference.
  • Message of change
  • Power of visual communication. Bellow is a master at slides, and it makes a difference.
  • “Technology can’t be the icing. It’s in the dough.”
  • 20% time  — he thinks this is low. Kids should be passionate all throughout school.

If the video starts at the beginning, go to 23:00 to start with Adam. The rest isn’t essential.

ISTE13 – Chris Lehmann

I just returned from  at ISTE13.  I am fortunate and grateful that I am able to attend this conference. This is not yet my reflection post. I’m still processing and find I need space to do that. As always, I wrote a great deal on the flight home – it’s the best place to immediately process. I will be posting thoughts from the flight later.

The next few posts are a spot for me to store the video from the conference that I will reference later. I love that ISTE does video on demand. It’s impossible to get to all the sessions you want during the conference — especially when they schedule Will Richardson and Chris Lehmann at the same time!

Chris Lehmann

I’ve blogged about Chris many times. It was watching him at ISTE 2011 and online that really started me down this path. He talk at ISTE13 is no exception. I’m sorry I wasn’t there in person.

Take a look through this video. Think about the questions he asks. These questions would make a powerful faculty experience. I may, in fact, take the questions and write a session even for the staff where I work.

The questions he asks – and is looking for a 10 word answer – include (paraphrased):

  1. Schools should help students become?
  2. How does technology help this?
  3. What are your “Legacy Apps” and how do you change?
  4. What will you do to change in 2013-2014?

Look for the responses on Twitter, #istetransforms. Powerful.

I was also empowered by Chris’s reference to parents. ISTE doesn’t always mention parents as much as I think it should, and it is often about how to convince parents to like tech, to move away from traditional grading. But how about us parents who want our schools to move away? Chris uses the term, Parent Activist. I love it. He encourages these passionate educators to use their role as parents in their kids’ schools to become activists, to encourage change there as well.