Cathy Nelson’s Professional Thoughts

Yes it’s coming, in just a few weeks, once again, educators all over the world will be totally caught up in a conference that is probably the most virtual event in the truest sense of the word “virtual,” and it’s a conference that keeps on giving regardless of where you are or when you decide to join in. Last October the first ever “online conference” commenced, being kicked off by David Warlick, who likened the Internet to traveling, taking this path or that, this road or that, moving in directions that can be strategic and purposeful to fanciful and based on a whim. The 2007 conference is scheduled to be held over two weeks, October 15-19 and October 22-26 of 2007, and will include a preconference keynote during the week of October 8. The conference theme is “Playing with Boundaries.” And once again, David Warlick has been bestowed with the honorary assignment of being the opening keynote. It was this time last year that I participated in Elluminate, which at that time Warlick dubbed a “fireside chat,” aptly called such because we logged into Elluminate and participated from the glow emanating off our computer screens. It was a great experience, and I think this even single-handedly opened my eyes to the potential of using 2.0 tools. After experiencing this conference, I wholeheartedly embraced the concept and began talking it up to all my friends, family, and colleagues. You do not want to miss, but thats okay of you do. This conference will be available to view and participate live, but also to download and listen, re-listen, and share many times afterwards. Best, it’s 100% free! All that’s needed is a computer that gets online and is fairly up to date. Visit the site today to read about presenters, tools or plugins you might need, and this year, see “teaser” videos of what is to come! I can’t wait.

Everything presented will have a feed, so you can track live using your calendar, or subscribe and have it made available for you when you are ready–this will be the simplest way for me since I do have a day job!! The K12 Online site has a feed, and just today as I subscribed, I noticed there are already 216 folks subscribed to any feeds coming out, and they are steady hitting my aggregator now, with the most recent activity including previews of what is to come in the format of videos. Subscribe and/or plan to tune in live. It will be a mid altering experience that will change the way you think.