Nexus

The neat thing about edubloggers is that they don’t just write about “stuff” after it happens; they get out there, jump in with both feet and try things. We’re all geared up for the K12 Online Conference and its theme of Playing with Boundaries seems to have hit home with many of us, as that’s exactly what we’ve been doing the past few days. There have been several opportunities this week to push the boundaries of professional learning by experimenting with social networking tools such as UStream TV.

Checking my Google Reader Friday morning led me to an invitation from Vicki Davis to virtually attend her sessions that day at the MAINEducation 2007 Technology Conference. She invited us to “pull up the stream [on UStream TV] and then follow along in the Google presentation“. I decided to accept the invitation and take the opportunity to “learn over the shoulders” of the participants in the Blogging for a Better Classroom presentation.

Having had a few experiences watching Will Richardson, David Jakes, Dean Shareski, IJohn Pederson and others play with UStream TV and Operator11 earlier in the week, I thought I knew what to expect - audio and video from the presentation and a running chat with the other viewers/listeners. Vicki’s expert use of UStream blew me away! She confidently and expertly handled the technology and skillfully drew those of us on the outside into the group, as though she’d been presenting this way for years. There are several factors which made Vicki’s presentation so successful.

1. The use of the UStream TV tool was planned by the presenter and not spring upon the presenter. Earlier on Friday I watched David Warlick’s presentation in Webster, Wisconsin courtesy of IJohn Pederson’s broadcast through UStream TV. Although David was made aware that IJohn was broadcasting, he hadn’t planned for the broadcast to be integrated into his presentation. Those of us “on the outside” never joined the group “on the inside”. Vicki on the other hand invited us, acknowledged our presence, welcomed us, encouraged her face to face participants to join us in the backchannel, and planned for ways for us to be drawn into the F2F group.
2. The viewers/listeners, (back channelers), were drawn into the presentation in a meaningful way. For instance, right off the bat, we were invited to drop links to our own blogs in the backchannel chat. Rather than talking about teachers who blog, Vicki brought us along and immediately connected the session participants to our blogs. There were other opportunities for us to add to the presentation, e.g. “Tell us how you are handling comments on your blogs”.
3. Vicki assigned what she called a “Backchannel Bouncer”, (sorry Vicki, I don’t care for the term), to watch the backchannel, welcome the participants, summarize responses to the presenter’s questions, and report back comments or questions that should be addressed. This role which was played expertly by Cheryl Oakes, is essential for managing the communication flow!

Here’s a snapshot of the session.

I went in intending to “learn over the shoulders” of the participants. Instead I found myself actively engaged with the group - all without leaving my desk. How’s that for playing with boundaries?

Technorati tags: education, edubloggers, blogging, UStream TV, backchanneling, Vicki Davis, David Warlick, K12 Online Conference, k12online07

This entry was posted on Monday, October 15th, 2007 at 1:27 am and is filed under online tools, UStream TV, social networks, backchannelling, conferences, about blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.