For those interesting in what is going on in Berlin, a brief overview of the session of today. As it was my first time being, I decided to subscribe myself for the pre-conference session where I should learn all about “Getting the best out of the conference”. It is a kind of kick-off meeting. Ready for 3 days of intense networking and hoping to discover too much and great stuff.
The session itself starts with an introduction of Sally Reynolds, who is working for ATiT in Belgium. As Educa Online is also meant to enlarge you network, she proposes to start immediately by proposing myself to my neighbour. We can introduce ourselves to eachother by telling our name, the name of our organisation and what you are doing at that organisation. I have the chance to learn some more of Ms. Dogba from Nigeria. She is working at the University where they are introducing a new LMS, namely Moodle. At the end of the session she tells me that she is originally from Poland.
After five minutes of introduction time, Sally Reynolds takes back the floor and asks each time two persons to introduce the other to all participants. Here is what I learned from the audience:
Jakko means sharing in Finnish. Elisabeth is from Sweden and works for a center for Game studies in Malmo, She is doing her PSD. Katia lives in Greece. She just finished her Post graduated studies with a thesis on collaborative learning and teaches now little children about new technologies. Radovan comes from Slovakia and works for a company called E-learn media which develop content and provide LMS services. One of his clients is Maria who is working for ING Insurance Slovakia Himek fidel from Sweden works as a Training supervisor in a company called Gettinga. Ms Sietta is from Brasil: Federal Center of Technological Education. She saw for the first time snow. Tinny lives in Finland as a Highschool coordinator of an e-learning environment There is also a Professor from Nigeria works on the field of Architecture, encourage people Asia Kanie shares experiences outside the classroom on a kind of website. A Professor of Chemistry of Russia. She is interested in all learning Hilde Geujens from Belgium works in a company Engine of innovation. Started First with Cultural Innovation topics and says that e-learning is crucial to that. Jim works in Brussels for an accreditation organisation who provide schools their Sell or Unique label.
A small Background: In November 1995 the first online educa conference started with the idea to bring together an international group (Community) of practitioners interested in exploiting technology to support learning regardless of sector, location or approach.
A small overview of the participants gives us a good idea of what Educa Online can mean for you:
Year # participants # countries
2000 1200 60
2001 1121 47
2004 1703 66
2007 2126 95
Organisation and management ICWE owns and manages the event consisting of a conference and ancillary exhibition. The agenda is built up through the work of the steering and advisory committees. It consists of a mix of public call for papers and selection and invitation process through the committees. The conference is open to everyone who can come to.
Selection starts in January: At that time they identify the themes and a call for proposals is sent out. How are they defined? First of all by the participants of last year and secondly by following what happening is in the world by reading blogs, wikis.
This year main topics are :
- Informal learning
- Generation Y
- Changes in financial market is this a opportunity for e-learning.
What kind of organisations are attending:
This is a good mixture of organisation over the conference.
Where do they come from?
It is remarkable that only 3% of the participants are Belgian. Is there a lack of interest or maybe a lack of funds to participate in this major event.
What can you expect on Educa Online?
2 pre-conference events
- security & defence learning forum
- Iberoamérica forum
- 16 workshops
4 Plenary sessions
- Opening: Learning, Cultural identity and ICT
- Generation Y
- Friday Morning Open educational resources, sustainability of OER Globalisation
During the conference there are also Parallel sessions (86 different sessions). You can participate in those sessions as being :
- Presentation sessions
- Focus session on a specific topic
- Panel discussions
- Demonstration and best practice show cases.
This is not everything, but even more things to do like:
- Show cases: informal exhibition.
- Networking via Notice-board for messages
- Speed networking session: Idea is to meet very fast new people: 2 or 3 mins per person.
- SIG: Special Interest GroupsKnowledge exchange sessions.
Websites
www.Eschoolnews.com
www.Checkpoint-learning.com
www.Elearningeuropa.info
www.Astd.org
www.Innovateonline.info
Blogs
www.Clive-shepherd.com
www.Donaldclarkplanb.blogspot.com
www.Zylstra.org/blog
www.downes.ca/news/OLDaily.htm
www.janeknight.typepad.com
www.schmoller.net
Some of the last things I heard were
- that diigo seems to be better… then delicious.
- Find an active blogger, for the dutch speaking people: Wilfred rubens is an active blogger
- SERV and JISK are good higher education resources
- Safaribooksonline: you can find lots of online books in pdf.
Berliner greetings
Bert Coolen
Projectmanager
Belgian Network for Open and Distance Learning
www.be-odl.org
1 comment:
Bert,
If you look at the participants, I think 3% is quite normal within Europe. Especially when compared with the number of people in Belgium.
Another question would be how come so many people from just 4 countries (not including Germany) are attending. Could it be that it is were the future successful professionals will be taught?
It is something Belgians have to consider. So in this light, Belgian participation is indeed low.
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