Welcome to the ISTE 2012 Ning!

Please introduce yourself and let us know how you'd like to use this space.

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Chris Betcher on September 5, 2011 at 3:36pm

Hi there. My name is Chris Betcher and I'm an ICT Integration specialist from Sydney Australia. After a great visit to ISTE in Philadelphia this year I plan to come to back for the San Diego event next year. I had a blast. One of the biggest positives for me was simply to connect with people in my PLN face-to-face, many of them for the first time. I blogged about my first trip to ISTE at http://chrisbetcher.com/2011/07/iste-in-less-than-140-characters/

Big thanks go to the organisers of this Ning, as it's a great idea to make connections before the event. It makes meeting in person all the richer when you already have some connection with people through these online communities.

How would I like to use this space? Part of my goal this year is to further expand my network by meeting a whole bunch of new people. I feel like I have a fairly extensive network already and I've worked hard to cultivate those connections over the last few years, but I feel it's time to add more connections to that web of people. It's funny; I feel like I know a lot of people in this edtech community from all over the world, but as I wandered around ISTE this year for the first time, looking at people's name tags to spot people I might know from online, I realised that there are still many, many brilliant educators whom I've not had the pleasure of getting to know better. So my goal this year is to make connections with more of you.

So let's connect!

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Permalink Reply by Barbara Bray on September 13, 2011 at 3:59pm

Hi Jennifer,

I am an educational consultant from California, USA. I have attended ISTE since 1998 and look forward to connecting with new and old friends -- many I only know virtually. My actual title is Creative Learning Strategist which means I focus on strategic planning, designing creative learning environments, and finding any ways we can to bring joy and creativity to learning. My website is http://barbarabray.net where I do a little ranting about changing teaching and learning. I believe it's all about the kids and preparing them for their future. I say it's time to shake up the system because it needs lots of shaking up now.

I am professional development chair for SIGilt (Innovative Learning Technologies). Our SIG will be providing Webinars on popular topics so I plan to share them on this Ning. Thank you for setting up the Ning early and nudging us to submit proposals. I have to get moving now. Thanks!

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Permalink Reply by Sarah H. on March 13, 2012 at 7:11pm

I'm an ESL / EFL / ESP curriculum developer and SMART Notebook 10 Certified Trainer at Defense Language Institute. I'm a member of CALICO, but this is the first year I've looked into ISTE. We don't really fit into any established niche; our school trains international military students and civilians from over 100 countries. All of our classrooms have SMART Boards, SMART Document Cameras, and Mixed Reality Cubes, and we're currently doing several pilot studies involving mobile devices (MP3 players and tablets).

I don't have many opportunities to network in ed tech at present, so I'd love to expand my professional network with others involved in language learning and educational technology. Up until this point, I haven't been able to attend any ed tech conferences like ISTE or CALICO (I did attend an Air Force IT expo, but very little of it applied to our mission), and I would love to get back into research (my master's is in applied linguistics; I'm particularly interested in CALL and psycholinguistics). I've started several educational technology and SMART Board groups on MilBook (the military version of Facebook) and RIO/GlobalNET, but haven't gotten much of a response yet.

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Permalink Reply by Anthony H. VonBank on April 29, 2012 at 12:12pm

Hi. I am a teacher, tweeter, and edublogger, and I joined this NING to network with people with whom I might meet in San Diego, get a feel for what might be going on socially during the conference, and to generally get a better feel for what to expect when i am there. I look forward to meeting people and discussing great tech ed ideas!