Meander your own way

Don’t follow, meander your own way in a conference. 

I finally made it to an ISTE conference! For anyone that does not know, the ISTE conference is arguably the biggest Educational Technology conference in the U.S.   The timing for the ISTE conference was always inconvenient for me, scheduled during vacations or other work commitments. 

The funny thing is the big ticket speakers and Keynotes didn’t draw me in at all. After a couple of ok sessions I found myself meandering the rest of time between the EdTechTeam and Google for Education booths in the vendor area.

Both of these locations featured teachers and former teachers and how they are using Google Apps and other instructional technology tools in education.  I really need to hear how teachers are currently using GAFE in classes, it's like water in a desert.

I learned more in some of these 20 minute sessions than in the 50 minute sessions I attended. I don’t why, but I must say the shorten sessions, being closer, all of it helped me.  It could be my attention span issues or simply that I am GAFE centric, but these sessions rocked.

Two of my favorite sessions are “Redefining Math” with Sandra Chow (@watnunu) and “Explore your World with Google Geo Tools” presented by Brad Lands (@MrLands).  Both of these presenters (currently teaching) are powerhouses and really gave me a ton of ideas I can’t wait to test out.

Sandra Chow is the math teacher I always wish I had, she is innovative (and a Google Innovator) and used google slides in a way I never thought of for collaborative math work. Bradley Lands broke more down about Google Geo Tools  in a quick 20 minute session than I ever thought possible.  I would suggest following both on Twitter, or just following them wherever they are.  There is much to learn from both of them.

I will post more on what I learned at ISTE and of course on my adventures in professional development as the summer rolls on. 
  
And probably one of the biggest highlights of the ISTE conference is my discovery of the sushi-ritto (a sushi buritto) at Hai’s Kitchen in Philly.  Actually not my discovery, Jesse Lubinsky was the official food tour director of our small group. (As per usual, Jesse, Sabrina and I traveling in our own little Ed Tech wolf-pack.) And quite a tour it was!