OEB 2009 – Echoes from the Participants / Submitted Stories

Tremendous Feedback

I gave a workshop to a packed room; in fact there were so many people wanting to come to the presentation that we had to bring in more chairs. The talk went well, with lots of questions and interaction. Within a few minutes of leaving the room after the session, my telephone starting buzzing to inform me that someone was signing up for the newsletter on my teachertrainingvideos.com website. For the next 24 hours, it was constant – so much so that I had to turn off my telephone. Twenty-four hours after my presentation, an additional 120 readers had signed up for my newsletter and nearly a thousand visitors had hit the website. I normally get 300 hits a day! This has, without doubt, been a very successful conference for me and I will definitely be coming back next year!
Russell Stannard

What I Took Home from OEB

Knowledge is not power anymore; access to knowledge is.  We need to inspire kids, inspire colleagues, inspire the people we can touch. Inspire people to learn, inspire people to change. Passive learning will not do any more to help address the problems we face as a world today. However, innovative and collaborative Internet technologies are enabling us to co-create a new world where we can help everybody carry schools, classes and knowledge in their pockets. We can now collaborate, share, co-create and co-direct our learning needs. We can step out of the grandstand onto the education playing field and truly contribute to the game. OEB 2009 taught me that the responsibility to get up and step in is now ours. The opportunities are there. OEB 2009 was massive, bubbling and thriving. Even though you need to come with a small army to take home all the benefits, you can never go home empty handed.
Rutger Pekelharing

Ahead of the Curve: This Year’s Learning Trends at OEB

I’ve just spent the last two days at OEB, held annually in Berlin. It is my third time attending, and every time I return full of new ideas and a glimpse at the future learning trends through the eyes of some of the top thinkers, academics and techno-geeks. This year was no different.
[…]
Trending this year were a few things: Tools like Twitter were not only mentioned in practically every session but were also being actively used to extend the learning beyond the seminar rooms throughout the conference. All kinds of video applications were also a trend, from having school kids use the video clips they took with their phone for show and tell, to the question of whether YouTube and its mega supply of how-to, just-in-time learning content might ever replace formal training. Mobile learning was also very big this year, with everyone doing it on their iPhones and other mobile devices, as well as discussing the future of learning as being “ hand-held”. This was linked to an ongoing discussion about the coming of cloud computing, having everything in the "cloud", with ubiquitous access, where any user can access any content, anytime with their phone, PDA, or even a TV. One plenary speaker heralded the end of "bulky" laptops, while holding up one of the smallest I've seen.

I myself found it fascinating that I only turned on my own PC once the whole two days (and that was for a Skype call to Sweden). Not that I was taking notes and talking instead; no, I was on my phone the whole time. I used it to Twitter the conference, used it to give feedback in sessions on Backnoise.com, to ask questions of other participants, to meet and interact with many people, and more. Instead of sitting down to write my blog posts, I micro-blogged the whole time (I would have never found the hour it takes me to write a proper blog post during that fast-paced conference.) And in doing so I got some experiential learning in "going mobile", learning a lot about this new hand-held future from many who do it so expertly.

In fact, my last Tweet from the Conference was: "#oeb2009 Difference @ OEB for me this yr: Didn't use my laptop at all- all interaction with mobile & found it great- Next yr no pc 4 me!"
Gillian Martin Mehers 

Something Old, Something New

All in all, the topics and the speakers of the conference were interesting. The discussions seemed to be repeating the old demands for change in teaching practices, but lacked enthusiasm for taking action. The most useful functions were, in my opinion, those that really focused on fresh approaches to teaching – for example, the PechaKucha presentations, social media in language teaching, and designing minimalistic web environments. As a perfect finish to the first day, the audience was treated to real fireworks at the Debate in which – in accordance with British tradition – two completely opposing opinions were expressed concerning the benefits of the teaching technologies. In particular, the speeches by Aric Sigman and Donald Clark electrified the atmosphere at the end of the long day – we really need to bring something like this to all conferences! My absolute favourite of the keynote speakers was Artur Dyro (Young Digital Planet), according to whom there will only be two agents in the future world of publishing: the author and the service provider. The direction of the change is obvious both in publishing as well as education, but in practice things move forward at a frustratingly slow pace. The problem is not with the technology, but in the ways people are willing to function.   
Riitta Suominen

The Last One of All – The Graveyard Slot

It all began on August 21st, when I learned my proposal had been accepted. I was so happy, so excited and so much looking forward to ONLINE EDUCA BERLIN that I could not stop myself from telling everyone around that I was going. A month later, I looked at the programme and thought: "they must have forgotten about me or...". No, they had not. My presentation was set for Friday, 17:40 – 18:00 – the very last one! Gone was my happiness, gone were my expectations, and gone was my enthusiasm to prepare! Uncomplaining, I said to myself that somebody must be the last one, and resigned. I changed my introduction to "Thank you very much for staying till the very last talk..." expecting to have nobody but my three co-presenters to say it to. None of my colleagues heard anymore about OEB from me.

On December 1st, I got on the train and, after a few hours of travelling with a few hours in front of me, something happened in my head. I realised I had been thinking about myself the whole time – how I would feel being the last one, what I would do in that empty room...But then a crazy idea – "What if somebody comes?" – struck me, and I began to panic. I took my laptop and felt more than busy for the rest of the journey – reorganising slides, changing colours, adding videos, eliminating texts, while thinking of how to please those who would come.

Three days later, December 4th, at half past five, and a room with a lot of people! People full of ideas, experiences and visions. They are tired, but relaxed, longing to spend the last minutes of the conference comfortably. People who, thanks to the presenters before me, have not only come but stayed. People who deserve to be rewarded for the simple fact they have come.

And there I am, hearing myself saying "thank you for staying till the very last talk, I will try to make it worthwhile for you..." and I am presenting, showing, arguing, explaining, suggesting, answering questions and ... the talk is over.

The end? Not at all! People are coming and asking for more information, for contacts and cooperation. Others are saying it was fun, and some are explaining how successful they have been in making others come to our session on Twitter. And someone simply said, "Thanks for saving my OEB; sometimes it's worth staying until the very end..."

And that was it. It was great to please the people in the audience. It was great to forget about myself. It was great to be the last one after all.
Libor Stepanek

 

December 16, 2009

 

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