I wrote a post this week for my Tech & Learning blog entry about books.  If you haven’t read it, I would love to get your thoughts on the topic.  The more I’ve thought about it, the more I wonder if the question simply doesn’t matter.  Bud Hunt responded to the post on Twitter by saying,

He makes a good point.  I was certainly leaning this way when I wrote the original post, and I’m close to there.  But, I just wonder about the scores of people who feel so passionately otherwise.  Are they misguided, or is there something to their argument?

If you get the chance, I’d love to hear where you stand on the question.  Feel free to comment here, or comment over on the T&L post.

Thanks to Gibson Claire McGuire Regester for use of the Flickr image.

Yes, this is my gratuitous NECC 2009 reflection post.  There were too many experiences and too many conversations that took place for me not to stop and reflect on the week as I experienced it.

The most noticeable observation I can make is the comparison of experiences from last year’s NECC to this year’s.  Last year was my first, and it was quite honestly an incredibly overwhelming experience.  I felt rather detached and fatigued as I flew out of San Antonio, and I can directly attribute that to how disconnected I was to this community.  I hadn’t yet started my blog, I was only faintly invested in Twitter, and I knew a total of about five people at the conference.  How a year can change everything.

I began my blog in August and have been learning by exponents ever since.  Not long after, I sought to engage in conversation on Twitter.  Again, the learning experiences quickly heaped one atop the other.  And as my learning opportunities increased, so too did my level of connectedness.  I came to NECC this year part of a very strong network- an engaged network who readily struck up conversations that will fill my foreseeable future with countless moments of pondering.

This experience has left me with no doubt that a learning network can be one of the best things any professional can develop.  Engaging the community and building relationships leave one in a place to break the bubble of solitude and grow in entirely unexpected ways.

I also learned what an outstanding experience it is to meet people face to face who you’ve been connecting with exclusively online.

I learned that

-Judi, Anne, Beth, Brady, and Scott M. are tremendous classmates
-Angela is every bit as dynamic in person as she is online
-Jon B. continues to be on my list of people I call friends (I swear the bracelet must have gotten lost in the mail).
-Dean is a crazy good golfer, and I could probably talk to him all day about all things education.
-Karl is in the same category of gentle, entirely wonderful human beings as Paul.
-Paul is an incredible social organizer
-Mike has now seen a baseball game and was the first person I’ve ever known to have a caricature drawn of his dinner rather than himself
-Scott F. is a great guy to hang out with
-Ketchup chips are as good as Dave says they are, and Dave is as good at riding in coach as I am at not making a mess in sessions
-Ken has the voice for radio
-Paula is a person you should know
-I have so, so much to learn
-Kelly is taller than her avatar and has a charming personality to match her charming southern drawl
-Jeff is the man to talk to if you ever get the itch to teach oversees.
-Vinny has an astounding memory
-Andy was missed
-Pat was very busy and had to watch someone eat rabbit
-Jen should have been there
-Jon O. is a master at the art of digital storytelling (something I’ve known for a very long time)
-Hank is a great guy to walk the monuments with
-Tim shares my excitement for digital photography
-Chris is the kind of principal I would work for in a second
-Chad is a great guy despite his love for the Brewers
-Mark is as nice as I thought he was
-Melanie is an outstanding student and a true humanitarian (see sandal fund)
-Cathy, Joe, and Lucy are great company at the airport
-Second Life still creeps me out
-Katie takes advantage of good photo opportunities
-Teryl knows how to have fun on a panel
-I wish I could grow a beard like Steve
-Christine is as nice as any Texan
-John does not cross streets properly
-Steve learned how to properly use the SMART pointer
-Nadine has great style
-Darren thinks I work for Sony
-Sylvia is a great person to converse with
-Scott M. is a person I am proud to call my friend
-I missed my family so much it hurt
-There was no way I could make this list without unintentionally leaving people out; I’m incredibly sorry if I missed you.

All this to say, it’s the people and the connections with each that made this conference one I’m truly glad I attended.

One other observation.  I’m not sure that the future format of a conference should stay as it is.  With our increased level of communication and sense of connectedness, it may well be that the session format needs to be rethought.  Much of what was presented in sessions has been discussed and broadcast at length online.  When such content is so readily available, what is it that gives a conference unique value?  I talked with several people about this, and it’s a topic that absolutely lands on the list of things to keep thinking about, but I wonder if we shouldn’t start looking to incorporate more of an edubloggercon or bar camp construct in the future.  I think this idea requires some vetting, so I’ll leave it open for your consideration as well.

That’s it.  My week in brief.  It was truly an outstanding experience, and I’m better because of the conversations, challenges, and pushes to grow.  Thank you all for that.

Thanks to Erica Marshall for the use of the Flickr image.

I’m of the conviction that the term “Web 2.0″ is inherently problematic.  There are many who maintain that the nomenclature provides a needed context for the changing nature of the web.  I would maintain it does much more to deter understanding than provide any functional enlightenment.

Proponents of the term state that the nature of the web has evolved in an organic fashion, and thus, we must qualify that new nature.  The web is now interactive, collaborative, and dynamic instead of static, nonreciprocal, and isolated.  While I certainly acknowledge the fact that the web has evolved over the past ten years, it remains, at its very core, still the web.  The addition of the 2.0 on the term only serves to confuse.

I heard, on quite a few occasions, teachers at a recent technology conference utter their confusion at the term.  One teacher asked where the url was for the web 2.0.  Another teacher stopped a panel discussion focused entirely on “Web 2.0″ tools to ask “what in the world” the term meant.  I think that is the rule, rather than the exception in the circles of general educators.  It’s a problem that the term immediately confuses and alienates the very people who would be best served to make use of the tools and concepts the new nature of the web presents.  If we used terminology that is exponentially more clear from the outset, such as “Interactive Web” or “Social Learning Web”, we would effectively make more headway and likely allow more students access to these experiences in their everyday learning opportunities.

I think the naming is likened to the naming conventions of cars.  Hear me out on this.  Cars have changed dramatically over the last 100+ years they’ve been around, yet they remain, at their very nature, still cars.  If at every iteration of change, we added the requisite 2.0, 3.0, and so on, what number would we be up to today?  When I’m going to go out and get something out of my car, I seldom yell out to my wife, “I’m going to run out to the mid-sized Japanese import car 10.0 and get the baby’s blanket.”  I just say car.  Because that’s what it is.  Yes, there are different kinds of cars.  There are Fords, Chevys, Hondas, Toyotas, Bugattis, and hosts of others.  There are even different types of cars beyond a manufacturer’s name.  We have SUVs, hybirds, pickup trucks, sports cars, minivans, and the like, but those naming conventions make sense.  They call the cars what they are.  We already have the equivalent in our web naming structure.  We have blogs, wikis, content management sites, social networking, learning networks, and so on.  All of these, at their nature, remain aspects of the web- a changing web, yes, but still simply the web.

A term like web 2.0 begets the notion that there will imminently be a 3.0, 4.0, and beyond.  The convention serves those within a specific group much more than it does those who need to understand the concept the most.  The term serves as a layer- an immediately unnecessary layer at that.  The convention allows those inside the realm of understanding to point to those outside and express how much the outsiders need the insiders in order to understand and be enlightened.  I’d rather we just all moved forward together in a way that makes sense and promotes progress rather than bifurcates.

And I really don’t take this issue as another instance of “let’s fight over the name of something” as much as that might appear what this post is all about.  Okay, so maybe it sort of is, but it isn’t just about the name.  It’s about what happens as a result of the name.  The web is, in my opinion, the greatest development in modern history.  And unfortunately, too many aren’t using it as such.

I know this one post won’t serve to change the way most people use the Web 2.0 term, but I hope it will give cause for some consideration.  The English language is a precise language.  I truly believe if we used it as such here, we would see one roadblock removed from the progress we should be making in engaging our students in dynamic learning.  And I’m entirely in favor of doing that which removes roadblocks and moves progress forward.

And now I’m stating such- on the web.

Thanks to xxxtoff for the use of the Flickr image.

Last week, Jon Becker threw down this tweet.

Jon rarely leads his followers astray, so I obliged my curiosity and clicked.  I was amazed.  For those of you who haven’t seen the video, prepare yourself to be blown away by data.  Seriously.  At the very least, watch the first eight minutes to get an idea of what Hans Rosling can do with an incredible visualization tool.

The way Rosling is able to present data is clearly profound.  That got me wondering.  The wondering led me to researching, and the researching led me to this.

Google has a module very similar to the tool Rosling used in his presentation.  It’s called Motion Chart, and it’s an available gadget for Google Spreadsheet.  What if we started utilizing a tool like this to help students understand complex data?  Or if we let students use it to help us understand the data?  Or if we used it to help teachers understand all kinds of classroom data?  Or…you get the idea.

Rosling also runs a service called Gapminder where he is working to “unveil the beauty of statistics.”  I, for one, think the world of education could use a whole lot more of that unveiling.  Maybe working with Motion Chart is the place to start.

Thanks to Nils Geylen for the Flickr image.