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Michelle Kuhns presented this session at NECC 2009, hailing from the American School of Warsaw, Poland. She described how one school established powerful parent education courses and made digital citizenship a collaborative endeavor. These days, everything is inter-related, whether it’s social networking, 21st-century skills, or internet safety. Michelle also helps manage the ISTE Ning, and presented this session along with Larry Kuhns. Jason Ohler recently touched on similar topics at his website and in another blog space at http://www.committedsardine.com/blog.cfm Lisa Olinda also has numerous postings on social networking related to business at Social Media Success Summit 2009. It really is a connected world these days. Check out these great resources!

Malcolm Gladwell delivered the Keynote address at NECC this year on Learning Environments. Here are some of the main ideas. In the first place, we tend to telescope the time for learning between inception and success. As a culture, we are certainly conditioned for instant gratification, even in education. Secondly, most believe success is built on success (the Capitalization strategy) Actually, we understand that success is built on previous failures. We celebrate great thinkers and amazing inventors, but we forget how many failures Edison worked through before building a reliable electric light bulb. The inspiration is usually more glamorous than the perspiration involved in all the work leading up to success. Third, Learning Paths are not necessarily Linear.  I recently heard someone warning against using digital text over printed reading material. They were concerned that readers might start viewing the text in non-linear ways! (That could be a good thing.) Following that logic, perhaps we should be using manuscripts and scrolls instead of printed books, since we view them differently. In conclusion, we need to put these ideas together. Learning takes time and effort. Learning takes making mistakes and compensating. Learning takes struggling and exploring along the way. If we understand these key points, we will be able to build successful Learning Environments. Great ideas!

The National Educational Computing Conference starts today in Washington, D.C. ISTE is looking back on three decades of changes in Educational Technology, and looking forward to innovation in the future. Lots of great ideas will be discussed and demonstrated over the next few days, and be taken back to schools around the US and the world. You can be a part of this discussion, whether you are attending NECC this year or not. Make some comments here on this blog, or visit the many NECC sites already in place. Over 80 bloggers are posting their thoughts as well, and their links are on the NECC site. What does the future hold for Ed Tech? That is the question!

Well, the new iPhone will be shipping in just a few days. How many of you use an iPhone at this time? Do you like the device? Are you satisfied with AT&T’s service with the iPhone? (we are still on Verizon) Would you buy an iPhone if it was available on Verizon or other carriers? It sounds like the relationship between Apple and AT&T has lost some of its luster, maybe even become acrimonious. What do you think? I just finished listening to Ken Ray on the Mac OS Ken podcast. Great show!

I read an article by Billie Will in The Reaper, a publication of SLM. A Benson Waema in Nairobi, Kenya, had drawn a picture of the Kilimanjaro elephant to help defray the costs of  printing literature for Bible lessons in his country. When donors gave money towards the giant rolls of paper used in printing the lessons, they were given a copy of his picture. The response was overwhelming, enough to buy 52 giant rolls of paper worth over $40,000. Benson’s efforts have made him the biggest “Paper Partner” the ministry has ever had. I will try to link to the article and elephant picture when I find it online, or scan the paper copy I have now. Good news to hear!

This image contains some of the illustrations from “Charlie’s Secret Telephone” by my sister Ella Marie Yates. She produced the book, and my oldest brother, Walter John Olinda, Jr. did the illustrations. I used Comic Life to arrange a number of the illustrations on a single sheet. My mom is 84 this year, and the book is about her brother Charlie, a family story from the early 1930’s. I will use my iPod to record my mom talking about this old family story. Stay tuned for more details later.charlies-secret-telephone

I just got Blog Stats working a little while back on WordPress. I am wondering how many people would be willing to click on the links below to connect to other blog entries. (Come on, all you other Baby Boomers out there…)  Just trying to make sure the counter is working. Oh, and you can read some while you are there. Just got done listening to another podcast episode of The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keilor. He always does a great job with this short podcast. I am hoping to begin using some of my blog postings as the starting place for a short podcast. We are also moving next year at school to a podcast format for our morning announcements. I am hoping that combining our existing elements in new ways will add variety and interest in the programming. Planning on using greenscreen for some of the video segments as well. We will see how it goes. Have a good weekend!

Lisa and I were married on May 31, 1986. Seems like yesterday, and in other ways many years ago. Many happy memories over those years, and lots of family time. We have 5 children, ages 20, 19, 17, 10, and 8. They have been a joy, and we are proud of them. Peter is the youngest. Recently, he was in the van when his older sister got dropped off at the hair salon. He glanced up at the sign as she went in and said in an alarmed tone to mom, “WHY IS SHE GOING INTO THAT SALOON?!” As I said, our children have been a joy and a blessing to us both. Lisa has been the busy mother of 5 for many years, and is such a talented individual. She has been building an online business as a Virtual Assistant over the past 18 months, and is making great progress. (She has done pro bono and non-profit work for some time, but paying clients are nice, too!) You can see her site at www.olindaservices.com. Hard to believe these years have passed. Looking forward to the next 23 years!

Read an article recently about the complexities of the human body. Human beings possess incredible ability to roll, twist, jump, spin, run, leap, lunge and balance in many different ways. Balance, sense of speed, body position, and making adjustments. (Or balancing on a champagne bottle like this young lady.) How does all of this work together? That is a good question. The old picture in the article is what caught my eye initially. Take a few minutes to connect to this link and read this article.

Just finished a book about the psychology of Time by Philip Zimbardo and John Boyd. The authors hope to help readers to reclaim yesterday, enjoy today and master tomorrow. Interesting insights on time and how it is perceived. I have always been very interested in thinking about time, from time management to time travel, To Do lists and crafting the future you are wishing for. It reminided me of my Bible teacher in high school, who always reminded us to think carefully about origins, purposes and destinies. All of our life here takes place inside of time. It is worth your time to take a look at this book.