Blogging with Discovery

My blogging energy these days is being spent over on the Discovery Educator Network

Digital Storytelling

Migrating

After traveling through Berlin and Prague with fellow Apple Distinguished Educators I've decided to try blogging through my .Mac account. Catch the travelogue at http://web.mac.com/jbtv.
--Joe

Bee-ing in D.C.

I had to go to Berlin to catch up on my last trip...

Teachers are easy to please. Some coffee, rolls and bagels, an occasional lunch, TIME to learn together and it’s Christmas morning! Well, it was Christmas in July last week at the Discovery headquarters in Silver Spring, Maryland, as forty of us from around the country gathered for the first Discovery Educator Network National Leadership Conference. Not only did we have the time and the place to learn together, we had great motivation and guidance from the likes of Hall Davidson, Alan November, Steve Dembo, Ron Reed, and the Travel Channel’s Educator Abroad, Josh Wolff.

But the learning wasn’t restricted to the fine presentations - roll out the red carpet! The first night we were treated to a barbecue on the roof followed by an evening tour of D.C. monuments. Since it was my first trip to the nation’s capital, I was especially moved to see Mr. Lincoln, stand where Dr. King told the world about his dream, walk through the four “rooms” of FDR’s terms, and see my high school classmate’s name on the Viet Nam Wall.

Wednesday night we attended a premiere of Discovery Atlas, a new series that will be debuting in October. Seated in Discovery’s state of the art HD (Hall Davidson?) theater, we watched the episode on China as told through the eyes of eight completely different Chinese citizens. We topped it all off with a Chinese dinner and a souvenir copy of the show’s soundtrack.

On Thursday we headed out to D.C. in our teams to gather information, sounds and pictures for our stories on America revealed. My team visited the Smithsonian, focusing on the original Star Spangled Banner flag and the impact icons have on our view of the nation. Our talented podcaster, Brian, even charmed a touring choir group into singing a verse of the anthem for us with a little help from an Australian. After working on our movies and podcasts all afternoon, we headed out for an evening of good old American bowling with books referenced during the conference as alley prizes.

Friday morning was a wonderful show and share as each team explained some of the process of constructing their projects and then showed the whole group what they had made and where it was posted. Then there was a quick lunch followed by a flurry of suitcases and almost everybody was gone (but not forgotten, judging by the emails and blogs I’ve been reading). I had the luxury of a later flight and leisurely took the Metro out to National with my own personal escort and tour guide, Dick Marchessault. And so my week ended much like it had begun, but on a much happier note. You see Dick had to escort me to the emergency room and a local pharmacy after the conference’s opening session on Tuesday when a “harmless” bee sting on the back of my hand had swollen its way up to my elbow. The DEN truly is a family (with a very generous parent) focused on the professional development and health of its members.

Back from NECC, off to D.C.

I'm back from the National Educator Computing Conference in San Diego: catching my breath, washing clothes, re-organizing, and re-packing for the Discovery Educator Network (DEN) Leadership Institute in D.C. starting Monday night. In addition to all the great presentations and products that overload your brain for three days, there's just a wealth of wonderful people, new and old friends, to connect and re-connnect with.

It started on the 4th of July when I headed to the home of one of my high school/college classmates with whom I was staying. He has a beautiful home up on a hill overlooking the airport and the bay. He also made some of the best ribs I ever had in my life and we watched the fireworks from all over the San Diego area at just about eye level. Coincidentally, I ended my stay with a birthday celebration for my host at a restaurant on the island across the bay from his house. Out of nowhere, comes a barge that fires off about ten minutes of fireworks. We tried to convince him we arranged it for his birthday, but he wasn't buying.

So, rather than focus on the stuff, here's the skinny on all the people. Our Illinois folk were well represented and a local suburban guidance counselor told me how he uses digital storytelling to get some of his students to open up. The usual Apple gang was there and we had a great reception followed by a get-together for those of us who are headed to Europe on a global awareness trip. The DEN was also well represented as was Discovery (in their butterfly wings!) The American Film Institute announced a partnership between themselves and unitedstreaming to deliver a great video on making movies in schools. We also headed over to Dave & Buster's to celbrate the 1st birthday of the DEN. Though I was so tired I could hardly keep my eyes open, we celebrated, played an interactive trivia game, had dinner, played video games in teams (selected by the birthday hat you had on), had a scavenger hunt, and received party favors with their signature thank you note and explanation of the significance of each of the gifts.

HOWEVER, the high point for me was running into Roger Wagner who was the genius behind the best interactive presentation program ever, HyperStudio. Not only did he create an incredible program for kids and teachers, he is personally responsible for turning me into the the multimedia guy I am and greasing the skids to get me out of the classroom. It seems every time I turned around in the early 90's there was Roger saying, "Joe, do you know kids can do this, teachers can do that, and even Spanish teacher/coaches can do it, too? Joe, you need this microphone. Joe, you have to have a video overlay card (with which I made a laser disc and wowed some company in New York)." So, it was only fitting I got to talk to Roger who launched the last iteration of my career as I begin the next.

No rest for the retired!

I have officially been retired for three weeks now and had hoped to "catch up" and organize before starting a very hectic July (NECC in San Diego, DEN national gathering near DC and Berlin to Prague on a global awareness trip with Apple's Distingished Educators). However, I got invited to lurk at the Midwest DEN Regional Institute these last 5 days and couldn't pass up a chance to learn and share and show off Chicago to 50 some enthusiastic multimedia maniacs. Kudos to Discovery Education for not only underwriting a great group learning experience, but also for hiring educators as field managers. They get it and they know what a classroom teacher needs and can use. And Chicago couldn't have been a better host: the weather (in spite of a daily dousing), the location (1 block south of the Loop on State St.), the food (barbecue, deep dish pizza, soul food and blues), and Navy Pier with a cruise!!! Plus it was all topped off by everyone's digital stories. And with just an extra hour on Sunday night Dick, Hall and I might have been able to straighten out the nation...

The Midwest R.I. WIKI

PC vs. Mac