Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users’ updates (otherwise known as tweets), which are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length. At the conference, add people to your Twitter network and tweet about what you’re up to, what you’ve just seen, where you’re going to next, etc …!

To keep track of everybody’s tweets, we have set up a ULearn08 Twitter page here. This will show all tweets which include the text #ulearn08. It is important to include the hash symbol # before ulearn08 (all one word), so that our page will pick up your feed.

Tweet tweet!

Blogs and blogging
If you are a blogger, please continue to blog while you are in Christchurch at the conference, and include the tags ulearn08 or ulearn08. Meet and join other bloggers during breaks at the Bloggers’ Cafe. There is more information on the blogs and blogging page.

Conference newsletter
The student reporters in the Media Team will be compiling a newspaper for each day of the conference. These will be handed out around the venue as well as being available on the ULearn08 website.

Flickr
Remember to bring your digital camera and upload your photos to your Flickr account. Tag your pictures with our conference tags, ulearn or ulearn08, so that others can search for them.

Twitter
Add people you meet to your Twitter network and tweet about your experiences at the conference. Twitter is a form of micro-blogging, where each tweet is a maximum of 140 characters - a great way of quickly letting people know what you’re up to, what you’ve just seen, where you’re going to next … and what you think about it all!

Check this page for more information about the social media being utilised at ULearn08.

Bruce is also one of ULearn08’s invited guests and will be giving a presentation entitled For which master? His workshop’s abstract is as follows:

Education is increasingly structured to serve the economic construct. We know that economic wealth is centred in a few hands, while our planet is being stripped of its life support systems and species, while our environment is rampantly toxic and stressful, while people are turning off or lashing out. What role does education NEED to play in today’s world if humanity is to have a desirable future?

Bruce McIntyre is known for starting Macpac at age 19 in 1973. Macpac became one of New Zealand’s early export success stories. Today, its innovative, high quality products can also be found in shops and mountains around Australia, UK, Europe, Scandinavia, USA, Japan and Asia.

In the late 1980s, disillusioned with traditional business culture, Bruce instigated a prolonged cultural and organisational reform project which transformed the workplace into an open, highly participative, team-based, human-oriented environment. These reforms were presented at the two Workplace NZ conferences.

Currently, Bruce is working on education reform, developing a model school, which has the intention of developing the innate, holistic potential of every student. Bruce comments that, “current education is openly focused on providing workers for the economy. But the base cause of our social, environmental and economic woes is that our society limits human potential to an estimated 10% of its capacity - the other 90% of us is shut down.”

• Julia Atkin, from Australia, returns to provide some clarity on collected and distributed leadership in relation to the curriculum.
• Westley Field, from the MLC School in Sydney, will talk about the Skoolaborate initiative, emerging technologies, and their implication for learning.
• Greg Gebhart, from IT Vision in Australia, will focus on the shift from Web 1.0 to Web 2.0 tools, highlighting a range of free and engaging applications that can enhance student learning.
• Nicola Yelland, Research Professor of Education at Victoria University in Melbourne, will discuss what it means to be literate in new times and the ways in which teachers can provide relevant contexts that support children to become multi-literate by extending their modalities of learning. This spotlight is particularly relevant for early childhood educators.
• Mark Treadwell, from Dataview in New Zealand, will take you on a nationwide tour looking at innovative practices surrounding curriculum, including school and centre management, assessment, the use of ICT, and transformational leadership.
• Cheryl Doig, from Think Beyond, will round off our local contribution by asking leaders to “walk the talk!”.
• Joan Dalton, from Australia, returns again to focus on 21st century learning in a digital, networked world, and asks us what this shifting landscape will mean for teachers.

The principles of ‘Open Space’ unconferences are:

1. Whoever comes are the right people.
2. Whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
3. Whenever it starts is the right time.
4. Whenever it is over it is over.

And, finally, the Law of Two Feet is a guide to people attending an unconference: “If you are not learning or contributing, it is your responsibility to respectfully find another place where you are.”

Remember that whoever comes to your session will depend on who is present at the time, and whatever happens on the day is meant to happen! So, think about what you might like to talk about and be ready to share your ideas at the unconference.