Planning for mini conference and quadratice equations!

Hi again,

Well as I had no idea what WizIQ was, I decided to check it out. There was a public session about to run on 'quadratic equations'.. Hmmmm. This could or more likely could not be of any interest to me, so after some pondering I decided to give it a miss and listen to the recording of Nelly Deutsch on evaluation strategies in Wiz IQ. It is great for me to realise that there is more than one option when it comes to synchonised interaction. As I have been working on elluminate, it is easy to become comfortable with that platform and become adverse or scared of another. Initially I wanted to get a presenter for my mini conference to discuss all the specific tools available on elluminate. However I believe I have learnt that one needs not to be afraid and that most of these platforms are user friendly and not that scary, with similar but slightly different ways of doing things. After talking this over with Sarah I have decided to change my focus on elluminate and instead focus on encouraging student interaction with synchonised arenas.

So that is the plan. A mini conference on elluminate with the topic on 'how to encourage student engagement in the synchonious environments online'. Colleagues have generously said they will present for me if I needed someone which is great and I do have colleagues that have had some good experience within the synchonous environment, but they are all about as new to this as I am so perhaps it would be better to get someone with a bit more experience? I have asked a senior lecturer if she would mind being a guest presenter. I explained the requirements of the course and the mini conference plan and said it need not be long (<10mins) presentation and informed her of the date of 12th November. I let her know what my initial plan was but said I would be interested in what thoughts she had about what would be a good idea/topic. She told me she would have to have a think about it as she is very busy right now and would get back to me.... Fingers crossed... I guess a back up plan though will be my friendly colleagues in Wellington.. We just won't tell them they are my second choice.

So basically I have half chosen the topic, the date, the time, although these can be worked around according to the presenter. I have a few presenter options.
Next I need to think about advertising my event. I have advertised it within the online facilitating mini conference page, but also thought I could advertise to some students as they might give another beneficial perspective. I have also thought about advertising it to some of my family members..don't know why.??

I feel much more confident now about creating a session on elluminate as Sarah has shown me through this.. Easy once you know how. I will formulate my introduction once I can confirm my presenter. I need to think about how am I going to plan for or manage technical difficulties and issues around attendance (perhaps that is why I will invite family?). The easy answer to technical difficulties is to have someone experienced in attendance such as my lecturer to help and give pointers or tips if I need. Also to have the more experienced presenter would help in that regard too. Last time, and luckily I was early for it, others told me my microphone had a hum.. The advised trying my head phones and mic on as oppossed to just the computer mic and that made all the difference. But there is always what I don't know that I don't know.

Anyway, I plan to keep you posted. I plan to attend another classmates conference too. Sharons event on cultural competence online sounds good.

Jade