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The iPod might have an instructional potential, but it is the educators who arrange and structure instructional events around it to make learning happen, not the instrument itself. To realize the instructional potential of technology requires a set of skills that can only be acquired through adequate instruction and practice. Just as speaking a foreign language is not a qualification to teach it, knowing how to use a technology does not mean that one knows intuitively how to use it as a teaching tool.

A keyword search for the word "tech%" and "computer" in the Modern Language Association (MLA) job list1 returns over 43 relevant ads out of 236 job postings (as of November 20, 2007): "familiarity with teaching-related technologies" (tenure track in Spanish, Missouri); "experience with technology in the classroom" (tenure track in French, Michigan); "ability to use technology effectively in teaching and learning" (tenure track in Japanese, South Carolina). The wording varies slightly from one ad to the next, but the message is the same: job candidates are well advised to have an answer ready when asked how they use technology in the classroom.

Because the field of language technology is at the crossroads of technology, instructional design, and languages, it calls for the close collaboration of experts in each area. Today, language centers are the only campus units where such a wide range of expertise can easily be found.

Prof Crystal said that texting had had a bad press, and it was merely another way to use language.

The panic about texting and its effects on language is totally misplaced... it adds a new dimension, enriches language, gives you a new option

"In the past comics such as the Dandy and Beano would have had quizzes where you had to guess a sentence from letters and pictures

As I “met” new people by following them I was learning new things that people had tweeted and I was able to ask questions and find answers from several sources.  I am always after new ways to bring technology into the classroom and the education process either for students, teacher, or the entire school.  Twitter helped me to build a network of people that were Tweeting their ideas, Retweeting the ideas of others, or putting up links to websites that people had found useful.  I consider myself a life long learner, that is I am always looking for ways to increase my abilities and Twitter has helped me to stay on top of the cutting edge of Educational Technology or Education 2.0 as some people call it.

The back channel allows more highly engaged conversations as well as passive conversations. I now know exactly what BJ Schone thinks about the sessions he attended without having a 2 hour conversation with him after the event. I was also able to hook up with BJ, Mark Chrisman, and many others for dinner that I had not planned. How? I simply sent out a tweet and everyone following the stream said meet us at the dinner signup board and join us...cool! Serendipidy!

At AG|08 last week we were able to provide our attendees with FREE wifi which was VERY well received and probably was a major factor in the success of our AG|08 Live implementation. (AG|08 Live - That's what we branded our collection of aggregated social tools) Sue is right - ACCESS is key. This new brand of conference "participation" will soon be considered as mandatory as the obligatory TRIP REPORT. Who needs a trip report when your co-workers can simply follow your twitter feed, or your blog posts, or your flickr images of the event.

Okay lets just keep it simple. All conferences really need to do is provide us really good wireless Internet with locations to easily charge our batteries if needed. We will do all the rest ourselves :) .

Watch TED Talks clips. :) More suggestions: Presentation Zen Deliver a Presentation Like Steve Jobs The Art of the Pitch (mp3)

http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00001B&topic_id=1

More recently, I've started watching and deconstructing Lessig's TED talk with my Art & Media Ed students (most of whom are becoming teachers) in order to better understand the power of Lessig's approach. We also review the critiques of PowerPoint put forth by Edward Tufte, Sherry Turkle, and David Byrne. As a point of reference, we view Peter Norvig's PowerPoint reworking of the Gettysburg Address. If you haven't seen it, Norvig's presentation translates Abe Lincoln’s moving 1863 cemetery speech into a series of six generic slides featuring bullet points, bland colors and a nearly incomprehensible ‘Organizational Overview’ graph. It clearly illustrates some of the profound limitations of PowerPoint as a communications tool. In contrast, Lessig uses visuals (and selected text) in a way that truly compliments and extends the conceptual/pedagogical aspects of his presentations. As Chris Tunnell has pointed out, the multiple slides, repeating images, and minimal text allows the audience to focus on, enjoy (and presumably remember) the material being presented. This is further enhanced by the logical (e.g. 3 stories and an argument) and sometimes poetic (e.g. "the refrain") structures that Lessig uses to organize his talks.

Worldmapper is a collection of world maps, where territories are re-sized on each map according to the subject of interest. There are now nearly 600 maps.

's only a question of which technology, and of the alignment between technology in the learning situation and in the assessment situation."

"It's not that we want kids to cheat," Prensky said. "It's that the definitions of learning, cheating, researching, and collaborating are changing right in front of our eyes."

The ideas about how people find information are very fluid, he added, and that can be seen perhaps most easily in medicine, where medical students and doctors are allowed texts in which to look up the answers to questions--but what is most important is knowing which questions to ask.