I'm finally getting around to putting my NECC reflections down on paper, so to speak. Ever since I left the house on my way to the airport, NECC has been on my mind. This post is going to focus on the people. I think we all agree that the people are essential to a great conference. I was hoping to have already posted this, but I ended up spending a lot of Friday refining the original NECC Animoto video. Yesterday was a holiday, so tried to limit my online time. I've received a lot of positive feedback on the video when I first posted it, so maybe pictures do say more than words. I only shared the original version of this video on Twitter, but as I watched it and reflected back on the people of the conference, I had to do a lot of remixing because I left too many people out, needed to change the order of the pics, or because I found other pictures I liked, resulting in the final version, shown above. I wanted the video to really show my experience, connections, and conversations. I didn't take my camera because I knew there would be plenty of others taking pictures. Search Flickr for NECC09 and you'll find thousands of pictures from the show - most taken by Kevin Jarrett. Anyway, I chose the pictures for my video carefully. Rather than go through an extensive list of the people who made NECC memorable (Ben Grey did a wonderful job on this), I wanted to show the people that helped make my conference special. The people shown in the video were people I had a conversation with, the friends I met last year and said hi to again this year, the people who participated in my state project who wanted to connect f2f and the new friends I met. I know I missed some people, and I'm sorry for that. I'd like to think of the video has a sort of thank you for helping make my second NECC a great experience. Smeech, you were right - here's a remix.

This year was the second year I attended NECC and I certainly had a different experience this time around. Last year, I was so overwhelmed, not to mention nervous. I went by myself, knowing only a few Twitter friends. This year was a different story. After spending the last year tweeting more, blogging more, and simply communicating and conversing more with my PLN, it almost felt like a family reunion. It was nice to recognize faces from last year or to be recognized and catch up. One of the comments I received on my video, by Karen Janowski, mentioned that it my video was all about the people. Ya know what? She's right, my video and the conference were about the people. But NECC is also about the content, which be the topic of my next reflection post.

Day 1 of NECC. It's just about dinner time and I'm taking a break in the Blogger's Cafe. We just wrapped up a fun little meetup with the owners of Common Craft. I'm sure most of you have seen their videos at one point or another, but it was really nice to chat briefly with the couple behind the creativity. I got to the convention center a little after 8:00 today, just in time for my first session, which began at 8:30. I was going on a lot less sleep than I had hoped, but was ready for the chaos of the convention.

My first session was dealt with reading and 21st Century Skills. The presenters talked about how they were using iPods and other digital audio devices with students. I came away with a few new ideas, which was good. I was a little unhappy that the session seemed to turn into a sales pitch for a website they use at the school. Due to this feeling, I walked out a little early.

I also attended the Library Tools Smackdown. This was pretty fun and I had a seat in the front row. The CoverItLive can be found here. I was uStreaming the event and trying to follow along with that and the CoverItLive, so I had a trouble actually paying attention to the tools being discussed. I certainly will be heading back to the wiki and taking a peek at the text from the session.

Hall Davidson presented some new ways to use video. He showed some pretty interesting possibilities, some of which I hope to use at some point down the road. If you've never heard Hall give a presentation, I'd recommend it, it's pretty entertaining.

With NECC right around the corner, getting ready for this massive conference is certainly not an easy task. Besides packing and figuring out your conference planner, there's the endless task of participating in the nightly functions. There's so much to do during the day and night that it could make your head spin. Most of these are already filled up, but the choices for evening collaboration are plenty. There's a Twitter Meetup, the NetTrekker Tour, the EduBloggerCon post party, the NECC golf outing, and probably plenty of others I'm not aware of or either forgot about. Regardless, preparing for a conferences can be a little stressful.

Here's a great link to a post written back in March. Chris Brogan writes about 27 things to do before a conference.

Take a peek at this article. Have you already completed some of the items listed? I have. Do you think there are more that should be added?

I wish I would have thought of this prior to the last day of NECC, but here is a list of 2 outstanding quotes from NECC. I'm pretty sure I have the name of the person who said these correct, but if I don't, please correct me.

Please feel free to add others.

Wes Fryer - "Sustained conversations over time change us."

I really like this quote because it reinforces the idea that we can't just say/write/read something once and have it stick. If we feel strongly about something, we have to keep pushing for the change to occur.

Bud the Teacher - "K12online is made of people. Of people!"

That's what our learning community is about. If the people involved were not interesting in learning, sharing, and growing together, the group wouldn't be successful.

Chris Lehmann - "The best collaborative tool is the one we all agree to use together."

The tool doesn't matter, it's the people who make the difference, well stated Chris.

Please add more to my list.

This is the first of what I hope to be several posts following NECC.

NECC 2008 - Convene, Connect, Transform. I headed to this conference by myself, hoping to meet some of the people I've worked with, learned from, talked with, read about, and shared with over past six months or so. Some I felt I knew a little better than others due to more interaction via a project we collaborated on, or through Twitter, Skype, or Blogging. Overall, however, my prior interaction with most was very minimal. I wish I would have attended EduBloggerCon to see what it was all about and after looking back, I probably could have made it for the afternoon. My flight arrived around 11:00 on Saturday and rather than head straight to a relative's house where I was staying, I could have stopped by for the experience. Hopefully it will work out next year if I attend NECC 2009 in D.C.

I wrote earlier about my thoughts sitting in the Bloggers' Cafe for the first time and how it compared to a classroom, but wanted to add that this was a very important place for me during NECC. I think I would have spent a lot of time wandering around if this place didn't exist. The Bloggers' Cafe was a place where people like me could take a break, have a conversation, or simply catch up. I didn't really blog that much although I did do quite a bit of reading (or deleting). This was also a place I met some people who collaborated on a project with me earlier this year. While I did have some email and Skype contact already, it was really nice to meet Laura Deisley, Robin Ellis, Howard Martin, and Teryl Magee face to face. These were great people and I ended up hanging with Teryl and Howard a little more as the conference went on. As the conference progressed, I met Martha Thornsburgh when I unknowingly sat next to her at a session. We chatted about the project we worked on together briefly and I'm happy to say they would participate again in the future.

I'm not usually the type of person who will go up to someone and introduce myself out of the blude so doing this wasn't easy for me, especially the first day. However, as the conference when on, I figured, what the heck. I was able to meet and have a few conversations with some of the people I follow, which was nice. Some people, like Scott Meech, came up to me, which was exciting. I had an interesting conversation with Laurie V. about walking up to the "big names" and whether or not that was appropriate or even if they cared. I mentioned a blog I had read about Elite-ism (by Darren Draper I think), which I feel is very much related to this topic. Are there "big names" and then the rest of us? This seems to have been a much discussed topic over the last week or so. The more I think about this, however, I think maybe it comes down to the role each of us has in education. Everyone I talked to was very nice, some more talkative than others, but I may have caught them at a bad time. What I mean by role, is simply their job. I'm a K-5 library media specialist. Others were teachers, tech integration specialists, district technology directors and so on. Perhaps people have an easier time talking to others who have similar interests/experiences/problems. When I look back, some the people I think are "big names" are people with educational technology positions I hope to have some day. They have been doing this much longer than I have and have more experience and knowledge in the field. Maybe that's why I think I'm not quite up to their level. Laurie and I both weren't sure what was the best way to handle these introductions, but we both did end up meeting great people. There were some tweets during NECC about this topic, some even mentioning that telling someone you "follow them on Twitter" was a faux pas. I don't agree with this at all. There's nothing wrong with walking up to someone and telling them you follow them. Like she mentioned, if you don't want this, don't put yourself out there. If they don't care, they will give you a brief response and the conversation will be over. When I introduced myself, I tried to say something like "I've enjoyed learning from you" or "I've enjoyed reading some of your stuff." I'm sure I mentioned Twitter at some point as well. Perhaps wording it like that reduces the stalker effect.

As far as meeting people, I was really shocked when the same thing happened in similar situations. One took place on an escalator and one took place in a session. I was positioned next to someone else and when they looked at my name tag, said, "Your Chad Lehman, Jen Wagner (who I met in Spring at WEMTA) told me I should say hi if I saw you" (or something similar). Wow, the power of Jen! Of the hundreds of people Jen knew at NECC, it was humbling to have her mention my name to some of her friends and have them try and meet me. In fact, in one of the situations, the other person and I were in the back channel of the session and Jen was participating as well.

I have more thoughts about NECC that I'll eventually get to. Please feel free to share your thoughts about about Connecting.

NECC wrapped up today and I must say I'm a little relieved. Tuesday was a pretty powerful day for me and I'm not sure I could have handled as long of a day. I hit a couple great sessions and hit the exhibit floor a little bit before wrapping up the day with an adult beverage at a little restaurant on the RiverWalk with some new friends. My flight out of SA is Thursday at 11:30 and I'm hoping everything goes smoothly and I can see my family at the airport when they pick me up around 3:15 in the afternoon.

Two sessions really stood out to me today. The first, one pretty much set up for librarians was more of a panel discussion with each librarian talking about how the library is changing and what we need to do to keep up with the changes. Great points discussed and good conversation going on in the back channel of the uStream, which did include a participant on the panel. I follow some of the wonderful teacher-librians on the panel (Joyce V., Cathy N., Diane C., and Caryolyn F.) and it was great to listen to them share information.

I also attended another session that dealt with online collaboration. This session, led by Wes Fryer and Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach talked a lot about the K12 Online Conference. I got pretty excited about the possibilities of this and after listening to some of the success of last year, decided to throw my hat in the ring as a possible volunteer. I will certainly be participating as a learner and am hoping to bring some of my colleagues along for the ride. A couple things in this session blew me away - not content wise, but technology wise. At this point in the game, new "discoveries" with technology shouldn't surprise me, but they do. One of the "presenters" was live via video Skype. I think it's rather amazing that I could learn from a wide range of people both in the room and in another country. In addition, in the back channel discussion on uStream, there was a follower participating in the discussion IN THEIR CAR driving home from NECC. A simple Verizon wireless card in the laptop allowed this to happen. Wow. It makes me think that a wireless world isn't too far away.

Near the end of the day, on my way to my last session, I walked by a room with a session being led by Steve Dembo. I met Steve a few days before and heard him talking about Acceptable Use Policies. I immediately went to this session. Sure, it saved me a few more steps, but I was interested in the topic and wanted to hear what Steve had to say. It was fast, but I got something out of it.

My time at the end of convention was spent at the Bloggers' Cafe with Lee K. and others watching the closing keynote and following Twitter and the many not so positive comments about it. After it was over, I said a few good byes and met a few new friends for a drink before heading out.

Overall, good day.

Look for more rambling about the conference other new discoveries in the next few days.

Connections - it's about connections. The second day of NECC for me was a big improvement over the first. I met more people I've been learning from and with, I attended some great sessions, had some good discussions, and generally felt pretty good. Although the night activities weren't as good as the previous, I enjoyed myself.

I did miss a session that I really wanted to attend dealing with NETS and AASL Standards for 21st Century Learners. I'm not sure what happened, but I simply forgot about it until it was too late. Oh well. I do remember people telling me prior to the conference that I would miss things and that I should focus on what I did attend and not what I missed. Fortunately, some of the sessions I missed were uStreamed by someone and I can hopefully go back and watch them - like Stephanie Sandifer's session.

Yesterday I learned a little about VoiceThread from a table presentation held by Wes Fryer. I am really looking forward to showing my teachers this and using it with kids to create some really neat projects.

I also visited the Student Showcase session and talked with a teacher and students who worked on a very cool state project. I worked on a state project kids from my school and we exchanged ideas and certainly picked up tips on how to improve what we are doing with kids!

Hall Davidson did a presentation on cell phones in education and I saw a couple of really cool tools that are just unbelievable. He demonstrated a website that allows users to text in answers to questions or even text in comments and the messages show up in real time on the site. Great stuff!

Yesterday was a great learning day and I certainly have to thank Teryl Magee, Tim Childers, and Tom Turner for hooking me up with Discovery Education. I'm really looking forward to using it quite a bit next year.

As a newbie to NECC and this complete information overload, I thought I'd share a few things about what I thought about the first day.

1. Unlike the previous day, I did meet a lot more people that I read or follow. The Twitter/EduBlogger dinner played a big role in that as well as some of the DEN people I've gotten to know. It was nice this morning to walk into the Bloggers' Cafe and say hi to some friendly faces. There are still more people I'd like to meet, but I have a couple more days.

2. As far as the sessions - I attended a few, actually leaving early from all of them. One didn't seem like the right fit and the others appeared to be following a wiki or some other online guide that I bookmarked and will take a peek at later. I hope the sessions I attend today and tomorrow will be better.

3. There seems to be more Macs around than PC's, but due to much of Web 2.0 being online and more and more applications online (Google Docs, etc) it doesn't matter as much as it did in the past.

4. I'm cold - inside the center. It's nice outside, but chilly inside.

5. I'm having fun. I wish I was staying closer to the conference center, but the price is right when you're staying with relatives and my district isn't paying for transportation or lodging.

These aren't anything really deep or thought provoking, but they are mine. I'm sure after the conference I'll be able to sit down and reflect more than I can right now.

Last week, I found out that I'm going to San Antonio to NECC '08. This was probably going to be the highlight of my summer, but my wife and I just booked an August trip to New York for a weekend to catch a show and a Yankee game before they tear down the house that Ruth built. I guess NECC now has competition for best summer trip. Anyway, as far as NECC is concerned, my flight is booked, accommodations set (at my cousin's house), all I need is a rental car - and tips from you.

Since this will be my first time attending, I'm looking for all the tips and advice I can get. If you've been to this conference before, what should I make sure I do? I'm not planning on attending any workshops, but are there any other "unofficial" things that need attention? I've heard of unconferences that will take place. How do I find out about those? I'll be adding my info the NECC wiki in the next day or two.

I read a recent blog about blog commenting and what kinds of posts get comments. There were several mentioned, but I'm hoping this entry gets plenty of action. The more advice the merrier. I certainly hoping to meet some of my fellow bloggers and twits (I think that's the correct term) during the conference. I met a few at WEMTA and it was very nice to be able to put a real person to the thoughts and ideas being shared.

If you've attended in the past, let me know your NECC experiences. If you're going for the first time like me, let me know that as well, perhaps we'll both experience something great.