Today was the wrap-up of Learning Design Summer Camp here at Penn State and as I sit here now, about a half an hour after the end, I’m starting to reflect on the day. Others have blogged about the day and have talked about the amazing energy that was in the room and I agree (except for that post-lunch slump, but I’ll blame that on the carbs).
One of the people are our lunch discussion mentioned that he was enjoying Summer Camp more than he enjoys the Symposium but he wasn’t sure why. I was thinking about that comment this afternoon and I think I figured out why (for me, at least).
Summer Camp felt like an informational “general session” of a conference, but with the informality and intimacy of a breakout session.
People were participating, sharing experiences, connecting, joining twitter to take part in the ‘backchannel discussion’, voting on questions, submitting questions, taking notes, blogging… all at once, in the same session – BUT… were also participating in a face-to-face environment. All of these things combined really allowed discussion and learning to happen.
This was a large group – we’re not talking 10 people – we’re talking 75-100 people at Summer Camp, but I truly felt like everyone was heard, and that everyone learned something.
Thank you, Allan for taking the lead on this and for allowing the entire community to be a part of the planning, discussion and learning. I am so proud to be a part of things here.
2 responses so far ↓
Allan // August 14, 2008 at 2:21 pm |
Awww….thanks Shannon. You make a very good point about the way that the large group talks felt like breakout sessions. The Live Question Tool was a huge success and I think it has a very obvious application to other educational situations.
The truth is that this kind of event wouldn’t work unless the people who came were active participants instead of “attendees”. In particular, I thought that planning the event through the wiki was an empowering process.
Now, the researcher in me wants to gather data and improve upon this event so we can do something similar for the Digital Commons Camp that Millet is planning and a 2nd annual Learning Design Summer Camp.
micala // August 14, 2008 at 8:24 pm |
I agree with you. It wouldn’t work if we weren’t all willing to be a part of the entire process – from planning to discussion and participation.
The idea of the Digital Commons Camp is exciting. I think that could be a really empowering thing for a lot of people.