My apologies for cross posting....
VLEs: Beyond The Fringe... And Into The Mainstream
http://ferl.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=6293
Ferl (part of Becta) is organising this online conference, to be held 28th
January to 4th February 2004. The conference is aimed at all those involved
in working with VLEs, whether you've got a VLE in place at the moment or
not. The conference will have two themes running through it:
· Cultural change - from learners to managers, with a keynote paper by
Grainne Conole, of the University of Southampton
· Implementation and Staff Development, with a keynote by Peter Kilcoyne,
of West Midlands Regional Support Centre.
As well as these, there are various other papers and presentations, and a
number of Ask the Expert sessions. Contributors include:
· James Clay, Western Colleges Consortium, on the centralised management
and support of a common VLE across five colleges
· Chris Kelland, Becta, on using NLN materials in your VLE
· Megan Robertson, Stoke SFC, on using a VLE to support and enhance learning
· Mandy Hayward, Hertford Regional College, on using a VLE to increase
achievement and manage student learning
· Claire Gill and Simon Shaw from Becta, on specifying and purchasing VLEs
from a schools' perspective
· CETIS, "Demystifying learning standards"
· TechDis and Sara Dunn, "VLEs and accessibility"
· Richard Everett, Oaklands College, "MLEs: Changing the accommodation to
reflect the new pedagogy - a strategy"
· James Dalziel, Macquarie University, Australia, "The Next E-learning
Revolution: Learning Activity Sequences"
· and many others.
There is a delegate fee of £50 (with discounts for bulk registrations). For
many people, this will be cheaper than many "free" conferences - no travel
to pay, no hotel rooms to book. What do you get for the money?
· Access to a large number of papers about VLEs, written by some of the
foremost practitioners in the UK.
· Discussions with the authors, lasting a lot longer than the usual face to
face workshop sessions.
· Ask the expert sessions, a Q and A with recognised experts in their field.
· The opportunity to share experiences, online, with all the other
delegates, over an intensive eight day period.
· The chance to visit the online suppliers exhibition area.
· The ability to attend flexibly, fitting your participation around your
work and leisure.
However, do remember that an online conference is a real conference. You
don't have to travel there, you aren't there physically, so you save a lot
of time in that sense. It's not live, so you can't really miss a session.
But it is likely to be very busy, and to keep up with the discussions you
will need to set aside time to login and read them. You won't be able to
fit it in during a 15 minute tea break between classes. On the other hand,
you can work around your classes to login when convenient. But it will take
time, and we would recommend that you spend at least 1 - 2 hours a day at
the conference. This will allow you to keep up with debates and the volume
of messages coming in.
If you're interested, visit the conference web site which has more
information on the presenters, a FAQ explaining how the conference will
work, and, most important, the online booking form. The site is at:
http://ferl.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=6293
Geoff Minshull
Direct Learn Training
Online services to education, project management and evaluation, VLEs,
deafness/disability consultancy, online conferencing
Web: http://www.directlearn.co.uk/ - last updated 11.11.03
Tel: 00 34 972 294 202
VLE Online Conference: See http://ferl.becta.org.uk/display.cfm?resID=6293
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