April+2012

April 23, 2012. Yeah, it's Monday
T.S. Eliot figured April was the [|cruellest] month, because it wakes everything up and disturbs the peace and quiet of winter. My April has been good; there has been quite a bit of disruption and a bit of new growth. Maybe Eliot was on to something there in the Waste Land.

This month started in Kochi City, on the island of Shikoku, in Japan. Palm Sunday and April Fools' Day all rolled into one. Our Dakota Collegiate Japan trip that spanned the embers of March and the buds of April was a fantastic trip- our band played well, none of our students were terribly ill or terribly naughty. No animals were harmed in the two weeks of the trip, and the deer of Miyajima seemed to enjoy our visit. Of course, the down-side to two weeks in Japan is the jet lag upon my return to Winnipeg. It took me about 10 days to get back to feeling like myself, sleeping through the night, and not waking up in odd places where I'd forgotten that I'd fallen asleep.

Since my notes in this blog/wiki mashup tend to be about 1 to 1 learning and all things Ed-Tech I suppose I ought to admit that I purposefully left my computer behind for the two weeks I was away. I did notice the withdrawal. I'm not savvy with smart-phones yet, so I didn't have a tablet or a phone along either. Did I miss out? Maybe. I do know that while I was snapping shots with my 5 year old digital camera some of our students were using [|Instagram] and a few other tools like it to update their status across a variety of social networking platforms. Skype was also a favourite- family and friends half a world away were as close as the nearest wi-fi hotspot, and wi-fi is pretty easy to find in hotels and airports, among other places.

So electronics make it seem like the world is a smaller place, but the plane rides to and from Japan (via South Korea) reminded me again of just how big this little blue marble really is. On the way home, Incheon Korea to Vancouver B.C., was about 10 hours at about 900 kilometres an hour. Bearable, but uncomfortable. I wonder what it would be like going by ship. This world is big, unless you're traveling at the speed of electricity. Maybe people will travel less in the future- energy costs are rising, and many kinds of meeting can be successfully accomplished using the internet. Still, it is hard to see the sights, meet the people, and sample the cuisine via broadband.

I arrived home late on the 6th, and began my prize-fight with jet-lag. It was good to be in Japan for my second time. I have to imagine that I won't get an opportunity to return, but who knows-life is full of twists and turns.

As April plodded on I became quite aware of the fact that I hadn't yet written anything here, that my four English classes needed some tending, and that I was scheduled to speak at a local evening PD event about my experiences teaching in a BYOD environment. Here is the poster: Thanks to [|Brian Metcalfe] for the poster. Brian-let me know if I should credit this poster to anyone beyond you and [|MANACE]. After all, I want to give credit where it is due! I enjoyed presenting, and it was a good reminder for me about the things that I am doing at Dakota in my classes that seem so regular and run-of -the-mill to me still seem so odd, audacious, and ground-breaking to others. My talk was a version of the same talk I had given at the [|Byte Conference], and I was able to present the slide show I'd set up for that talk. It was good to connect with a few of the people I'm following on Twitter, and to run into a former student as well!

I think that I am realizing that while I really feel like I only know a very little bit about teaching in a BYOD environment, about 21st Century Learning, and about figuring out how to learn and teach using so much technology that I do have something to offer. Thanks again to [|Andy McKiel] for inviting me to share the bit I know with the good people who attended the MANACE Technology Information Night!

If you are looking for the wheat in the chaff here I can't offer you much help. If I were to offer the tweetable version of this post it might read: //Japan was awesome & so was MANACE TIN! So much 2 learn!// Only 85 characters, but that sums it up. Brevity indeed. I wonder what old T.S. would think...

p.s.: Thinking of you too, today, [|William].