Ahh the irony

The New Hampton website just ran an article about Wikifest. They point out the irony of going half way around the world to connect with people online. Kind of funny when you think about it.

Trends for EL programs to think about

After Wikifest all I could do was to outline things I wanted to think about and then try to recover from jet lag and deal with getting sick from re-entry into New England weather. (Actually it turns out that about half the conference attendees have come down with something, maybe I'm the vector for the next Asian flu virus to kick the butt out of the east coast?)

Now I'm ready to actually think about things! First of all I want to echo something I first posted about when I was noticing the proliferation of adventure programs on Facebook and the like. It was a post from 2005 regarding blogging events. The article talks about how blogging is a good way for non-profits to spread the word regarding an event. The reverse is also true: if you are a blogger attending a conference and post during the event it's a great way to spread the word about your blog.

Here are some trends that EL programs need to spend some time thinking about and my thoughts and reccomendations:

• Massive publishing - Web publishing is free, easy and growing rapidly. In addition 'official' sources no longer dominate the market. So our future participants can find out as much about our programs from our past participants, our fans and our detractors as from us. My thoughts: get on board, start small, pick an area you are comfortable with and see what it can do for you. If a blog is too much, join a couple of Facebook groups in your industry. Leverage the network in a small way at first and see what happens.
  
• Effective filtering - Growing in accordance with massive publishing are effective tools for finding and filtering the information we want. How we filter our information could be as important as the quality of the information itself. My thoughts: check out rss feeds, subscribe to some feeds that you like and see how it affects what you hear about and learn about.
  
• Free communication - Yesterday I connected (for free) with colleagues in Romania, Indonesia and Colorado. I needed pictures for an article I was writing and within 24 hours I had some from a colleague in Hong Kong. My thoughts: start a Skype or AIM account and publish your address to your staff or participants, see what happens. Also, I found that leaving my Skype turned on during the day was helpful for people to message me as long as I let go of my need to respond right away, check and respond tops 2-3 times a day.
  
• Early adoption stage - Adventure programs are still in the early adoption stage with this good stuff. Many of us have just added websites to our tool kit, and many staff don't see the connection and benefit of technology to what we do. My thoughts: start small, leverage the network and see what the result is, if you have a success share that with others.
  

Wikifest Video Reflections

Here are the video reflections that participants of the Wikifest 2008 at Outward Bound Singapore shot on the last day.

Part One: Meet the 'Wikis'


Part Two: What we learned, and how it will benefit our schools


Part Three: Next steps and outtakes


These videos were shot with RCA Small Wonder video cameras which were thoughtfully donated to the project. My apologies that some of the footage shot by participants does not appear above.

Although the video cameras are quite easy to use they do have some limitations. The mic is fairly limited and does not pick up audio from a moderate distance. As you can see from the videos, the audio also doesn't start recording until a half second after the video. The cameras like PC's more than Macs and save files as .avi. I used the free iSquint program to convert them to a Mac friendly format.

That being said these are a great low cost way to shoot video, they are quick and intuitive to use, shoot good quality within their optimum range and have a handy built in USB jack so you don't need to worry about bringing a cable with you.

Wikifest Pictures

I've posted an album of pictures from Wikifest! They are posted over at Flickr. Enjoy!

Back Home & Outline for Reflection

Back home at last! Above is a picture of Harmony and Symphony, the two OBS boats that run from Singapore mainland to the island base. Although I'm completely beat I logged into Skype and found a couple of folks online, one in Colorado and the other in Indonesia. How cool is that.

I worked on the ride home both on the video reflection, but also on my own personal reflection on take aways. So here's an outline of things I'll be posting on as I have a chance.

1. Web 2.0 trends that relate to experiential learning and education
2. Decision making around personal and institutional engagement with social networks
3. Understanding goals and ROI of engagement
4. Institutional risk assessment of engagement vs. no engagement
5. Social networking roles
6. Digital divide
7. Direct transfer to EL and traditional classrooms
   
8. My to do's

Here's a picture I took of one little part of the wiki that I'd like to help work on.

Great to be home - missing everyone from Singapore too!

Basically done

Can't believe it - it's Friday afternoon here, we're basically done. Heading over to the OB Singapore sea base to get away from our computers for a while. I'm going to have to crank tonight to get some things done before leaving Saturday.

Real reflection, communication of learning will have to wait - if only I had a 24 hour chunk of time when I am sitting on my butt doing nothing.

Oh, wait . . . .

Yesterday?

I'm having a hard time with time related posts like yesterday. That was Thursday for me, but it's still Thursday in the States. So when was it? Not sure, any way - the previous day we worked through some key wiki things.

We discussed needed resources and available resources at some length, including barriers to uploading, proprietary concerns and various 'jobs' or roles in the project.

I'm going to post a list of roles at some point when I can figure them all out again.

Here we are later in the day having a discussion about language divide and digital divide. Some functions are available in wiki such as language settings, other problems were more thorny for us. Like how to translate certain pages, and how to enable non English speaking users to engage.
Here is a picture of the ships backing into Singapore harbor - reminds me of my thoughts from the last days, backing up!

Slipping into Reporter Mode

I'm slipping a bit into reporter mode this morning, I don't have mental space to reflect right now. I'm going to take another look at Tom and Noelle's presentations from yesterday to recapture some of the aha moments for me and share that back when I have some space.

For now I wanted to report on yesterday, here's the basic agenda.
We looked at overview of the project, overview of network building tools, then specific tool sessions. I learned Skype and started a LinkedIn profile. We wrapped with a vision session and a brainstorm of tangible benefits. Here's our vision of what OB will look like in 5 years with these new globally focused technologies.
We needed an energizer about 3/4 of the way through the day!


After the session we went to China Town for dinner and sight seeing.

Outward Bound Mogulus Stream

During Wikifest we broadcast several sessions live on Mogulus. Now we're rebroadcasting the reflection videos and some other content on the stream.

Update: I'm taking the stream off the blog because I find it annoying when it auto starts when people are reading a more recent post. The stream is currently broadcasting videos from Wikifest, and I'll let you know if it goes live again.

Wiki Metaphors

We did three great activities before climbing on Tuesday. I often feel high challenge activities are a bit of a let down after good processing from group initiatives. It was a good progression though. The whole time we were drawing connections back to the work we will do going forward during the conference.
First we did the helium hoop. We struggled with this one, our facilitator asked folks who had done it before to be less active. I'm really glad that I did because although it was hard for us it was great to see new solutions and ideas come out. Ultimately we couldn't do it although we made progress.

Here's the amazing part, after talking it through we tried it again and totally did it! I've never seen a short conversation lead to such quick action in this initiative. The essence of the conversation was quite simple - that we should let go, trust our teammates and let the hoop come to us. It doesn't make much sense to hear me write it. Take away: Ideas have power, shifting focus can lead to results.

Next we piled on a platform, our task to sail our boat to the other shore. At first it seemed impossible as we tried to look beneath our own feet to see what we had to work with. Slowly a solution emerged, or rather a half dozen small independent solutions that evolved with out direct leadership. Take away: Figure out what you have to work with, take many small steps forward, eventually you reach the shore.

Next: artificial caving. This was the only activity today that was completely new to me. We climbed through a series of transport containers with obstacles inside, all while collecting clues that would give us the pass code to unlock the door at the far side. We had one faint blinking LED type light. We rushed ahead to the end of the first container, no way to continue! What did we do wrong? Turns out we had to retrace our steps back on a higher level, then go up again and at last move forward to the next 'cave.' Take away: Going backwards isn't necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes its the way forward.

Finally we climbed the ropes course. There were two sections, either a three part self belayed traverse of a hanging net, a burma type bridge and then an hanging platform. For me this was the least group engaged I felt all day. I think though, this was a better metaphor of how we will work together going forward, disjointed, disconnected and self directed. I belayed, went to the bathroom, climbed, chatted, climbed again. Take away: Filling different roles at different times is OK. Stepping up and stepping back are good for the whole process to move forward.

First Day

We had a great first day at OB Singapore! Here's a shot of us having lunch in a big open pavilion.

The base that we are at is only one of their campuses, this one is mostly right in the city. But there is still a great view from our dormitory.

The goal for the day was to do a series of high and low challenges to bond us as a wiki-team and to draw lessons from the activities as metaphors for our future work both together. This will be even more important once we leave Singapore and continue to network from home.

We did an course element I had never seen before - a simulated caving trip inside these containers in groups of four. Very dark, very twisty and a great puzzle too that went through the whole course.

It's been in the 80's and muggy. Right after we broke for the day it started to downpour. That lasted for about an hour and now it's clear again. These are the bunk houses for the kids when they come. They sleep up above through the green door, but you can notice that underneath there is a covered space for rainy times. Great design, each group has their own rain space and classroom.

Tomorrow we will get into the web part of the training, but we're off to a great start!

Tokyo!

Free wireless, outlets that take US plugs, primary coverage, did I leave the states? No wait, it's okay - free Sake and beverages of multiple exciting colors. It is Japan :)

The plan is to stay awake as long as I can, then sleep on the plane and when I get to OB Singapore, that way when I wake up I won't be jet lagged and I'll be ready to go. That's the plan anyway!

So far so good

Waiting in Manchester for the flight to DC. Here we go! Not going to mention that previous problem so as not to jinx anything.

While I'm waiting I thought I would answer some questions that one of the organizers of the conference, Tom, posed in a welcome email.

What do you hope to gain from this conference?
I think my main goals are as follows.

• Learn about new tools and deepen my skills with tools I already know about
• Explore how new technology can be used in both management of EL programs, as well as as course elements of EL programs
• Meet, share and be inspired by like minded professionals
• Spread the word about New Hampton School as doing some good work in both education in general and EL/tech in particular
• Become a more valuable member of the OB Wiki team so I can be more productive to the project
• Identify specific things I can bring back to NHS

I realize many folks reading this blog perhaps for the first time may not be totally up on all the language I'm throwing around. Here's a little primer and some links to help.

• EL as in Experiential Learning, here's how we define this at New Hampton School
• NHS or New Hampton School, the independent high school where I work
• Wiki a collaborative website built by many for mutual benefit, examples include Wikipedia, the Outward Bound World Resources Project or my own wiki
  

Here's an idea, in the same line of thinking as Beth's Open Thread, if you have questions, ideas or thoughts that might be addressed by Wikifest please leave a comment on this post and I'll see what I can do to find out!

Passport update

I haven't been able to get in touch with anyone from American Passport Express, but here's a really weird coincidence. Sarah was out last night with her mom's group from NHS and one of the moms, Destiny, works for American Passport Express!

So I sheepishly called her this morning, apologizing profusely for bothering her at home with a work question. She told me it wouldn't be any problem at all to travel with the passport with this slight misprint! I'm very relieved! I'll get a free reprint when I'm back.

I'm going to bring my old passport with just in case and of course my drivers license. Here's a picture of the misprint. Notice that the last letter of Mundahl is actually an "I" not an "L." Very slight - in fact Sarah, Ilana, Russ and I all missed it the first times we looked at the it.

Seems like we're okay, I'll keep you posted!

Uhoh

Just noticed a misspelling on my name in my new passport. This should make things fun.

The last 10%

A former colleague of mine Miles told me once that the last 10% of any project takes 90% of the work. That seems to be the case for Wikifest. In this case, the work isn't so much the actual conference as it is taking care of everything else on this end with work before I go!

Two big projects that launched today were the summer web page at NHS and the online registration information system behind it. Then there is some board information that keeps dragging on, and the wrap up from the JUA that thankfully Ilana is taking care of. Thank you Ilana!

But I did find a small suitcase I can use for the plane and not check anything which seems wise. Note: if you are traveling overseas TSA requires that you put all your toiletries into a quart size plastic bag and you can't have anything larger than 3oz! Do these people travel? Have they ever put toothpaste, deodorant, shaving cream, gel, shampoo, soap and sun screen into a quart bag? I don't really think I need a lot of items in this department, but that's pretty hard to do!

Got the passport!

Looks like I'm set to go! I was kind of stressing about this.

Just 40 million things to do for work before Sunday morning!

I've already learned something from this conference actually - check it out it's a web service that lets you broadcast live video feeds. It has a very professional feel although I've only tried it out with my webcam in the mac. We'll be broadcasting some of the sessions from the conference live.

The service is called Mogulus and the channel for the live OB broadcasts is here. I'll try to give you a heads up when we go live with it or embed the feed here on this blog.

Passport is on the way

I just got the email that my new passport shipped today and I should have it tomorrow! It was kind of a weird thing to buy a plane ticket without a valid passport. I went with one of these ultra fast, we can get you your passport in a day places.

I was talking with my friend Joe about this and he scoffed (being the biggest world traveler that I know, meaning he travels a lot, though he is a big guy too) claiming these types were scam artists. "Just take your plane ticket down to Boston to the consulate and you'll have your passport that same day," he says. Exactly my point - I'm going to freaking Singapore on a week's notice sure I have time to go to Boston and wrangle with this. Well he's probably true, I could have saved myself some money, but in this case I'm happy to trade time for money.

After having a passport for years I unwisely let it lapse. I guess it didn't look like I was going to be doing much traveling for a while what with kids and work and all. Little did I know I would wanting to go to Singapore, duh!

I'm going to Wikifest!

Hi folks - a couple of posts ago I mentioned that Outward Bound had started a wiki to build a global knowledge base to promote the development of that organization. I've been working with them off and on in my spare time as a way to give back to this organization that gave me a great deal when I was starting my career.

Outward Bound International is hosting a conference to discuss web 2.0, experiential learning in general and the World Resources Project in particular. I was pretty excited to be invited to participate a few weeks ago - but I'm even more excited to be able to attend!

The conference is taking place at the Outward Bound school in Singapore! That's here in case you're like me and have to look it up:


View Larger Map


So I'm heading out this Sunday - I have a ticket and I really hope I'll have my passport by then!

I'm planning on posting pictures, video and key learnings to this blog so stay tuned for more!