#Bett13 The Excel London Docklands 2013

A week's worth of meetings crammed into three days in and around BETT13.  I liked the new venue for its space and for all the other presentations that were able to run simultaneously.
 Well done orgnanisers  for building an excellent programme around the exhibition area and reaching out to the right folks to populate the programme. I joined the Education Leaders Strand , The Workbased Learning Strand and the Higher Education Strand for different sessions and managed a couple of keynotes in the main learning arena. In past years I felt  guilty about buying tickets and not being able due to meetings to get to all the sessions I had booked.

The meeting rooms were also really useful I was able to grab a welcome cup of tea and a natter with colleagues from Mirandanet who were running an excellent programme . The British Computer Society and others had also booked some of the meeting rooms which meant we could do business on site. I was able to catch up with Adobe , Microsoft , Google , Oracle and many others and headed north with lots of ideas and business.

The bits I was not sure about were really down to me . I opted to stay over in Greenwich as the hotels were a bit cheaper than those around the Excel. This meant I was constantly worried that I would miss the last light rail train across the Thames. I think next time I will go for something on the north bank. It also took me some time to get my bearings to confidently navigate the light rail. The night of Bett Awards the line I needed was closed and I ended up stomping along under the tracks looking for a taxi.
I missed too my familiar bolt holes around Olympia where I can take folks for meetings without paying conference venue prices for coffee or lunch. I need to improve my east end knowledge.

It was really quite eye opening to spend time in this bit of London. It did really feel like a boom town rather than a city in a country climbing out or the worst recession since the 1930's . There seemed to be new developments going up all over the place. I am sure it will have made a very good impression on all of the international visitors to the event.

I looked really hard but I don't think there was anything startling new at this year's Bett - the event misses the ministerial input that Bett's of old used to have. But I think this is just a reflection of ICT feeling less of a priority for the current Westminster government. It is now about schools and learning institutions negotiating their own way through all of the offerings from the vendors. There were lots of 'new' systems that were really virtual learning environments with some elements of social software added. I think every third stand mentioned the word app somewhere. So not as much on policy or technology front as in previous years.

I think we still have an opportunity to present a much more joined up picture of all the good things that go on in Scottish Education at this event. It would be great if Education Scotland , SQA and Skills Development Scotland looked at having a stand at a future event. There are still too many speeches and sales pitches based on false claims of a UK Education system .. which are really only trying to sell bits of the English system to international customers and often bits that we do much better  in Scotland.




 

The Bett Show 2nd Helpings #bett12, #BETT_Show, #bett2012

Michael Gove set a much better tone and direction for this year's conference, he may have disappointed some with talk of making programming exciting while perhaps overlooking the  fact that many folks still see a need for ict to permeate the curriculum more,  just using the stuff does require support and neither teachers or learners naturally apply technology in a learning context. We still need a focus on digital literacies.


I looked around for some familiar Education Department folks to compare notes with - I think an Education Department Stand at BETT would be useful. Though I have to say Naace and ALT are doing a fine job in keeping debate going and providing guidance for schools in maintaining quality of ICT Provision for learners.
It is worth looking and contributing to the  following debate at SchoolTech.Org.Uk 

When you see commercial muscle that is on display each year at BETT it is easy to see how and why local authorities can be seduced in to making large investments. There is an  interesting on going BBC investigation on UK Schools paying up to fives times more for technology than other parts of the world.

There was I thought some misplaced smugness from Scotland - we have done much around games and learning , programming in classroom and lots more and Curriculum for Excellence genuinely opens up a very broad range of opportunities from 4- 19 and across the full subject range,  but we still have much further to go.

Hoping Gove's  damascene conversion is what it appears and that it spurs on some more joined up messages and actions from Education Scotland and SQA . We've been talking about wikifying education for last six years hope some ears pricked up at Michael Gove taking this forward in England.

The Bett Show First Pass #bett12 #BETT_Show, #bett2012 , #mmafa , #tmbett2012 , #C84C , #EWF , #ELB2012 , #ATC21S

Lots of people can and do spend a lot of time slagging off the BETT Show but it is the one week in year where you  get the sense in the UK that learning technology has a full part to play in the future of learning.  

It can be really hectic but it is always a privilege to attend and critical I think that anyone who gets to attend shares things with the broader learning community. There are a few learning 'consultants' who top up on their jargon this week and will drip feed it to their clients for the rest of the year.  I think "flipped classroom" will be the term  for Bullshit Bingo this year.  ( not knocking theory but those who will mouth it emptily in the coming year ) 

The event was a lot busier than last year both on exhibitor and it felt on attendee front.  Some folks said rightly that last year had a poor turn out because of the weather but it still felt busier than last two previous years.  Good too to  meet up with both Education Scotland and Scottish Government at the  event - it is really critical we make the most of events like BETT both for information gathering and on promoting the best of Scottish Education.

I'll do a few posts  to summarise my BETT experience. There were lots of great links and interesting topics flying around on twitter I hope some of these streams will be archived.

#EWF,  #ELB2012  , #ATC21S I think lots of folk are unaware that BESA now helps organise an Education World Forum on the Monday and Tuesday before BETT started.  There are quite a few useful snippets in the feed from this  http://www.ewf2012.org/  , Microsoft's Education Leaders Briefing  and one to have a look at the assessment and teaching of 21st century skills programme http://atc21s.org/ which we at SQA have been engaged with from inception.

#bett12 #BETT_Show,  #bett2012   - I wish that the official BETT Tag did not have an underscore in it . I don't know who came up with that idea but hopefully one that changes next year. 

 #mmafa  The Miranda Mod  Unconference and some excellent sessions http://www.mirandanet.ac.uk/bett/ 

#C84C  Collaborate for Change a useful new additional fringe event on Thursday evening some lively discussion from vendors and ICT support people http://www.c84c.org.uk/   Looks too that it has a format that can sustain large conference numbers.

#tmbett2012 The one and only - but I'm still not able to hang about until Friday and I am still not sure that teachmeets work when you get 200 folk in one room. But it looked good as ever http://teachmeet.pbworks.com/w/page/48562279/Teachmeet%20%40BETT%202012  and its still critical to have this kind of informal , informative , networking event for teachers at BETT. I'd still like to be able to offer some  no strings sponsorship for  this but I am not quite sure what is happening on this one. Delighted too that John Johnstone has been nominated for a NAACE award for impact of teachmeets http://www.johnjohnston.info/blog/?e=2245 I am sure lots of folk from across UK and beyond will want to help John get his portfolio together. 

More posts to follow 

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#BETT12 Here it comes

Well my diary is almost full of the important catch ups with vendors that I can only really make in this slot in the year.  I'll  be at BETT from Wed morning to Friday afternoon this year.

Normally I am aware of what the main big ticket issue is as a backdrop to BETT - in the past you could guess before you went that dependent on year you would be running into

- purveyors of electronic whiteboards
- ICT Training initiatives for teachers, learners , adults , civil servants ....
- whole school and local authority management information systems
- technical service providers for local authorities
- special deals for bulk buys of hardware
- Virtual Learning Environment providers
- Schools for the future , gazers , describers , sellers , costructors - in handy pre-formed partnership teams

The only constants over last 10 years are quiet stands full of fuzzy felt and interesting things for primary learners and  appalling really for Britain's premier education exhibition, wi-fi will be inaccessible or really dreadful.

It is hard to tell what main thing will be this year - I am guessing policy folk will sit around and talk about PISA - this has been main topic for last three years. It is verging on the obsessive really.

I'd like discussions to be around how education in the  UK can support BYOD if not for learners then certainly for teachers and how and why we can't be as ambitious for learners as a county like Uruguay can be in terms of moving to one lap top per child and building the infrastructure around this.
It may only be a short hop away as 4G and new networking technologies may mean that high bandwidth is available to support new initiatives in this space without cost of all the hard-wiring.

Would be great too to hear from school system of some examples where local authorities of regions have moved into cloud in an open scaleable way and overcome any security issues they may have had for learners and for information security too.

I usually come back with some great new ideas from international links we have http://www.joewilsons.net/search/label/BETT  and a huge sense of relief we don't operate in the same policy landscape as the English education system. ( should add for blogging police this is a fact on policy landscape  rather than any form of  political statement )

See you there folks 

A week and a headfull #LWF11 #EWF11 #ELB2011 #BETT2011

It is really useful to start the year immersed in ideas and that is often what happens around the BETT Conference in January. Here are some reflections and reports on a week among educational policy makers , educators , educational technologists and the business interests that circle education in the UK and globally.

I'll try and capture each event in a few bullets and offer some follow up links.

#LWF11 Learning Without Frontiers

The Conference was aimed to be about disruptive education and did it well through informed and engaging speakers who in the main made good use of data to flag up the opportunities that lie ahead for education. David Muir has made a great job of blogging many of the sessions.

• The education service that globally becomes the next facebook will turn up side down education as we know it - this was the underlying thesis.
• Lots of focus on arrival of tablet devices or next generation mobile phones - not much mention of my favourite $100 lap-tops but these are part of solution - one solution a device, built by tech group Raspberry Pi, will provide students with access to a full PC experience. The USB-powered device includes wireless networking, a Linux OS, an ARM processor, an HDMI output. Richard Braben wants to trial the device later in the year radical in that was very low cost.
• Speaker after speaker suggested that games industry and a large education partner may be the place to watch - new consoles and immersive games , growing on-line communities around these and their ever more sophisticated delivery platforms . Stephen Heppell predicts that Education is the next cartell that will be destroyed by people and technology. The argument that the next stage of technological paradigm shifts after hardware, software, databases, search and now social uses, will be learning. 
  
  
  My question would be which cartells move in as we move through period of disruptive changes.

• BBC made announcement that more programming will be available free for education in UK

http://tdalton.co.uk/2011/01/time-for-a-new-ict-qualification/

http://www.linkedin.com/groupItem?view=&srchtype=discussedNews&gid=3141501&item=40102829&type=member&trk=EML_anet_mc_pst_ttle

#EWF Education World Forum

In the background the Education World Forum aimed at education ministers from around the world was going on in Westminster. The speaker line up looked remarkably similar to last year's event  - which included technology in the title. Still on look out for best blog post on this event  - there is actually quite a good summary in the press information on events webpage and some good observations on the twitter stream from John Connell and Ollie Bray not sure these will be curated so grab a look soon  Angela Constance Scottish Skills Minister made a good speech..  Here is Michael Gove's speech welcoming large number of  education ministers to UK

#ELB2011 Microsoft Education Leaders Briefing

On Wednesday evening I attended useful session updating on developments coming our way through Microsoft Partners in Learning.  It was good to be joined at this event by colleagues from Learning and Teaching Scotland.

#Bett2011 Awards 

On Wednesday evening too - We brought back a BETT Award for a games based assessment platform for young people on our Skills for Work courses in Retailing, Health Sector, Energy and Uniformed and Emergency Services. Meant that there was a lot of interest on the SQA Stand on Thursday and Friday.

#Bett2011

I can't blog too much on all the meetings I had around exhibition and I think my initial post is fairly accurate reflection of experience. Some good blogs are picking up more from event from a practitioner's viewpoint.

http://olliebray.typepad.com/olliebraycom/bett2011/

http://alessiobernardelli.wordpress.com/2011/01/14/what-a-day-at-bett-2011/

http://helenmyers.blogspot.com/2011/01/bett-2011.html

and looking forward to seeing work of Leon Cynch who seemed to be everywhere capturing coverage of teachmeet and lots more.

#bett11 First Impressions

I've been really lucky and very privileged to attend BETT the British Educatonal Technology Show for last 12 years either in my current role or in previous jobs. The picture above is of the main hall and the interesting thing is if you have a look at shots over last 12 years  ( probably last three here on flickr) remarkably it  has not changed that much both in terms of who is there and in terms of the solutions being peddled to an educational audience. As usual for me it is the side meetings with partners that matter. Anyway first impressions from day one

• The changing of the guard - new government seems to mean much less top down guidance on ICT in education. This may or may not be a good thing - but quite hard to find folk on policy side who can set out direction of travel in England.
• Last year there were shed loads of functional skills materials - this year hardly in evidence - would be interesting to see figures on how much money has been spent on reforms here.That appear to be continually delayed.
• Whiteboards everywhere as usual but this year turned on their sides to make gigantic tablet PCS
• Seems more crowded with stall holders than ever but footfall seems much lighter
• Useful educational focused side programme and more informal teachmeet type content - always better than advertorial and getting better each year.

For those who don't regard education and learning as chiefly a money making enterprise BETT can be pretty harrowing. For a free pen or even a pendrive  there is only so much sales patter you can stomach. Combine lots of people selling stuff with hordes too of home grown or international educational technologists all on the make  and you get a heady brew and has any of it really changed the experience of learners in schools ?

#lwf11 Learning Without Frontiers

Lord Putnam and Jimmy Wales founder of Wikipedia debate in final session at Learning Without Frontiers.

I had a productive two days at Learning Without Frontiers and well done Graham and team for organising an event with a difference in a useful calendar slot before the purgatory of BETT.  The speakers were awesome , entertaining and informative and looking forward already to watching them be re-streamed and appearing on i-tunes and YouTube soon ( guess announcement will appear here)
I had some prejudices before I came - this was a relatively expensive event - and a free/discounted  i-pad was on offer if I signed some dotted line ( I'd love too but as attending is as part of my normal day job I can't pick up technology like this) . While I am slightly covetous I still can't figure out how owning one will help my day job. Did appear to be bigger version of i-phone for too wealthy short sighted guys ( guess they haven't worked out that it can't phone yet) sort of techno porn for geeks.
I did enjoy the best wifi I have had at a conference out with trips to States ..and so did everyone else - there is a fairly impressive twitter stream #lwf11 and was great too to find some friends picking up video feed from conference as it went out live.
So how could it be made better - event needs more back channels - a live twitter stream behind and beside presenters. - needs some more unconference stuff - there were some really great people in audience a few five minute slots from a few of them would have been really good. The event was about disruptive education - still not disruptive enough - one or two presentations were corporate advertorial.  Would have been interesting to have some input from open educational resource producers. A hook up somewhere with JISC in UK too would be really constructive - slight danger that it becomes schools silo.
Special tribute to David Muir who managed to do a blog posting on every session he attended.