In a couple of hours’ time I will be distributing the latest version of Getting the Best out if BETT, which includes the views of over 30 people who attended last year’s BETT. Here’s a Wordle of what products they thought worth pursuing, the trends they spotted, and the advice they offer to schools in these straitened times.
Computer Science courses should be left to the experts: teachers
It’s astonishing how everyone is an expert on school education these days. Everyone, that is, except the people who actually work in and with schools. The latest half-baked idea appeared in the BETT opening speech by Michael Gove, the Education Secretary for England & Wales. Here’s what he said:
Universities, businesses and others will have the opportunity to devise new courses and exams. In particular, we want to see universities and businesses create new high quality Computer Science GCSEs, and develop curricula encouraging schools to make use of the brilliant Computer Science content available on the web.
This is a dreadful idea for several reasons.
The BETT Show from a Canadian’s perspective: an interview with Vincent Jansen
BETT 2012 Round-up
I thought it might be interesting to collate some of the blog posts that have been written about BETT 2012, before it recedes into a distant memory. First, though, here’s a Wordle of the trends that people who responded to my BETT survey spotted. I haven’t edited the text, so there are some superfluous words, like “see”.
Technology & Learning Editor Kevin Hogan Interviewed
I had the pleasure of meeting up with Kevin Hogan again at BETT this year. Kevin is the Editor of Technology and Learning, which is a good magazine, a great website, and a brilliant blog and a new international blog. In this short video he talks about BETT, and the differences between educational technology in the USA and the UK, as well as his plans for the magazine.
BETT Survey
Did you attend BETT this year?
If so, please contribute to a review I’d like to compile about what was good, trends, etc. This will be made available free of charge once it’s done. Please complete a very short online survey.
Thanks!
Education Technology and ICT at BETT: Big changes for 2013
Er, excuse me. Um, I just wondered…, er could I just squeeze past…, oops, sorry…
How many times have you found yourself stuck behind a couple of people walking at such a snail-like pace that one suspects they started out the day before? That’s just one of the problems experienced at BETT at Olympia: so much squeezed into a space which has long been too small, resulting in aisles that are far too narrow for the volume of traffic and a stand numbering systems which seems to owe more to random number generation than logic. Well, hopefully this is all now a thing of the past, a soon-to-be distant memory of a venue we can reminisce about but not miss.
Education Technology and ICT at BETT 2012: 7 Things to do afterwards
There is always a danger that no matter how good an event is, it will turn out to have very little impact in the longer term, as you forget what you saw and more pressing concerns vie for your attention. Here are 7 suggestions for preventing that from happening.
Developments in Education Technology: Reflections on the first day of BETT
For me, the day can best be characterised as one of mixed feelings and divided loyalties. To be sure, there was all the excitement and adrelain-inducing "buzz" for which BETT is noted, and why it ought to be prescribed on the National Health Service as a cure for "the blues", but the experience was not one of unadulterated pleasure.
Read MoreUnofficial BETT-Related publications now available
17 Ways to get the best out of BETT
BETT and Computers in Classrooms
News update: BETT, Collabor8 4 Change and Computers in Classrooms Newsletter
I’m currently working on the next edition of Computers in Classrooms. With any luck I’ll get that out some time today. It will contain, amongst other things:
- More details of the Collabor8 4 Change event. There are now 114 people attending, 62 round table discussions to choose from, and only 36 tickets left. Ticket availability is open only until Saturday 5pm GMT.
- Access to an extensive unofficial guide to BETT, which will be useful for other conferences as well.
- Access to a review of the trends seen at last year’s BETT, and the reflections of a number of well-respected people in the educational ICT community in the UK.
All this, and it’s free to subscribe! Wow!
Update on Collabor8 4 Change
Here is a quick news flash:
Read MoreEven MORE reasons to attend Collabor8 4 Change!
Collabor8 4 Change is one of the fringe events at the forthcoming BETT show, and comprises up to around 50 round table discussions, each lasting 20 minutes. You can attend up to 5 of these over the three hours of this stupendous event. In a daily series of posts this week I hope to highlight some of the table discussions that are planned.
Here are the third five on my list
BETT Radio Broadcast today!
Ed tech evangelist Russell Prue (@russellprue) will be broadcasting live today about next week’s BETT show. Should be good, as it features a wide range of people from the ICT world. Russell very kindly invited me to take part too. We’ll be chatting about how to get the best out of BETT, and I hope to follow this up shortly with an even longer list of suggestions, which I will send out to subscribers to Computers in Classrooms, the free e-newsletter for educational ICT professionals! Anyway, here’s the information from the man himself:
Another 5 compelling reasons to attend Collabor8 4 Change
Collabor8 4 Change is one of the fringe events at the forthcoming BETT show, and comprises up to around 50 round table discussions, each lasting 20 minutes. You can attend up to 5 of these over the three hours of this stupendous event. In a daily series of posts this week I hope to highlight some of the table discussions that are planned.
5 Compelling reasons to attend Collabor8 4 Change
Collabor8 4 Change is one of the fringe events at the forthcoming BETT show, and comprises up to around 50 round table discussions, each lasting 20 minutes. You can attend up to 5 of these over the three hours of this stupendous event. In a daily series of posts this week I hope to highlight some of the table discussions that are planned.
Here are the first five on my list:
9 Reasons to attend BETT 2012
Well, here we are again. It will soon be Christmas, and just as we're all hoping to have started to recover from over-eating and over-imbibing (not me though: I'm being sensible!), it's the BETT show. Said to be the largest educational technology show in the world, it's gruelling but also exciting. IF you can get to it, do so -- and if you can't think of why you'd want to, you're in luck, because that's what this article is all about.
There are at least 9 good reasons to attend BETT, these being to: