Day one of the I*EARN Conference started off with Bill Coppinger as the first speaker of the Welcoming Ceremony. Bill is the organiser for I*EARN Australia. He welcomed all of the delegates from around the world to the conference, and he introduced each speaker that wanted to say a few words about I*EARN.
The second speaker was Peter Copen who is the President of the "Copen Family Fund". He talked about world destruction happening with:
The Third speaker at the Welcoming ceremony was Rosy Aguila. She read out a poem in Spanish and Bill Coppinger translated it for us. It was about brotherly love and how I*EARN is bringing people together. Rosy is one of representatives for Argentina.The I*EARN Conference was officially opened by the honourable Haddon Storey who is the Minister of Tertiary Education. He defined I*EARN for us which was "To join people together using telecommunications". Haddon also said that "Telecommunications should be used for our educational needs". At the end of the Welcoming Ceremony, people from Russia, America, Hebrew, Spain, South Africa, Argentina, Netherlands and Korea said a welcome and thank you in their language. This Ceremony helped everyone to understand what I*EARN was about, let everyone settle in and gave people the chance to get to know each other.
By Grant Smith.
The Snapshots was a good chance to see what the workshops were about. As each presenter talked a little on their workshop we gained some idea of what we would be doing in their workshops. Some of these sounded really interesting and it is a pity that I could not go to them all.
As we arrived
at Global Publishing everyone introduced themselves and told everyone about
themselves and what they do. Our lecturers were Charly and Cathy Bullock, they
are from Albuquerque U.S.A.
Charly and Cathy were teachers at a school in Albuquerque They knew very little about computers before being introduced to I*EARN. They only used them for word processing. When Charly was asked to join I*EARN he was not sure about it but his friends said he was crazy if he did not join, so he joined. I*EARN supplied the school with a new computer and set them up so the school could communicate with the world.
Charly never regregts joining I*EARN because he has had many chances to communicate with people and learn about them and become friends.
Cathy showed some slides that were very interesting; they showed buildings, homes, schools, life style, climate and the desert. The slides were also of the school at which they taught.
Charly and Cathy then shared some stories that were written in a book
Then Charly asked us to write up on family treasure's or family traditions. The class then shared them and the people who wanted them on posters handed them up.
This workshop showed us how people can come to know people from different countries and learn things about them. I enjoyed this session as it showed me how I can learn about so many different people and how they live.
By Aaron Coulter.
Day 1: Global
Village Project: Shaping Global Citizens For A High Tech World:
Presenter: Ceil Jensen Director Adams High School
From this reporters viewpoint this was an interesting presentation: a good example of how telecommunications can be used to look globally and foster understandings about other people as well as something about ourselves.
Ceil Jensen explained to the audience the nature and operation of the Global Village Project at Adams High School, Oaklands Schools District, Detriot, Michigan, USA. Ceil explained how the Village Project is interdisciplinary, uses technology such as telecommunications, global is concept and context, offers travel opportunities, fosters team work and places the teacher in a position of being a facilitator of learning.
Ceil presented to the audience some wonderful examples of the 'products' produced by students in the class. Some mirth was caused when it came to the door prize for the mystery flag had not been handed out. However, the problem was overcome when Greg King (from Capetown) was able to provide Ceil with a South African note for her currency project.
What was clearly evident throughout this presentation was the enthusiasm that Ceil had towards ensuring that her students would find success, obtain 21st Century skills, foster critical and creative thinking skills and benefit from the international exchange program.
I have no hesitation in saying that this workshop should be viewed by every Conference delegate because it showed what was possible when it came to using telecommunication to expand the learning horizons of students.
The lunch today was the first lunch of the conference, and usually you like to make a good impression on the first day, well the lunch certainly did not make a good impression on me. When I opened the box all I saw was healthy looking things. The sandwiches were not real nice, the cake tasted like rubbish, and the rest was basically the same, yuck (horrible)!. Todays lunch scores a 3 out of 10.
Lunches By Aaron Coulter