I'm sitting here watching as the sun sets over the Alps, in beautiful Villach, Austria. The peaks are glistening, and the bell in the church is tolling. So, I vill here my German practice: 'Der gipfel des Berges funkelt im Abendsonenschein'. There, that impressed the pants off you didn't it? I can tell. It's from the poem Lorelei - the only German I remember from secondary school. All the rest was learned afterwards, in conversation with chattering Teutonic chappies. I travelled up this morning by train from Ljubljana, after a restful night, and have ensconced myself at the Holiday Inn. I'm here to attend and present at ICL 2008, the annual bash organised by Michael Auer and the Karenthia Institute here on the river Drau. It really is a sweet little town with plenty of places to eat out and countryside to explore. Not that I will be doing too much of that. It will be busy here at ICL.
The programme looks interesting, and over just three days, there is a lot to cram in. There are no less than 10 keynotes (in fact there are eleven if you count the keynote panel in the last session on Friday). There are sessions on the semantic web, knowledge management, adaptive and intuitive learning environments (work it out for yourself), e-portfolios, collaborative learning, mobile learning environments and applications, and they've thrown in the kitchen sink for good measure. And what excitement! There is a social programme extra - on Saturday they are taking us all down to Venice for the day - how many other conferences can boast such a treat, eh?
I
wrote last year in this blog that there were only a few sessions that 'shone out like diamonds in the mud' and was castigated by Stephen Downes for my poetic licence. Well that's all water under the bridge now, and this is a clean sheet, so I'm putting my best foot forward and will be avoiding cliches like the plague. I'm in room 501, just in case anyone wants to send me up a free pair of Levi's or something - and here's a clue... for anyone taking part in tomorrow's little fun quiz during my pre-conference workshop on Web 2.0: (whispers) 501 also happens to be the highest first class individual cricket score record held by one Brian Lara. Don't say I didn't help you out there. (end of whispering)
wrote last year in this blog that there were only a few sessions that 'shone out like diamonds in the mud' and was castigated by Stephen Downes for my poetic licence. Well that's all water under the bridge now, and this is a clean sheet, so I'm putting my best foot forward and will be avoiding cliches like the plague. I'm in room 501, just in case anyone wants to send me up a free pair of Levi's or something - and here's a clue... for anyone taking part in tomorrow's little fun quiz during my pre-conference workshop on Web 2.0: (whispers) 501 also happens to be the highest first class individual cricket score record held by one Brian Lara. Don't say I didn't help you out there. (end of whispering)Oh, and one final quirky little point - here's the picture to prove it.... The elevators here are designed by a company called Schindler - so that makes it Schindler's lift.
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