LAN Party coming together

I sent out an e-mail today inviting 17 people who said they were interested in joining me for the conversation. I've copied and pasted the e-mail below for others to use and get ideas from.

Be a part of somethingspecial

The first every K12onlineShanghai LAN party

 

As some point in the last month you all have saidyou would be interesting in joining me for the first every K12online conferenceand the first ever Shanghai K12online LAN party. (Ifyou know of others who would be interested pleaseforward)

 

This little brain child of mine has been gettingsome attention and has been mentioned here, here, and here. Last night I had a great conversation withSheryl who is the lead person for the conference.She loves our idea and wants to make sure that what we do here is highlightedwithin the conference.

 

So some background if you are not familiar with theformat. There are 4 strands spanning 2 weeks.

 

Week 1 Oct23-27

A week in the classroom (1 keynote 10sessions)

Basic Advance Training (1 keynote 10sessions)

 

Week 2 Oct30-Nov.3

Personal Professional Development (1 keynote 10sessions)

Overcoming Obstacles (1 keynote 10sessions)

 

So here is what I'm thinking. We would have two 3hour sessions each week. Each session would focus on one strand. A session wouldlook like this.

 

45 minutes: Together everyone listens to the Keynote and wediscuss. (recording our conversation for a podcast)

90 minutes: We have breakout sessions. Where everyone wouldwatch/listen/do the "sessions" they wanted to. You will not have time to do all10 and try new stuff. So everyone can pick one or two and really get into someprograms, discussions or heavy thinking.

45minutes: We come back together and we all discuss what we have learned,what we tried and what we're thinking. (recording our conversation for apodcast)

 

That's it!

 

Once we're done I will take the podcast we createaround our discussions and send it the Sheryl. She will load it onto thek12onlineconference blog for everyone to listen too. Essentially becoming a partof the conference and conference history.

 

Time andDates

 

This is the hard part. Please, Please, Please do not feel obligated to come to allof the sessions. Any or all of them is fine with me (Exceptfor Daneah she has to be there!) So that being said here are two optionsthat I have come up with for the LAN parties. Please choose which option best suits your needs and reply byThursday Oct.11 at 3:00.

 

 

Option 1
For those thattreasure their weekends:

 

Oct. 24 5:00-8:00 ~A week in the classroom  (Pizzanight)

Oct. 26 5:00-8:00 ~Basic Advance Training   (Chinese night)

Oct. 31 5:00-8:00 ~Personal ProfessionalDevelopment (Thai night)

Nov. 2 5:00-8:00 ~Overcoming Obstacles (FingerFood)

 

Option 2

For those that treasure theirnights

 

Oct. 24 5:00-8:00 ~A week in the classroom  (FingerFood)

Oct. 28 9:00am-12:00pm ~Basic Advance Training   (Brunch potluck)

Oct. 31 5:00-8:00 ~Personal ProfessionalDevelopment (Chinese night)

Nov. 4 9:00am-12:00pm ~Overcoming Obstacles (BrunchJeff cooks...this could be scary)

 

Food and Drinks:

 

It would be great to know in advance who will becoming to each session (we'll figure this out later) so I know how much food toorder. We will have Beer, Wine, Soda, Water, and a liquor cabinet full of goodstuff. ;) For each session you attend there will be a "Food/Drink Fee" not surehow much, we'll see what the bill is and divide by the number that shows up.Fair?

 

Location:

 

I think my house is as centrally located inShanghai as we're going to get. So this will take place at my house. This alsoallows us to listen to the keynotes on my stereo system just like you are in alarge conference hall :). Iwill provide you with directions in Chinese soon. I will also do my best to haveall the keynotes and sessions available on my external hard drive in case theInternet decides not to work. You will be able to plug into the external,download the sessions you want, and then work on your own.

 

What you need:

 

You will need to bring your own laptop with ACadapter and earphones. The laptop must be wireless and I would hope less then 2years old as that makes it easy. If it isn't, we'll give it a try anyway orcontact me and I'll check one out here for you. (Mac users you are on your own.I will take down the sign in my office that says NO MACS ALLOWED for thisspecial occasion:) ) Don't forgetyour ear phones, 10 people listening to 10 different things could becrazy!

 

OK, I think that's it...hope Ididn't scare anyone away with this long e-mail. Just trying to think thisthrough. I'm preparing 3 sessions for the conference on: Using RSS feeds,Social-Bookmarking, and Flickr. So I'm busy preparing as we speak. Thank you andhope to hear from you soon!

 

Jeff

 

[tags]k12online[/tags]

Technorati Tags: k12online k12online06