Shift to the Future

The first time I experienced any form of telepresence was probably 10 years ago at a Cisco Systems office.  They produced a hi-tech corporate teleconferencing room that was and is fairly expensive but unique in how it makes the room participants feel connected to one another.  It worked by connecting like rooms together.  For example I was in a teleroom in Vancouver connected to identically equipped and designed rooms in various US cities and we were able to see each other and our voices were heard in relation to where we sat.  The cameras would auto focus on the speaker.  Participants could present from any of the rooms to all participants.  That was than but the world has changed, dramatically. Do you remember when Sheldon on the TV show Big Bang Theory confined himself to his room and would only ‘come out’ as a telepresence robot?  Well, I was at a conference this past week in Montreal, an historic city in Quebec eastern Canada and at one of the e...

Back in 2001 when I moved from Nanaimo to work for the Coquitlam School District, I recall having to buy a “good” map book to find my way around the District and the lower mainland.  I would use online maps increasingly to figure out routes but would write the turns down or print them.  It wasn’t elegant but I managed to get by.  My recent change to join the Vancouver School Board takes me to many schools and other places in the city that I’ve never been to.  Thankfully, my iPhone with Google Maps exists!  I plug in an address and pick the best route, press Start, and off we go.  The GPS “person” is very patient with me even when I pick route elements I think are “better”, ‘she’ recalculates the route and gets me on track.  I also love how I can speak to my phone, ask SIRI to plot a route to a place, eg a business or restaurant location, and it does it.  What a difference a decade of change makes for maps. My son and I were talking the other nig...

Along with about 20,000 others last week, I was learning at the pace of tweets.  ISTE puts on a pretty amazing conference each year where educators involved with educational technology gather en mass.  This year ISTE hailed from San Antonio, Texas home of the famous Alamo where the Texan’s and Mexicans had their standoff in 1836.  The temperature was a balmy 38 degrees Celsius with a “feels like” of 46.  Prior to heading down, I noticed via Twitter that a colleague I only knew through tweets and blogs was there so we arranged to meet Saturday evening for dinner.  After enjoying some amazing Texan ribs, we wandered over to the Alamo – it was closed so could only see the outside. This was pretty exciting for me as I had read about the Alamo battle in a historical fiction novel recently.  It was cool to experience a piece of history in person I only knew through a book.  San Antonio has a river, well “creek” might better describe it, that meanders throu...

E-Learning is in a state of flux.  The early days saw distance learning programs move online and essentially the same boring ‘learn at a distance’ method occur, but in a more paperless manner.  I have never really been a fan of e-learning in its course delivery model.  Sure, it’s an efficient way to deliver content and to many students at once but is it really an effective experience for the learners?  Online tools don’t replicate social learning experiences well, yet.  Sure, with Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and Hangouts, Skype, or Blackboard Collaborate (formally Elluminate Live) students can connect in asynchronous and synchronous ways.  But, it is still not the same as face 2 face.  I believe e-learning needs to be a fully blended experience so as to leverage the best of what it means to be human – being together. I was asked to represent the K12 sector on a “ Future Trends ” panel at the recent Canadian MoodleMoot .  Along with a person from...

Joel soaks up the sun this fine day on May 19, 2021 as he walks to school.  He’s excited ‘cause today his middle school is finally allowing him and his fellow students to engage with the new “textbook”.  He’s a little puzzled why it’s called a textbook .  It’s really a place to enter in and experience – it’s not a book.  Joel rarely actually uses “books” as in the paper kind, these days.  The students have learned that the new textbook requires them to wear a special headset with glasses and ear buds.  They can choose from a multitude of colors, shapes, and sizes that the school provides or they can purchase and bring their own along with their other school supplies.  These headsets or “Portal Sets” as their teachers referred to them as, work anywhere and anytime. Joel arrives at school and sees his friend Carrie – he runs up to meet her at the door.  Joel and Carrie catch up on what they did on the weekend as they walk to the great hall of lea...

It’s interesting, actually encouraging, that with all the modern ways we have available to us to connect with each other, we still like to meet together face to face .  There’s just something inherently human and fulfilling about being together in the same physical space, shaking hands, looking each other in the eye, seeing facial expressions, and hearing the other person’s voice, live.  We travel all around the world to see amazing places and things, face to face .  I wonder though how things may get blurry with future, yet to be invented, digital devices? Last Tuesday a colleague and I received 10 principals from Denmark who were interested in our system of schooling and examples of educational technology.  We toured three schools visiting five classrooms.  They were able to have a great experience talking to teachers and students about their use of iPads to transform learning, various immersive uses of technology, technology used to support English as a sub...

Reality.  It is something we all encounter, every day.  “ In philosophy , reality is the state of things as they actually exist, rather than as they may appear or might be imagined ” ( Wikipedia Apr. 28, 2012).  I wonder what our definition of reality will be in the future.  I just read an article “the Future of Food” ( The Futurist May-June 2012 , p.24-28) that talks about the efforts to genetically engineer / modify organisms.  There are scientists experimenting with creating transgenic crops (eg, a potato with a chicken gene), referred to as Frankenfood , interestingly.  They are creating rice with vitamin enhancements, hardy corn crops to grow under harsh conditions, etc.  Some geneticists claim that one day we will select flavors, textures, and colors for our tomatoes with the a few clicks of a mouse.  In the future will our food be real, as we know it? Another article in the same issue of The Futurist, “Unlimiting Energy’s Growth” (p.29-...