The Midwest Education Technology Conference (METC) in 2006 was my first professional development opportunity.  Many educational technology tools and terms were new to me.  I was very inspired by the two keynote speakers.  Diane Lewis provided a keynote address “Creating Classroom Communities on the Web.”  She introduced free resources such as blogs, message boards, and wikis.  She examined actual classroom uses and explored curriculum projects that build understanding through classroom communities.  She also discussed ethical considerations of working with web-based communities.  I was inspired by the power of the Internet to improve writing skills by providing an authentic audience.

The most beneficial session was delivered by web-based educator Tom March from Australia.  “The New WWW – Whatever, Whenever, Wherever” introduced the concept of the WebQuest.  Tom was a co-developer of the WebQuest strategy with Prof. Bernie Dodge.  The concepts I learned in this session facilitated my creation and delivery of a presentation about WebQuests for a class at Three Rivers Community College and development of a WebQuest about wildand fire.  In addition, the Job Corps Safety Officer and I facilitated a WebQuest from Tom’s Best WebQuests website about school safety and violence.  More about Tom is contained in the Ozline story.

The final session of the conference proved to be very instrumental as well.  Community Education Outreach Manager Donna Nonnenkamp and Program Coordinator Raymond Vollmer presented an introduction to the unique distance learning programs offered by Adventures in Medicine and Science (AIMS) through the Saint Louis University School of Medicine.  Working with AIMS and the Job Corps Data Center, I was able to facilitate a videoconferencing session about the harmful effects of methamphetamines.  This was the first use of the new Job Corps Polycom videoconferencing technology for education outside the Department of Labor. 

I participated in the Midwest Education Technology Conference (METC) held on February 26-28, 2007 in St. Louis.    The conference is a project of the Cooperating School Districts of Greater St. Louis.  I enrolled in two preconference workshops.

I participated in Cultivating Digital Literacy with Classroom Podcasting on Monday, February 26, from 9:00 a.m. until noon.  This workshop was led by Karen Montgomery and Wesley Fryer.   Moving at the Speed of Creativity, a weblog by Wesley, is utilized by thousands of educators worldwide. The session explored examples of successful classroom podcasts and demonstrated how teachers can start their own classroom podcast using open-source and cross-platform software Audacity.  Following the class I also acquired the book KidCast, Podcasting in the Classroom by Dan Schmit for my personal library. 

I continue to keep in contact with Wesley and Karen and often refer to Wesley’s recommendations in social bookmarking tool Delicious.  Wesley is also a keynote speaker for the 2010 Midwest Educational Technology Conference. 

Later in the afternoon I attended a workshop SMARTboard in the Classroom instructed by Stephanie J. Madlinger, Ed.S. This three hour session demonstrated the SMARTBoard Interactive Whiteboard as well as the SMART Notebook Software.  Stephanie provided resources on a CD to all participants.  “Cyberteacher” can be followed on Twitter.

Other highlights from the conference included participation in three sessions by consultant, author, and public speaker David Warlick who established the Landmarks for Schools project in 1995.  In addition, I learned about eMints from Missouri state coordinator Christine Terry.  Instructional Technologist Diane Tinucci and Technology Support Teacher Bill Stewart provided valuable information about the educational possibilities of videoconferencing.  Director of Technology at the Whitfield School in St. Louis Alex Inman provided a three hour hands-on session about loading and configuring a SUSE Linux laptop from scratch and introduced open-source course management system Moodle.  The students at the Whitfield School utilize a 1 to 1 laptop program.  This program is discussed on the ISTE website.  Dr. Curt Fuchs introduced the Missouri Virtual Instruction Program (MoVIP) that offers “any time, any place” learning for Missouri students.

The venue for the 2008 METC was moved to the St. Charles Convention Center February 4-6, 2008.  I attended one pre-conference workshop with Educational Technology Consultant Diana Dell, Ed.S.  Diana graduated from the School of Information Science and Learning Technologies in 2002 and developed Sqooltools.com and gamequarium.com.   She can be followed on Twitter.  Her presentation was “The ABCs of VLEs.”  In the session I learned the basics of setting up an online class through Moodle and obtained use of Moodle through SqoolTools.com. 

Other sessions included information about Really Simple Syndication (RSS), copyright basics for teachers, Web 2.0 for special education, digital storytelling, educational use of photo sharing, and using mobile technology to differentiate instruction.  I posted my notes and recommendations from the 2008 METC as a link on my website, Web 2.0 In the Know.

I was very fortunate to attend the 2008 MOREnet Instructional Technology Conference: Teaching and Learning 2.0.  In addition to assisting with the University of Missouri School of Information Science and Learning Technologies exhibit booth, I was able to attend a few sessions and meet Dr. Eric Nicklas, MOREnet K-12 Program Manager.  The conference provided me with many opportunities to learn, collaborate and experience the impact that technology can have on teaching and writing.  Memorable sessions were delivered by fellow Kansan Kevin Honeycutt who discussed online safety.  He often repeated the phrase, “if you don’t know them in real life, you don’t know them.”  Kevin has a couple of websites devoted to education including My Safe Surf.  Additional sessions were attended about MoVIP, photo sharing, wikis, and blogging.  Notes from the 2008 MOREnet Instructional Technology Conference were posted to my website. I also included comments about resources on my blog, Rob's Mizzou Blog.

On June 5, 2009, while attending graduate school at Minot State University, I attended one day of the two-day Northern Great Plains Technology Institute.  I obtained additional information about Minot State University’s use of Wimba, Adobe Acrobat Connection Pro and Blackboard for online course instruction.

Finally, on February 9-10, 2010, I was able to represent the University of Missouri at METC 2010 at the St. Charles Convention Center. Information obtained from prospective students was provided to Mizzou.