An Interesting Week

That’s putting it politely.  I am so pumped and I know I am going to be so exhausted.  Today, Brenda drives me to Morresville, a Lake Norman suburb of Charlotte, where I’ve been invited by Dr. Mark Edward to present to middle and high school teachers this afternoon, and then to about three hundred members of the community this evening — along with Susan Patrick (NACOL President and CEO) and Randy Wilhelm (Co-Founder & CEO of Thinkronize — publishers of netTrekker).  Mark Edwards, now leading the Morresville Graded Schools, has moved down from Virginia where he was the vision behind Henrico’s celebrated and scrupulously watched 1:1 initiative.  He’s trying to ready his new community for 21st century education.

Then I fly to Missouri, assuming that weather will be more conducive this week.  Last weeks Missouri Bar conference was canceled because of weather.  This week, I’ll be working at the eMints Winter Conference, with Bernie Dodge as the main keynote speaker — always an educational treat.  It seems that I’ve heard on several occasions from outside observers that Missouri is a state to watch, no doubt as a result of the expanding influence of the eMints model.

Then I meet my wife and son at the JFK airport to fly to Enland, where I’ll be mostly attending the NAACE Annual Strategic Conference.  The highlight will be finally getting to see Ewan McIntosh present, as he is March 4 evening keynote speaker.  I’ll be doing one presentation about contemporary literacy, but not at all certain of how relevant it will be.  Education, in the U.K. seems to have gone through some fairly revolutionary changes. 

While in this new country to us, we’ll enjoy almost a full day in London, hours on trains, almost a day in St. Ives, and then almost the entire conference.

I wish that would be it!  But flying home, I leave Brenda and Martin in NYC and fly on to Salt Lake City for a literacy conference there, and then back to NYC for the Teaching & Learning Celebration conference.