After a decade of inroads,
SUCCESS
in modeling blended learning
in theory AND practice
at F2F and online conferences
Vance Stevens, Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi
AACE Spaces of Interaction:
An online conversation on improving traditional
conferences, Feb 19, 2009
http://www.aace.org/conf/spaces/
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Abstract
Vance Stevens
has been a long-time advocate and agitator for broadcasting online both into
and out of on-site professional development events and conferences. He
describes inroads made during the past decade in making conferences
accessible to many more than just their physically present delegates.
Having debunked the myth that if conferences were open to
online access on-site attendance would drop off, a case is
made for the opposite scenario:
• that broadening channels for conversation at conference
venues is a win-win situation in which everyone benefits
• and conferences where these channels are blocked are
the dinosaurs doomed to extinction.
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

What this presentation is about
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Who am I? Who are Webheads?
• Vance Stevens
http://adVancEducation.blogspot.com
• Coordinator of
Webheads
http://webheads.info/
• Webheads started in
1998 as a weekly
free online writing &
grammar class for
students enrolling at http://study.com
Photo from http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/webheads.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

1999 - Our 1st online event
from a F2F conference
• Writing for Webheads at New York TESOL '99 Web Faire,
March 10, 1999, CALL-IS Electronic Village. Maggi Doty and
Michael Coghlan appeared at Palace and chatted online with
passers-by. Student reactions:
• Vance: I am really happy for you! It's glad to
know that you can present what we have
done in the web. I really appreciate what
you have done for us! - Hilda
• I am so happy to have you my teacher and
my web page to be used at the TESOL
conference. Best luck for your speech at
conference. See you around. Choi Hae-
Young. Mar 03, 1999
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

What was unusual about this?
Start of pioneer effort by
•
Webheads to get f2f
conferences connecting online!
Risk! No certainty that promised
•
session could be logistically
pulled off
We didn’t know about cohesion
•
in networks back then and we
were pleasantly surprised when
students actually turned up.
The Palace gave us a
•
comfortable sense of presence
Screen shot shows our Virtual Schoolhouse in The Palace, where
two students have placed themselves contentedly on Maggi’s avatar’s chair
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2000 – Webheads online before live
audiences at 2 conferences
• TESOL Conference in Vancouver, March 2000 –
Vance was invited to give a live and online demonstration as part of an
invited presenters session (significance: came with TESOL supported
Internet). Michael Coghlan, Maggi Doti, and Webheads participants Ying
Lan and Moral performed online via HearMe voice plugin before an
audience of around 100.
The handouts and reports can be found here (slide shows need IE) http
://lightning.prohosting.com/~vstevens/papers/tesol2000/tesol2000.htm
• Presentation on Writing for Webheads at Zayed University in Abu Dhabi,
February 2000
WFW was subject of a demonstration held live and online in Abu Dhabi.
After cameo appearances at web fairs, this was the first time the Webheads
appeared at a conference presentation live and online as a session in their
own right. Michael Coghlan appeared at the Palace and in the voice chat
with Webheads participant Ming.
http://lightning.prohosting.com/~vstevens/papers/tesol2000/zu2000tesol.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2000 – Hear Me voice chat
gains Barcelona attention
Webheads presented on May 3, 2000, at the Military Language Institute’s Teacher to Teacher
•
Conference 2000 “Tools of the Trade” in Abu Dhabi, UAE. Students present online were
Maggie and Moral at the Palace, and Maggie and Nicia in the voice chat. Maggie was also at
the Homestead Chat. Teacher Webheads included Shabana from Dubai, Claudia from Austria,
Jason at ESADE in Spain, and Chi -Chin in Illinois, all at the HearMe voice chat site.
http://lightning.prohosting.com/~vstevens/t2t2000/gvs_t2t.htm Screen shot also shows how
we used Real Player for voice
• Webheads presented at the CTELT 2000
Alternate Assessment 4th Annual
Conference \"Current Trends in English
Language Testing\" May 10-11, 2000
Zayed University - Dubai Campus (UAE)
Community Building Tools for Online
Language Learning. Here we invited
anyone to join us at HearMe voice chat,
as well as text chat. Jason again joined.
http://lightning.prohosting.com/~vstevens/ctelt2000/gvsctelt2k.htm
Jason worked for a language school in
Barcelona which was holding a conference in
July. We got a late invitation and were
squeezed into the program.
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Students present in voice online at F2F
event in Barcelona - 2000
Webheads broadcast from the ESADE and IATEFL Computer SIG joint event \"CALL for the
•
21st Century\" June 30th - July 2nd, 2000, Barcelona, Spain.
Community Building Tools for Online Language Learning was the title of our
presentation in the program and the logs of the chats during the session are linked from
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/ch000702.htm.
– Webhead student participant Ying Lan opened the presentation via HearMe, saying who
she was and who Webheads were and their significance. Participant Moral was in the
Palace and had a long conversation with Antje, a delegate at the conference. This was
displayed on the big screen at the front of the room, though unfortunately, the palace
was not installed separately at each station, so no other F2F delegates could join us
there virtually. But Moral did a great job carrying that part of our demonstration, and
delegates in Barcelona watched from their seats at their own computers. Meanwhile,
Maggie in China was at the Homestead chat having conversations with whoever
dropped by there. And at the very end, just as we were wrapping up, Sorsah from
Cambodia came along.
– In sum, another successful presentation by Webheads at another F2F conference. I was
particularly impressed with the contributions of our online students. Moral and Ying Lan
gave what amounted to an eloquent presentation of their Writing for Webheads class
and the work they've been doing in it for the past couple of years. We captured what
they said at The Palace here:
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/ch00070p.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2001 – Webheads present at distance at TESOL Arabia
- Vance streams Plenary from Cyprus
March 14, 2001 - Webheads students figured prominently in Vance’s presentation
•
on online chat tools at the 2001 TESOL Arabia Conference in Dubai,
http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/tesol/arabia2001/ . At the conference, Moral
and Michael Coghlan appeared in our Excite voice chat room (which we were using
because Hear Me had gone commercial). Moral said a few words to a rapt audience,
followed by Michael’s explanation of the Webheads concept and how we had
become good friends and productive colleagues for three years without having
actually met. John Steele meanwhile was holding down the fort in Homestead and
Tapped In.
Vance streams a plenary address OUT entitled
•
Implementing Expectations: The Firewall in the Mind at a conference in Cyprus
May 5th and 6th, 2001, http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/cyprus2001/.
– Michael Coghlan presented a paper streamed IN to conference delegates from
his home in Adelaide. One person at that presentation was upset that Michael
was not physically present, though I tried to explain that she was witnessing a
significant breakthrough in F2F conference connectivity.
– Eric Baber helped with streaming all presentations through server in London (of
the half dozen who had agreed – all had been offered).
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2001 Project in Turkey leads to distance
presentation in Abu Dhabi
The Webheads Community of Language Learners Online, a
demonstration by Vance Stevens and Arif Altun, Nov 7, 2001 at Teacher
to Teacher 2001 conference, November 7 & 8 2001, Abu Dhabi, UAE
A proceeds of the session was published in Stevens, V. and Altun, A. (2002). The Webheads
–
community of language learners online. In Syed, Z. (Ed.). The process of language learning: An
EFL perspective. Abu Dhabi: The Military Language Institute. Find an online version here:
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/papers/t2t2001/proceeds.htm
Wednesday, October 31, we held a practice session, connecting live online in synchronous text,
–
voice, and video-enhanced chat, two classes of non-native English speakers from Turkey and
China - archived here with pics from both locations, and a link to reflections on the experience
by the students from Turkey:
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/chat2001/wfw011031.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2002 – More live streams from
Abu Dhabi and CALICO, TESOL
March 21 2002 at TESOL Arabia 8th Annual International Conference: \"Critical
•
Reflection and Practice\" - I presented a demonstration at the Technology Fair
entitled \"Webheads in Action: Community development online“ where I had a
web cam set up and invited conference delegates to interact with Webheads who
come online.
March 30, 2002 - CALICO 2002 Annual Symposium at University of California, Davis:
•
Creating Virtual Language Learning Communities - I was in the program as:
“Webheads: online community building since 1998\" We demonstrated with live
and online participants throughout the community.
http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/tesolarabia2002/calico2002.htm
April 10, 2002: TESOL 2002: Language and the Human Spirit - Salt Lake City, Utah I
•
handled the on-site live-broadcast for the CALL-IS Academic Session entitled
\"Theory Meets Practice in CALL\" - Presenters: Joy Egbert, Elizabeth Hanson-Smith,
Deborah Healey, Vance Stevens, Thomas Robb, Lynn Hendrickson. Despite obstacles
(no IP address allocated for streaming), we managed to webcast the session (via
http protocol in Yahoo Messenger, plan B  ) Eric Baber was set to manage stream
under plan A.
http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/evonline2002/academic.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Punching through the firewall at TESOL
2002, Salt Lake City
• Friday, April 12, in Salt Lake City - Vance Stevens presented
Writing for Webheads and Webheads in Action: Community Formation
Online and its Role in Language Learning at a second special Internet
fair session for Classic (\"tried and true, reliable, amazing, memorable,
etc.\") previous Internet Fair presentations.
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

eMerging eLearning Abu Dhabi 2002
• e-Merging e-Learning Conference at Higher Colleges of
Technology Men's College, Abu Dhabi, UAE
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

eMerging eLearning Abu Dhabi 2002
A visit with Webheads online community of practice for language learners and
•
teachers, September 8, 2002 convened members of the Webheads community
online to demonstrate 'live' our freely accessible text, video, and voice enhanced
synchronous communications technologies, while showing conference delegates
around the Webheads community.
A transcript with video images of our presentation is here:
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/chat2002/wfw020908.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Ismail Fayed and I broadcast from
2002 Cairo TESOL Conference
• Saturday December 14, 2002, at the Education Technology Special Interest
Group of EgypTesol Electronic Oasis, at the EgypTesol Conference
(December 13- 15 2002), Sheraton Heliopolis Ismail Fayed and I presented
Demonstration, with Internet access: A visit with Webheads online
community of practice for language learners and teachers
We convened members of the community online to
demonstrate 'live' our use of free text, video, and voice
enhanced synchronous communications technologies, while
showing conference delegates around the Webheads
community:
Vance's HTML rendition of Ismail’s ppt presentation
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Connecting from within the
Baltimore TESOL 2003 Convention
March 26, 2003 -
•
Colloquium: \"Case study of a community of practice\" at the TESOL 2003 Convention Baltimore, Maryland, USA
– Webheads were on the TESOL 2003 Convention program. Presenters were Vance Stevens, Dafne
Gonzalez, Teresa Almeida d'Eça, Chris Jones, Arlyn Freed, Aiden Yeh, Michael Coghlan, and Buthaina Al
Othman. Due to unstable world situation (we watched the invasion of Iraq from our hotel rooms) only half
our presenters were able to travel to the USA. So, in edupunk fashion, we purchased a phone line (at our
expense, $200) from the Convention Center and brought the missing four to the conference remotely
using Wimba for voice presentations and Yahoo for web cam broadcasts.
• Wed March 26 - I represented \"EVOnline workshop:
Communities of practice online: Reflection through
experience and experiment with the Webheads
community of language learners and practitioners\"
at one of the Electronic Village Internet Fairs. The
handout for this session is here:
http://academics.smcvt.edu/cbauer-ramazani/TESOL/evol2003handout.htm
• March 28, in the Electronic Village - Webheads
physically present in Baltimore webcast LIVE for an
Internet Fair Classics session, and Webheads and all
colleagues worldwide were invited to join us.
Webheads presenters physically present included
Vance Stevens, Chris Jones, Arlyn Freed, Claire
Bradin, Sophie Ioannou-Georgiou, and Elizabeth
Hanson-Smith (some pictured )
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Invited to Taiwan to present at conference,
joined by Webheads there
Ying Lan Liu, Aiden Yeh, and Venny Su were on hand to help me co- present.
http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/webheads/taiwan/wenshan2003.htm
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Global Learn Day 2003 draws Michael Coghlan and
Buthaina Alothman to Abu Dhabi
• Sunday November 16, 2003 Michael Coghlan and I were key presenters for
the Middle East at the Global Learn Day VII presentation on \"Meet the
Webheads: An experiment in world friendship through online language
learning.\" The presentation was cybercast live from a large Lecture Hall at
the Petroleum Institute, Abu Dhabi.
Buthaina Alothman flew from Kuwait to Abu
Dhabi especially to be on hand to help
present. Buth took pictures and archived the
event at her website:
• http
://alothman-b.tripod.com/wia-buth- gld.htm
• http://alothman- b.tripod.com/esl-ef_wia_gld_files/frame.htm
(requires IE)
The AACE audience was amused to learn that
there were 60 people in the online voice chat but
only half a dozen at most in the 100+ seats
capacity auditorium where the presentation was
given live F2F.
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

2003-2004 Webheads present TO F2F
conferences in Cairo, Minsk
December 18, 2003 - I was a keynote speaker, presenting from a distance, at a
•
physical conference in Cairo. Title of presentation:
Teacher professional development in online communities of practice: How does this impact
The thesis was that only through use of CMC in professional development does its
use with students become second nature. The chat was webcast using Elluminate.
November 3, 2004, Dafne Gonzales, Susanne Nyrop, and I were asked to give the
•
lead presentation online, entitled \"Intro To Asynchronous Communication Tools\",
during the Belarusian Association of Teachers of English (BelNATE) and Minsk State
Linguistics University 6th International BelNATE-IATEFL Conference 'Teaching English
as a World Language in the Information Age' (November 3 - 5, 2004).
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/papers/belnate2004/pgram_dbase.htm
http://prosites-vstevens.homestead.com/files/efi/papers/belnate2004/belnate041103.pdf
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

WiAOC 2005, 2007
2009 May 22-24
http://wiaoc.org
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

There’s a LOT more!
The purpose of what has been
•
presented so far is to give some
idea of the work that was being
done in this area starting 10
years ago, and to give some
indication of its frequency, which
has increased since then.
We could keep going, 2004 to
•
present, but it would take
another hour.
This is from TESOL 2005, where
•
ElderBob Brannan arranged for
Webheads in San Antonio to
meet at at a restaurant with
wireless and connect with the
wider network BEFORE and
DURING the meal;
is this an extreme makeover or
what?? 
But, let’s move on …
•
Why the interest in F2F
•
conferences going online NOW?
Because we CAN and ..
•
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Multiliteracies and overlap of F2F
with online environment
• From Gutenberg through end of read-only century (Lessig,
pictured presenting in 2006)
– Face to face conferences
– Print literacy dominates, publication difficult
• Read-write century, Web 2.0
– Unconferences (via wikis)
– Bar camps
– Purely online,
home-grown efforts
– Back channels and extended interaction
during F2F conferences
Lessig, Lawrence. (2006). The Read-Write Society, a keynote given 15 September 2006 at the Wizards of OS4 conference.
http://www.wizards-of-os.org/programm/panels/authorship_amp_culture/keynote_the_read_write_society.html.
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Multiliteracies
• Print is King (
Bonk et al)
• Podcasts are
King (Vance)
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pyjRj3UMRM
Picture credit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_audio_player
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

What have you read lately?
http://www.downes.ca/
•
http://wp.nmc.org/horizon2009/
•
Picture credits: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_and_Peace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_is_Flat
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Heard anything good lately?
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Edupunk
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaQr9zXSY84
From the blogs: http://bavatuesdays.com/the-glass-bees/
http://binaryliving.blogspot.com/2008/09/edupunk-redefining-how-we-use.html
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Edupunks just DO it
• Examples: F2F w/strong online components:
Good listening: It’s Elementary #28 http://edtechtalk.com/node/3495
– EduCon 2.1 http://educon21.wikispaces.com/
– NECC http://center.uoregon.edu/ISTE/NECC2009/
– Flat Classroom Project (Thomas Friedman & Qatar)
http://flatclassroomproject.wikispaces.com/
– Learning 2.008 http://learning2cn.ning.com/
– And (this just in via Twitter, takes place Feb 21, 2009)
http://colearning.wikispaces.com/Home%202009
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Why?
Because …

Modeling for Learning
Downes, Stephen. (2007). Personal Learning the Web 2.0 Way. Presented at WiAOC
•
2007 - http://www.webheadsinaction.org/wiaoc2007/StephenDownes.
– Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/Downes/personal-learning-the-web-20-way.
– Recordings: Part 1: http://streamarchives.net/node/84Part 2:
http://streamarchives.net/node/83
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Prime Role of Conferences: Model
heuristics for effective learning
Click here for:
The slide show of the presentation this comes from
An elluminate recording of essentially the same presentation
Stevens, Vance. (2007). The Multiliterate Autonomous Learner: Teacher Attitudes and the Inculcation of
Strategies for Lifelong Learning Independence, Winter 2007 (Issue 42) . Retrieved from
http://www.learnerautonomy.org/VanceStevens.pdf
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

Benefits to conference attendees
Wider perspective on the conference
•
Ability to inform and draw on network
•
Backchannel connections possible
•
Connectivity will DRAW participants
•
Limited connectivity a growing concern
•
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009

10 Aspects of Paradigm Shift
• Pedagogy - didactic->
constructivist
• Networking - isolated ->
connectivist, distributed L/N
• Sharing - copyright ->
creative commons
• Literacy –
print -> multiliteracies
• Heuristics
client/server -> peer to peer
• Formality –Trepidation -> F.U.N.
• Transfer –lecture, sit/get -> modeled, demonstrated
• Directionality – push -> pull e.g. RSS
• Ownership – proprietary -> open source
• Classification – taxonomy ->Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009
folksonomy
Vance

Don’t be a dinosaur!
Latest version of these slides will be posted at http://slideshare.net/vances
•
Write-up in progress at http://tinyurl.com/aace-vance
•
The presentation was recorded and is available here:
•
http://aace.na4.acrobat.com/p92907860/
Vance Stevens
Abu Dhabi
Feb 19, 2009
http://adVancEducation.blogspot.com
Picture credit: http://www.geekologie.com/2007/09/get_your_very_own_pet_dinosaur.php
Vance Stevens for AACE Feb 21, 2009