EdTech @ ADW

As you probably know, I have attended two Blackboard conferences in Dubai in the past few months. I presented a number of topics and participated in other sessions. It is quite common that over the course of a conference day of say 6 sessions, that there are only one or two that really are either useful or thought provoking. How common is it to regret choosing a particular session and saying that I should have attended the other one?! On my long and lonely drive back to Abu Dhabi, I was wondering how things could be improved for us conference delegates!. Obviously one improvement is having the conference in Abu Dhabi (which would brighten up the day quite considerably).

Here are some questions that are currently in my head.

1. How can we improve the hit rate of useful sessions at a conference?
2. Leaving with just new information after a days work seems to be quite pedagogically un-rich. Can anything be done to improve the types of interactions/collaboration that happens at conferences?
3. Is there a place for a ‘blended conference’?
4. How could Web 2.0 add value to what can be learned at conferences?

I know, too many questions but what the heck!