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Teachmeet
A TeachMeet Hub at the Learning Science Research Institute, University of Nottingham
55 months ago
I am delighted to say that after a meeting with Charles Crook, the Director of the Learning Science Research Institute (LSRI) from October 2011, there is the open invitation to use their facilities for community events.
The LSRI at the university of Nottingham has meeting rooms laden with monitoring equipment to capture, stream and archive events.
The National College for School Leadership has supported TeachMeet events for a number of years and I am pleased that the university might make such a generous offer to continue to help the community. The main space at the LSRI can hold between 20-30 people however there is the potential for other university spaces to be made available too.
Diagonals by blinkingidiot
Attribution-NoDerivs License
I am seeking some reaction from you all about a few different elements, so please take a look and let me know what you think.
TeachMeet Hub
- The space offered by the LSRI could be used by the TeachMeet community, in fact that is what instigated the meeting, on a semi permanent basis to host events.
- It would be good to develop regular events in the space provided, once a month say.
- The frequency of events would mean we could be more open to specific topics being covered or explored in more depth.
- Whole schools could use the event space to conduct there own TeachMeet style event.
- A range of colleagues from the university and LSRI could contribute relevant research to specific groups.
- Local links made with the university.
- Small TeachMeets up to 30 people.
- Captured, broadcast and archived using the professional facilities available.
- No cost to use the space.
Purpos/ed Assess
- On the back of the current Purpos/ed campaign about assessment I am keen to hold a small event in the space offered by LSRI.
- The informal meeting would extend the debate and discussion that has continued around the agenda of assessment in schools.
- We would explore the challenges we face, practical solutions and what we perceive to be future directions.
- Again it would be up to about 30 people.
- Early September.
Please let me know your thoughts on the potential of these ideas, your own suggestions for making the most of this generous invitation, whether you could attend a Purpos/ed event or how you might like to be involved in moving this forward.
TeachMeet Midlands 20th May 2011
310 months ago
by tombarrett
in Teachmeet
I am delighted to be announcing that there will be another Midlands TeachMeet this year. Hot on the heels of the great success in Lutterworth at Spring half term comes Teachmeet Midlands 2011 take two!
We are in celebratory mood as it is the 5th anniversary of the best type of teacher professional you will ever be involved with. There are stacks of events kicking off around the UK to mark the celebration – which are you involved in?
2 years ago Stuart Sutherland and I organised the first TeachMeet Midlands at the National College in Nottingham and we are really pleased to announce we will be using this stunning venue again. We also welcome along the huge expertise of Kevin Mulryne to the organising team who has (amongst other things) the challenge of making the streamed online experience the best it has ever been for a TeachMeet.
It was a great success last time out and I am sure those who attended will comment that the venue contributed to the quality of what we learned that night – I am sure it will be the same this year.
Head on over to the wiki and sign up to lurk or even to give a short presentation about an interesting story of learning.
But wait there is more – here is my personal challenge to you, yes that includes all you regulars who enjoy these events. We need to find those who may never have heard of TeachMeet before. We need to go that extra mile this year to spread the word.
So choose:
- Tell 2 people about TeachMeet Midlands who would not normally discover this type of event.
- Encourage 2 people to go to TeachMeet Midlands (or one of the TM5 events this year.)
- Bring 2 people with you who would not normally attend.
Leave a comment to show how you have helped spread the word.
Which are you going to do? It could change the way they perceive teacher professional development forever.
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Pics
Using Kinectimals to Support Play in the Early Years Classroom
1611 months ago
I would like to introduce to you Marc Faulder who is currently a newly qualified teacher working in Foundation 2 at my school. Last week I challenged Marc to attend TeachMeet Midlands and present about his brilliant work he is doing with the XBox Kinect and the game Kinectimals. He did a great job with his presentation and has followed it up with a guest blog post explaining his ideas. I hope that soon I will be linking back Marc’s own blog where he can continue to share his ideas and classroom work. Over to Marc…
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My blog post follows on neatly from the themes discussed by Tom Barrett in his work with Nintendo Wii’s Endless Ocean. I took on the challenge of introducing Games Based Learning to my Reception class, and to myself! I used an X Box Kinect because game play without a controller seemed ideal for Foundation Stage children. After a 2 – 3 week project on animal homes using Kinectimals as a stimulus, I have reflected on the impact that Games Based Learning had on children’s enquiry. My reflection is structured around four themes; organisation, planning, supported play and Kinect sensitivity. I hope that the successes, difficulties and solutions I found help with any Games Based Learning planning in your classroom.
Organisation
- Originally game play happened in a whole class
- In twenty minutes only 4 children had a turn: class lost interest
- Moved X Box to a separate classroom, and groups played on Kinectimals on a large screen TV.
- When returning to the classroom, the whole class discussed progress each group had made in the game – sometimes through role play which was effective.
Planning
- Originally my planning was very structured.
- I should have given children more time to explore game play, like you might give children time to explore a new book.
- When planning group activities on Kinectimals, I planned for specific events in the game.
- I found that not all groups would unlock that part of the game, or they would choose to explore another part of the game.
- Planning became much more open ended and child lead.
- I attached questions relevant to any aspect of game play – what is this place like? Which animals live here?
- This kind of planning required more resourcing.
- As well as game play, children in the group engaged with objects and artefacts that might be found in that environment on Kinectimals: shells, sand, logs, leaves, pine cones…
Supporting Children’s Play
- Back in the classroom, children would recreate game play through their child initiated play.
- They made the water tray a rock pool home
- They fed our Tigger teddy or lion puppet carrots and water – as that is what their Kinectimal ate in the game.
- Children used the resources from the group time in their own activities
- Writing became incidental; they wanted to write ideas down from the game to share in the classroom
Kinect Sensitivity
- The camera was sensitive enough to recognise large scale movements the same as small scale movements – any sized kick or throw would give the same response in the game
- But the camera isn’t sensitive enough to prevent adults from intervening.
- If a child was struggling to play the game, I could crouch behind them and either move their arms for them or use my hands to model the actions required
- Transition between players was mostly seamless. Players can step in and out of the cameras viewpoint and the X Box would continue the activity that was being played.
- There is also a swap player function during game play, but we never had to use this.
Final Reflection
Games Based Learning isn’t about playing on the game every day, for long periods of time. I’ve realised that the game is used to inspire children’s interest and is a great format to let children take control of planning and learning. As game play doesn’t occur at the pace I played it, I had to be much more open with my planning and support learning through children’s interests. I have learned so much about my teaching and children’s learning through games.
Protect the TeachMeet Format
1211 months ago
by tombarrett
in Teachmeet
A TeachMeet is an informal gathering of educators curious about other people’s ideas on learning. Educators are a nosey bunch! We love the chance to look around other people’s classrooms and to use ideas that have had success elsewhere.
When we attend a TeachMeet or any professorial development event the currency is ideas, we are dealing in ideas. We go with our own and most of the time we are up for trading them with those from other teachers. Broadly speaking whichever course we are attending we hope there is something that we can take back and apply to our own classes.
I think the emphasis on real, practical ideas and stories from the classroom is great but I think we must always remember that the format they are delivered in must be nurtured too.
One of the main reasons people don’t attend such an event cold, (ie. never attended before, not heard of it before) is the assumption it will be like 95% of all professional development teachers have had since university. Basically an expert, paid, invited, revered (?) speaker telling them how it is / was / should be.
The style of TeachMeet breaks that mould. The people attending are all experts, there is a relaxed approach to learning. We all understand that some of us prefer to flit between things, some of us prefer to become engrossed. Some of us stand, some of us sit, some of us Tweet. And that is all OK.
One of the reasons we don’t present is that so many of us believe our own ideas are not going to be good enough. That MY IDEA + CONFERENCE + PRESENTING = DOOM. But our own ideas are ones we have already committed to – so often they are successful little sparks that have been brilliantly useful in our own spaces. Growing into glowing flames in our classrooms. How do we get beyond the thought that sharing the flame might extinguish it?
Perhaps we need to organise smaller TeachMeets.
If I attended a meeting with 20 educators and I took away 19 practical classroom ideas – I would be really happy! Are those 20 people going to be more willing to share their ideas in that smaller group – probably. Are those 20 teachers going to return to their schools ever so slightly more willing to speak up in a staff meeting and make their voice heard and to share an idea they got from elsewhere – hopefully.
So the very nature of the event needs to be nurtured so that it is not what you might think from a conference. That old assumptions have to be disbanded from the outset. After all a teachmeet doesn’t need a sponsor, technology – it just needs us to bring our ideas and be willing to make that trade.
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Pic – TeachMeet at BETT 2010 by Mr Ush
TeachMeet Hits its Fourth Birthday: Coming of Age #tmfuture
71 year ago
TeachMeet is entering its fifth year and the unconference for teachers, by teachers has helped hundreds – maybe thousands, in fact – to try out something new, alter the way they already teach and learn, join a community of innovative educators or completely transform their way of working.
The hope was that the model would spread. It has, but as those who have created and helped pull TeachMeet together over the past four years, we want to see it spread further, deeper and with increasing quality of input from practitioners. This post outlines how we think we might manage this.
This is the beginnings of a conversation with those who care about TeachMeet. Add your views in the form of any blog post or comment or tweet – tag it #tmfuture
What are the goals of TeachMeet?
TeachMeet was originally designed to:
- Take thinking away from the formal, often commercialised conference floor, and provide a safe place for anyone to pitch their practice.
- Provide a forum for more teachers to talk about real learning happening in real places, than one-hour conference seminar slots allow.
- Showcase emerging practice that we could all aim to undertake; sales pitches not allowed.
- Be all about the Teach, with only a nod towards tech that paved the way for new practice.
- Provoke new ways of sharing our stories: PowerPoint was banned. We wanted people to tell stories in ways that challenged them, and the audience.
- Empower the audience to critique, ask questions and probe, all online, through SMS or, later, Twitter.
Over the years, these ‘rules’ have altered, leading to some great innovations, others less so. The answer to “What is a TeachMeet?” has become a myriad of meanings, some pretty far off the original goals. We need to help and support people to organise, run and contribute to events that build on previous ones. We need to make TeachMeet as accessible to newbies as it was in 2005. We need TeachMeet to once more find its focus.
Supporting the “infectiousness” of TeachMeets
- Organising TeachMeets should not be easy. Taking part in them should be. But more support is needed for organisers.
- Sponsorship is hard if there’s no bank account into which funds can be sent.
- Without sponsorship, any event over 30 people becomes tricky to organise while also giving people a special night of learning, the time, space and mood that gets people over their self-conscious selves.
- Paying for refreshments and venues is impossible if there’s no organisation to pay them the precise sum.
- The best TeachMeets provide social space, social activity, entertaining MCs, good refreshments, good online coverage and some form of online ‘conclusion’ – this needs coordinating by the organiser(s), but it’s not a skill everyone will have the first time around.
- We’ve got a superb opportunity to curate the best bits from all these TeachMeets that are happening weekly – this needs a degree of oversight.
A means to make TeachMeet more sustainable, easier to use for sponsors and organisers, and have the ability to do something spectacular
TeachMeet is owned by the community that shape it – but there needs to be a body to manage sponsorship and sponsors, and provide support for new organisers so that they maintain the TeachMeet goals. We assume that if someone is organising a ‘TeachMeet’ they would like to emulate the success of those popular early TeachMeets, and better-supported national conference ones (e.g. SLF and BETT).
What would support from the TeachMeet body look like?
- Seeking of sponsorship all year round – including ways and means to get your message to as many teachers as possible
- Brokerage of sponsorship – i.e. one place sponsors and those seeking sponsorship can come together, in a transparent manner
- Recommendation of onsite support (good venues at discounted rates/free, A/V, event organisation [for bigger venues], catering etc)
- Suggestions for various formats that have worked in the past
- Mentoring from previous TeachMeet leaders including on-the-night help
- Featuring of content and promotion of the event in a timely manner on an aggregated, higher profile TeachMeet site
- A group calendar so that events can be seen by geography and date
- Promotion of TeachMeet through international and national events, using contacts of existing TeachMeeters
- In-event publicity (e.g. if you plan an event at a regional ICT day or national event, then we can help broker paper materials for insertion into packs etc)
But, above all, TeachMeet is reaching a point of saturation in the UK – things are going really well in terms of enthusing teachers about their own learning. We have a great opportunity to carry over a small proportion of the sponsorship and contributions towards creating a TeachMeet culture in countries where teacher professional development in this way is still blocked by barriers physical, financial or cultural. This is just one idea, harboured for a long time but unable to realise in the current setup.
This body can take the form of:
- A Limited company (with a Director and shareholders)
- A Charitable Limited Company, with a board of directors and voting rights for fellow ‘shareholders’ (we could work out some way of people being ‘awarded’ shares based on [non-financial] involvement?)
- A Social Enterprise, perhaps formed as a Limited Company (see more information on what this means and how it might work (pdf))
- A Charity (this feels like a lot more red tape to pull through and perhaps not entirely necessary)
As we take things forward we invite you to contribute your ideas and thoughts to make things work smoothly. We want you to comment, probe and make your own suggestions before the end of June, using the tag #tmfuture
Pic: The main room awaits TeachMeet Midlands 2009 :: Ian Usher
My Reflections on TeachMeet Takeover
392 years ago
by tombarrett
in Teachmeet
Try something different. If it turns out to be a mistake then you’ve learned something, so it isn’t really a mistake.
The TeachMeet community tried something different this year at BETT. We mobilised, we tookover vendors’ stands and talked about free ideas teachers could use on Monday. We made an attempt to pass on the inspiring ideas that are regularly presented at the face to face TeachMeet events, to those who may have never attended one. Teachmeet Takeover made a small step out of the echo chamber that the community often gets caught speaking to.
Yes we made mistakes, we stumbled, but the idea I think is sound enough – here are a few things I have learned, observed and thought about from the last few days of TeachMeet Takeover
- Teachers get very excited about free tools.
- The majority of free web based tools that are familiar to some are completely unknown to others.
- Some companies understand the need for teachers to be talking directly to other teachers about real practice.
- There are so many passionate and inspiring teachers willing to stand up and present about their ideas.
- A handful of companies genuinely believe in the same things as we do.
- It can be hard to make the FREE message authentic amongst all of the SELL, SELL, SELL. But what started as a whisper…
- Many, many more vendors want their stands involved at BETT 2011.
- Next year we will stipulate requirements for the stands. Internet access, big projection facilities and a PA system.
- A simple competition gives people who are unsure a clear direction and encourages them to see multiple TeachMeet Takeover talks.
- Publicity is important, so people know about it before arriving.
- Maybe Takeover should only take place on Thursday and Friday.
- It exceeded all of my expectations.
- I now know the idea works in reality, with more planning for 2011 we can be more ambitious – perhaps.
- We could try a mass Takeover, four stands all close together in much more of a flash mob style.
- Certain companies are happy to volunteer time, money and resources (including their stands) to support TeachMeet Takeover.
- Keeping talks under 15 minutes is best.
- Having two people on a stand talking consecutively works really well.
- It has never been more important for teachers to be sharing free resources, tools and ideas with other teachers.
I have been thinking deeply over the last 3 days about the relationship between sales driven companies and the teachers sharing free ideas. For some of the talks there were 30-40 people on the stands – we were bringing them in. That is obviously good for the vendor but it also good for teachers sharing ideas with other teachers. Maybe 3 or 4 people stop and look at some of the vendor’s fliers or products, similarly maybe 15-20 people go away and find out about the free idea they heard from a presentation.
Perhaps we need to bridge the often gaping chasm between these two communities if we are to properly amplify some of the messages, ideas and ideologies to the majority of teachers which are so intrinsic to the TeachMeet community. There has been plenty of reference to the disconnect between teachers and those who sell products, but I am more convinced that we need to build partnerships to effect large scale change in schools. The interesting thing is that companies at BETT are desperate to find ways to engage with their users on a more authentic level. I think TeachMeet Takeover has provided a viable option and it works. Importantly the teacher community has acted first on this, it is on our terms, we have defined how this engagement happens and so can keep the right intentions at the heart of what happens in the future.
None of the vendors involved deliberately hijacked an audience to peddle their own wares – they really did just let us takeover. I think that turning people on their stands into real sales is harder then encouraging teachers to look further into a free idea that is presented. Also a person’s subsequent research into how they might use a free tool will inevitably lead to teachers’ blogs and maybe the domino effect is that they start to find out more and more free tools and ideas. We must be aware of the knock on effect a single 10 minute Takeover talk could have in the weeks ahead.
I heard about one teacher attending TeachMeet Takeover who had never heard of Twitter or any of the online tools that were being presented. After his first talk he spent his day at BETT attending most of the other Takeover talks collecting the 8 ideas he needed to win the goody bag prize. Hopefully his head is buzzing with that bunch of new, free ideas and is thinking about how he can best use them to support learning with his class.
A BIG thankyou to all of the vendors and teachers who contributed to TeachMeet Takeover this year.
We were able to apply some of the feedback from Thursday to improve things for the following days – I would be grateful to hear more of your thoughts and reactions from the Takeover events. What should we consider changing or improving for next year? What stories from Takeover have you to tell?
Sharing Classroom Inspiration For Free
02 years ago
by tombarrett
in Teachmeet
Something new is happening at the BETT show this year, the largest educational technology trade show in the world. Not a new product or technology service. Not a new website or gadget. This year some companies have handed over their brightly coloured stands to teachers. They are downing tools for 30 minutes and giving teachers the controls!
Teachers and educators have voluntarily signed up on a wiki to “takeover” these stands throughout Thursday, Friday and Saturday and will be speaking about free ideas. Sharing classroom inspiration for free. This, ladies and gentleman, is…
But why would a brave few companies allow us to takeover their expensive stands? Here are a few reasons, the first from Chris Bradford from BrainPOP UK, one of the very first companies to offer their support (and orange stand) to TeachMeet Takeover:
We support CPD (Continuing Professional Development). To support those who want to be better teachers. We know BrainPOP UK works best as part of a good teacher’s toolkit – we also know teachers call upon any number of other resources. Why shouldn’t we do our bit to encourage open minded investigation into new ways of doing things?
The second set of remarks come from another Chris, this time Chris Ratcliffe from Scholastic UK who has been instrumental in driving this idea onwards:
At BETT, I usually spend a lot of time talking to very interested consultants and advisors (and I like doing so), but I don’t spend a lot of time talking to teachers. My feeling is that as the stands are much more corporate than at the other shows, it is much more serious; and to get people to be excited to come back time and time again it needed something different.
To me, when I came across TeachMeet, it felt like the perfect solution. To have teachers standing up and talking to other teachers about what gets them excited would be just the sort of thing that would lift the show.
If you are attending the show you can see the full timetable on the wiki or why not download our flyer which has all of the details. Not only that but the flyer has details of a competition too in which you can win a £350 goody bag just by collecting some idea, here is a snap of part of the flyer.
If you are at BETT please help by taking part and heading over to the stands, you might learn something from the teachers presenting. If you are not attending be sure to follow along on Twitter, the hashtag for the 3 days of takeover talks is #TMtakeover.
If you are attending, presenting or showing at FETC or ISTE in the US this year why not try something similar. Companies: hand over the controls – let go and learn! Teachers: takeover and share your great ideas for free!
Looking Back
92 years ago
by tombarrett
in Blogging, Featured, Games Based Learning, Google, Google Earth, Teachmeet, Twitter, Wii, WISE
The sun will soon be rising on 2010 and I just wanted to look back at a hugely eventful year for me personally. Here are some of the things that have been memorable.
Last Christmas we spent our holidays in Australia. It was an amazing trip for me and I would dearly love to return to that part of the world, perhaps on a more permanent basis. When we arrived in Sydney our apartment was not going to be open until later in the day. We had landed about 8am and the prospects of entertaining a 2 year old with all of our luggage still in tow was going to be tricky. But to our rescue came Judy O’Connell and Dean Groom, both of whom I had known from our various online networks but had never met before. Judy kindly picked us up from the airport and we went back to her house where we were able to unwind for a little bit. Dean picked us up later and took us on to our apartment in Manly. I am so grateful for that amazing gesture of kindness – it got our trip off to a great start and illustrates the trust that can be developed through online connections.
The TeachMeet community has had an incredible 2009 and I have been fortunate enough to have been to five events in person. The BETT show TeachMeet began the year and I was just amazed by the scale of things and the huge interest from the commercial sector. In May Stuart Sutherland and I organised and ran the first TeachMeet in the Midlands, hosted by the National College for School Leadership. It was incredible to be part of the full organisation and we are hoping to hold another in 2010. I was delighted to be invited to do a mini-note at TeachMeet North East London and also to organise TeachMeet Channel 4 to bookend their education conference. In September I was able to return to the Scottish Learning Festival and another TeachMeet held in the BBC Scotland building. Along with popping into various Flashmeetings I also attended Dai Barnes and Doug Belshaw’s hugely successful EdTechRoundup TeachMeet which was held online. This added another amazing dimension to this incredible professional development event. With Stuart Ridout, I am currently organising TeachMeet Bett 2010 as well as TeachMeet Takeover – it looks like it should kick off another inspiring year of grass roots professional development.
When you get an invitation from royalty to a conference in another country you can be excused for being a little sceptical. But the inaugural World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE) in Qatar was no joke. I was delighted to be included in only 1000 of the invited delegates from all over the world. A handful of edubloggers were invited but not many actually attended. It was a privilege to represent primary school teachers from the UK and be part of the wider discussions. Although the word “innovation” was in the conference name, little was done to “walk the walk” in terms of the communication processes used. That said, I blogged and tweeted my way through the event to encourage remarks and comment from a wider audience. I hope that if there is a 2010 event that more will be done to encourage delegates to share what they experience with a world audience.
This time next year I will have spent a term in a new job! After a bit of grumbling I stumbled upon a Deputy Head Teacher job that I believed would be a great opportunity. I spent the return flight from Qatar writing the letter, which got me an interview. The day and a half interview was a great challenge and I was thrilled to be offered the job. I will be starting as Deputy Head Teacher in the Summer term. I have been in my current post for about 8 years and I have been through some great times, but it has long been time for me to move on and face a new challenge. As part of the interview I asked readers of this blog and followers on Twitter to help with some testimonials. I printed them off and found a moment in the formal interview to hand them out to the panel – it was an amazing set of references and I have no doubt helped secure the job. Thankyou to everyone who contributed to the 20,000 character job reference.
During 2009 I continued my involvement with multi-touch technology in the classroom. At BETT in January I met with representatives from SMART and organised an early trial of the SMART Table in my classroom. After working with it I felt it’s capacity to impact on learning was limited. Sadly the trial was abruptly ended, in my opinion due to an honest and frank account of my experiences I blogged about. Although critical of the SMART Table I was committed to helping SMART improve and develop it as it would directly benefit the wider multi-touch educational technology field. But, alas, they prevented that by taking it away and they did it, in my opinion, to limit the damage caused by my negative posts. I am now a member of the SynergyNet steering group at Durham University who are developing a multi-touch learning project, and met in November of this year for the first time. The developments at Durham are really exciting: multi-touch classrooms, networked tables able to pass media between them and a general focus on the pedagogies that underpin multi-touch enhanced learning.
This academic year we have been doing shorter half-termly topics in Year 5. We have found that although shorter, they are more focused. The first one was Sealife. Built around and inspired by the Nintendo Wii game Endless Ocean. It was a pleasure to work with the children during the 7 weeks as we explored, discovered and learned together. Using an open ended game to drive a topic was amazing to work with and the children were completely engaged and enjoyed every moment.
Maths Maps has been a long time in the making. Years ago I made some Google Earth resources that used the satellite imagery to structure maths activities. With the development of Google Maps and the ability to now collaborate on a map as if it is a document, such as a Google Document, I have been able to realise what I had always imagined with these resources. Each Maths Map is a maths topic with activities located on real life objects visible in the satellite imagery layer of Google Maps. In total the 3 current maps have been viewed 85,000 times, but more importantly the idea has inspired other teachers to begin using Google Maps to produce engaging content for their learners.
This year I finally made the switch to a self hosted blog. With the nudging of Doug Belshaw I bought some space and installed WordPress, transferred everything from my old blog and have been really happy here in my new home. The most obvious advantage is the personalisation that you can achieve with your own space. There is no limit or other person choosing what you can add or not. You are free to be as creative with your space as you are with what you write. I was pleased to have been nominated by my peers for 6 different Edublog Awards categories this year, thankyou to all those who wrote such kind words in their nomination posts.
I just tweeted about a couple of updates to two different “Interesting Ways” presentations. The IWB resource was started in November 2007 and now there are about 30 different crowd-sourced resources with a huge amount of shared expertise. I prefer not to be too tool-centric, nor do I like the formulaic “100 Awesome things to do with a Cabbage” sort of posts that have littered education blogging recently. In my opinion what sets the Interesting Ways resources apart is that (a) they all begin at zero, they are put out there not as a perfectly formed multiple of 10 lists and (b) they are built by everyone, the crowd, educators explaining and sharing their experiences. They are authored by the community and I feel lucky to be in the position to keep encouraging them along.
A memorable year in lots of different ways and Christmas at home this year has been made really special as my 3 year old son’s excitement has built to a feverish crescendo. I have been able to share in some of that too. I wonder what 2010 will bring? I am looking forward to it already. I wish you all the best for 2010 and hope you continue to join me.
