whatsateachmentthen?

This is what Ewan McIntosh says:

TeachMeet is an unconference, but that doesn't mean that it doesn't need organising. Early on, get a small group together to get everything sorted out for your event. "Right, if I can have your attention please. Just a minute. Great. Now, I would like to introduce to you..." Oh dear. We all know it. It's like being back in the rows at school, waiting to see someone very important attempt to hold our attention for an hour with more bullets than you could point at the Sundance Kid and that drawl we remember from the adults in Charlie Brown (it was actually a trombone, did you know?). Unconferences are all about taking away the bits of conferences nobody likes. If you want people's attention to get your unconference underway, don't let someone else bring you down before you even get started, and don't start by effectively telling off your participants. Take control and set out the rules for presentations (see below). Learn from the way jazz concerts get started. Get some music playing out loud as people mingle and get settled (the nervous ones who don't want to network yet can pretend to be listening). Your favourite, most energetic track comes to an end. Begin. We all need some guidance to make an event a success, no matter how 'unconferencey' you're trying to be. Some rules might be: no [|PowerPoints], micro-presentations must last no more than seven minutes, nano presentations no more than two, no selling of products, everything must be happening in a classroom now. Or how about setting a theme for one section of the evening: gadgets, free stuff, games, my favourite online reads... The MC of the evening (you) needs to keep a good eye on the time and spot when people need a break. See the [|Rules suggested by the TeachMeet community]. We all know the best parts of conferences are, of course, the coffee breaks and social events, where you get a chance to pore over someone's laptop for 15 minutes and learn one new really cool thing you can actually use, have late-night discussions over serious stuff, helped along by a few drops of amber. Why not just make this the conference itself? Provide coffee and tea all day long, lots of muffins and biscuits like they did at Reboot and, even better, open a bar. In the six weeks before the unconference even takes place get your attendees to start suggesting topics they would like to talk about or hear someone else talking about. It's the participants' job to spread the word and market the conference to their friends and colleagues, by [|displaying a logo on their website] or taking part in [|Facebook groups], for example. It doesn't matter if they're not sure yet how they might contribute - it's just about getting some ideas brewing, and they can always change their minds on the night. The worst thing that can happen for a conference or training event is for people to go home actively disagreeing with what one (or all) the presenters had to say. You've got to provide an opportunity for people to make their views known and give the presenters a fighting chance of bringing them around. Q&A is one way to do this but people haven't really had time to digest and come up with a good question. Instead, have a section later in the unconference where anyone can take the stage themselves, refuting or adding to what they've heard. Get a bit of a public debate going if it suits. Back-to-back shorter presentations (like two-minute nano-presentations) or soapboxes are often entertaining, always interesting given the divergent views and let people get it off their chest. It also opens up the conversations in the more informal parts of the conference, since people know who they want to go to talk to. Let people make up their own conference. One of my favourite parts of [|BarCampScotland] and [|Reboot9.0] were the large blank sheets of paper as you walked in - the participants plan what they want to hear and when, by putting up what they are going to talk about next to a time and a location in the venue. Make sure you offer a number of large, medium and small rooms, tables or floor space for the large, medium and small egos ;-) A good unconference does cost some money although if everyone pulls in it needn't cost a fortune: food, drink, space, projection facilities, audio visuals, publicity beyond the web... Getting a good sponsor might seem the answer to your dreams, but it might end up being a noose around your neck. Do not take all the funding from one place, and then be held to their publicity, their terms and their way of doing things. Some [|BarCamps] put an upper limit of £150 ($300) per contribution to have a feast of many, not a gathering for one. Once you've had a successful event or two under your belt the sponsors will come to you. It's essential to have a place where people can extend the discussion beyond whatever the presentation is about. This is called a backchannel. You can use a blog set up to receive mobile phone messages, but it's easier to get everyone onto a [|Jaiku channel], or display messages left by people from the mobiles or computers on [|Twitter] [|(Twittercamp] is lovely to do this). In some conferences this backchannel is displayed behind the speakers. Much better, in my opinion for what it's worth, is to equip the stage with a large monitor so that speakers can take a peak and have a chance to respond to criticisms or misunderstandings before they're picked up by too many other people. Presenters also need to be aware that there is a public backchannel in the first place. You need wifi. Ideally you have electricity in abundance, too, for bloggers to blog, photographers to [|Flickr] and for the backchannel to survive. Good wifi is a must, but make sure everyone knows about it so that they actually bring their laptops and cameras. Make sure that everyone coming to the conference, everyone who wanted to and couldn't and all the major events sites (e.g. [|Upcoming.org]) know what the conference tag is, otherwise all that online coverage is going to be lost. Tags identify what your post is about ('curriculum', 'assessment', 'blogging', 'TeachMeet07'). Tags need to be short, memorable and mean something to the people at your event. SLF2008 is how we will be tagging the Scottish Learning Festival blog posts, photos and videos this year. By tagging your posts SLF2008 they will be picked up by others at the event, and by websites including Learning and Teaching Scotland's Connected Live. At every nearly every conference I organise I make sure that I have some young people producing the podcasts, the videos or some blogging. This isn't because I want cheap labour, it's because of the angle they take on it and what they are able to contribute in this way to the arguments given in the conference. Their legacy is also far more long-lasting than that of the adult participants this way :-) [|Different types of unconference] [|Some photos from][|BarCampScotland] that give some clues [|The Unconference Blog] [|Open Space Events] [|What is speed geeking?] [|The][|BarCamp] way [|The][|BloggerCon] way ...[|and, of course, Wikipedia] []
 * 1. Get started on your (cool) terms**
 * 2. Rules are rules**
 * 3. Make the coffee break the conference**
 * 4. Conference participants, not bystanders**
 * 5. Flat pack your conference**
 * 6. Don't hold yourself to one sponsor**
 * 7. Encourage speaking at the back of the class**
 * 8. May the wifi be with you**
 * 9. Tag, tag, tag - and tell people about it**
 * 10. Cover the event yourself - but get young people to do it**
 * Here are some more hints and tips for budding unconferencers:**