Are you coming! The program is out...

About the Virtual Round Table
The Virtual Round Table conference is a 2-day live online conference which takes place on Thu/ Fri 12-13 November 2009. It is all about "language learning with technology" and is a completely 'green' conference since no-one has to travel to attend.

We are looking forward to more than 20 sessions, 5 panel discussions, more than 35 guest speakers and especially look forward to meeting delegates from more than 50 countries who have already signed up on the Virtual Round Table Conference site.

The sessions take place in two different virtual classrooms (Adobe and Elluminate) and in Second Life and we are also looking forward to lively virtual round table panel discusssions, workshops, product presentations, tours in Second Life, language classes live online and much more.

As a highlight, there are a total of 5 panel discussion.

Opening Panel Thu 12 November 2009, 1pm GMT
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it.“-Theodore Hook
with panelists who have been instrumental in inventing the very future of language learning with technology. Dr. Gary Motteram of the University of Manchester, Shiv Rajetan of LanguageLab and Stefan Booy of Myngle. Moderation: Valentina Dodge

Panel Thu 12 November 2009, 7pm GMT
"Technology will not replace teachers but teachers who use technology will probably replace teachers who do not“-Ray Clifford with panelists who are seasoned teacher trainers of ICT and language learning: Pete Sharma of Te4Be, Shaun Wilden of International House, Gavin Dudeney of The Consultants-E and Heike Philp of LANCELOT School GmbH. Moderation: Marina Petrovic.

Panel Fri 13 November 2009, 7am GMT
"„Learning is a treasure that will follow its owner“-Chinese Proverb with Twitterers Graham Stanley of British Council, Karenne Sylvester of Kalinago English, Shelly Terrell, Burcu Akyol and Peter Travis of Floe-Jo. Moderation: Holly Longstroth

Panel Fri 13 November 2009, 1pm GMT
"Imagination is more important than knowledge“-Albert Einstein with panelists who have successful used their imagination to build an online teaching business: Monica Thomas of Ad_Lib, Lukas Palecek of WebSchool and Stephen Jones of Jones-English.

Closing Panel Fri 13 November 2009, 7pm GMT
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it“-George Santayana with panelists who have a combined total of more than a century of language learning with technology experience: Graham Davies of Camsoftpartners, Vance Stevens, Duane Sider of Rosetta Stone and Ton Koenraad of the University of Utrecht.

How to participate
The sessions take place in virtual classrooms (Adobe Connect Pro or Elluminate) and Second Life. The Second Life events will also be screenshared in a virtual classroom. For more information on how to attend, please sign up on the Virtual Round Table Conference site
http://virtual-round-table.ning.com.

Program
For a complete program see the following link. http://virtual-round-table.ning.com/events . All times mentioned are in GMT

Sponsorship
If you wish to be a sponsor for this conference please send an email to heike.philp [at] lancelotschool.com.
For a list to all sponsors, click here

Are you blogging or tweeting?
Please us the tag vrt09 or the hashtag #vrt09 for the conference.

First Virtual Round Table Conference

About the Virtual Round Table
The Virtual Round Table conference is a live online conference dedicated to language learning with technology. It is aimed at educators and language teaching professionals in language schools, institutes or other language related organisations.

It purposes to introduce to its participants a number of tools and best practises on how to use these tools in class for the benefit of our language learners.

With so many tools around, often the very decision on ‘how to use which tool’ for creating blended learning experiences or for selecting digital teaching and learning material and also for building a web-presence and using tools for online marketing are difficult and time-consuming and pales the efforts of learning the tools into insignificance.

During this conference these issues will openly be discussed by small groups of experts in certain fields of technology so that the participants will be equipped with solid information so as to be able to make informed decisions.

Who is the conference for?
The conference is for all those interested in language specific ….

· web-based or software based applications
· digital teaching and learning material
· electronic or digital tools
· mobile learning applications
· digital classroom management
· live online environments, virtual classrooms and virtual worlds
· and all other aspects of language learning with technology

This includes language trainers educators and mangement of language schools or institutes, freelancers and any other language teaching professionals.

Venues
Virtual classrooms (Adobe Connect Pro) and Second Life.

Conference themes
Theme 1: Best practises
Theme 2: Trendsetting
Theme 3: Online Marketing and Networking
Theme 4: Classroom management, administration and training
BONUS theme 5: On demand guest speaker

Event Schedule
October 31, 2009 deadline for submissions
November 5-6, 2009 presenter rehearsals
November 12-13, 2009 conference (Thu, Fri)

Conference Structure
The conference will be held on Thursday or Friday, 12-13 November with 4 main panel discussions (virtual round table discussions) of 90min each scheduled at different times to meet the main time zones: Europea, America, Asia.

The sessions in between those virtual round tables will be workshops or product presentations or individual presentations and there will also be plenty of breaks between the sessions.

The formats of the sessions will be
- 90min virtual round table discussions with 2 or 3 experts, each presenting a brief pecha kucha* or PRESTO** presentation followed by a learning conversation
- 60min hands-on workshops or showcases delivered by individuals
- virtual exhibition in Second Life with poster sessions (throughout) with exhibition tours planned
- ‘external links’ collection wiki for research and development in the field of language learning with technnology
For more information on the conference please click here. The program will be announced also on this NING site shortly.

Registration
To register for the conference please sign-up on our ning site and as soon as the schedule is announced we may ask you to sign up at each individual session you wish to attend. http://virtual-round-table.ning.com website.

Sponsorship
If you wish to be a sponsor for this conference please send an email to heike.philp [at] lancelotschool.com.
For a list to all sponsors, click here

Contact Information
Please contact Holly Longstroth or Heike Philp at LANCELOT School GmbH, holly.longstroth [at] lancelotschool.com and heike.philp [at] lancelotschool.com.

Are you blogging or tweeting?
Please us the tag vrt09 or the hashtag #vrt09 for the conference.