Ideas+for+the+day...

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Email sent to all memebers on Tuesday 28th May Dear all the unconference is coming round very quickly. It is 6 weeks from this Friday. As the **event** (sorry about the error in the email, I really should get stuff proof read) will be reflecting what is being raised on the Wiki. We would like everyone to reflect on what has been said on the Wiki so far and make any changes, raise thoughts, and challenge. We are trying to arrange for the unconference to be as accessable as possible for those unable to attend directly. I would like this virtual attendance to be much more than passive observers or even more than a chat in back channel. We would like the virtual attendee's to have their own discussion groups/topics and feedback to the unconference with conclusions and ideas. How we could do this is open for suggestions. Please add ideas to the wiki. Also, have discussion with colleagues, suppliers, pupils, students, family, anyone else and feed this back into the wiki. We are wanting to really push the debate over the next few weeks so that the event itself is as productive as possible. Thanks for your thoughts and involvement Yours sincerely Ian Stuart = = =The event itself....= What is an [|unconference]? It is an event where the participants drive the content, structures (if any) and direction of the event. On this page please add your thoughts or add to the [|discussion] on what we should attempt to do or achieve and how it could be done.

The Content
So far the discussions and pages of this wiki are likely to be the elements that people will want to discuss

The Structure
(This is taken straight from wikipedia, please add or edit this freely)

**Appreciative Inquiry** [|**Appreciative Inquiry**] **"**The basic idea is to build organizations around what works, rather than trying to fix what doesn't. It is the opposite of problem solving. Instead of focusing gaps and inadequacies to find blame and remediate skills or practices....Both approaches involve bringing very large, diverse groups of people together to study and build upon the best in an organization or community"

BarCamp
//(Very similiar to Open Space Technology, see below - Krysia)//
 * [|BarCamp]** While loosely structured, there are [|rules] at BarCamp. All attendees are encouraged to present or facilitate a session. Everyone is also asked to share information and experiences of the event, both live and after the fact, via public web channels including (but not limited to) [|blogging], [|photo sharing], [|social bookmarking], [|twittering], wiki-ing, and [|IRC]. This open encouragement to share everything about the event is in deliberate contrast to the "off the record by default" and "no recordings" rules at many private invite-only participant driven conferences.

A Fishbowl
[|**A fishbowl**] Four to five chairs are arranged in an inner circle. This is the fishbowl. The remaining chairs are arranged in concentric circles outside the fishbowl. A few participants either volunteer or are selected to fill the fishbowl, while the rest of the group sit on the chairs outside the fishbowl. In an **open fishbowl**, one chair is left empty. In a **closed fishbowl**, all chairs are filled. The moderator introduces the topic and the participants start discussing the topic. The audience outside the fishbowl listen in on the discussion. In an open fishbowl, any member of the audience can, at any time, occupy the empty chair and join the fishbowl. When this happens, an existing member of the fishbowl must voluntarily leave the fishbowl and free a chair. The discussion continues with participants frequently entering and leaving the fishbowl. Depending on how large your audience is you can have many audience members spend some time in the fishbowl and take part in the discussion. When time runs out, the fishbowl is closed and the moderator summarizes the discussion.

Foo Camp
//Very similiar to barcamp but with a constantly evolving schedule. May be better suited to a full day event rather than just evening (Krysia)//
 * [|Foo Camp]** is an annual [|hacker] event hosted by publisher [|O'Reilly Media]. O'Reilly describes it as "the wiki of conferences", where the program is developed by the attendees at the event, using big whiteboard schedule templates that can be rewritten or overwritten by attendees to optimize the schedule. The goal of the event is to reach out to new people who will increase the company's intelligence about new technologies, and to create opportunities for cross-fertilization between people and technologies that are on the O'Reilly radar.

Knowledge Cafe
When the introduction session is complete, the group breaks into small groups, with about five people in each group. Each small group discusses the questions for about 45 minutes. The small group discussions are not led by a facilitator, and no summary of the discussion is captured for subsequent feedback to the large group. Participants then return to the circle and the facilitator leads the group through the final 45 minute session, in which people reflect on the small group discussions and share any thoughts, insights and ideas on the topic that may have emerged.
 * [|Knowledge Cafe]** ...The facilitator....introduces the café topic and poses one or two key open-ended questions...

Lightning Talks

 * [|Lightning Talks]** A short [|presentation] given at a [|conference] or similar forum. Unlike other presentations, lightning talks last only a few minutes and several will usually be delivered in a single period by different speakers.

Open Space Technology
[|**Open Space Technology**] The facilitator will greet the people and briefly re-state the theme of their gathering, without giving a lengthy speech. Then someone will invite all participants to identify any issue or opportunity related to the theme. Participants willing to raise a topic will come to the centre of the circle, write it on a sheet of paper and announce it to the group before choosing a time and a place for discussion and posting it on a wall. That wall becomes the agenda for the meeting.... If someone posts a topic, the system expects that the person has a real [|passion] for the issue and can start the discussion on it. That person also must make sure that a report of the discussion is done and posted on another wall so that any participant can access the content of the discussion at all times. No limit exists on the number of issues that the meeting can post.

**Soothing the Savage Breast...**
We can't spend ALL the time talking about education and technology (okay, I know we can, but maybe we shouldn't) - so, can we arrange for a guitar or two (and anything else that anyone wants to strum, scrape, pluck, hit or blow into) to be available so that we can have an occasional musical interlude, either during the day itself, or more likely at the end of the day? I can provide a guitar (although I might need someone who is travelling by car to transport it for me - not sure it will get on the plane) - on the other hand, I'm sure there are lots of the things already on Islay? :-)