Monday in Sydney I ran a half day workshop on Graphic Facilitation, then we played again with graphics at the Sydney Facilitator’s network. Here are some images for fun.
And…
The full slideshow from the Sydney Facilitator’s network is here. Thanks to Jeanne Walker for sharing the photos!
I’m blogging from my trip down under. I thought it might be nice to cross post one here for a little blog continuity!
All work and no play makes Nancy a dull and out-of-shape girl, so today I headed out early to Australia’s beautiful Blue Mountains with Bronwyn Stuckey et al for a bit of a tramp in the misty woods near Katumba to see the “Three Sisters.” (Full trip pictures here.) I deeply appreciated the chance for a bit of play, because my two weeks here are packed with workshops and conferences. So some time on the wild is perfect.
While a dense, misty fog kept us from seeing the sculptural grandeur of the Three Sisters formation, we had a wonderful walk. The weather kept away the tourists and for long stretches of the walk down the 
Giant Stairway and along the valley wall we had the woods to ourselves. We took our time going down the over 500 steps, but even still, my knees and legs were a bit wobbly.
As we walked along the ridge above the valley, the sounds of the birds were amazing. We saw vivid red and blue birds (I need to look up the name), small finches and heard many more. Along the way, we had the 
extraordinary good luck to come upon a male and female pair of Lyre birds. Apparently they are attracted to blue. I was wearing blue. Heh! The walked towards us, giving me time to pull out my camera and catch the pair before they flew up to a distant gum tree.
There were many small, colorful spring flowers – miniature show pieces – and burbling waterfalls. Thankfully, we did not have to walk back up the 500 stairs, instead taking the worlds steepest funicular train. We snagged the front seats (which are really the back seats going up) and in just a few minutes, we were back up at the rim and headed back to Echo Point were we started. Here are a few shots of the ride up:
Tomorrow the workshops begin – on Monday, Stewarding Technology for Communities in the morning, Graphic Facilitation in the afternoon. Join us?
November I’m heading back to Australia. I had such a great time in 2006, I’m going back. I’ll be blogging about it again on a dedicated blog, but I also wanted to cross post a few things here as a “heads up.”
Below is a location by location, chronological listing of the events I’m involved in during my trip. There are links for more information and registration. Some of the details are not complete, so I’ll update this post as the rest of the information gets settled. You may notice there are some openings if you want to propose something!
November 9th
9-12 am – Stewarding Technology for Communities
1-4pm – Introduction to Graphic Facililtation
6-9pm – Sydney Facilitator’s Network Evening Tweetup
November 10th
9-12:30 – Introduction to Online Communities
1:30 – 4:30 pm – Advanced Online Communities
November 11th
Open in the morning. Want to do something?
Transit to Canberra via train in the afternoon
November 12th
Private workshop 1-3pm
Transit to Adelaide 5:30 pm
November 13th
E-Dayz Conference Keynote “Why should we “do” community (or why not) for learning?” (9:20 am as part of larger 3 day event!)
November 14th
Play day in Adelaide!
November 15th
Transit to Melbourne
November 16th
Private events in the morning and afternoon
6 – 8 pm KMLF Public Event – RMIT Graduate School of Business, 300 Queen Street. Melbourne, Lecture room 158.1.2B (Ground level – just behind reception).
Ample metered street parking nearby in Queen Street (between La Trobe and Little Lonsdale). RSVP: by email to melbournekmlf@gmail.com
November 17th
8:45-12:00 Introduction to Online Communities
1:00 – 4:00 pm Advanced Online Communities
Evening transit to Mooloolaba
November 18th
1 – 4:30 pm Stewarding Technology for Communities
November 19th
Keynote at Learning Technologies Conference
November 20-22
Play days
November 23
Return home
Are you one of my Australian pals? Interested in spending time learning and talking about some shared interests? Well I’ll be down under for nearly three weeks in November.
Matt Moore of Innotecture and Carol Daunt Skyring have set me up with a roller coaster ride of events, some of which are open to the public and you can register for them now. So here is the run down (there will be a trip blog!)
You can get all the workshop topic and registration details on the Matt sponsored workshops in Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne here –> Nancy White in Australia
You can get the details on the Carol sponsored workshops and conferences here .
Hopefully there will also be informal gatherings, tweetups and the like! G’day!
I learned yesterday that one of my wonderful online friends, Marie Jasinski of Australia passed away. I feel like I have known Marie for most of my online life, probably coming into contact around 1999 or 2000. She amazed me with her natural facilitation gifts, her curiosity to move beyond the “same old same old” and her innovation with games as a central part of learning and being together, especially online.
In 2006 I got to meet Marie F2F in her hometown of Adelaid. We got to go out to dinner and have a “girlfriends” night out. We talked about our work, our lives and of course, about food. On the way to dinner, I took this picture of Marie, mid street, mid sentence. I entitled it “Marie Crossing.”
Now Marie has crossed out of our physical world. Her light and energy, her insistence on pushing our learning forward, her love for the people around her will leave a big hole in our worlds, online and offline.
Marie, thank you for everything you brought into my life and into my worlds. Marty, and all of Marie’s closest, I’m sending massive love beams to see you through this crossing.
Update Jan 24 – More memories, a wiki to share your thoughts and see the comment below for an online memorial gathering tonight 9pm PST for those of us in the nothern hemisphere.
