Rob Baker

Director of Technology, Cincinnati Country Day School   

Title: INK Everywhere
         Digital Ink is a powerful Modality

Abstract:
Deploying devices or going 1:1 is not the finish line, it's merely the enabler of collaboration, engagement, alternate forms of assessment, creativity, personalized learning and problem solving. Schools need to Focus on Functionality and deploy the right kind of hardware that allows users to choose the modality that fits the subject and task at hand rather than constrain learning, or cater only to certain types of learning tasks. In education, the device DOES matter! Baker’s  focus has always been on Removing Constraints and Enabling great Pedagogy.  Unfortunately, most tech implementations in education only ever aspire to be great add-on programs.  Technology can empower transformational pedagogy and learning environments. Digital Ink was a key driver for Baker in 2007 when he hacked OneNote and created their shared OneNote Class Notebooks that were the conception of the powerful framework the OneNote team has made available to every teacher and student in the world.  He is looking forward to sharing the transformational effect Cincinnati Country Day School has experienced as a result of incorporating Tablet PCs with Digital INK, touch and keyboard for the last 13 years, and where he hopes we are headed.

As Cincinnati Country Day School’s Director of Technology, Robert Baker is responsible for creating some of the most powerful teaching and learning environments in the world. He has been instrumental in developing technology programs both in the United States and internationally focused on embedding a range of new technologies into the learning process.

Since 1996, Robert has proven himself a leader in technology integration – with Country Day being the first school in the United States to provide each student from grades 5-12 their own device, and again in 2003, being one of the first to start deploying tablet PCs.

First and foremost, Robert is an educator, which has allowed him to look at initiatives through the eyes of a classroom teacher focused on pedagogy, not technology. His work at Country Day makes it a lab for the world in terms of showing what is possible when schools deploy the right kind of hardware, which removes all constraints, and allows teachers to use the modality that fits the task.

Some of Robert’s most important work has been with Microsoft on replicating Country Day's shared OneNote environment that he developed and implemented in 2007, and the fruit of that labor, the Class Notebook Creator App for Office 365 has made this a powerful framework for teaching and learning available to every teacher and student in the world.

His award winning work around the use of tablet PCs with digital INK and touchscreens has seen him internationally recognized as promoting the effective infusion of technology into instruction that reflects the skills, knowledge and experience that are essential for success in the 21st century global economy.

See what’s possible for yourself here: http://bit.ly/22VOvu0 

Bill Buxton

Microsoft Research

Title: Consistency and Ubiety in Interaction with Displays Large to Small

Abstract:
In 2015, Jeff Han and I organized a workshop at the Microsoft Faculty Summit on large displays.  Jeff had seeded a number of universities with 55” Microsoft displays, and at the workshop, invited the recipients to present what they had done over the preceding year.  As a bonus, we offered them the opportunity to present on the new 84” version of the display – a display that they had never seen before.  Most accepted.  From our perspective, the greatest lesson from this was how poorly things designed for the 55” worked on the 84” – despite all other things besides size being equal.  In this presentation, my hope is to shed some light on what happened and why, and then step back and speak to the bigger picture.  The main message is this:  by pushing the extremes, insights emerge which enlighten not only how we design for the extremes, but also how we can improve design for what lies in-between, and in the process, raise the promise of attaining far more consistent interaction across form factors.

Bill has been walking the path along the boundary where people and technology meet for over 40 years, as a designer, musician, lecturer, writer, teacher, critic and researcher.  His focus has always been at the human level – from motor-sensory to cultural, with a particular interest in the creative disciplines.  His work has helped shape how we communicate both with technology, and each other through technology, with our human qualities not just intact, but enhanced.

Tracy Hammond

Director, Sketch Recognition Lab

Associate Professor, Computer Science & Engineering

Texas A&M University 

Title: Learning through the Lens of Sketch

Abstract:
The act of writing and sketching by hand has been shown to improve comprehension, memory, and processing power in various circumstances. Our research at the SRL lab has recently shown that the marks we leave behind also betray our competencies and confidence in various subjects. The manner in which we sketch can reveal our age, our gender, our expertise, and the experiences we have had. The path of our eyes, which often act similarly to our pen strokes, can indicate what we are doing, how much difficulty we are having with it, what our perception is of it, and who we are. All of these advances are through algorithms used originally to recognize drawn objects. This talk will explain how sketch recognition algorithms invented by the SRL lab to better classify objects can be used to process human learning activities, including sketching, eye movement, and body movement, to provide insight into how we learn. 

Director of the Sketch Recognition Lab and Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at Texas A&M University, Dr. Hammond is an international leader in activity recognition (focusing on eye, body, and sketch motions), haptics, intelligent fabrics, SmartPhone development, and computer human interaction research. She holds a PhD in Computer Science and FTO (Finance Technology Option) from MIT, and four degrees from Columbia University: an M.S in Anthropology, an M.S. in Computer Science, a B.A. in Mathematics, and a B.S. in Applied Mathematics. Prior to joining the TAMU CSE faculty, Dr. Hammond taught for five years at Columbia University and was a telecom analyst for four years at Goldman Sachs. Dr. Hammond has been featured on the Discovery Channel and other news sources.

Jeff Han

Founder,  Perceptive Pixel

As General Manager for Microsoft Surface Hub, Jeff led a world-class interdisciplinary team of hardware, manufacturing, and software engineers, along with interaction designers and researchers dedicated to building large-format interactive displays and experiences.

Jeff is most well-known for giving one of the most watched TED talks of all time - an early 2006 dramatic live demonstration of multi-touch interaction techniques he published the year prior, launching the interface into the public mindset well before the introduction of Apple's iPhone and Microsoft's Surface table.

Shortly afterwards, Jeff founded and ran Perceptive Pixel (PPI), a successful venture-backed startup dedicated to the research and productization of advanced user interfaces for the knowledge worker, which was acquired by Microsoft in mid-2012.

The company achieved prominence during the 2008 U.S. presidential primaries and election as its "Magic Wall" touch displays and visualization software were used by almost every major broadcaster in their live coverage of the historic event.

In 2009, Jeff received the Smithsonian’s National Design Award in the inaugural category of interaction design.

In 2008, Jeff was named one of the “Time 100” most influential persons of the year.

Jeff studied electrical engineering and computer science at Cornell University, where he worked on CU-SeeMe, the early internet multi-party videoconferencing application, which subsequently led to his first startup in the late 90s.

Jeff continues to contribute frequently to research communities and publications, including SIGGRAPH, UIST, and SID.

Computer Interfaces Can Stimulate or Undermine Students' Ability to Think

The Pen is Mightier than the Keyboard

Reflections on Classroom Presenter

Thinking with Hands

Pen-Based Interaction in the Classroom and The Clinic

Olya Veselova
Program Manager,
OneNote, Microsoft,

Perspectives on Microsoft OneNote and Education