The presenter's rule

If you as the presenter aren't having fun, neither is your audience. Blue Skunk

I adopted the expression above from my supervising teacher back in 1976 who admonished my 24 year old self that if I was not having fun as a teacher, my students weren't having fun either.  Happily, as a teacher or a presenter or a workshop facilitator or a board report giver or a panelist or whatever, I've always had some degree of fun when speaking to a group.

I've been thinking about this quite a bit this week as I prepare to give a workshop and two presentations over the next five days. The workshop and one presentation is for TIES, our state technology conference. The workshop is tomorrow afternoon on creativity and the presentation is on the librarian's role in 1:1 schools. I'm looking forward to both teaching and learning in both these sessions.

On a more recreational note, I will giving a presentation to the Minnesota Rovers Outdoors Club on Tuesday evening in St. Paul. The Rovers are a large, active group of folks who enjoy camping, hiking, biking, skiing, canoeing, etc and hold weekly presentations on topics of interest to members. Here is the description of my talk:

December 13: Vacationing by Bicycle: a Puffer’s Guide

A “puffer” is a bicyclist who doesn’t have an expensive bike or equipment but still enjoys taking multi-day biking trips. Having been a “puffer” since 1980, I will show photos and speak about a variety of bicycling vacations I have taken and offer tips on getting the most from them. ​Please join ​me in a conversation about what makes longer bicycling adventures a pleasure for YOU!

This talk is an update of one I gave a few years ago that seemed to be well-received. This new version will include my most recent biking trips but also, in keeping with the "fun" adage, a few of my Lessons Learned from Bicycling illustrated.

If you are in the neighborhood of either the TIES conference or the Rovers' meeting, please drop in (you don't have to be a Rovers member to attend the presentations).

I plan on having fun and will make sure I do my best to make sure you do as well.