Many of our presenters come to the ISTE Conference & Expo for the same reason that other attendees come: They love the engagement, learning from peers and electric atmosphere.

We asked a handful of ISTE 2017 presenters to tell us what they like most about the conference and to share a little bit about themselves. Caroline Haebig, digital learning coordinator for the School District of New Berlin in Wisconsin, will present the session Make it Happen with GAFE and iPads: Show the Thinking! Here’s what we learned from her.

Which presenter are you most excited to hear/meet and why?
I’m am most excited to hear and talk to David Jakes! I can’t wait to participate in his session 10 Strategies for Improving the Classroom Spaces of Your School. Jakes provides powerful insights and practical applications for rethinking and redefining how we use current and emerging spaces in our school district. David is an engaging presenter and truly helps me think through current topics from new angles. I love how he challenges me! Further, I absolutely love how David Jakes has a deep understanding of powerful instruction and how to leverage it to take student learning further.

What’s your top tip for people #notatISTE?
Tune into Jennie Magiera’s Tuesday keynote! She not only is a strong presenter with a saucy sense of humor but really gets how to focus on the learning, not just the tools!

How about for #ISTEnewbies?
Don’t get overwhelmed. Focus on topics that will allow you to directly implement something new in your current environment, and the social events truly can be a way to extend powerful conversations.

What’s your favorite thing about the ISTE Conference & Expo? What’s your favorite ISTE memory?
I find that the ISTE Expo Hall allows me to continue to build relationships with companies I’m a client of, ask questions, learn about new updates and of course see what new vendors are emerging and what solutions they have to offer. Favorite ISTE Expo memory: putting a real face to voices and emails correspondences I’ve had along the way with vendors who are so amazingly helpful when I’m using their solutions day to day.

In your opinion, what are the three most important topics in edtech right now?

• Leveraging edtech to engage learners in the process of meaningful feedback.
• Unpacking how we can maximize virtual reality experiences and technologies to expand on learning targets.
• Design thinking and how it can help us transform digital and physical spaces.

What book did you last read for PD?
Two of the last books I read for professional learning were The Writing Strategies Book: Your Everything Guide to Developing Skilled Writers by Jennifer Serravallo. Serravallo has powerful strategies that we can use to frame our uses of technology. And I’ve read  #FormativeTech: Meaningful, Sustainable, and Scalable Formative Assessment With Technology by Monica Burns. Monica Burns is spot on about the latest tools to check for learner understanding!