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BETT is the world’s largest educational technology event and it takes place every year in Olympia, London. Last year, I wasn’t able to go, but I was determined to visit the event this year.

Having been eight or nine times before, my usual BETT routine is something like this:

• Visit the show without a plan or anything in particular that I want to see.
• Arrive and receive a carrier bag already full of paperwork.
• Wander around the show, browsing the stands and collecting every flyer / freebie possible.
• Leave the show (missing out on any seminars / presentations) with multiple bags full of paper, most of which I then end up recycling because it’s of no interest!

As a result, I usually discover a few new and interesting things, but in the end it all felt like a nice day out, which hadn’t really been very productive.

This year, things were different and I had the most enjoyable BETT visit ever. The success of my visit this year was due to a number of reasons:

1. I had some money – My headteacher had said to me earlier this week that I had a small amount of ICT money that I could spend, so it was nice to be able to go to BETT with that in my mind. If I saw anything useful, I could go back to school and order it. Walking around BETT, looking at lots of exciting gadgets, can be a bit depressing if you only ever think ‘well I can’t buy that for school’ or ‘we can’t afford that’!
2. I had a plan – Before the show, I used Evernote to create a list of things that I wanted to see and people I wanted to talk to. This was synced to my iPhone and accessible wherever I was. Very handy!
3. I made notes – BETT can be extremely overwhelming. There are two large halls with lower and upper levels, as well as extra areas hidden around Olympia. It’s noisy and crowded and there are thousands of things which try to catch your attention. As a result, it can be very easy to forget some of what you see. This year, I took regular breaks and posted some reminders to myself via email. These were then posted to a Posterous blog and my Twitter account. This allowed others to read what I had posted and I have had some nice comments thanking me for posting these online.
4. Teachmeet – After watching last year’s Teachmeet online from home, I really wanted to be there in person this year. The event was incredible with hundreds of teachers sharing their ideas and experiences. Teachmeet deserves a post of its own, so this will be published soon!
5. The community – During past BETT visits, I have never really know many (if any) of the people there. I sometimes bumped into sales people who have visited us at school, but I rarely knew any other teachers up at the show. This year that situation was completely different… because of one thing – Twitter. Over the past year, I have become (almost!) addicted to Twitter, using it to communicate with teachers and other education professionals. The Twitter community was fully active up at BETT and it was so nice to be able to meet some of the people who I talk to regularly via Twitter but have never actually met.

I’ll write more about Teachmeet and the teaching community up at BETT in another post, but here are some of my highlights from the show floor itself:

• Anithings – A ‘creativity tool’ which lets children create animations by simply dragging objects around on screen. We regularly make stop-motion animations at school, so I’d love to give the children a chance to play with Anithings. It costs £250 for a site licence, but there is a 10% discount during January.
• e4education – e4education designed our school website last year, so it was really nice to see them showing it off to others at the show! I love adding children’s work to it, so it will be really nice to tell them that so many people were looking at it up in London last week!
• Interactive Resources – We have all of the software from Interactive Resources, including the (extremely useful) Maths Packs, Teaching materials and Primary Games. During BETT, I was given a quick tour of the new online version of their site, allowing teachers (and pupils) to access the resources online at home and school. By talking directly to the companies at these events, it’s also possible to get discounts, which Interactive Resources were kind enough to offer!
• Smart – It was nice to hear about the release of Smart Notebook 10.6 (available now) which brings compatibility with Windows 7 and Snow Leopard on the Mac. It also has a ‘transparent’ tool which makes the Smart Notebook interface disappear, as well as a number of new Maths tools.
• Story Stage – I watched a demo of this software from Scholastic and was really impressed at the ability to connect multiple mice to the same computer, allowing children to work collaboratively. Children at our school regularly have to share laptops so sharing mice can sometimes be an issue. Why doesn’t all software allow multiple users like Story Stage?
• 2Simple – I managed to get a final copy of 2Create a SuperStory, as well as trials of 2Assess ICT and the Online Tools. I’m really impressed with the potential of the online tools, allowing children to use creative software at home and school and save their work to an online storage area. Anthony Evans showed me 2Design&Make (built into the online tools) to make some fantastic 3D models. I’m going to be taking full advantage of our free trial to see what my pupils think of it!

So BETT 2010 was definitely my favourite BETT visit so far. I discovered lots of new ideas and resources which I now need to explore in more detail, met some wonderful people and came away from the show buzzing with excitement.

Carry on reading… Part Two.