Dautlon, Kenny, Ron and Zach walked around the conference and asked the attendees about their digital footprint.  Was it positive? How did they know?  Here's what they had to say.

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A documentary team of middle and high school youth using mostly camcorders, iPods, iPads, and smart phones to blog their view of the conference was an experiment. None of the kids had experience with using social media professionally. 

I can say with no hesitation the experiment was a success. As intended:

• The conference attendees and folks not able to attend the conference found value in the blog posts. Evidence of such can be found in tweets and the comments of the blog posts.
• The students gained invaluable experience blogging with video, photo and text. The students also learned how to work in a team with deadlines. Evidence of such can be found in the blogs.

As Gen explained in her post, the teachers working with the ShinyYouth were amazing. I must say the ShinyDoor staff were also amazing. Dan led the ShinyYouth project. Bart led one of the teams and helped plan the ShinyYouth project. Gen edited blog posts for grammar and helped out as needed. Darien, the ShinyDoor Intern, did anything and everything. All did a fabulous job with the kids and keeping the project organized. 

No doubt in my mind we would like to conduct this experiment again. We'll certainly change it up and make some improvements. But I suppose that is what one calls an experiment.

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Dear eTech,

I have had a lot of fun learning about all the technologies that were at this convention. The amount of knowledge that was walking through these halls was through the roof.

Thank you for inviting us to this conference.

If you enjoyed my blogs then follow me at @ ZachSullivan1

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The ShinyYouth's involvement at the Ohio Educational Technology Conference 2012 was a success! Everyone was highly impressed with the interviews the kids put on, their posts about their perspective of the conference and the use of technology in the classroom, and their overall young excitement about life and their future. 

The ShinyYouth would never be here if it weren't for teachers who believe in them and in the possibilities for their future. Those teachers were fantastic additions to our team this year and we never would have made it without them.  

Three Ohio school districts were represented in the ShinyYouth Studio this week. Four teachers from two different districts participated. Cheryl Webber and Rebecca Prusak came with four students from Spectrum Occupational Center, a school for austistic kids. Scott Burke and Chad Sinnott came with nine students from Lancaster High School. 

We were also blessed with the volunteer efforts of Dan Vasi and Nelson Juarez from Lorain County Community College's Early College High School Program. 

Jeremy Brueck, Director of DigiTXT of University of Akron Center of Literacy was a tremendous help in lending his aid to the students as they posted their material on the blog. We were not only encouraged by his presence and enthusiasm, but his support spurred us on with momentum. 

Everyone worked hard and stayed focused until the job was complete. They had a very busy schedule and they met the challenge with courage, enthusiasm and focus.

Every school should be blessed with such as these. Thank you a hundred times for your time and hard work. It has not gone unnoticed. 

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I have to thank all of ShinyYouth for letting us cover this event! It was a great experience and I got to see what it's like to be a real journalist.

I pushed my writing to new limits and discovered I could do anything if I put my mind to it. Who knows, maybe one day this could be my career!

Hopefully, next year we can comeback and cover this event again.

Once again, thanks guys!!!

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Day three was a blast it was filled with great times and I'm very sad I will be leaving.

But I am not leaving with nothing. I have gained so much from being here and had fun at the same time. I got to meet many new people and develop friendships with them.

This is an experience I will never forget. If I had the chance I would do it all over again.

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Along with saying goodbye to the people I met, is letting this experience come to an end as well. I really appreciate being offered to experience this conference. As I said before this has helped me improve my writing greatly and has given me a voice.

I knew before coming to this conference I would have a good time but I didn't anticipate that i would have this much fun. Thank you to everyone who helped get us here. We won't forget it.

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I would like to thank everybody that was involved with Shiny Youth during my 3 days. It was a great experience learning about all the new technology at the conference. This was a big time convention with many opportunities to learn.

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Monday morning, Kenny and I set out to ask Ohio eTech attendees the question, "If you could be any technology, what would you be?" We got a lot of responses, but the most popular technology is the iPad. I would be an iPod touch. I like all of the games, especially Angry Birds.

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I met a man who can speak his mind whether he is right or wrong and believe in what he is saying with all his heart.

That is what I think of Dan Savage. I had the pleasure to speak with Dan right before his speech at the conference. He was very passionate about his opinion.

Dan is a gay man who has made a program called "It Gets Better" for gay, lesbian, and bisexual teens that are being bullied and are suicidal.

Through my interview with Dan I got to see his passion through the way he responded to my questions. He also gave me new ways to look at issues he is fighting against.

Many people are against Dan and think that what he stands for is not important. But I am 100% supportive of Dan and his fight to help gay and lesbian teens.

I had a great experience talking with Dan and hope that his program, "It Gets Better", will thrive and continue to help young teens. Some people might be against you. But I want to tell Dan there are thousands that are with him.

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Daulton and I apparently are experts at twitter. At least that's what people think that are clueless.

Today, Daulton and I gave a tutorial on how to use twitter to an elementary teacher that did not know much about it.

During this tutorial we showed how to tweet and where your tweet goes after it has been sent. Hash tags are an important part of twitter that can be very confusing to new users. That is another item we discussed along with tweeting to another person and inserting their twitter name.

Twitter is addicting once you get the hang of it and is a great way to blog about your life.

Even though it's difficult to get used to at first, it is well worth the time you spend learning.

Daulton and I have the knowledge it takes to become a twitter genius. Look us up if you have any questions. Twitter is a big time network.

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Being responsible for documenting a conference is a brand new experience for all the ShinyYouth. To help them with their new responsibilities and to also help them think about their online future, we invited 3 special folks to video chat with the youth. Andy Carvin, John Biggs and Christina Cacioppo all graciously agreed! They explained to the kids what they do for a living and then the youth asked them questions.

Andy Carvin is the Senior Strategist of Social Media for National Public Radio. 

John Biggs is an Editor for TechCrunch.

Christina Cacioppo is an Analyst at Union Square Ventures

A few of the ShinyYouth posts reflecting on their video chats with Andy, John and Christina:

My Experience with Christina Cacioppo

Christina Cacioppo

Technology Around the World-- Christina Cacioppo

Blown Away with ShinyYouth

My Experience with John Biggs

My Day With Shiny Youth

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During the walk at the Exhibit Hall, just about every other booth had free pens. I took just about all free pens that I saw.  I have got a total 33 pens, and 2 pencils. I got 2 4-color pens.  That's is the exact reason why I wanted to go to the Exhibit Hall! The best pens I personally like is the bobblehead pen from Instructional Technology Professional Development. His head keeps coming off, though. What's up with that? 

SHOUT-OUT to Spectrum School! I've made friends with some of the other teammates. SHOUT-OUTS to Jonah, Ben, Jordan, Alek, and Daulton, the people I've made friends with. SHOUT-OUT to the rest of the Shiny Youth Team! SHOUT-OUT to Ms. Moon, and Dr. Larson back at Spectrum. I've missed you.

We are heading back north to Spectrum and I really hope we get to come back next year!

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While we were walking down the Exhibit Hall, I met some people who had information about maps. I was really excited. He told me that people are putting all the maps on the computers. He gave me a catalog, and a booklet. I haven't read it yet, but I know it's going to be awesome. I like maps because I just like knowing places. Besides that reason, I really don't have a solid reason. I just like maps out of naturalness. It's just keeps getting better and better!

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At first sight I was in shock because I have not seen one in person before so I asked to get in.

She told me to jump in and I started to pretend I was driving down a hill like a movie but sadly it was only pretend.

Our schools have a chance to race these marvels of science and math. While having fun building these cars, you have to do portions to build this.

To figure out how to have your school participate in this amazing event check out www.aasbd.com.

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Having trouble catching your students attention when it comes to reading out of those huge textbooks in class? Would you act on it if you knew there is a way to grab your students attention and easily get them interested? Well, the iPad provides that for you.

When sitting in on an iPad lesson with Priciple Chad Reynolds, I was able to gain a new outlook. I think everyone, even teachers, can agree that all those readings out of  textbooks are not the most interesting thing in the world.The iPad provides apps for books that allow students to have fun while reading, instead of students wanting to catch some extra z's during your class period.

These apps are amazing! Some of the apps even come with video animation that go along with the audio that is being read aloud. These apps even can go as far as translating Old English into modern day English. All the student needs to do is highlight the word in the text, its as simple as that.

These reading apps are very easy to use and can help kids learn because they become more interacted with the project. There are many different apps to choose from too! This is a fun way to learn for everyone.

When I hear a teacher say, "Pull out your textbooks and begin reading.." I automatically assume that the text is going to be a bore. I think with these apps students will become excited to read. They will be able to learn so much more from these apps.

Want to turn those sighs you hear from students when asking them to read out of their textbooks into cheers? I would reccomend trying out these amazing apps, this could change a students perspective on reading.

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Shiny Youth has been great so far and I am really enjoying covering this event.

Not only have I learned about a lot of upcoming technology in schools but along the way I had some great adventures. Whether it was covering brand new technology at this conference or finding out the mystery in the hotel room (graves), I had a great time at this conference.

The best part? It's not over! Tune in later for my big time blog on bullying in today's schools.

Thanks for reading guys, I appreciate the support!

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Building fixtures with circular cardboard pieces isn't really my cup of tea, but apparently it is for Ben Kuhn. The Shiny Youth group students were asked to help build different sculptures. Ben jumped on this opportunity with great enthusiasm.

I got a chance to catch up with Ben and ask him about his experience. He stated, "this is a super good time, and that I would love to do this again." Now that's a big time statement!

I don't think I would enjoy to build fixtures with cardboard but if that is what Ben likes to do, then more power to him.

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Right now as you are reading this, a new structure is being built. A group of Shiny Youth members put their heads together to figure out what was going to be built next.

Curious to see what they came up with? Make sure to keep yours eyes peeled and look for this new structure. You won't be disappointed.

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