Well, I now have my first conference as a math teacher under my belt. It was interesting. It was VERY crowded and it was VERY hard to get into sessions. Basically, if you REALLY wanted to go to one, you had to skip the one before to go get in line. Then sit on the floor killing time. I waited for 1.5 hours for one, 1 hour for several. Worth it? Eh.
It wasn't until the third and final afternoon, when most others had already left, that I really felt like I was getting some useful information. Not that the first 2.5 days, weren't useful, just not really new useful.
Part of the problem was my ability to pick sessions. I was not good at it. There were SOO many of them and it was hard to guess by the three sentence blurb if it'd really be something good.
Also, other attendees were friendly but I didn't see as much bonding and sharing and such as I'd have liked or expected. While sitting and waiting, I tried to talk to the people around me and several just wanted to text or read or not talk to me. Hmm... maybe it's me! The ones who did engage in conversation were very nice and I got several new, good ideas from them!! The other thing is that many groups stuck together. Most of us from my group were split up all day, partly due to interest but also to try to get the most out of it. If all 3-4 go to the same session, how is that helpful?!
So, those are my thoughts. I'd go again next year. Partly cuz it's in Houston though :)
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