I'm on the blogg

Moving Home

2007-12-19T14:09:00.000+04:00

http://img175.imageshack.us/my.php?image=stopsigngp5.jpg

This blog is moving to http://www.elearnenable.blogspot.com.

Microsoft Windows Live Services - Yesss Please.

2007-11-28T12:04:00.000+04:00

My computer crashed about 7 months ago and I lost a lot of stuff I had downloaded. Well anyway, as part of this USQ MEdTech we needed some way to communicate and since Skype is banned in the UAE, I had to look at using something else. I had just started using Windows MSN prior to the crash so I said what the hell and redownloaded it.

As soon as I had, windows live messanger poped up and said that 1 of my friends was online and I had 20 something unread messages in my inbox. This got a thumbs up straight away. Anyway, I started chatting away and realised that I could send audio and cam feed. I was liking it better and better.

Later, I was working on my wife's laptop and realised I needed to print something but that it was not connected to the printer. No bothers, I opened a shared folder from her MSN on her computer to my MSN with the computer that was connected to the printer. Hey presto, file printed. That saved me buying another printer.

Now, I just find out that they do Microsoft TV (like YouTube) and give 1GB of hosted storage free so I uploaded some .pdfs. I'm wondering now how I get to search other public folders and if they'll do tags and networks like Del.icio.us.

Anyway, the point of this is that although I'm having problems navigating to the various sections of the interface at the moment (they seem to change appearance everytime I log in)and also that the various tools are in Beta, I really like the look of all these combined aspects. I can't wait to see what they do next.

Backpack Software

2007-11-27T12:39:00.000+04:00

So there I was rambling on about a place were we could upload our books, .pdfs, etc. and what should I find but Backpack.

Ask and you shall receive.

Now I wish I had loads of money, a big house and all the rest of that stuff. I'm waiting...

Virtual Thefts

2007-11-25T16:50:00.000+04:00

The other day in second life I was in somebody's home and I picked up a Sherlock Holmes book and started to read it. I was going to log off but hadn't finished reading the book so I took a copy. Later I was wondering if this constituted theft!

Now, I've just come across an article about theft in the social-networking site Habbo Hotel leading to police action. And I also recall an article about a bank in Second Life,Ginko Financial, where the owner of the bank scarpered with millions of Linden dollars - which equated to $750,000 dollars but the police couldn't do anything because it wasn't a real bank.

Now, it seems that one increasingly needs to have a knowledge of law in virtual spaces.

Google Jockeying

2007-11-25T13:48:00.000+04:00

Well,

I was at a USQ elluminate meeting the other day and was busy throwing out URLs into the backchannel as one does. (I have to try to appear clever someway since it doesn't happen in real life). Anyway, catspyjamas (people have some weird names these days. Just as well children don't get to pick their own names)said that I was a right google jockey. This passed me by at the time but I later yahooed it (I don't google!) This brought me to the educause article and some other sites.

Well I'm thinking that this could be quite useful when teaching and indeed at the CLTI2007 conference I realised that this was what was happening, through multiple jockey's.

Anyway Pros Vs Cons

Pros
Students focused
Additional material generated
Move from broadcast media to collaborative

Cons
Diversion of attention
2nd projector required
Jockey's skill
Internet connection speed.

Online book repositories

2007-11-23T09:19:00.000+04:00

I was just reading about Kindle (Google's new ebook internet connected reader). Now while my wife has bought 2 ebooks I haven't got any. (Though I did take a couple of editions of Sherlock Holmes' stories from somebody's home the last time I was in Second Life. I wonder if that classifies as breaking and entering? Hmmm?)

Whatever, I like the concept. You have phones these days that are all about listening to music, or playing games or taking pictures but reading books (if they turn it into a phone)... Problem here would be carrying it. After all it's 7.5" x 5.5", Penguin paperback size. Ruins the suit pockets and who wears a suit these days? Possibly those projection googles.

Anyway, this got me to thinking about all the downloaded .pdfs that I've got on my computers, portable hard discs, etc and I was wondering why there's not a repository for storing articles/books etc. something like del.icio.us?

I suppose this would function like a folksbrary but you would be able to tag any article as private. They would have to have some sort of mandated fields and upload size but I'm sure they'd sort that out.

How would they pay for it?
Now, that's the question I wonder about with YouTube, ImageShack, Del.icio.us etc. Surely advertising doesn't bring in that much money?

Learning - Then, now and in the future.

2007-11-22T13:23:00.000+04:00

This was a post in reponse to a question on the USQ Emerging Environments Course.

Think of an episode in your life when you engaged in some significant amount of learning in some environment.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away I was an 18 year old studying for my A-levels (university entrance exams for those non-British readers). I was taking 3 subjects. The classrooms consisted of either science lab benches or individual desks. The class sizes varied from 4 other students up to 20.

What do you see as the major components in this learning environment and did these components assist or support your learning?

The major components for learning then consisted of the teacher – “Sage on the stage”, chalk boards – two of which were rolling ones, the course text books (published >20 years prior), a poorly equipped school library (with a cypher for book locations) and the other students. Oh yes, one teacher had a new-fangled device called an OHP and was able to make copies of his notes with a sheet of blue carbon paper and a machine called a stencil duplicator. (Think of Cerf’s and Schutz’s (2002) 2 billion people).

All these components assisted my learning to some degree. The sages directed what they believed I needed to know to pass the exams. Having taught the course for many years they knew what hoops to jump through. The OHPs, Photostats, and chalkboards contained their knowledge to be transmitted and with the scrolling boards, we could even compare two sets of notes!!! The course books and the library held additional information and the other students helped when I couldn’t understand something.

Which of these components could be improved and how?

All of them (and indeed I now believe that we will forever be in perpetual beta)! The teachers could have moved to “a guide on the side” style of teaching. They could also have organised the learning episodes so that there was less emphasis in the transmission based domain and more on problem based learning with a development of “self functioning skills” (Siemens 2005).

As for the classrooms, any of the presentation and classroom participation tools mentioned by Brown (2005) would have helped. Access to the internet would also have meant the text books being only 1 source and “Google jockeying” (Educause, 2006) could have occurred during the teacher’s delivery ensuring not only additional information but also a fostering the ability to question and enquire. (Thanks for the reference Joyce). Libraries, well it seems that while one is now able to have access to a much wider range of material, the same problem of hunting through indexes and strange numbering systems has not been resolved (Lipponcott, 2005). Interaction with other students could have occurred at any time over a variety of social networking sites and any information found added to del.icio.us so as to reduce the pressure on others’ personal bandwidth.

Did some components of the learning environment have a negative impact on your learning? Why?

They did to the extent that it was much harder, less enjoyable and more limiting to achieve the tasks being set. However, at the time these were the known and accepted pedagogical methods and the technological constraints of the era. It was, after all, pre net-gen! They, and we, did the best with what was available. If Brooks’ 2002 prognostications (as found in Kurzweil) come to fruition that, in less than 20 years, we will

“…have to start banning kids with neural Internet connection implants from having them switched on while taking the S.A.Ts”

then the techniques and tools we currently use will appear as antiquated in 20 years time as those of 20 years ago do to us today. Indeed, even the situation envisioned by Neumann and Kyriakakis (2002) has students and teachers remotely placed in,

“a fully immersive aural and visual environment…”

with vast archives of all past holographic lessons at the students’ fingertips.
So, did it have, and is my current learning environment having, a negative impact on learning? I suppose it all comes down to whether one subscribes to Clark’s (1994) view or not.

References:

Brooks, R. (2002). Flesh and Machines: How Robots Will Change Us. New York, NY: Pantheon Books. Retrieved November, 2007 from
http://www.kurzweilai.net/meme/frame.html?main=/articles/art0397.html?

Brown, M. (2005). Learning Spaces. In D. G. Oblinger & J. L. Oblinger (Eds.), Educating the Net Generation: EDUCAUSE. retrieved November, 2007 from http://www.educause.edu/educatingthenetgen

Cerf, V. & Schutz, C. (2002). Teaching in 2025: Education and Technology Transformed. In Visions 2020: Transforming Education and Training Through Advanced Technologies. Washington, DC: US Department of Commerce. Retrieved on November 2007 from http://www.technology.gov/reports/TechPolicy/2020Visions.pdf

Clark, R.E. (1994). Media will never influence Learning. In Educational Technology Research and Development, vol. 42, no. 2, pp. 21–9.

Del.icio.us. (2007). Social bookmarking. Retrieved November, 2007 from http://del.icio.us/

Educause. (2006). 7 things you should know about...Google Jockeying. In Educause Learning Initiative. Advancing Learning through IT innovation. Retrieved November, 2007 from http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7014.pdf

Lipponcott, (2005). Net Generation students and Libraries. In D. G. Oblinger & J. L. Oblinger (Eds.), Educating the Net Generation: EDUCAUSE. retrieved November, 2007 from http://www.educause.edu/educatingthenetgen

Neumann, U & Kyriakakis, C. (2002). 2020 Classrooms. In Visions 2020: Transforming Education and Training Through Advanced Technologies. Washington, DC: US Department of Commerce. Retrieved on November 2007 from http://www.technology.gov/reports/TechPolicy/2020Visions.pdf

Siemens, G. (2005). Learning Development Cycle: Bridging Learning Design and Modern Knowledge needs. Retrieved November, 2007 from http://www.elearnspace.org/Articles/ldc.htm

Wikipedia. (2007). The Mimeograph machine. In Wikipedia. Retrieved November, 2007 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mimeograph

Dimdim - Free video conferencing

2007-11-19T11:06:00.000+04:00

Wow, I liked the sound of this site so much that I didn't even finish the last post before I started this one.

Anyway, I was browsing racingshoes del.icio.us links and I came across Dimdim. It looks like a video conferencing startup company. (Subscribe $1000 before December and save $9,000. Neeed money quick).

Well, the thing about this is that it's free and they are attempting to mimic the success of Hotmail and Skype. Now, I've sent away for a trial of their free package and I'll try it out. I also have a free Elluminate room so I can compare. The benefit that dimdim has going for it is that it's been designed by people from Moodle and so ties into their system.

More later.

Corporate Learning: Trends & Innovations

2007-11-19T09:46:00.000+04:00

Well,

Just attended the first day of the Corporate Learning: Trends & Innovations (hosted by

ICT reshaping not only what but how we teach.

2007-11-13T19:22:00.000+04:00

Looking back five years from now, I
suspect the apotheosis of mechanistic, e-learning ‘content
delivery’ systems will coincide with the peak of target-driven,
test-based education policy, and what follows
will be more personal and aimed towards a broader set
of personal development goals in both technology and
pedagogy. The personalisation agenda is not only about
interface options and learning styles, but the whole
experience of how, what and with whom we learn.

Bryant, L. (2007).Emerging trends in social software
for education In Emerging Technologies for Learning Volume 2 (2007), Becta.

Clipmarks software

2007-11-09T11:31:00.001+04:00

Checking out clipmarks to see if it's any use.

clipped from clipmarks.com

Thought activated Controls

2007-11-05T12:28:00.000+04:00

Well came across this article on thought activated controls which I could have done finding 6 months back. Seems they were thinking along the same lines as that posting I put on the USQ board.

(I dig it out and put it here for reference as well).When I looked at this exercise, I initially thought of a large plasma touch screen at work which is used to provide guests with an overview of the college. Then I realized that I use touch screens every day, to pay my electric bills and to withdraw money at ATMs. So I thought, “If I could, what would I like to try ?”

Well the other day, frustrated on a slow computer, this
came to mind. Thought activated mouse and keyboard control. Hmm, now I’d love a go at all that new-fangledness, I thought, and input through thinking appealed to my laziness. But is it really new? Searching back, I come up with this Clint Eastwood movie - Firefox.
Thought activated plane controls - back in 1982. That’s only a gap of 24 years!

So now, after reading about implantations of electrodes into monkey’s brains , and Dobelle’s (2000)

work on brain-computer interface (BCI), connecting video cameras to the cortex of blind people, this gets me to thinking about Neo’s (in the Matrix ) downloading of information to his brain.

SURE, WHEN? Depends. If you believe Kurzweils cititation of Moore's Law and the exponential growth of computing, then sooner rather than later.

Indeed, according to Brooks, (director of MIT’s Artificial Intelligence Lab and therefore not to be dismissed lightly),

“… in just twenty years the boundary between fantasy and reality will be rent asunder.”

He then goes on to suggest that where previously teachers had to ban calculators in exams, they may soon,

“…have to start banning kids with neural Internet connection implants from having them switched on while taking the SATs”.

That soon? Well probably depends on the The Singularity I suppose.

As for output, well I was always bad at languages so when I need to say something on holiday I could think about it in English, use the translation software I just downloaded for whatever country I’m in and then output a string of verbal utterances that the waiter will understand as “Bring me two cold beers, please”.

Now that’d be the perfect fusion of education and technology.

Edit: Breaking up the links so that it fits on a single breadth screenshot

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bostrom, N. (1998). How Long Before Superintelligence? In Int. Jour. of Future Studies, 1998, vol. 2. Retrieved May, 2007 from a http://www.nickbostrom.com/superintelligence.html

Brooks, R. (2002). Flesh and Machines: How Robots Will Change Us. New York, NY: Pantheon Books. Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://66.102.1.104/
scholar?hl=en&lr=&client=firefox-a&q=cache:VgY4LrEAuVYJ:www.hp.com/
execcomm/itjournal/second_qtr_02/pdfs/article9.pdf+artificial+intelligence+implants

Dobelle, W. (2000) Artificial Vision for the Blind by Connecting a Television Camera to the Visual Cortex. In American Society for Artificial Internal Organs. Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://
web.archive.org/web/20041010113607/artificialvision.com/asaio1.html

Kurzweil, K. (2003). The Human Machine Merger: Are we headed for the Matrix? In Taking the Red Pill: Science, Philosophy and Religion in The Matrix. Ed Glenn Yeffeth.
Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://www.kurzweilai.net/articles/art0552.html?printable=1

Pinto, J. (2002). The Singularity is coming. In InTech. Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://www.isa.org/Content/ContentGroups/News/2002/December9/InTech10/
Pintos_Point__The_Singularity_is_coming.htm

Wikipedia. Firefox (film). Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox_(film)

Wikipedia. The matrix. Retrieved May, 2007 from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Matrix

Wikipedia. Moore's Law.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moore's_law

Also this seems interesting. C3 vision, Mental image search.

Common Craft Videos

2007-11-04T09:50:00.000+04:00

Just come across this site.

Very clear descriptions of different web 2.0 devices and an all important how to kill zombies video as well. You just have to have faith in anything they say now.

Label Cloud

2007-11-01T11:18:00.000+04:00

Saw a nice cloud tag on one of the attendee's blogs, yahooed it and have just found a site that turns your labels into a cloud tag (link in title). How cool is that.

What is Corporate Learning: Trends and Innovations?

2007-11-01T10:50:00.001+04:00

Well, signed up for this corporate learning conference. Will post on it later.

Testing No right click

2007-06-08T13:59:00.001+04:00

Can you copy this?

Testing No right click

2007-06-08T13:59:00.000+04:00

Can you copy this?

Wikipedia - J Wales

2007-05-30T07:58:00.000+04:00

I'm not worthy, I'm not worthy.

Online Debate

2007-05-06T15:22:00.000+04:00

Well,

It seems I'm a con in the debate. I wonder how it was chosen? Random probably. I'm probably as far from a con as you can get but whatever. Anyway,

ACT 1 - Scence 1.

An argument in the Staffroom

(Scene: Two teachers, Logos and Antilogos, are locked in heated debate over the relative merits of how the school budget fits with the use of computing in the curriculumn. Other teachers look on, waiting for their chance to enter the fray.)

Logos I'm telling you, every classroom should be a lab and every teacher computer literate.
Antilogos Look, I am not saying that computers are not a useful tool for some subjects in the classroom, I'm asking why a physics should have to know how to design webpages never mind fix the damn thing when those flashing-lights come on saying "Danger Will Robinson, Danger!" Surely, it's best left in the hands of professional web designers and computer technicians.

(Antilogos, sensing that others particularly the music teacher is becoming interested, poses a leading question).

But while we're on the subject, where exactly are the school board going to get the money for all these computers from? Pluck it off the money tree? Get real!

Logos Well, what about those artsy-farsty courses. We don't need them. This is the harsh reality of life and what we need is people who know how to work in the real world not some commie-layabouts smoking Gittanes and spouting poetry! Also, you may as well ask why should they have to know how to speak and write in English? It's time they got with the program. This is the digital era not quill and ink.

Music Teacher. What do you mean artsy-fartsy. Are you trying to insinuate that your business program should take precedence over musical intelligence. Probably not, since the meaning of half those words would be lost on a fatuous ignoramus such as yourself.

Logos. If we had a computer here, I'd show you were you could stick that woodwind instrument you're carrying.

Antilogos. Exactly, that's another point. If there are computers in every classroom how are you going to control what they're looking at. 14 year old boys, 2 guesses what they'll be looking at. Sounds like a recipe for a 40 years in jail, just like that poor teacher down in Norwich, Conn.

(Teachers ears prick up and they inch a little closer. Jail time for using computers, what's this? Can I use this as an excuse to get out of using those damn things?)

Logos seeing the others crowd round.

Stop scare mongering, that's all you ever do.

(Chemistry teacher sitting by a bookshelf). Actually, I believe the name of the gentleman (or not depending on whom one believes)is Julie Amero. [Hey that's a woman! Yes,yes but it doesn't go with my pun]. A substitute teacher I believe. One of the jurors even echoed your thoughts Logos,

"If a 40-year-old school teacher does not have the sense to turn off or is not smart enough to figure it out, would you or any other person wanting her teaching your child or grandchild?"

Seems that they believe a cull is in order.

Class bell rings and teacher file back to the trenches.

(To be continued)

Chat Boxes

2007-05-03T12:14:00.000+04:00

Well,

The girls liked my chat box so much that they all wanted ones of their own. 20 mins later they were busy chatting. javascript:void(0)
Publish

It seems that these chat boxes serve both as synochronous and asynochronous communication technique.

They were also asking about uploading video so Youtube the next stop.

Wil E. eat your heart out

2007-04-27T11:56:00.000+04:00

Nokia N800

Me likey. Now, how can I get to write material for this.

Technology is like black magic.

2007-04-24T11:19:00.000+04:00

OMG! I remember reading early on how one teacher running an ILC confessed that trying to get the computer systems to work was as near as black magic as they wanted to come! Well, I can totally empathise with this person.

I downloaded the audio file about chat in Second lLif, 3 days ago, from Dekka's Decks and it was in flash format, space saving device, I think. Anyway, I tried to upload it to youtube from work but couldn't so I had to change it into MP3 format by playing the flash file while recording it in audacity. Found out that the Lame file was missing from audacity, had to download that and then download another piece of software that converts MP3 to .AVI extensions.

A lot of hair pulling later and I had a movie file to upload. 2Hours! to upload to youtube and the recording quality now sucks but I have a playable file.

Now off to post in the USQ boards before they close. Shame really 'cos I don't think I'll include it in the analysis but the others might like it.

USQ inworld

2007-04-21T08:45:00.000+04:00

OK,

Done a bit more exploring and found some interesting stuff. Sitting in a lecture hall, complete with video screen, which has been set up for chat or voice chat.

There was also a voice recording about the place which I'm trying to upload.

There was also a discussion board downstairs in another room. This place was really cool.

Here is a link to Peggy Sheehy's blog who took the classes.

On-line Courses in a Virtual University in 2nd Life.

2007-04-20T12:48:00.000+04:00

Well,

Now I'm getting really enthustiac!

Here's me flying around SL, complete with furry tail, and where do I stumble into - Herdfordshire University

Well, being the curious fellow that I am, I pop along to the internet and yahooandbehold (I don't google) there it is. So after printing off the promotional flyer and having a read I'm think that this encapsulates many of the strands that this module is talking about. Here we have a game 2nd life, so we're engaged, where the students from 2-75 can interact "in settings... from the serious to the fanciful".

In the university, they use traditional media but also the SL chat and interactive audio via skype. No mention of discussion boards though, so I'm wondering if these would be meta-game?

Mindblowing!!!

And there's more. USQ have a campus as well. Well, Lindy McKeown has. She has set up a campus that I've just about to look around. I wonder if Petrea is aware of this?

McKeown, L. (2007) Tera Incognito. In Second Life. Retrieved 20th April, 2007 from http://slurl.com/secondlife/Terra%20incognita/152/96/33.

The New Media Consortium. (2006). About the NMC Campus. http://sl.nmc.org/docs/about-nmc-campus.pdf

The New Media Campus wiki. NMC-Campus:About page. http://sl.nmc.org/wiki/NMC-Campus:About

Checking out ScribeFire's features

2007-04-10T15:03:00.001+04:00

Right,

While on the

ElearnEnable - Home

right clicked menu and "blog this page" option. Let's see what happens.

(Well, it seems that it'll insert a link to whatever page you are currently on.)

Testing of this ScribeFire link

2007-04-08T16:11:00.001+04:00

Checking out this ScribeFire link at the bottom of the Firefox Screen. Lets you open a window and type stuff to appear on your blog.

Also has other settings which I'll play with later.

Insertion of video material

2007-04-08T11:43:00.000+04:00

Right,

One of the giirls was trying to insert video into her blog the other day, so I've just done it to see how it's done.

I'll probably have to show them how to set up a YouTube account now.

Attrition

2007-03-28T19:16:00.000+04:00

Some of the girls are starting to lose interest in the blogs. It seems the "wet cement" (XXXX 200X) isn't even waiting until the end of the course!

Not overly surprised though, since, as my wife reminded me, "How long was it before we did the same?" Probably, as XXXX noted (200?), has something to do with the narcisism factor or believing that one has something to say or, if in a community, that people are wanting to hear something.

Anyway, one of my co-teachers has asked me to get some of the girls to post their written exercises on the blogs. Then, they can be corrected and edited.

Getting the girls to post

2007-03-28T12:54:00.000+04:00

The girls have been adding pictures to their blogs to spice them up a little. Another forgotten password today. I really have to make comprehension questions from the other blogs for them.

Also, I've been reading about M-Learning. Interesting idea but I'm wondering how I could use this technology?

Some Technical Difficulties

2007-03-20T09:54:00.000+04:00

Well,

We lost one blog due to a forgotten password. Shame really because she had chosen a good name.

Anyway, all the students have been told to record their usernames and passwords on their phone.

One of the students has started to upload photos already.

First Group of Students Blogged on

2007-03-19T13:21:00.000+04:00

Today our first group of students blogged on, well 75% did but we'll sort the rest out tomorrow. I think they were all pretty excited, but why don't you click to their pages to find out.

Do onto others, as has been done onto you!

2007-03-13T07:54:00.001+04:00

Right, we all know what they say misery loves, so I've decided to make my students become bloggers as well!

In this way they will have a weekly writing exercise and I'll have information with which to update this blog.

Not only that, but I'll also have data with which to discuss in different forums(a), Latin endings!

Ding dong - the bells are ringing

2007-03-09T22:52:00.000+04:00

God, I hate Blogs!

Never was one for diaries but for this USQ MAEdTech, I have to keep a reflective journal so here goes.