Thursday, 31 May 2007
WebTV
I'm not entirely sure what the difference is between podcasting, WebTV and videosharing. I suspect the difference is merely semantics and probably not important, it's the sites that matter. Here's an interesting site that does WebTV/podcasts. Quite a lot about entrepreneurship.
http://www.thamesvalleypod.tv/
posted by Helen Whitehead 3:08 PM
Thursday, 24 May 2007
Wayne Hodgins: Off course, on target
I've discovered a new blog from Wayne Hodgins
He discusses an excellent online learning resource about tying knots (think sailing!) and describes Pecha Kucha, the fast and furious new presentation format from Japan now sweeping America (of which more anon).Labels: blogs, e-learning, online learning, presentations
posted by Helen Whitehead 9:27 AM
Tuesday, 22 May 2007
Culture and technology
So often those who start using learning technologies (or creative technologies, or social technologies....) carry over into the new context assumptions, methods and processes that were appropriate in the old context but not in the new. However, it can take time for new ways of working to be discovered and to develop. By throwing off the old it is possible to explore affordances of the new technology that the old does not have and may release creativity and innovation.
Some examples:
Stage play to Film
When film was first invented, films were merely recordings of stage plays because that's what people were used to. It took time - and the development of the technology - before film developed as a medium - simple things like zooming in, filming outside the theatre=studio, moving, short scenes - all those features of film that we are now very familiar with and have since gone on to influence another new medium - television - and on and on....
Manuscripts to print books
I have a book that was published in 1475. It still has the spaces at the beginning of each chapter for the initial letters to be painted in. Other features of early books which were carried over from manuscripts include the use of abbreviations (much easier when laboriously writing common words to abbreviate them) and the lack of spaces between words (to save precious vellum).
In many ways, I believe that multimedia hypertext should owe more to those original manuscripts than to the print book - which is a sort of cul-de-sac in the development of text...
Stagecoaches to trains
Early trains had carriages with side to side seating in, just like stagecoaches. It wasn't for some time that the longitudinal layout with a corridor was invented. The stagecoach had to be filled with as much seating as possible in a small space to be economic - but the train is a bigger canvas.
Roman to Arabic numerals
Have you ever tried doing long division with Roman numerals?
It can't be done. Long division could not be invented by the Romans, it needed a new system of number.
The use of technology is embedded in cultural practice, and the job of a learning technologist or e-learning champion is to challenge such practice.Labels: culture, e-learning, history, technology
posted by Helen Whitehead 11:50 AM
Useful books on e-learning
McConnell, D. (2006) E-Learning Groups and Communities: Imagining Learning in the Age of the Internet.
Jochems W, van Merriënboer J and Koper R (2004) Integrated E-Learning: implications for pedagogy, technology and organisation, London: Routledge and Falmer
Collis B and Moonen J (2004) Flexible Learning in a Digital World (2nd edition), London: Routledge and Falmer
Rosenberg, Marc (2006). "Beyond E-Learning: Approaches and Technologies to Enhance Organizational Knowledge, Learning and Performance," Pfeiffer. ISBN 0-7879-7757-8
and a website
Re-Engineering Assessment Practices (a study from Scotland)Labels: assessment, books, e-learning
posted by Helen Whitehead 11:34 AM
Saturday, 19 May 2007
Nice little example of online learning
A digital camera simulator
http://www.photonhead.com/simcam/Labels: e-learning, photography
posted by Helen Whitehead 12:08 PM
Tuesday, 15 May 2007
Tag cloud of recent posts
advice (3) available (3) bbc (7) blog (7) comments (12) community (5) course (6) create (3) development (3) e-learning (5) education (4) eduserv (3) group (4) identity (6) inspiration (3) interesting (4) learning (13) life (11) main (3) mirandanet (3) news (8) office (4) online (13) others (3) page (5) people (4) php (5) pipes (3) platforms (4) practice (4) real (6) rss (3) rule (3) season (4) second (11) secondlife (3) simteach (4) tagcrowd (3) technology (3) think (3) thinkfree (3) uk (16) usability (3) virtual (7) website (4) wiki (4) work (3) worlds (6) writing (7) year (3)created at TagCrowd.com
posted by Helen Whitehead 3:09 PM
Web Applications and Web 2.0 links
Personalised homepages
PageFlakes
http://www.pageflakes.com/
Netvibes
http://www.netvibes.com/
iGoogle
http://www.igoogle.com
Office/Organisation
30 boxes web calendar
http://30boxes.com/welcome.php
Amazon S3 (NOTE - not free)
Simple Storage Service
can be used to store and retrieve any amount of data, at any time, from anywhere on the web
Yahoo pipes
feed aggregator
http://pipes.yahoo.com/pipes/
Thinkfree
ThinkFree Office is a Microsoft® Office compatible application suite comprised of word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation graphics software-all usable online and off.
http://www.thinkfree.com/
Google Apps
Free for domains (premier service for charge)
Groups can check email, schedule meetings, check email, chat in real time, collaborate on documents, and more, via the web.
http://www.google.com/a/
Dabble DB
Web database
http://www.dabbledb.com/
Virus Scanners
AVG
http://free.grisoft.com/doc/1
Trend micro housecall
http://housecall.trendmicro.com/
More from
The Freelancer’s Toolset: 100 Web Apps for Everything You Will Possibly Need
Web 2.0 links
RSS Info
tools for rss feeds
http://www.rss-info.com/
ELGG
Open source social networking platform developed for LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP) which encompasses weblogging, file storage, RSS aggregation, personal profiles, FOAF functionality and more
http://elgg.org/
There.com
A virtual world that's not Second Life
http://www.there.com/
UK Web Focus - Web 2.0 blog
http://ukwebfocus.wordpress.com/
Office 2.0
http://itredux.com/blog/office-20/Labels: calendar, organisation, Web 2.0, web applications, website development
posted by Helen Whitehead 2:27 PM
Monday, 14 May 2007
Jakob Nielsen on Web 2.0
Jakob Nielsen, usability guru, on Web 2.0 - I don't think he's impressed!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6653119.stmLabels: usability, Web 2.0, web design
posted by Helen Whitehead 3:11 PM
How Second Life could be a haven for terrorists...
From the Sunday Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/05/13/nternet13.xml
I'm pretty sure Linden Labs can find out where people are logging in from. But would they cooperate with US police let alone British police? So the watchdogs think it's dangerous.Labels: internet policy, second life, terrorism
posted by Helen Whitehead 9:08 AM
Tuesday, 8 May 2007
The 1% rule
What is the 1% rule?
http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1823959,00.html
"It's an emerging rule of thumb that suggests that if you get a group of 100 people online then one will create content, 10 will "interact" with it (commenting or offering improvements) and the other 89 will just view it."
Actually, I'm not so sure this is "emerging" - I was aware of this kind of ratio ten years ago when we were creating the trAce Online Writing Community. It was applied to mailing lists in those days...
posted by Helen Whitehead 9:37 AM
Second Life in the Education Arena
with thanks mostly to Martin Mackain-Bremner via the recent JISC Web 2.0 Webinar
Second Life official homepage: http://www.secondlife.com/ and http://secondlife.com/education/
Media coverage:
Second Life has received a LOT of media coverage in the past year or so. A press archive is maintained here: http://secondlife.com/news/
Some academic projects:
Schome: http://www.schome.ac.uk/
TPLD: http://tpld.net/main.php?page=102
Game-based learning essentials: http://www.tpld.net/tpld/main.php?page=142
DDM Collective (Annabeth Robinson's class project page): http://ddmcollective.blogspot.com
Sloodle (Integration of Moodle and SL) : http://www.sloodle.com/
There is an expansive Wiki hosted on Simteach.com
Go to http://www.simteach.com/ and click on the 'Wiki' button or go direct using this link: http://tinyurl.com/zbwlj
The papers from the 2006 Second Life Education workshop can be downloaded from here: http://www.simteach.com/SLCC06/
There is also a Second Life Education - UK group that has been set up 'in-world'. It is free to join and hopes to organise virtual events
at least on a monthly basis. Using the 'Search' menu, look for the group UK Educators . A wiki page for the group has been set up here:
http://www.simteach.com/wiki/index.php?title=UK_Educators , please add your own details to the page!
Other Virtual Worlds
There exist a range of other Virtual Worlds now available or in development.
Some notable ones include:
OpenCroquet http://www.opencroquet.org/
(and Qwaq http://www.qwaq.com/ )
Active Worlds http://www.activeworlds.com/
There http://www.there.com/
and development platforms:
Blink3D http://www.pelicancrossing.com/
Multiverse http://www.multiverse.net/
For a longer list, see the Virtual Worlds Review: http://www.virtualworldsreview.com/
and: immersive worlds guide
See also the recent JISC Review on Learning in Immersive Worlds at
http://www.elearning.ac.uk/news_folder/ news_item.2007-02-26.9065151405
Caspian Learning are one of the leading UK providers of services that can be hosted by them or by institutions:
http://www.caspianlearning.co.uk/
Eduserv in Second Life http://www.eduserv.co.uk/foundation/sl.aspx
Virtual worlds, real learning?
Seminar, Thursday 10th May 2007 Congress Centre, London
http://www.eduserv.co.uk/foundation/symposium/2007/
More to be added on Second Life as I get it...
posted by Helen Whitehead 9:25 AM
