W12 Mobile and Virtual

For Class Discussion:

Mobile and virtual learning will continuously grow expanding the horizon of promises, innovations, revolutions, and challenges. Distinction between mobile and virtual learning can be subtle, and video/online games and virtual worlds are also web technologies not to ignore. Truth is, adoption and use of web connected mobile phones and devices will grow, and their needs for content access and collaboration will expand. Less discussed, but important and related pedagogy includes location based learning, ubiquitous learning, and game/simulation-based learning.

1. Mobile Learning Environments by David J. Gagnon
2. Educause's 7 Things You Should Know About Mobile App
3. Educause's 7 Things You Should Know About Android
4. The Official Google Blog: The Future of Mobile by Steve Kolowich
5. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Virtual Worlds
6. Video Games and the Future of Learning by Kurt Squire
7. Sharing: The Moral Imperative by Dean Shareski (26 minute video)
8. Questioning the Future of the Open Student by Vicki Davis

Further Resources - These are for those who want to explore further...

1. Free as in Freedom: The Power of Pull – John Seely Brown by Sumeet Moghe
2. Travis Allen’s Blog: The Life of a 21st Century Student.
3. The Mobile Campus (#3 and 4 illustrates the current practices, challenges, and needs of proper research)
4. Educause: From Distraction to Interaction: Incorporating Cell Phones Into the Learning Environment (13 minute audio)
5. From Toy to Tool: Cell Phones in Learning a blog by Liz Kolb. Please explore her site and be sure to listen to Liz Kolb’s and Jeff Stanzler’s blogtalk radio interview with Florida Spanish teacher, Ariana Leonard. You’ll find the interviews on the right hand side of her blog. You can listen to this interview directly on the site or via iTunes. (35 minutes)
6. Educating the Net Generation, Chapter 12, Learning Spaces
7. Educating the Net Generation, Chapter 15, Planning for Neomillennial Learning Styles: Implications for Investments in Technology and Faculty (You can choose either the pdf or html version (with diigo highlights) of Chapter 15)
8. “Living Epic”: What the title means and what it implies by Roger Travis. Be sure to read parts 1-3 (the links appear at the end of posts 1 and 2)
9. My Personal Learning Network in Action by Karl Fisch
10. Cell Phones in the (Language) Classroom: Recasting the Debate by Peyton Jobe
11. Social Media in Africa, Part 1
12. Social Media in Africa, Part 2: Mobile Innovations
13. Social Media in Africa, Part 3: Democracy. Want to know more about the impact of mobiles in the developing world? Check out this 38 minute presentation by Nathan Eagle of MIT (not required), “Crowd-Sourcing on Mobile Phones in the Developing World“

Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351sp2012/

1. PhoneGap - Open source mobile framework for developing/downloading apps
2. Portable Applications (Many applications are search-able by topics and categories)
3. Second Life, OpenSim, and Virtual Worlds Review
4. Scratch - Easy to use remixing tool from MIT (video 1 min)
5. Game development: Unity, GameSalad, Sharendipity, Alice (3D programming)
6. National Library of Virtual Manipulatives
7. Siri - Virtual assistant
8. Foursquare - Others can check where you are and where they have been, info around you
9. ClassSpot and TeamSpot from TideBreak.Inc

You can comment on any of the following:

• Which tool was your favorite? How did the tool compare to others introduced in this week? If you plan to adopt the tool, for what purposes will you use it and how often? If you don't plan to use, why not?
• Do you think a school or workplace must actively use tools introduced in this week? Anything to consider in adoption or implementation at school or work?
• Or your reflection on anything related to the course (material, assignment, clarity, usefulness, suggestion, reaction to others, etc.)

W11 - Social and Personal Networks

For Class Discussion:
We all know social networks, such as Facebook are big and here. Tools for social networks network have a definite place for teaching and learning, but contexts play a bigger role, so you should have clear purposes and plans before integration into them into teaching and learning. Regardless of your opinion or preference, our students and learners use these tools very actively, so we must know what benefits and pitfalls they have to guide proper use in education.

1. Myths and Opportunities: Technology in the Classroom an Alan November video (13 minutes) - The concept of a student, learner, and contributor
2. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Personal Learning Environments
3. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Facebook
4. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Facebook II
5. I’m So Totally, Digitally Close to You by Clive Thompson, NYTimes
6. Comparing Social Networking to Online Communities by Lee and Sachi Lever
7. Spectacle at Web2.0 Expo… from my perspective by Danah Boyd

Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351sp2012/

1. Facebook (can sign in with yahoo account)
2. Ning
3. LinkedIn
4. Orkut (can sign in with gmail account)
5. Now, Google related Google Plus

Further Resources - These are for those who want to explore further...

1. Sharing: The Moral Imperative by Dean Shareski (26 minute video)
2. My Personal Learning Network in Action by Karl Fisch
3. Questioning the Future of the Open Student by Vicki Davis
4. Kiva.org - Microloans for less fortunate
5. TakingItGlobal.org - connects you to social issues that affect us all
6. Mashable - latest news and trends on social media

 

You can comment on any of the following:

• Which tool was your favorite? How did the tool compare to others introduced in this week? If you plan to adopt the tool, for what purposes will you use it, how, and why? If you don't plan to use, why not?
• Do you think a school or workplace must actively use tools introduced in this week? Anything to consider in adoption or implementation at school or work?
• Or your reflection on anything related to the course (material, assignment, clarity, usefulness, suggestion, reaction to others, etc.)

W10 Content Presentation

For Class Discussion:

The bottom line is, lecture without much interaction, good structure/sequence, and/or interactive media can be boring, and we all have bad experiences from (long) PowerPoint presentations. If any tool from this week is selected and used well, it will make presenting contents much more interesting. There are many tools and media hypes about podcasting, screen capturing, online video, and virtual conferencing, but it's all about presenting and sharing more rich contents easier, faster, and reach more people. Tools selected for this week exactly address that - some focus more on audio, others are more on video:

1. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Next-Generation Presentation Tools
2. Challenging the Presentation Paradigm (in 6 minutes, 40 seconds): Pecha Kucha by Jason B. Jones
3. Garr Reynolds’ Presentation Tips in particular, the three sections, ‘Organization & Preparation Tips’, ‘Delivery Tips’ and ‘Slide Tips’.
4. Seth’s Blog: Really Bad Powerpoint

Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351sp2012/

1. iTune
2. Audacity - (Be sure to download the MP3 save add-on by checking the plug-in option under the Download menu)
3. Skype
4. Wordle
5. Slideshare
6. Zoho Show
7. Prezi (3 lessons)
8. Jing
9. Ustream
10. Elluminate (virtual conferencing, now called BB Collaborate, free version supports up to 3 people)

Further Resources or Tools worth checking:

1. PechaKucha 20×20
   
2. Screencast-0-Matic
3. CamStudio (Windows only)
4. Talkshoe
5. Flickr Slideshow
6. Spresent
7. Glogster
8. Vuvox
9. TodaysMeet
10. Poll Everywhere
11. Livestream
12. Podcasting with Windows Media Player by Jake Ludington
13. Create a Podcast with Blogger (YouTube Video, 2:26 min)
14. JuiceReceiver - a media aggregator which automatically downloads podcasts and media files to your computer or portable device
15. Educating the Net Generation: Chapter 7, Convenience, Communications, and Control: How Students Use Technology
16. Video for ELI: Net Gen Students at University of Minnesota from a 2007 Educause Learning Initiative session. Please watch the 5 minute video.

Supplementary Sources, if interested in extending YouTube:

1. YouTube Annotations
2. YouTube Launches Auto-Captioning for Videos by Ben Parr
3. And for another perspective on YouTube’s auto-captioning feature: Sorry, Google, YouTube Captions Aren’t for the Deaf. They’re for Your Robots by Xander Becket
4. Viddler (commenting and tagging video contents to improve search and share)

Ideas and suggestions for commenting:

• Which tool was your favorite? How did the tool compare to others introduced in this week? If you plan to adopt the tool, which one(s) you will use, for what purposes and how? If you don't plan to use, why not?
• Do you think a school or workplace must actively use tools introduced in this week? Anything to consider in adoption or implementation at school or work?
• Or your reflection on anything related to the course (material, assignment, clarity, usefulness, suggestion, reaction to others, etc.)

W9 - Storytelling

For Class Discussion

These tools may look different in terms of purposes and usage, but they have one essential commonality: creativity. Using storytelling, drawing, or mapping tools, people can create artifacts, learn visually, practice with safety, simulate the model, and most importantly, have fun and learn actively (and also collaboratively).

1. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Digital Storytelling
2. Web 2.0 Storytelling: Emergence of a New Genre by Bryan Alexander and Alan Levine
3. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Google Earth

Popular Tools

1. Voicethread - The Voicethread 4 education wiki is a great pedagogical resource.
2. Animoto. Using Animoto to Promote Speaking in the Foreign Language details how José Picardo used it with his Spanish language students
3. Gliffy - Online diagram software, can create and share flowcharts, network diagrams, floorplans, user interface designs, etc.
4. Toondoo - Create your own comics! Book Maker. Make a character or ToonBook!
5. Flick'r - The most popular online photo management and sharing tool
6. Digital Storytelling Part V – Google Maps by Silvia Tolisano
7. Concept/story mapping: Mindomo and Spicynodes
8. Picasa - Fast and easy photo sharing from Google
1. Flick'r upload plugin for Picasa
2. Free Picasa Flash and HTML template

You can comment on any of the following:

• Which tool was your favorite? How did the tool compare to others introduced in this week? If you plan to adopt the tool, for what purposes will you use it and how often? If you don't plan to use, why not?
• Do you think a school or workplace must actively use tools introduced in this week? Anything to consider in adoption or implementation at school or work?
• Or your reflection on anything related to the course (material, assignment, clarity, usefulness, suggestion, reaction to others, etc.)

W7 - RSS

For Class Discussion:
The topic of RSS is also closely related to finding and evaluating information in a connected world (week 4). All are to manage information more effectively and efficiently.

1. RSS in Plain English by Lee and Sachi Lefever (3.5 minutes)

Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351sp2012/

• Google Reader
• Bloglines
• And more RSS tools or feeders - Some are for desktop and platform specific
• RSS Mix (web service) - If students work on research or web search, their search URLs can be combined and created into a RSS feed
• If you know HTML code and DreamWeaver, this service automatically converts any RSS feed into a JavaScript code, which you can add to a layer. If your page has a panel or column where updated RSS news contents can appear, this is it! (RSS to Javascript)
• Pageflakes, Netvibes, vs./& iGoogle - Each tool allows you to add many panels/flakes to a single web page. The first two allow you to organize panels by different RSS feeds (if the web site provides RSS feeds).

Further Resources - search URLs or Wiki page history can become your Reader subscription, but be aware, unless

1. Google's News Advanced Search - If results are good, can copy the search URL to Reader's subscription field
2. Blog search from Google or Technorati's watchlist - same action as above can be done
3. Moreover or Syndic8 - they claim, their search are more targeted to social media and results provide easy RSS subscription
4. Google's news sources when you use the Blogger or Reader
5. Google Scholar, DigitalCommons@UConn, DASH, eScholarship - inside each source, you can find the RSS subscription feature

You can comment on any of the following:

• How has your access to Web resources of your career/major interests expanded? Did it create information overload for you or were you able to organize your RSS to manage the quality and quantity of information?
• After your lab experimentation, any unique or major strengths of an RSS tool? Which tool did you try? What is your plan for using an RSS for teaching or learning?
• Anything to consider in adoption or implementation (e.g., how learning from RSS can be shared among class or institutional members, etc.)
• Or anything related to the course (material, assignment, etc) or your learning experience in terms of using RSS

W6 Collaborative Writing and Editing

For Class Discussion and Weekly Blog Post:

1. Wikis in Plain English by Lee and Sachi Lefever (under 4 minutes)
2. The Power of Wikis in Higher Ed by Linda L. Briggs

Popular Tools - Course Google Site at https://sites.google.com/site/idt351class/

• Google Docs - Check out Tom Barrett’s Interesting Ways Series using Google Docs.
• Google Sites
• Wikispaces
• PBWorks
• Wetpaint
• And more tools (some can be downloaded and installed onto a server)

Further Resources

1. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Google Wave
2. See Who’s Editing Wikipedia by John Borland
3. Wikipedia and the New Curriculum by David Parry

You can comment on any of the following:

• Any difference, strengths or weaknesses compared to blogging tool(s)?
• Any unique or major strengths of wiki tool?
• Anything to consider in adoption or implementation (e.g., user management)
• Or anything related to the course (material, assignment, etc) or your learning experience

W5 - Blogging

 

For Class Discussion (to prepare in advance):

1. Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Blogs
2. Reflecting, Writing, and Responding: Reasons Students Blog by Carie (Windham) Page

Blogging Tools - As a group/pair, select one blogging tool from below or any popular one, then post a needed information about the tool to the course Google Site: https://sites.google.com/site/idt351spring2013/home.

• Blogger - Free weblog publishing tool from Google, for sharing text, photos and video
• WordPress - A popular open source content management system focusing on web standards, and usability. A nice how-to screencast by Molly McDonald on setting up a WordPress blog (10 min)
• Joomla - Another popular free, open-source content management system (CMS)
• Drupal - Another popular free open-source CMS
• MoveableType - Another popular free open-source CMS

Further Resources (for those who are interested in exploring further about blogging)

• Edublogs Award site
• Tom Barrett’s Interesting Ways series
• Blogging Policies and Resources Wiki by Bud Hunt
• Blogger for Word - Can post right to your Blogger from Word
• The 25 Basic Styles of Blogging…And When to Use Each One
• Great blog post example from Will Richardson on: “Why Johnny’s Professor Can’t Read”

Your comment can be on any one of the following (150-250 words):

• Which blogging tool is your favorite, why? Which feature(s) did you find most useful for teaching or learning?
• Any difficulty or challenge experienced?
• For what purposes do you plan to use your blog? Class lecture showed possible applications, such as portfolio, content/file management, class discussion, etc.
• For adoption or implementation within an organization, what is important?
• Course set-up, material, and assignment, etc.
• Or any personal reflection

W4 Lab 1

Lab 1 Posts
Post your Lab 1 comments here. Remember to do both Part 1 and Part 2 before making your post. The post should be 200-300 words and refer to specific examples that you discovered in completing the activity.

W4 Find and Evaluate

 

Class discussion
I have little doubt that you frequently hear the problem of information overload and the sub-par quality of information on the Web. Regardless of these 'talks', #3 and #4 show clearly that the major innovations for the next generation of the Web are driven by features, such as 'post-filtering' and search algorithms (that make search of shared contents and capturing contextual relevance and quality better). After the class, as a comment, post the exact URL or location of the sources below that you liked the best and briefly share your thoughts on information overload.

1. We’re on information overload by Thomas Washington.
2. “It’s Not Information Overload. It’s Filter Failure” by Clay Shirky. A little under 24 minutes.
3. Tips for Handling Information Overload: Too Much Content by Dawn Foster
4. The Chronicle of Higher Ed: The New Metrics of Scholarly Authority by Michael Jensen for subscribers only. For an earlier and freely available version, see Authority 2.0 and 3.0: The Collision of Authority and Participation in Scholarly Communications by Michael Jensen.
5. The iPad and Information’s Third Age by William Rankin

Web tools/services:
Items 1~3 are information organization tools that allow browser customization. Zotero compares to a 3rd party citation tool called Endnote. Anytime you do online search, you can create a summary note. Rubistar is a great tool to create an evaluation/grading rubric. If you ever need to create a rubric to evaluate products or processes, it is a great and easy to use free tool.

• Netvibes - personalized dashboard publishing platform for the Web
• Page Flakes - social personalized homepage
• Protopage and iGoogle also allow personalized homepage
• Zotero - A tool that helps gather, organize, and analyze sources and then share the results of your research
• Rubistar - A free evaluation rubric builder with a search feature

W3 Reaction Paper (due Feb 3, as comments)

For the past two weeks, we have reviewed major trends and issues, such as learning 2.0, trends in education and society, and online rights and safety. Those topics were to answer the question of WHY before we move onto what and how.

The following questions do not have any right or wrong answers; however, you should avoid naïve or over/rosy-generalizations. Your response should be about half a page (200-300 words). Discussing with others is fine, but your answer must be unique and any opinions or generalizations much be backed up by relevant materials and resources that you will include at the end of your response (resources do not count towards your 300-400 words). Reviewing related materials can greatly help. Make sure to address each questions concisely but thoroughly:

1. What is your perception/knowledge of the Web as teaching (or learning) tools now and how has it changed since this course began?
2. Assume your colleagues or supervisors are skeptical and cautious about the proper use of information and resources on the web (especially regarding either safety or copyright). How will you resolve that challenge?

50 points total.

1. Clear and concise capturing of major benefits/strengths of the Web for teaching/learning (30%)
2. Use of relevant materials (minimum 2) to support views (30%)
3. Flow and cohesion (20%)
4. No naïve or over/rosy-generalizations (10%)
5. Accuracy of grammar and spelling (10%)

Submit your paper as a Comment to this blog post.

 

Example:

My understanding of the web as teaching tools is that tools, such as xxx are readily available for teachers to use in the classroom as well as outside the classroom. They can motivate students more with resources that show the application of contents, and engage students into active and reflective learning. For instance, Brown and Adler in their article, entitled Minds on Fire, show many web projects where teachers make the best use of resource-based, inquiry oriented, and cooperative learning environments. Unlike past teaching that heavily relies on textbook and knowledge transmission (as seen in Wesch’s video, Machine is Us/ing Us and Information R/evolution), web tools provide greater opportunities for students to search, share, and discuss related materials easily and publish work in view of audience outside the classroom.

Richardson (2009) also points out, work remains after the course and these artifacts can work as resources for future students as well as their portfolio that can grow over time… However, care must be taken for online safety (or identifies) because xxx indicates that students are using popular social networking tools with little parent or teacher guidance… Unless teachers pay attention to the issue of fair use and the existence of sources (can add related sources, such as Creative Commons) to support your view or as a resource), students may impinge on copyright without knowing or reinvent the same work ....

W3C1 Rights and Safety

Class discussion

Create a Google account (choose a login and password that is different from your university ones, and send your gmail address to hrdswon@gmail.com). The topic of online right and safety is thorny. Issues related can impact any individual and workplace substantially, and you will see many powerful arguments and evidence for using web 2.0 tools as well as against it. I believe, debates on whether the Web is safe for kids, or whether one should participate in Facebook or not, or whether companies must ban or monitor can completely miss the point. Any workplace must proactively plan, manage, evaluate, and improve practices of profiling/privacy and fair use/copyright when using web technologies. Don't forget to complete the reaction paper on trends and issues by 2/05 Su midnight by checking the next post.

1. Be aware online filter bubbles (Eli Pariser, TED 9 min)
2. In Defense of Open, Online Communication in Education by Jason Welker
3. The Online Amplification Effect by Margaret Soltan (many examples that show how stories can spread rapidly and affect individuals and workplaces)
4. Copyright-Friendly and Copyleft Images and Sound (Mostly!) for Use in Media Projects and Web Pages, Blogs, Wikis, etc. by joycevalenza - as an IDT major, if you want to share your work more with others or like to use their work properly, you must read this and also check the video on the top (3 min video)
5. Recut, Reframe,Recycle by the Center for Social Media at American University - Did you ever wonder about whether you can use commercial work in your video or school project? Check the short video on fair use (about 4-5 min)
6. Time to Get Scared, People? by Tony Hirst. Be sure to read the comments as well. (Google has an app that synchronizes friendship/network from several different applications.

Further resources

• Best practices for managing your online identity by claimID
• The complete guide to building a digital footprint by David Truss
• Unmasking the Digital Truth, a wiki by Wesley Fryer (exemplary laws/rules that administrators must know)
• Creative Commons & Educause’s 7 Things You Should Know About Creative Commons
• The Electronic Frontier Foundation
• Next Vista for Learning (free educational videos on various subjects)
• Firesheep should get your ATTENTION: Open Public Wifi Dangers are REAL by Wesley Fryer (includes laws and rules more than CIPA mentioned by Richardson)
• Nicole McClure and Joe Madaus will share with us the use of technology for universal design in instruction
• Admissions of Guilt by Terry Calhoun

W2C2 - Learning 2.0

Class discussion

#1~3 below illustrates emerging/promising practices and challenges surrounding education. #4 embodies the power of experiential and hands-on learning driven by authentic and relevant tasks.

1. Information R/evolution by Michael Wesch (under 6 minutes)
2. What is Web 2.0 by UTech (under 6 minutes)
3. Learning to change - Changing to learn (5 minutes)
4. From Knowledgeable to Knowledge-able: Learning in New Media Environments by Michael Wesch (15 min for reading plus a 20 minutes video inside the reading)

You will see that media always portray brighter pictures for technology, when the reality of tech integration for teaching/learning and impact is complex, dynamic, and disappointing. I claim, technology is only as good as the people behind it. People balk about something as the next killer application, much less discussed among practitioners is which instructional design and learning theories should apply to guide the use of media (because those two drive what people do with tech).

As/after you review these materials,we will discuss:

• What is learning at its core? How one should learn?
• How learning will become different because of the Internet?
• Should any workplace or school formalize web tools/services into curriculum?
• If you are an ID person or one with expertise in instructional technology, what are the implication of trends and issues reviewed by these materials?

* Week 3 reaction paper covers materials from weeks 2 and 3. After class discussion, you are welcome to leave a brief comment (which will count toward course blogging participation (I highly recommend watching the second and the third video below).

Further resources:

• A vision of 21st century teachers (under 5 minutes) - contrast this with a humorous video: 20th vs. 21st century teachers (1 min)
• How digital generation learns by Howard Gardner (5 min) 
• Khan Academy (educational videos, 20 minute TED talk)
• Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education (17 minute TED talk)
• 3 Steps for 21st Century Learning by Jackie Halaw (4 minutes) 
• Communities of practice by Mark K. Smith

W1 Course Introduction

For the course overview and expectations, you can check the syllabus handout.
This course blogging site will work as an archive of web materials used in the course. Per selected week, I will post a prompt for your blogging participation, which will work for your personal reflection as well as formative evaluation (e.g., suggestion, satisfaction, correction, etc.). Your comments can be brief, directed to the instructor’s post or others’ comments, and should address your positive or negative experiences, suggestions for improvement, and insights for improving any aspects of teaching and learning. The only criterion is, your comment must add 'substance' or 'meaning' to your learning or to the course.

The first prompt for you to comment is to share your personal attitudes and beliefs about web tools and services (e.g., whether they will truly change education or learning, whether it is another hype or passing trend, whether they must be used more for teaching and learning, etc). If there is a tool you already use for learning or sharing and you find it very beneficial, you can use your experience as evidence. Before class next week, check how others think of web tools for teaching and learning. There is no right or wrong answer - you can be honest!