Podcasts and wiki's and mashups...oh my. Mobile devices, multi-channel learning, and "mashups" of many technologies make the future of e-learning, in a word, exciting. One of the best parts of this course for me has been the opportunity to "play" with these emerging techs. In second life I learned that you can use virtual characters to represent teachers, coaches, and learners. I believe this may be the killer ap that breaks the curse of "educational games" Collaboration and social networking software like social text or edu 2.0 has moved e-learning from a model of instructor-led teaching of individuals to the more engaging learner-led finding, doing, and collaborating. Peer-to-peer technologies help users share resources and collaborate interactively in educational environments.
e-learning instructional designers and learners will be the great benefitters of these emerging and burgeoning trends.
Friday, May 15, 2009
User centered design
So how does one employ good user-centered design? According to Don Norman one should do the following.....
1. Use both knowledge in the world and in the head
2. Simplify the structure of tasks
3. Make things visible
4. Get the mappings right
5. Exploit the powers of constraints-Natural & Artificial
6. Design for Error
7. When all else fails, standardize
project management
Who would have guessed that one of the most mundane sounding topics would turn out to be the most interesting topic of the whole semester. First off, I was deeply surprised to hear you could be certified as a project manager. To me I always thought of project manager as a position one attained....like shift manager at a MickeyDees or something. I have a couple of engineer friends who have described themselves to me as project managers and I just assumed they rose to that elevated title b/c they were the most capable on the project. I still think that is the most logical pathway to the position but I now I have a better understanding of what's involved in the job....and I find it rather interesting in an odd way.
I couldn't help thinking how different things might have been if we had applied some of the principles of project management to the planning and building of our camp at burning man this year. An epic undertaking with no real project management to speak of.....in fact, a distinct desire for no "management" whatsoever. I believe our camp would have benefited greatly from some of the basic criteria of project management; not the least of which is the decompression/review session when the project is finished.
check out what it's like to have real project management at burning man.
I couldn't help thinking how different things might have been if we had applied some of the principles of project management to the planning and building of our camp at burning man this year. An epic undertaking with no real project management to speak of.....in fact, a distinct desire for no "management" whatsoever. I believe our camp would have benefited greatly from some of the basic criteria of project management; not the least of which is the decompression/review session when the project is finished.
check out what it's like to have real project management at burning man.
Digital learners.
I teach digital learners. I'm living with the reality of their adjusting to the shifting paradigm of their own learning environment. We are all struggling together to make sense of how we are going to use these "newfangled" yet somehow familiar tools. The blog, they twitter, we made a facebook page together for our chemistry class. The short attention span, "I can find a better explanation of this on the internet," generation are my peeps.
The most amazing thing I've seen that addresses this topic is the following video. I've seen a few different iterations but it never fails to amaze. It's more eloquent that I could ever be, so here it is......
Did you know 3.0
The most amazing thing I've seen that addresses this topic is the following video. I've seen a few different iterations but it never fails to amaze. It's more eloquent that I could ever be, so here it is......
Did you know 3.0
connectivism and cyclic learning.
Connectivism is most definitely an important theory (or is it a theory at all??) to consider in this web 2.0 class. According to Siemens himself, “Connectivism is a learning theory for the Digital Age” With connectivism, learning is a cycle in which the individual feeds info into the system...which feeds info back to the individual....who in turn feed in back into the system/network/cyberspace. It's all connected see !!! For connectivists, learning is a process that has a variety of shifting....sometimes rapidly shifting elements. Because of this fluidity and shifting nature of knowledge, it is of paramount importance that the learner be able to filter and evaluate content to determine validity, and to re-evauate prior decisions/beliefs based on updates to that knowledge base.
For me, a teacher, this is the most important learning theory (or is it?) that I've come across. The implications are pedagogy changing.......
The ability to learn/evaluate/incorporate new info is more important for students that memorizing what's currently known. The foundations of knowledge can change and it's important to be able to adapt one's personal knowledge base to accomodate this new info.
The ability to "connect" with information is more important than the information that is available
Students are able to learn by connecting to the information that is available and then build upon the information to form new knowledge which can then be shared back onto the network for other students to access......cyclical learning.
Information is in a constant flux. Learning can be enhanced thought the connection of a network and this “amplification of learning, knowledge and understanding through the extension of a personal network is the epitome of connectivism" (Siemens, 2004).
For me, a teacher, this is the most important learning theory (or is it?) that I've come across. The implications are pedagogy changing.......
The ability to learn/evaluate/incorporate new info is more important for students that memorizing what's currently known. The foundations of knowledge can change and it's important to be able to adapt one's personal knowledge base to accomodate this new info.
The ability to "connect" with information is more important than the information that is available
Students are able to learn by connecting to the information that is available and then build upon the information to form new knowledge which can then be shared back onto the network for other students to access......cyclical learning.
Information is in a constant flux. Learning can be enhanced thought the connection of a network and this “amplification of learning, knowledge and understanding through the extension of a personal network is the epitome of connectivism" (Siemens, 2004).
Thursday, May 14, 2009
presentations part deux
I really enjoyed this class too. It's just so amazing to see the diversity of projects that people come up with when given a basic prompt...."build something based in Web 2.0 tech"
As I've said before, I love Arl's project...it's what I want to do when I grow up. My goal is to build something similar for my school. My tech director is already excited and on board already. I just need to develop some skills.
Alex...cool as always. Only you would think to use prezi to jazz up your presentation. Do you ever sleep or do you just wander around the internet day and night finding interesting things.
Tai's idea is truly awesome...a fantastic idea to use Web 2.0 tech to develop a communal communication structure
Lance/Brian...Great concept...nicely done presentation. CMS in Joomla was interesting. I've checked out both Joomla and Drupal for my final project design. thanks for engaging in the debate.
tracy... I know you think we all know aboun ning but in reality it was great to see your presentation b/c it made me think about what I could do with it.
Diedre: loved your presentation on SEPAL. I am department chair in science at my school and I get a lot of mail from SEPAL. Your presentation will make me reconsider their offerings.
Andy. very quick and to the point. Nice idea tho. deserved more time b/c it's a deep concept.
Hai/Mindy. I can't believe the fight you are having to make this happen at your school. I wish you were at my school. Your ideas would be embraced.
Jeff....of jeff's balls fame...I think you should open a restaurant called Jeff's Balls...filling but not greasy. Fascinating idea to attempt an elearning project on language aquisition. I think you're right to focus on blended interaction b/c of the need to talk in front of others. Clear well put together presentation.
Marc: Oh wait...that's me. nevermind.
and so this blog ends....
As I've said before, I love Arl's project...it's what I want to do when I grow up. My goal is to build something similar for my school. My tech director is already excited and on board already. I just need to develop some skills.
Alex...cool as always. Only you would think to use prezi to jazz up your presentation. Do you ever sleep or do you just wander around the internet day and night finding interesting things.
Tai's idea is truly awesome...a fantastic idea to use Web 2.0 tech to develop a communal communication structure
Lance/Brian...Great concept...nicely done presentation. CMS in Joomla was interesting. I've checked out both Joomla and Drupal for my final project design. thanks for engaging in the debate.
tracy... I know you think we all know aboun ning but in reality it was great to see your presentation b/c it made me think about what I could do with it.
Diedre: loved your presentation on SEPAL. I am department chair in science at my school and I get a lot of mail from SEPAL. Your presentation will make me reconsider their offerings.
Andy. very quick and to the point. Nice idea tho. deserved more time b/c it's a deep concept.
Hai/Mindy. I can't believe the fight you are having to make this happen at your school. I wish you were at my school. Your ideas would be embraced.
Jeff....of jeff's balls fame...I think you should open a restaurant called Jeff's Balls...filling but not greasy. Fascinating idea to attempt an elearning project on language aquisition. I think you're right to focus on blended interaction b/c of the need to talk in front of others. Clear well put together presentation.
Marc: Oh wait...that's me. nevermind.
and so this blog ends....
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
First round of presentations
What a great class to finally see my fellow classmates present their stuff. I really enjoyed the round of discussion on privacy. It's a very big topic and the ramifications are only starting to be considered. Obviously it's more acute with minors, but adults using Web 2.0 tools indiscriminately are starting to feel the heat. Lot's of stories of mistakes being made, people getting fired for posting to facebook, students finding themselves under scrutiny for what they say online. Cyberbulling has led to suicide, students get their acct's hacked by other students, adolescent angst gets permanently codified. Alex's comment about netiquette was well made. I chatted with my students about it the next day and they said the rules change daily.
Web 2.0 is an evolving organism. New game, new rules, new paradigm. It's fun to be a part of it, or at least to sit on the side an deconstruct it as it's happening. Glad we didn't have cell phones or the internet when I was in high school.
Web 2.0 is an evolving organism. New game, new rules, new paradigm. It's fun to be a part of it, or at least to sit on the side an deconstruct it as it's happening. Glad we didn't have cell phones or the internet when I was in high school.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Design Critigue of edu 2.0
I checked this site out after Arl mentioned it one night and found it somewhat useful but not too exciting to look at. I haven't really had the opportunity to do much with it except sign up and check out the available resources. I still haven't created anything and submitted it to the site.
On Information: This site is designed for teachers and administrators to create simple learning management platforms. The reading level is appropriate for a college educated user. The graphics are minimal and limited to functional (as opposed to decorational) uses. It's not an overly detailed page...actually it's rather minimalist overall. There is a consistent cascading visual and textual style with each page...and with each page you add.
On Interactivity: Excellent orientation. Very easy and intuitive navigation with a simple tab interface a just a few icons for major functions. Information was easy to retrieve by search box or basic navigation. Great default help function that can be turned off when not needed.
On Screen Design: This is a very unnatractive design with awful color combinations of light blue and white with faded yellow tabs. Font is kind of greyish. As mentioned before, the layout is very simple and intuitive (albeit unnexciting) The resolution is good but the font is on the small side for older vision.
On Information: This site is designed for teachers and administrators to create simple learning management platforms. The reading level is appropriate for a college educated user. The graphics are minimal and limited to functional (as opposed to decorational) uses. It's not an overly detailed page...actually it's rather minimalist overall. There is a consistent cascading visual and textual style with each page...and with each page you add.
On Interactivity: Excellent orientation. Very easy and intuitive navigation with a simple tab interface a just a few icons for major functions. Information was easy to retrieve by search box or basic navigation. Great default help function that can be turned off when not needed.
On Screen Design: This is a very unnatractive design with awful color combinations of light blue and white with faded yellow tabs. Font is kind of greyish. As mentioned before, the layout is very simple and intuitive (albeit unnexciting) The resolution is good but the font is on the small side for older vision.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Pink is the new black
So....I asked Dr Foreman if I could do something a little different with this project. I was absent the day we picked teams and I felt I wanted to focus on my area of interest...classroom teaching. I was pretty moved and inspired by Pink's book. I must have chattered with everybody I know about his ideas. Even my students were inspired...one of them is now reading the book and he loves it.
What I found most powerful is that he defined some of the undefinable qualities of a great teacher with his six R-directed aptitudes. Very spot on in many ways.
I won't babble on here b/c I'm embarrassed to say that my podcast came in at about 15 minutes. I realize this is far longer than I was assigned but I'm sorry....it' didn't look like 15 minutes on paper. I don't expect to show it in class with the others.
If you have the time...feel free to check it out. I apologize in advance the ticking metronome in the background/foreground. I have done everything possible to turn it off but it is a malfunction of the software (garageband) It should not be audible in the playback...but it is nonetheless.
my podcast is here.......hopefully.
What I found most powerful is that he defined some of the undefinable qualities of a great teacher with his six R-directed aptitudes. Very spot on in many ways.
I won't babble on here b/c I'm embarrassed to say that my podcast came in at about 15 minutes. I realize this is far longer than I was assigned but I'm sorry....it' didn't look like 15 minutes on paper. I don't expect to show it in class with the others.
If you have the time...feel free to check it out. I apologize in advance the ticking metronome in the background/foreground. I have done everything possible to turn it off but it is a malfunction of the software (garageband) It should not be audible in the playback...but it is nonetheless.
my podcast is here.......hopefully.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Yuri's night
I won't be in class today b/c I'm going to an event at the academy of sciences in GG Park to celebrate the anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's historic flight into space. If you are American, you may not know that Comrade Gagarin was in fact the first man in space and the first to orbit the earth, almost a year before John Glenn.
Yuri's night link
Sorry to miss class but this is a big deal and a worldwide celebration....besides, its a great way to see the academy at night.
see ya'll next week.
Yuri's night link
Sorry to miss class but this is a big deal and a worldwide celebration....besides, its a great way to see the academy at night.
see ya'll next week.
Friday, April 3, 2009
Things I learned at the Web 2.0 conference
I couldn't take time off work to go to the presentations but I spent my thursday night classtime perusing the wares at the "booth crawl" Altho the way they were pouring beer it might be called the "booth stagger" for some folks. I myself grabbed an embossed pint mug from the ebay booth (still can't figure out what they were promoting) and I plan to post it for sale on ebay later today. Can't decide whether to post it as half full or half empty. Half full might get more buyers, half empty might get more positive feedback responses (for my honesty as a seller) Tough choice. Here's what I learned.......
Hella schwagg...so bring a bag.
Big booth = big beer...Lotsa free beer but no free puppies as far as I could tell.
crackberry's still outnumber iphonaddicts among geekazoids. Tight polo shirt with tech logo = blackberry. Tight suit with no tie = iphone. High heels = blackberry. Clogs = iphone.
Posing the question; "but how can this be used for educational purposes?" will often stump the booth jockey.
Social networking is the new black. I did some "research" and at this time there are approximately 27, 468 social networking sites. ( I can't divulge my research methodology b/c the algorithm is a trade secret between me and google) I myself am starting a new social network site called YoUrSpace. (this word is trademarked so don't even think of stealing it) It's your space..just for you..no one else can link to it, RSS feed from it, comment on it, or find it in any web searches. It's a place to put YoUrStuff (also trademarked so back off) your pics, your embarrassing video's, your offshore bank accounts, your extensive porn collection. It's private....it's YoUrSpace. I'm gonna be rich!!!!
No seriously, everyone is jumping on the social network bandwagon and your current social network stored stuff is referred to as assets. New sites are appearing that centralize the experience. In class I presented the browser Flock b/c it's a great way to centralize access to all your other accts (facebook, digg, de.li.cious, etc) but these new interfaces are the actual environment themselves. You never actually have to log into any other location. At nomee.com you create a user identity that you upload directly to and it feeds to any other site you want to update. Load pics to nomee, they are stored in your flicker acct. Create an album in nomee, your facebook acct gets a similar album. write an update to your blog in nomee, it loads onto your blogspot....you get the picture. This is definitely the next step. The buzzword seems to be social operating system, but I think that overstates the capabilities a little. Nonetheless, an interesting next step. Collaboration, integration with existing apps and assets, unlimited storage, no branding, no ads, and all open source seemed to be the overiding theme to the event. Sadly, education was not well represented. Like education games, education web 2.0 seems to be an area that's avoided by developers. Then again, that leaves room for those of us in itec to fill a niche.
My fave booths...besides the ones serving beer...were
Adobe. Adobe has an amazing 3-D thing they can do in flash. Actually it's more of a hologram effect but I was impressed by it. I couldn't help thinking how engaging this could be for a science application. Here's a demo on GE's website. You need acces to your printer to make it work.
Hologram
Maybe it's not new to you, but it was for me.
Another fave was any booth using microsoft surface technology. It's a pricey piece of hardware (10k for developers, 15K for you and me ) but you can see that it's the interactive surface that our grandkids will use. I remember it was 10K for a 50 inch plasma screen in 2004, yesterday I saw a guy in san jose selling his 55 inch screen LCD for $500. We went from chalkboard to whiteboard to smartboard and the next step should be this type of interactive board.
Here's some video's of the table. vids
Hella schwagg...so bring a bag.
Big booth = big beer...Lotsa free beer but no free puppies as far as I could tell.
crackberry's still outnumber iphonaddicts among geekazoids. Tight polo shirt with tech logo = blackberry. Tight suit with no tie = iphone. High heels = blackberry. Clogs = iphone.
Posing the question; "but how can this be used for educational purposes?" will often stump the booth jockey.
Social networking is the new black. I did some "research" and at this time there are approximately 27, 468 social networking sites. ( I can't divulge my research methodology b/c the algorithm is a trade secret between me and google) I myself am starting a new social network site called YoUrSpace. (this word is trademarked so don't even think of stealing it) It's your space..just for you..no one else can link to it, RSS feed from it, comment on it, or find it in any web searches. It's a place to put YoUrStuff (also trademarked so back off) your pics, your embarrassing video's, your offshore bank accounts, your extensive porn collection. It's private....it's YoUrSpace. I'm gonna be rich!!!!
No seriously, everyone is jumping on the social network bandwagon and your current social network stored stuff is referred to as assets. New sites are appearing that centralize the experience. In class I presented the browser Flock b/c it's a great way to centralize access to all your other accts (facebook, digg, de.li.cious, etc) but these new interfaces are the actual environment themselves. You never actually have to log into any other location. At nomee.com you create a user identity that you upload directly to and it feeds to any other site you want to update. Load pics to nomee, they are stored in your flicker acct. Create an album in nomee, your facebook acct gets a similar album. write an update to your blog in nomee, it loads onto your blogspot....you get the picture. This is definitely the next step. The buzzword seems to be social operating system, but I think that overstates the capabilities a little. Nonetheless, an interesting next step. Collaboration, integration with existing apps and assets, unlimited storage, no branding, no ads, and all open source seemed to be the overiding theme to the event. Sadly, education was not well represented. Like education games, education web 2.0 seems to be an area that's avoided by developers. Then again, that leaves room for those of us in itec to fill a niche.
My fave booths...besides the ones serving beer...were
Adobe. Adobe has an amazing 3-D thing they can do in flash. Actually it's more of a hologram effect but I was impressed by it. I couldn't help thinking how engaging this could be for a science application. Here's a demo on GE's website. You need acces to your printer to make it work.
Hologram
Maybe it's not new to you, but it was for me.
Another fave was any booth using microsoft surface technology. It's a pricey piece of hardware (10k for developers, 15K for you and me ) but you can see that it's the interactive surface that our grandkids will use. I remember it was 10K for a 50 inch plasma screen in 2004, yesterday I saw a guy in san jose selling his 55 inch screen LCD for $500. We went from chalkboard to whiteboard to smartboard and the next step should be this type of interactive board.
Here's some video's of the table. vids
Saturday, March 21, 2009
LMS and CMS
I really enjoyed this "expert" discussion and I'm bubbling with ideas about what my final itec project will be. I'm definitely going to start becoming my own expert on Drupal, Ed 2.0, moodle etc so that I can design a learning management system for my classes. I didn't have this project until last thursday nite so I'm indebted to our experts for their very informative presentation.
Which brings up a problem. As we move forward into new territory, can the itec program keep up? This year I've been taking seminar classes but next year it's about skill development. I tentatively plan to take dreamweaver and flash classes but I'm increasingly seeing that I need these skills less and less as web 2.0 develops. I started the program with a goal to create an awesome educational website so dreamweaver and flash made sense, but now I'm leaning more toward modifying something like drupal or moodle to create a learning management system. Where will I develop these skills. Sure..I can do my own research, join a user group, troll the forums and blogs for useful tidbits, but I only have so much free time and I can't both spend my monday/thursday evenings in a classroom (and my weekends doing homework for those classes) AND develop these outside skill sets. I'm burning candles at both ends already.
Perhaps the itec program can take a page out of it's own book and allow us to take elearning courses offered elsewhere and apply them as classes toward our degree? Of course, this brings up a money issue. Clearly sf state will want there $1500 a semester AND the elearning course will want tuition too!! I can't afford both on a teachers salary.
clearly a connundrum I must address..............but not today.
Which brings up a problem. As we move forward into new territory, can the itec program keep up? This year I've been taking seminar classes but next year it's about skill development. I tentatively plan to take dreamweaver and flash classes but I'm increasingly seeing that I need these skills less and less as web 2.0 develops. I started the program with a goal to create an awesome educational website so dreamweaver and flash made sense, but now I'm leaning more toward modifying something like drupal or moodle to create a learning management system. Where will I develop these skills. Sure..I can do my own research, join a user group, troll the forums and blogs for useful tidbits, but I only have so much free time and I can't both spend my monday/thursday evenings in a classroom (and my weekends doing homework for those classes) AND develop these outside skill sets. I'm burning candles at both ends already.
Perhaps the itec program can take a page out of it's own book and allow us to take elearning courses offered elsewhere and apply them as classes toward our degree? Of course, this brings up a money issue. Clearly sf state will want there $1500 a semester AND the elearning course will want tuition too!! I can't afford both on a teachers salary.
clearly a connundrum I must address..............but not today.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
podcasting...part deux
Good gravy!!! It apparently worked. Well whattaya know. I apologize for the length of the podcast. but I was trying to include as many of my classmates as possible while keeping it coherent.
podcasting
last week we were assigned this podcast to make on Doc Wagners visit. The goal was to cut up and splice together our recorded reflections and then post the finished product to this blog. I worked with garageband and found it relatively easy to use since I've used apple's imovie before. It was fun to add images to. However, I got stuck on the sharing function. My first effort to share to itunes seemed to be a closed loop since nowhere on this blog does it allow for uploading from itunes. Next try was to upload to iweb. Somehow, I've now created a web page with my podcast as the only content..rather embarrasing. Now I will try to link that web page to this blog. Wish me luck!!
My podcast should appear here
My podcast should appear here
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
podcast block
So I'm having such a difficult time with this assignment and it's not for lack of enthusiasm. I tried to start yesterday and found myself merely repeating what I wrote in my previous post but in a very contrived Q/A format. I just tried again but it doesn't feel right. I wouldn't mind doing an actual podcast sometime but this is not the way to do if....at least for me. Since the goal of the exercise is to apply some of Doc Wagners ideas to learning, I think I will attempt to focus on that and avoid the formatting efforts that are hampering my flow of ideas. (I sound like I'm conceptually constipated)
The topic that I would like to expand upon is the concept of the metaverse. Dr Wagner talked about how Web 3.0 was the 3-D web combined with the web of things. I find this so freaking fascinating. The metaverse is a phrase coined by Neil Stephenson in his book SnowCrash. (btw. that's the second time in this course my favorite cyberpunk writer has been mentioned. His follow up book, The Diamond Age, was referenced in one of our readings.....find his books and read them..they're great) The metaverse refers to an online universe; a sort of parallel world that exists alongside our meat universe. At the time it was far fetched but it's clear she thinks this is a future reality.
At this time, the best examples of this metaverse are massive multiplayer games like World of Warcraft or EverQuest (know as EverCrack b/c of it's addictive nature) and the increasingly popular virtual reality world known as Second Life. While WOW lets you fight trollls and collect gold, Second Life is about networking and simple social interaction (carrying a sword and beheading people you meet in SL is frowned upon) WOW creates a virtual imaginary world, SL creates a virtual real world. People do mundane things in SL. They attend concerts, go on virtual hikes, watch sunsets (there's a beautiful sunset every 4 hours in SL) bu they do them...together. SL is a social virtual world, poeple log on to socialize with other people. Learning is a social function. I think it was the constructivists who first said that, but if you teach, you know it's a truism. SL is a starting point for virtual learning.....it's happening already.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency has a 12 x 20 meter virtual island in Second Life that is a giant weather map of the U.S.A. Satelite weather data is fed into SL and constantly updates this virtual 3-D represantation of our nations weather. Students studying weather at University of Colorado can actually walk and fly around "IN" this virtual weather. It's a fully emmersive way to learn a topic. Nearby in the SL universe is another fun learning environment. At the International Spaceflight Museum, visitors can fly alongside life-size rockets, from the huge Apollo-era Saturn V to a prototype of the Ares V, one of the launch vehicles NASA hopes to use to send Americans back to the moon. They can fly alongside satelites or travel around our solar system examining planets. You like tennis? If so, just stroll a virtual tennis court inside Second Life and examine the paths of every serve and volley of a Wimbledon match in progress, reproduced by IBM in close to real time (youtube) Recently, the author of the comic strip Dilbert did a virtual book tour all within the SL world.
This is all cool..........but it's not the metaverse. Yes you can fly around mars, but these are still clunky, pixilated worlds in which you converse in chat form. But that will change...it already is. These social virtual worlds (and there are others besides SL) are incorporating more and more real-world data into their online universe. They become richer by the day.
Now lets think about google earth. Is there ever a week in this class when the ubiquitous G isn't referenced in some way. Google Earth is a "virtual globe" Virtual globes and their 2-D counterparts, Web maps, are getting more personal and immersive. This personalization has been referred to as "neogeography" and it's an explosion of user created content from travel photos, to sketchup representations of landmarks, to simple anecdotal reports, annotated to locations on this virtual globe. A trip to virtual Paris on google earth includes a bunch of information added by folks actually been to Paris. This layering of information is tranforming google earth from a virtual glove to 3-D wikipedia. In my opinion this is the first map of the metaverse. Base maps are just a reference point but these metaverse maps will include reviews, opinions, photos and anything else that we want to add. I can easily imagine a geography class visiting the pyramids via google earth and then exploring all the content at the location. Why not? In a real example, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum worked with google to create a layer that highlights the locations of villiages in Sudan that had been destroyed by the janjaweed. Close up views show destroyed homes and pop-up boxes contain testimony from survivors and some truly horrific photos. Now that's a learning tool. Berlin recently created a full 3-D representation of the cities infrastructure..all within a layer of google earth. You can actually walk right into the Reichstag and into the parliamentary chambers.
While the source code for both these environments is still tightly controlled by their respective owners, programmers can build any auxillary applications they choose....that's what makes both of these worlds so rich...people can build in them, and build out from them. Many folks are talking about a "mash-up" of google earth and second life; ostensibly called, Second Earth. Imagine combining Googles immersive 3-D data with Second life's immersive world...it's within this type of mashup that the metaverse will be born. Pundits predict that within the next 20 years...about the same time it took for the Web to get off the ground floor...this type of metaverse experience will be the standard way in which we think of going online. Today we visit a web site to shop for xmas presents, tomorrow we walk our avatars into an virtual store and inspect the merchandise. Wild huh!!
What set's this metaverse apart from the virtual world of something like WOW or SL is that it will actually be a mirror-world of our world. You can imagine it almost as a data filled, form-fitting net flowing over and around our own real world. And this is where Dr Wagners "Internet of things" concept comes in. As more and more objects input data into this web of information we construct a richer and richer mirror of our world. GPS is virtually ubiquitous, and I can download an iphone app that lets my friends know exactly where I am at all times (why I would ever want to do that is beyond me) so you can see that this tapestry is already being woven. As "things" are developed that send more and more information out into this mirror world, the image will start to gain resolution.........it will become a 3-D internet.
Fantasy worlds like WOW and Second Life won't dissapear (they'll get better) but a new type of "non-fiction" virtual reality will emerge that will become as all pervasive as the 2-D internet has become. Don't believe me! The tech research firm Gartner (authors of the now famous Gartner Hype cycle) predict that by the end of 2011 80% of internet user and Fortune 500 companies will participate in some form of virtual world environment like Second Life. The NOAA created it's Island as a kind of educational amusement park; Weather World, but dozens of hard core businesses are setting up shop in Second Life....including Big Blue (IBM) Caldwell Banker opened a real-estate brokerage where new second life residents can purchase virtual homes. Starwood Hotels constructed virtual prototypes of real hotels they plan to build and used suggestions from SL visitors into the final construction designs. You can download layers for most major U.S. airports that track all commercial flights in and out.
So the concept of combining SL and google earth into a Second Earth hybrid mashup is hella cool on it's own, combine that with a whole bunch of sensors around the real world feeding in real-time visuals, real-time atmospherics, the latest traffic situation, how much of your favorite beer is avialable in your local corner store, and you've got a transformative mirror world metaverse experience. Now make the metaverse accessible to all and you have a place where a teacher can teach anything, to anyone, at any time.
That's my podcast for this week.
The topic that I would like to expand upon is the concept of the metaverse. Dr Wagner talked about how Web 3.0 was the 3-D web combined with the web of things. I find this so freaking fascinating. The metaverse is a phrase coined by Neil Stephenson in his book SnowCrash. (btw. that's the second time in this course my favorite cyberpunk writer has been mentioned. His follow up book, The Diamond Age, was referenced in one of our readings.....find his books and read them..they're great) The metaverse refers to an online universe; a sort of parallel world that exists alongside our meat universe. At the time it was far fetched but it's clear she thinks this is a future reality.
At this time, the best examples of this metaverse are massive multiplayer games like World of Warcraft or EverQuest (know as EverCrack b/c of it's addictive nature) and the increasingly popular virtual reality world known as Second Life. While WOW lets you fight trollls and collect gold, Second Life is about networking and simple social interaction (carrying a sword and beheading people you meet in SL is frowned upon) WOW creates a virtual imaginary world, SL creates a virtual real world. People do mundane things in SL. They attend concerts, go on virtual hikes, watch sunsets (there's a beautiful sunset every 4 hours in SL) bu they do them...together. SL is a social virtual world, poeple log on to socialize with other people. Learning is a social function. I think it was the constructivists who first said that, but if you teach, you know it's a truism. SL is a starting point for virtual learning.....it's happening already.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency has a 12 x 20 meter virtual island in Second Life that is a giant weather map of the U.S.A. Satelite weather data is fed into SL and constantly updates this virtual 3-D represantation of our nations weather. Students studying weather at University of Colorado can actually walk and fly around "IN" this virtual weather. It's a fully emmersive way to learn a topic. Nearby in the SL universe is another fun learning environment. At the International Spaceflight Museum, visitors can fly alongside life-size rockets, from the huge Apollo-era Saturn V to a prototype of the Ares V, one of the launch vehicles NASA hopes to use to send Americans back to the moon. They can fly alongside satelites or travel around our solar system examining planets. You like tennis? If so, just stroll a virtual tennis court inside Second Life and examine the paths of every serve and volley of a Wimbledon match in progress, reproduced by IBM in close to real time (youtube) Recently, the author of the comic strip Dilbert did a virtual book tour all within the SL world.
This is all cool..........but it's not the metaverse. Yes you can fly around mars, but these are still clunky, pixilated worlds in which you converse in chat form. But that will change...it already is. These social virtual worlds (and there are others besides SL) are incorporating more and more real-world data into their online universe. They become richer by the day.
Now lets think about google earth. Is there ever a week in this class when the ubiquitous G isn't referenced in some way. Google Earth is a "virtual globe" Virtual globes and their 2-D counterparts, Web maps, are getting more personal and immersive. This personalization has been referred to as "neogeography" and it's an explosion of user created content from travel photos, to sketchup representations of landmarks, to simple anecdotal reports, annotated to locations on this virtual globe. A trip to virtual Paris on google earth includes a bunch of information added by folks actually been to Paris. This layering of information is tranforming google earth from a virtual glove to 3-D wikipedia. In my opinion this is the first map of the metaverse. Base maps are just a reference point but these metaverse maps will include reviews, opinions, photos and anything else that we want to add. I can easily imagine a geography class visiting the pyramids via google earth and then exploring all the content at the location. Why not? In a real example, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum worked with google to create a layer that highlights the locations of villiages in Sudan that had been destroyed by the janjaweed. Close up views show destroyed homes and pop-up boxes contain testimony from survivors and some truly horrific photos. Now that's a learning tool. Berlin recently created a full 3-D representation of the cities infrastructure..all within a layer of google earth. You can actually walk right into the Reichstag and into the parliamentary chambers.
While the source code for both these environments is still tightly controlled by their respective owners, programmers can build any auxillary applications they choose....that's what makes both of these worlds so rich...people can build in them, and build out from them. Many folks are talking about a "mash-up" of google earth and second life; ostensibly called, Second Earth. Imagine combining Googles immersive 3-D data with Second life's immersive world...it's within this type of mashup that the metaverse will be born. Pundits predict that within the next 20 years...about the same time it took for the Web to get off the ground floor...this type of metaverse experience will be the standard way in which we think of going online. Today we visit a web site to shop for xmas presents, tomorrow we walk our avatars into an virtual store and inspect the merchandise. Wild huh!!
What set's this metaverse apart from the virtual world of something like WOW or SL is that it will actually be a mirror-world of our world. You can imagine it almost as a data filled, form-fitting net flowing over and around our own real world. And this is where Dr Wagners "Internet of things" concept comes in. As more and more objects input data into this web of information we construct a richer and richer mirror of our world. GPS is virtually ubiquitous, and I can download an iphone app that lets my friends know exactly where I am at all times (why I would ever want to do that is beyond me) so you can see that this tapestry is already being woven. As "things" are developed that send more and more information out into this mirror world, the image will start to gain resolution.........it will become a 3-D internet.
Fantasy worlds like WOW and Second Life won't dissapear (they'll get better) but a new type of "non-fiction" virtual reality will emerge that will become as all pervasive as the 2-D internet has become. Don't believe me! The tech research firm Gartner (authors of the now famous Gartner Hype cycle) predict that by the end of 2011 80% of internet user and Fortune 500 companies will participate in some form of virtual world environment like Second Life. The NOAA created it's Island as a kind of educational amusement park; Weather World, but dozens of hard core businesses are setting up shop in Second Life....including Big Blue (IBM) Caldwell Banker opened a real-estate brokerage where new second life residents can purchase virtual homes. Starwood Hotels constructed virtual prototypes of real hotels they plan to build and used suggestions from SL visitors into the final construction designs. You can download layers for most major U.S. airports that track all commercial flights in and out.
So the concept of combining SL and google earth into a Second Earth hybrid mashup is hella cool on it's own, combine that with a whole bunch of sensors around the real world feeding in real-time visuals, real-time atmospherics, the latest traffic situation, how much of your favorite beer is avialable in your local corner store, and you've got a transformative mirror world metaverse experience. Now make the metaverse accessible to all and you have a place where a teacher can teach anything, to anyone, at any time.
That's my podcast for this week.
Dr Wagner podcast
Tonight our guest is Dr Ellen Wagner. Dr Wagner is a Partner and Principal Analyst for Sage Road Solutions / Sonoma Partners. She is responsible for learning industry market trend research aggregation, trend analysis, forecasting and decision support. Welcome Dr Wagner.
Thank you...and I must admit you're far more handsome in person than your blog picture would indicate.
Oh my...So tell our listeners a little about yourself.
Well...originally my background was in academics. I got my PhD at University of Colorado in Boulder. My focus was on learning psychology. I taught at Northern Colorado University and was chair of the educational technology program. I left academia for the corporate world and eventually found myself the senior director of worldwide eLearning at Adobe Systems.
Why did you leave Adobe?
None of your business.
I can't do this......
Thank you...and I must admit you're far more handsome in person than your blog picture would indicate.
Oh my...So tell our listeners a little about yourself.
Well...originally my background was in academics. I got my PhD at University of Colorado in Boulder. My focus was on learning psychology. I taught at Northern Colorado University and was chair of the educational technology program. I left academia for the corporate world and eventually found myself the senior director of worldwide eLearning at Adobe Systems.
Why did you leave Adobe?
None of your business.
I can't do this......
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
Great conversation with Doc Wagner...and I'm enjoying following her blog. Good topics included the concept of "free beer" vs "free puppy" Both are "free" but one comes with "strings" attached. Free content management systems (or any kind of software) has hidden costs that must be considered; including limited functionality, security, and lack of support. On the other hand, these free puppies have open sourceware that allows them to be customized and often communities grow up around them. I'm not much of a techie but it's an interesting debate.
Another good topic was hype cycle as applied to tech. I love it. I recall the joy I got when I bought my iphone at the reduced price and outrage it engendered in the early adopters. In education I've seen lots of hype around technology...from probeware to smartboards. There is that initial trigger followed by that peak of inflated expectations. Laptops were going to transform writting in the classroom, but only writing can transform writing. In my chemistry class I've found probeware often removes students from the experiment and focuses entirely on recording data. You could say I'm in a trough of disillusionment regarding probeware. However, as I modify the poorly written probeware labs to better reflect the kind of teaching and learning I try to do I will enter that slope of enlightenment that will become the legacy of my probeware curriculum.
Then there's her take on Web 3.0....the 3D web. Right now she doesn't have much to base this on. Second life is really the only good example of learning taking place in a 3D (actually it's more 2D but lets say virtual) world. Limitations exist; The avatars are clumsy, the world is graphically poor compared to our world, but it's a start......and you can fly. Personally, I think Web 3.0 is the mash-up web. Things will start to cross polinate or cross platformate. This is where the free puppy pays off. People are already talking about a mashup of google earth and second life...second earth. These existing 3-D platforms let outside programmers build their own auxiliary applications (can you say mashup) within the virtual world. I read about a colorado professor using second life as a way to get his students "inside" the weather. At the international spaceflight museum, visitors can virtually fly alongside life sized rockets. It's only a matter of time before I meet my students in the metaverse classroom......'oh the places we will go"
Ok...now I've excited myself into a daydream. I think I'll work on my podcast for awhile
Another good topic was hype cycle as applied to tech. I love it. I recall the joy I got when I bought my iphone at the reduced price and outrage it engendered in the early adopters. In education I've seen lots of hype around technology...from probeware to smartboards. There is that initial trigger followed by that peak of inflated expectations. Laptops were going to transform writting in the classroom, but only writing can transform writing. In my chemistry class I've found probeware often removes students from the experiment and focuses entirely on recording data. You could say I'm in a trough of disillusionment regarding probeware. However, as I modify the poorly written probeware labs to better reflect the kind of teaching and learning I try to do I will enter that slope of enlightenment that will become the legacy of my probeware curriculum.
Then there's her take on Web 3.0....the 3D web. Right now she doesn't have much to base this on. Second life is really the only good example of learning taking place in a 3D (actually it's more 2D but lets say virtual) world. Limitations exist; The avatars are clumsy, the world is graphically poor compared to our world, but it's a start......and you can fly. Personally, I think Web 3.0 is the mash-up web. Things will start to cross polinate or cross platformate. This is where the free puppy pays off. People are already talking about a mashup of google earth and second life...second earth. These existing 3-D platforms let outside programmers build their own auxiliary applications (can you say mashup) within the virtual world. I read about a colorado professor using second life as a way to get his students "inside" the weather. At the international spaceflight museum, visitors can virtually fly alongside life sized rockets. It's only a matter of time before I meet my students in the metaverse classroom......'oh the places we will go"
Ok...now I've excited myself into a daydream. I think I'll work on my podcast for awhile
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Is that a terabyte of information in your pocket or are you just happy to see me.?
Bonks lecture was rapid fire but invigorating. One of the most enlightening things I learned was that the U.K. was an exceptionally "dodgy" place b/c of the rather bitey dogs. All kidding aside, the concept that anyone, can learn anything, from anyone, at anytime.....is what this class is really all about. I used voicethread to create a presentation on his WE ALL LEARN pneumonic (are caps really necessary) and it was an interesting exercise. I like the voice over aspect and I think it could be used by my students for classroom presentations. I decided to present his 10 big points in a "what can you do as a teacher" theme. It's posted right before this post...sadly, I couldnt' figure out how to embed them together.....next time.
On the whole the class was (as usual) pretty inspiring stuff....but an exceptionally bad powerpoint. Clearly Dr Bonk has ppt ADD. Each slide was filled with multiple graphical images and random odd noises. Combined with the constant chanting it tended to take away from the outrageous concept of the content. While his presentation left a lot to be desired (he should ask Al Gore for some ppt pointers) his ideas are powerful and well worth thinking about.
On the whole the class was (as usual) pretty inspiring stuff....but an exceptionally bad powerpoint. Clearly Dr Bonk has ppt ADD. Each slide was filled with multiple graphical images and random odd noises. Combined with the constant chanting it tended to take away from the outrageous concept of the content. While his presentation left a lot to be desired (he should ask Al Gore for some ppt pointers) his ideas are powerful and well worth thinking about.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Dang...lost my last post..but now I'm back and I've learned a few tricks
Sorry for the late blog but I've been on a "mini-break" to celebrate my 50th birthday. My gf surprised me with a party and I've been catching up with many folks I haven't seen in years. You would be proud tho. I spent a great deal of time at my party talking about web 2.0.
I thought I was on top of things when I started blogging in class last week (look ma..I'm multi-tasking) but then flock crashed and boom...I was gone. What's most interesting about this for me is the obstacles. I've been blogging from the flock browser directly into this blog and when it crashed...it took my most recent drafts with it. Took me a while to find my way back here. Love flock but it's not without some "issues"
Great class last time. I love the conversations we have in this class. Great thought...If you blog and no one reads it, are you really blogging? "What is the sound of one hand typing" I'm intensely private (my facebook is so locked down it's pointless) so the concept of someone reading this is actually uncomfortable for me...but.......at the same time it's fascinating to read others. I really should reply more often to what I read. No one likes a lurker.
Like the luddite I am, I just brought my info on my wiki site to class. It didn't occur to me to post my wiki site finds so here's one I like.
http://www.seven-oaks.net/ScienceEd2/pmwiki.php?n=Main.HomePage
There now...wasn't that interesting. It's a link to a science education wiki space called science education 2.0.
And this leads me to my topic of the week. The learning curve. Right now I'm stuck on a bunch of technical problems (or at least my Luddite version of a tech problem) with facebook and my blog. As an example, I don't like that link above. I want something more elegant looking. I won't go into my facebook issue. I find that I spend more time trying to figure stuff out than adding content. Next week I'm presenting the browser Flock. I've been working with it for a week or two and I'm frustrated that it's not doing the simple things I want it to do. From not being as open to incorporating things I want to do, to actually doing what it says it will do. The good news is there's tutorials online, but as we alluded to in an earlier discussion, you have to filter the good from the bad. some are poor quality, some are hard to follow, and some are just plain incorrect. It's a fun experiment tho. I've been trying to sign up for all the "services" aka feeds that Flock has but then I've run into tech issues there. I spent my lunch yesterday trying to get the crop picture function to work so that I could have a picture next to my acct. No big deal but a waste of 30mins of my life futzing with a defunctioning function. once again, it's an interesting experiment in patience and time management. (two of my least developed skills)
So last week was a blast. I really enjoyed the wiki presentation b/c I think of all the stuff I've seen so far, wiki spaces have the best (or at least the most obvious to me) application to education. I think the short story exercise we did in socialtext was bloody eye opening and I've talked about it with many teachers. The way you can monitor each draft and who contributes is a very strong assessment tool. btw. I would like to officially apologize to deidre for writing over her contribution. I simply cannot be trusted to not edit others. "My name is Marc, and I'm a control freak."
Same for the Emerging tech reading. So much good stuff in a short section of what appears to be a good book. Personally I found it a great overview of what we are studying and at first I thought..."why didn't we read this on day one so I'd know what all these things were?" but actually I'm glad I read it when I did b/c now my curiosity was already peeked and I was really happy to find odd stuff like SuprGlu and mashup's defined more clearly. What really blew me away was midway down page 13 they actually answer a big question we had at the beginning of this class. How does one determine validity, reliabilitya and potential bias with user generated content. They used ebay rating system as a model for rating validity. Profile can be dynamic and increase rating. High ratings = "trusted content provider" So obvious I don't know why we didn't see it.
My absolute favorite aspect of last weeks reading was the reference to Neil Stephenson's book, The Diamond Age. For those not familiar, in this book an engineer builds a "primer" that will act as a surrogate parent/educational tool for a young girl. It's interactive and changes based on her needs. There is so much more to the story but I've been thinking about it since we started this course. In the spirit of last weeks converstion, heres the wiki page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Diamond_Age
one last thing that was cool about last week was the yahoo pipe feed that Ethan showed us. With his assistance I hooked ya'll up via pipeline and now I can see everyones blog in a quick scroll. quick click and I can open you up. Very sweet application. Now I just need to find the time to read em all.
see ya in class.
socialtext
I felt he was a bit defensive about my questions but overall I enjoyed the class. I think social network environments have a lot of potential in education. I talked with students about it yesterday and many seemed excited (actually excited) at the idea of a facebook like network for a class in which students could turn to each other or the instructor for help outside of class. I envision having a feature similar to photo albums but instead of pics it would be loaded with the keys to homeworks from that section (each album could be a unit of instruction) Like facebook it would have a chat feature, posting, comments, feedback, the list is endless. I'm thinking strongly of following up on this.
Blogged with the Flock Browser
Saturday, February 14, 2009
I'm on fire
Ok..so I opened a crackbook account, a youtube account and I'm trying to organize all my stuff in flock right now.
this is my first blog post directly from flock
this is my first blog post directly from flock
Blogged with the Flock Browser
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
I'm frustrated
I'm frustrated that I'm struggling to add content and it's not working....specifically a video from youtube and I'm unclear on how to link other blogs to mine. I know it's a luddite moment on my part but it's frustrating nonetheless.
video. First off I'm pissed b/c I can't just simply link to the video like I would in an email. I quess it would look more elegant if I posted the video but both my upgrade to quicktime pro and my downloading of TubeTV are simply not working.
weblinks. These also seem to be impossible to just paste on the page. I'm sure it's my fault but it's making me crazy.
procrastination
OK...one thing I learned this week is don't wait to post on this blog. A few days ago I was jumping around linking to all sorts of interesting web 2.0 stuff but I didn't blog it immediately and now it's all lost to the ether. First thing I did was clink on all those links that are a mystery to me...digg, delicious, redditt, etc. I've always wondered "what's that all about?" and now I know...there all very similar to each other. Basically, a push rather than a pull of information. Sure some have minor differences, but that's the bottom line. Rather than search for content...they deliver. I like the concept in some ways but I also feel it elliminates some of the serendipity involved in just perusing the content of an online source. As an example, I would never set up a link for business news, but recently I've been clicking on the bzness page out of simple curiosity. Same with sports...every once in awhile something jumps out at me and I investigate. So...while I love all this rss feed type stuff, I still think there is some merit to the random perusal of open content.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Look Ma...I'm blogging
yippee yai yay kai yo..I'm up and running. I'm loving this class but I just missed a whole bunch that she said while setting this thing up. We need to become experts on something? Wonder what it was? She moves quick, which i suppose is sort of appropriate for this class. Web 2.0 moves hella fast...I'm just learning about it and it's already 3.0 time. I know, it's just a semantic game but a frantic game nonetheless. I must admit I'm a little excited to actually be learning something that seems quite useful for a change. I love the combination of cultural anthropology and social technology that this program seems to be. I really enjoyed the "what do you think Web 2.0 is?" game and I'm glad we did it. I usually hate those poster exercises but that was a useful overview and it helped to point out the vagueness of the term. I realize I'm no more in the dark or illuminated about this concept than anyone else around me. And I really enjoyed the "cynic" in our group. His "don't believe the hype" perspective was an interesting take on the whole thing.
As always, my goal with this program is to become a better teacher. If it can help me reach my crackbooked, myspaced, students then it is time well spent. If it changes the paradigm of my classroom, then it is the best use of my time possible.
And thats the end of my first blog entry ever.
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