Just in case you're curious...
Random readings in philosophy and physics brought LaPlace's Demon to my attention. Simply put
"In the history of science, Laplace's demon is a hypothetical "demon" envisioned in 1814 by Pierre-Simon Laplace such that if it knew the precise location and momentum of every atom in the universe then it could use Newton's laws to reveal the entire course of cosmic events, past and future."
(from "LaPlace's Demon" on Wikipedia)
The existence of both the ability and such a being is both terrifying and oddly appealing. I'm not so sure that I'd want that much knowledge...or the responsibilty and dread that would accompany it.
Monday, June 01, 2009
We learn better together
I just attended a celebration to commemorate a year's worth of success in our campus mentoring program. Individuals who are dedicated to improving teaching have worked diligently to assist both experienced and inexperienced instructors in refining their craft and supporting students. These are skills that can't be learned from a book, and working in the isolation of the classroom with only periodic student evaluations can't possibly provide the feedback to drive improvement. It must by dialogic, it must be reflective, and it must be directed at figuring out what makes the greatest difference for student achievement.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
Riding on the coattails...
Being a busy sort of guy, I haven't checked in here in some time. Oh, my intentions were good, but the amount of unemcumbered time on my schedule is getting mighty scarce. Some things must simply go...checking in was one of them.
Those who blog on a regular basis have already experienced that about which I choose to write. I checked my email and realized that some ill-meaning leeches chose to take advantage of the fact that my blog allows comments. I had thought that something I had to say here might be of sufficient interest justify a post. Instead of pithy, meaningful comments related to my posts, I found ads promoting someone's distance learning scheme. I have decided to turn off the comments feature, and I'll have to think long and hard before I turn it on again.
It's a pity, too. I was hoping to stimulate some intelligent conversation. Thanks a lot, folks. What worries me most about the people who do such things is that they attempt to invalidate the medium as a means of expression by posting their cyber grafitti. I do not wish to be associated with them.
Okay, I'm through ranting now. Please return to your regularly-scheduled life. Thanks for listening.
Those who blog on a regular basis have already experienced that about which I choose to write. I checked my email and realized that some ill-meaning leeches chose to take advantage of the fact that my blog allows comments. I had thought that something I had to say here might be of sufficient interest justify a post. Instead of pithy, meaningful comments related to my posts, I found ads promoting someone's distance learning scheme. I have decided to turn off the comments feature, and I'll have to think long and hard before I turn it on again.
It's a pity, too. I was hoping to stimulate some intelligent conversation. Thanks a lot, folks. What worries me most about the people who do such things is that they attempt to invalidate the medium as a means of expression by posting their cyber grafitti. I do not wish to be associated with them.
Okay, I'm through ranting now. Please return to your regularly-scheduled life. Thanks for listening.
Wednesday, March 29, 2006
Looking at Learning through the Group's Eyes
As I write this, I am vacationing with family in the Rockies, about 10 miles from Beavercreek, and maybe 18 miles down-valley from Vail. Because I didn't get out of the dot-com business by way of golden parachute, it is fortunate that I actually have family that lives in the area. It certainly makes accomodations more affordable, but it still requires teamwork and collaboration/cooperation on the part of many to make a seemingly-uncomplicated trip such as this a reality.
I reflected on this while enjoying a ride up to the Vail Valley by way of the most-excellent Colorado Mountain Express, a shuttle service that is comfortable, swift, and convenient. Prior to climbing on board, my wife and I flew in to Denver via Alaska Airlines. In order to get to PDX, we bummed a ride off of my step-son who, surprisingly, was more than happy to arise at 4:30 in the morning in order to get us to the airport in plenty of time for out 6:40 departure. Now that we're in the Valley, we're collaborating and cooperating with family as we share outings and child care. Overall, it works just fine.
Teamwork. It's what made this trip work. It's also hugely important for student success. This is especially true for older students who may have had a less than stellar experience in school at an earlier time, or for those who are returning to school after a prolonged absence. Indeed, it seems to be especially helpful for students who are facing the need to integrate computer technology into their professional lives...sometimes after systematically avoiding it for years. Yes sir, there's nothing quite like a mandate from above to motivate behavior. Stick or carrot? Maybe both??
I have noticed that students often learn best from other students. "Duh, Dan!" I hear some of you say. But as intuitive as this sounds, there are still plenty of instructors out there who focus on driving through content, requiring that students learn things in one way, and strongly sanctioning any collaboration. I have met some instructors who insist on teaching four different ways to copy and paste during the same lesson in Word. Confusing? Obviously not for the instructor, but probably for the student who just wandered through the door with a requirement to upgrade some skills. "Just give them all the ways they can do a certain thing, then let them choose," one of my former colleagues insisted. Choice is good, and constraining students harms them in some way which I have yet to understand or even discover.
No, I would reply. It's probably better to help them learn one approach to solving a technology problem well, then work in a supportive atmosphere on educationally-valid assignments tied to their area of responibility. Make the learning relevant, and let the students feel free to clarify and amplify as they collaborate. This may sound like I'm abdicating my responsibility as an instructor, but it's exactly the opposite. Years of teaching students from 7 to 70 have taught me that after I have patiently explained something three radically different ways, the best way to clarify the situation is for another student to chime in and elucidate. Why? I'm glad you asked.
Most students haven't plowed years of their lives into learning and teaching applications. Similarly, most students don't seize upon the mission of spreading the good news about instructional technology in quite the same way we TechnoZealots do. Stands to reason, then, that they will approach the topic with a beginner's eye and will see the little stumbling blocks we old war horses may miss. Interestingly enough, I'm comfortable with this, and, if you teach, you should be, too.
About 9 weeks ago, one of my very bright students (VBSs--we all have them, but my very bright students ARE much brighter than your very bright students) was helping one of my more junior students (JS) deal with a problem with a certain HTML tag when I floated past on one of my 200+ trips around the room during a typical 3-hour class. When I approached, VBS suddenly jerked back and stopped talking to JS. I was surprised, commented that her ideas were welcome, and that I didn't have a problem with her helping out JS. I then asked VBS why she had reacted as she had. Her reply caught me off guard, then caused me to mull the point for some time (approximately 9 weeks, or so it would seem). It appears that she was corrected by not one but several instructors in the past who felt that they were the only legitimate source of knowledge. Her input, they told her, was best used on her own assignments. Students should do their own work.
Well, maybe, especially when we're building foundational concepts. Let's face it: there are some things you just gotta know. Rote doesn't do it, and having someone else do the work doesn't help. However, using a more collaborative approach (informally here, obviously) can pay tremendous benefits in terms of clarity and speed. Further, as much as I would like to be known as the person with the answers, I'm not sure that I want to stand up to that level of pressure. I really don't have a problem with a student coming up with a clearer way of doing something; indeed, I may look at something from a point of view so substantially different that I don't understand that which an individual student is facing. At this point, we need to do what is necessary to help the student learn. One way to do this is to tap into the power of the group. We are stronger learning together, because no one has all the answers...no matter what the sages on the stage may want you to believe.
I reflected on this while enjoying a ride up to the Vail Valley by way of the most-excellent Colorado Mountain Express, a shuttle service that is comfortable, swift, and convenient. Prior to climbing on board, my wife and I flew in to Denver via Alaska Airlines. In order to get to PDX, we bummed a ride off of my step-son who, surprisingly, was more than happy to arise at 4:30 in the morning in order to get us to the airport in plenty of time for out 6:40 departure. Now that we're in the Valley, we're collaborating and cooperating with family as we share outings and child care. Overall, it works just fine.
Teamwork. It's what made this trip work. It's also hugely important for student success. This is especially true for older students who may have had a less than stellar experience in school at an earlier time, or for those who are returning to school after a prolonged absence. Indeed, it seems to be especially helpful for students who are facing the need to integrate computer technology into their professional lives...sometimes after systematically avoiding it for years. Yes sir, there's nothing quite like a mandate from above to motivate behavior. Stick or carrot? Maybe both??
I have noticed that students often learn best from other students. "Duh, Dan!" I hear some of you say. But as intuitive as this sounds, there are still plenty of instructors out there who focus on driving through content, requiring that students learn things in one way, and strongly sanctioning any collaboration. I have met some instructors who insist on teaching four different ways to copy and paste during the same lesson in Word. Confusing? Obviously not for the instructor, but probably for the student who just wandered through the door with a requirement to upgrade some skills. "Just give them all the ways they can do a certain thing, then let them choose," one of my former colleagues insisted. Choice is good, and constraining students harms them in some way which I have yet to understand or even discover.
No, I would reply. It's probably better to help them learn one approach to solving a technology problem well, then work in a supportive atmosphere on educationally-valid assignments tied to their area of responibility. Make the learning relevant, and let the students feel free to clarify and amplify as they collaborate. This may sound like I'm abdicating my responsibility as an instructor, but it's exactly the opposite. Years of teaching students from 7 to 70 have taught me that after I have patiently explained something three radically different ways, the best way to clarify the situation is for another student to chime in and elucidate. Why? I'm glad you asked.
Most students haven't plowed years of their lives into learning and teaching applications. Similarly, most students don't seize upon the mission of spreading the good news about instructional technology in quite the same way we TechnoZealots do. Stands to reason, then, that they will approach the topic with a beginner's eye and will see the little stumbling blocks we old war horses may miss. Interestingly enough, I'm comfortable with this, and, if you teach, you should be, too.
About 9 weeks ago, one of my very bright students (VBSs--we all have them, but my very bright students ARE much brighter than your very bright students) was helping one of my more junior students (JS) deal with a problem with a certain HTML tag when I floated past on one of my 200+ trips around the room during a typical 3-hour class. When I approached, VBS suddenly jerked back and stopped talking to JS. I was surprised, commented that her ideas were welcome, and that I didn't have a problem with her helping out JS. I then asked VBS why she had reacted as she had. Her reply caught me off guard, then caused me to mull the point for some time (approximately 9 weeks, or so it would seem). It appears that she was corrected by not one but several instructors in the past who felt that they were the only legitimate source of knowledge. Her input, they told her, was best used on her own assignments. Students should do their own work.
Well, maybe, especially when we're building foundational concepts. Let's face it: there are some things you just gotta know. Rote doesn't do it, and having someone else do the work doesn't help. However, using a more collaborative approach (informally here, obviously) can pay tremendous benefits in terms of clarity and speed. Further, as much as I would like to be known as the person with the answers, I'm not sure that I want to stand up to that level of pressure. I really don't have a problem with a student coming up with a clearer way of doing something; indeed, I may look at something from a point of view so substantially different that I don't understand that which an individual student is facing. At this point, we need to do what is necessary to help the student learn. One way to do this is to tap into the power of the group. We are stronger learning together, because no one has all the answers...no matter what the sages on the stage may want you to believe.
Tuesday, March 21, 2006
Sleep Deprivation and the Student Experience
I surfed on over to CNN last night just to see what was going on. Although I often remark to my students that visiting news sites simply exposes me to the fact that the world is not always a nice place (something that the idealist in me would like to avoid, but that the realist has learned to place into some sort of context), I do it anyway in a search for "the answer", whatever that may be at the time.
On this particular visit, I read with great interest an entry in Anderson Cooper's 360 Blog. The post was by Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN Medical Correspondent, and he talked about his direct experience with sleep deprivation due to career and fatherhood. You can read his post here Dr. Gupta vividly described his experiences in a flight simulator under a state of sleep deprivation--a condition not entirely foreign to students, especially during this time of year. For those who are removed from realities of life in academe, it's almost spring break time (residents of Daytona Beach, lock up your children!). Prior to blasting off for some R & R, students must endure the pressures of finals, end of term projects, and the nagging questions surrounding the next term or academic year. In essence, it's time to make choices...and not necessarily under the best of circumstances.
I can't help but think that high-pressure, high stakes situations make it harder for people to work successfully with their technological tools. It would come as no surprise to me if, upon examining help desk logs and anecdotal information about the experiences of computer-using students, one could discern a significant up-tick in problems as students attempt to complete work ranging from final papers to Visual Basic projects. Add to this that a significant number of students now take classes online, and it would seem to present a situation in which technology could "fail" or "fight against" users at just the time when they need it most. Certainly, the ramifications are not a dire as driving or flying a plane when half asleep, but the frustration level must certainly affect perceptions about the transparency of technology and its role as a helpful tool. Time for research.
On this particular visit, I read with great interest an entry in Anderson Cooper's 360 Blog. The post was by Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN Medical Correspondent, and he talked about his direct experience with sleep deprivation due to career and fatherhood. You can read his post here Dr. Gupta vividly described his experiences in a flight simulator under a state of sleep deprivation--a condition not entirely foreign to students, especially during this time of year. For those who are removed from realities of life in academe, it's almost spring break time (residents of Daytona Beach, lock up your children!). Prior to blasting off for some R & R, students must endure the pressures of finals, end of term projects, and the nagging questions surrounding the next term or academic year. In essence, it's time to make choices...and not necessarily under the best of circumstances.
I can't help but think that high-pressure, high stakes situations make it harder for people to work successfully with their technological tools. It would come as no surprise to me if, upon examining help desk logs and anecdotal information about the experiences of computer-using students, one could discern a significant up-tick in problems as students attempt to complete work ranging from final papers to Visual Basic projects. Add to this that a significant number of students now take classes online, and it would seem to present a situation in which technology could "fail" or "fight against" users at just the time when they need it most. Certainly, the ramifications are not a dire as driving or flying a plane when half asleep, but the frustration level must certainly affect perceptions about the transparency of technology and its role as a helpful tool. Time for research.
Thursday, March 16, 2006
Reflections on Wifi-The Adventure
Lessons Learned
I consider myself to be a reasonably intelligent guy, but I have to admit that my recent trials and tribulations involving establishing a WLAN here at the Big House (as we affectionately refer to our home) took a bit more time and energy than I had hoped. Please understand that I'm not new to Wifi. I have established WLANs for friends/clients in the past, and I have enjoyed reasonable degrees of success. But bridging the distance between floors proved to be a problem. Turns out that setting matter...a great deal. I insist on securing my network, which includes assigning a static IP address for my WLAN card connection. All seemed to be going well, but my connection wouldn't persist much beyond 3 minutes. Finally, I learned at about 2:30 this morning that a valid DNS entry can be a beautiful thing. Honestly, I'm surprised that this little piece of reality slipped my mind (I know better, trust me...), but anything can go horribly wrong at an hour when most sane folks are sleeping. It is now 7:30 PM in the city, and I've had a pretty smooth ride since about 4:35.
I know, you gotta read the directions. Problem is, the directions were of absolutely no help whatsoever. Yes, both the quickstart guide and the product manual recommended various courses of action. The difficulty arose from the fact that the authors either assumed that I knew why they wanted me to follow a particular course, or that a seemingly endless series of nifty-neat screen shots took the place of some well-reasoned expository writing. The writing craft is not dead, nor should it be. This is especially true when instructions may be read by those who don't already know the secret handshake. C'mon folks, assume we're all idiots,and give us some user-friendly instructions. I've been playing with technology since the early 80's, and I can still use a hand every now and then.
I consider myself to be a reasonably intelligent guy, but I have to admit that my recent trials and tribulations involving establishing a WLAN here at the Big House (as we affectionately refer to our home) took a bit more time and energy than I had hoped. Please understand that I'm not new to Wifi. I have established WLANs for friends/clients in the past, and I have enjoyed reasonable degrees of success. But bridging the distance between floors proved to be a problem. Turns out that setting matter...a great deal. I insist on securing my network, which includes assigning a static IP address for my WLAN card connection. All seemed to be going well, but my connection wouldn't persist much beyond 3 minutes. Finally, I learned at about 2:30 this morning that a valid DNS entry can be a beautiful thing. Honestly, I'm surprised that this little piece of reality slipped my mind (I know better, trust me...), but anything can go horribly wrong at an hour when most sane folks are sleeping. It is now 7:30 PM in the city, and I've had a pretty smooth ride since about 4:35.
I know, you gotta read the directions. Problem is, the directions were of absolutely no help whatsoever. Yes, both the quickstart guide and the product manual recommended various courses of action. The difficulty arose from the fact that the authors either assumed that I knew why they wanted me to follow a particular course, or that a seemingly endless series of nifty-neat screen shots took the place of some well-reasoned expository writing. The writing craft is not dead, nor should it be. This is especially true when instructions may be read by those who don't already know the secret handshake. C'mon folks, assume we're all idiots,and give us some user-friendly instructions. I've been playing with technology since the early 80's, and I can still use a hand every now and then.
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Collaboration and Cooperation
Dr. Barbara White, CIO of the University of Georgia, just delivered a compelling keynote that was aimed at CIOs, but was immensely helpful for faculty and technologists to hear. The central message: be there, be involved, and take part in the process of decision making. Information is king, and so is knowing the requirements of your audience when you have those important conversations. The bean counters want to know about ROI and TCO, so having cost numbers in hand is critical. Overall, you must discover and understand the mission of the institution and be able to articulate how your plan, mission, program, etc., fits in to the greater plan for the institution.
This was one of those "common sense" presentations that contained information we all forget from time to time--sometimes to our peril. If you follow the rules, you definitely improve your chances for achieving your objectives. As the conventional wisdom reminds us, some days you get what you want, and other days you get what you need.
I'm now off to a session entitled "Instructional Technology Council (ITC) National Survey Results: The Status of Distance Education in the US". I'll let you know how it goes.
This was one of those "common sense" presentations that contained information we all forget from time to time--sometimes to our peril. If you follow the rules, you definitely improve your chances for achieving your objectives. As the conventional wisdom reminds us, some days you get what you want, and other days you get what you need.
I'm now off to a session entitled "Instructional Technology Council (ITC) National Survey Results: The Status of Distance Education in the US". I'll let you know how it goes.
Syllabus--The Adventure Continues
Syllabus Update—Thursday, July 28, 2005
It has been a busy week. I never cease to be amazed at how much happens at conferences. Participants will sometimes complain about the cost or the venue, but it’s clear that amassing so much experience, knowledge, and like-minded enthusiasm in one place for a week is worth many times what we invest in these adventures.
Issues that seem to bedevil almost everyone center on technology integration and faculty/staff development. For the most part, participants acknowledge, students can find ways to make technologies work as long as faculty provide (or suggest) logical connections between the tools and the content. Content is king. I asked Diana Oblinger (dolblinger@educause.edu) of EDUCAUSE if she felt that the content we’re able to provide online and our ability to assess are a match yet. She stated (and I agree) that we can provide the content, but we’re not yet able to address unique learning styles in the way that we currently assess students. A great deal of online assessment is still multiple-choice and true-false—objective tests which don’t work for a significant number of students. There definitely seems to be interest in further developing alternative means of assessment.
There were certainly a number of occasions during the past several days when ePortfolios were on the agenda. Still, there exists the question of how to assess quickly and consistently. A group of educators from the University of San Diego ( discussed the use of ePortfolios, but lamented that providing a level playing field for the assessment of those portfolios has been a challenge. They’ve striven to use rubrics to streamline the process, only to find in the initial stages that different evaluators scored similar content quite divergently. The team has since refined its practice, but this is a good example of the evolutionary nature of problem solving in the digital age—or any other time, for that matter. (Blogger's note: It's worth mentioning that the ePortfolio implementation was in reponse, at least in part, to USD's mission to achieve NCATE accreditation. The manuscript detailing their adventures can be found at http://www.sandiege.edu/~ammer.)
On the issue of ePortfolios, the make-or-buy debate rages. Apps like Taskstream (http://www.taskstream.com) have a sizeable following, but there are still technologists who like to roll their own solution. The most common tool is HTML, followed by PowerPoint. Regardless of the tool, streaming media is growing in popularity. The group from USD found that their students were able to demonstrate the ability to teach reading and math more readily by providing a video artifact. California evaluators like the digital video, but only if the segments were long enough (appox. 2-3 minutes) to show the competency, but not so long as to take up huge amounts of time. This is definitely an idea worth adding to the list.
Archiving content is a significant concern among attendees. Ali Hanyaloglu (ali@adobe.com) of Adobe (http://www.adobe.com) and Brian Harris of Loma Linda University offered up a surprisingly non-commercial presentation about the use of PDF/A the soon-to-be de jure standard for long-term archiving of content. We can implement PDF/A right now, as there are options to output to the format from Acrobat 7.0. The standard is just settling in, but we know that it will exclude such things are JavaScript, executables, and broken links. Fonts will be embedded, much as in current Acrobat, and the resulting package, it is hoped, will help institutions avoid the inevitable technological obsolescence that has rendered some Vietnam War records, land use records, and certain types of Census Bureau data unreadable in the past. This is pretty exciting, and it fits right in with the practices I see happening among some PCC faculty and staff right now.
It’s about time for me to go off to the last keynote of the conference. I’ll post more information this evening and in the upcoming days. There’s so much to do (well, some things haven’t changed), and so many good ideas to at least consider.
It has been a busy week. I never cease to be amazed at how much happens at conferences. Participants will sometimes complain about the cost or the venue, but it’s clear that amassing so much experience, knowledge, and like-minded enthusiasm in one place for a week is worth many times what we invest in these adventures.
Issues that seem to bedevil almost everyone center on technology integration and faculty/staff development. For the most part, participants acknowledge, students can find ways to make technologies work as long as faculty provide (or suggest) logical connections between the tools and the content. Content is king. I asked Diana Oblinger (dolblinger@educause.edu) of EDUCAUSE if she felt that the content we’re able to provide online and our ability to assess are a match yet. She stated (and I agree) that we can provide the content, but we’re not yet able to address unique learning styles in the way that we currently assess students. A great deal of online assessment is still multiple-choice and true-false—objective tests which don’t work for a significant number of students. There definitely seems to be interest in further developing alternative means of assessment.
There were certainly a number of occasions during the past several days when ePortfolios were on the agenda. Still, there exists the question of how to assess quickly and consistently. A group of educators from the University of San Diego ( discussed the use of ePortfolios, but lamented that providing a level playing field for the assessment of those portfolios has been a challenge. They’ve striven to use rubrics to streamline the process, only to find in the initial stages that different evaluators scored similar content quite divergently. The team has since refined its practice, but this is a good example of the evolutionary nature of problem solving in the digital age—or any other time, for that matter. (Blogger's note: It's worth mentioning that the ePortfolio implementation was in reponse, at least in part, to USD's mission to achieve NCATE accreditation. The manuscript detailing their adventures can be found at http://www.sandiege.edu/~ammer.)
On the issue of ePortfolios, the make-or-buy debate rages. Apps like Taskstream (http://www.taskstream.com) have a sizeable following, but there are still technologists who like to roll their own solution. The most common tool is HTML, followed by PowerPoint. Regardless of the tool, streaming media is growing in popularity. The group from USD found that their students were able to demonstrate the ability to teach reading and math more readily by providing a video artifact. California evaluators like the digital video, but only if the segments were long enough (appox. 2-3 minutes) to show the competency, but not so long as to take up huge amounts of time. This is definitely an idea worth adding to the list.
Archiving content is a significant concern among attendees. Ali Hanyaloglu (ali@adobe.com) of Adobe (http://www.adobe.com) and Brian Harris of Loma Linda University offered up a surprisingly non-commercial presentation about the use of PDF/A the soon-to-be de jure standard for long-term archiving of content. We can implement PDF/A right now, as there are options to output to the format from Acrobat 7.0. The standard is just settling in, but we know that it will exclude such things are JavaScript, executables, and broken links. Fonts will be embedded, much as in current Acrobat, and the resulting package, it is hoped, will help institutions avoid the inevitable technological obsolescence that has rendered some Vietnam War records, land use records, and certain types of Census Bureau data unreadable in the past. This is pretty exciting, and it fits right in with the practices I see happening among some PCC faculty and staff right now.
It’s about time for me to go off to the last keynote of the conference. I’ll post more information this evening and in the upcoming days. There’s so much to do (well, some things haven’t changed), and so many good ideas to at least consider.
Monday, July 25, 2005
Syllabus 2005
July 25, 2005: Syllabus 2005, Day #1
Nanette and I arrived in Los Angeles around 10:30 last night. Since we flew into LAX, we had quite a transfer to get to Hollywood; we were finally in our room by around midnight. It was definitely time to crash; Monday morning would arrive early.
Nanette and I arrived in Los Angeles around 10:30 last night. Since we flew into LAX, we had quite a transfer to get to Hollywood; we were finally in our room by around midnight. It was definitely time to crash; Monday morning would arrive early.
Figuring that waking up would be, well, complicated, I set two alarms. I needn’t have bothered—nervous energy and the trusty internal alarm clock effectively awakened me about an hour ahead of my schedule. I was early for registration and passed the time reading a little Hunter S. Thompson before facing the day. Once registration was behind me, it was off to a quick breakfast, then on to the first event of the day—the keynote.
Always Start Your Day with a Good Keynote
Tracy Futhey, VP and CIO for Information Technology at Duke, focused on the delicate balancing act involved in launching new initiatives, including the innovative iPod First Year Experience that provided iPods to about 75% of the freshman class (AY 2004). The portable devices were used in creative ways in more than 35 courses to gather information, help students review for quizzes, and provide a platform for playing back lectures. A curious project, to be sure, but one that seemed to work; it provided enhanced learning for students and new teaching modalities for interested faculty.
Surprising Facts
When we think about large research institutions, we (at least I) assume that such places have tight coordination of effort. That’s why I was a bit surprised and confused when faculty presenters from a MAJOR, WORLD-CLASS institution of research and higher learning candidly revealed that their university currently operates almost 30 different delivery platforms for distance learning, and rolls along with nearly 50 different email solutions on its vast campus. Who knew?
Blended Instruction Insights
An entertaining and informative session on what we would call hybrid instruction left me with the conclusion that we are actually some distance ahead of even major universities. The initiatives described by the team from UCLA were launched only after considerable preliminary work with college representatives at the provost, dean, and department chair levels. The classes developed and deployed were successful, at least based on initial analysis.
I found it curious that the developer’s choice of tools required that a separate quiz tool be implemented to accommodate the import of question sets. After having worked with both WebCT and Respondus, I’m convinced that I have a serious set of tools to confront most situations. I can’t really imagine going out to find bolt-ons. Of course, there is a tendency for groups to implement their own proprietary solutions. I haven’t quite figured this out, however. Perhaps the logic of it will come to me in the shower.
Save It—Don’t Throw It Away!
Terry Ryan of UCLA Library offered up some great ideas in her session entitled “Dynamic Models for Saving, Finding, and Reusing Learning Content.” She and her colleagues are busily developing protocols for archiving the information, learning objects, and even entire Web-based courses developed by UCLA faculty. The team first finds out if faculty are willing to share content, then they determine whether the content is, in fact, worth keeping (or legal to keep). Provided that all the signals are encouraging, the staff then works with appropriate faculty and departmental representatives to determine the best way to archive the resources. One compelling argument for placing such information in the hands of the library staff is that libraries are in the business of creating and maintaining repositories of information. Second, creating an accessible archive helps the academic community retrieve and reuse content in other courses. Seems like a viable labor saver, but there are plenty of questions that will require deeper reflection, including the best way to tag data for easy retrieval and whether to convert resources to some sort of standardized file format. More on this, perhaps tomorrow.
The Exhibit Hall: Opportunities for Spirited Adventure
I do so love wandering the exhibit hall floor during a technology conference. Because the sessions today were held at UCLA (far away from the conference hotel), I’ll be denied my bliss until sometime Tuesday afternoon. I look forward to learning about new technologies and registering for the chance to win free software. If all goes well, I’ll bring home some good things to share. At the very least, I will end up with a handsome collection of professionally-produced marketing materials.
It's getting late, and tomorrow will be busy.
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