For All My Faculty Friends
Thinking of you! Blog this! Share on Linkedin Share on Posterous Tweet about it Subscribe to the comments on this post Print for later Tell a friend
So Dad, How Do You Like Your iPad
When buying an iPad for someone who isn’t too tech-savvy, make sure you explain exactly what it is! *Video: so dad, how do you like the ipad we got you? Blog this! Share on Linkedin Share on Posterous Tweet about it Subscribe to the comments on this post Print for later Tell a friend
Scared of those shortened links in Twitter?
By now, we’ve all seen one of those shortened links in Twitter. They often look like something like this: http://bit.ly/yySl56 URLs to specific pages or articles can be long and, as you know, Twitter is meant for short posts. So, in order to fit the link into your tweet and include some writing, Twitter uses the [...]
Mobile Learning is Not Going Away, So Let’s Do it Right!
My head is swimming right now. Earlier today, I listened in on an amazing webinar, 7 Myths of Mobile Learning. I am not sure what I was expecting to hear but I can tell you that I wasn’t expecting the insights that were given. The Problem with Device-Dependency I’ve been saying for a while that [...]
For All My Faculty Friends
Thinking of you!
So Dad, How Do You Like Your iPad
When buying an iPad for someone who isn’t too tech-savvy, make sure you explain exactly what it is!
Scared of those shortened links in Twitter?
By now, we’ve all seen one of those shortened links in Twitter. They often look like something like this: http://bit.ly/yySl56
URLs to specific pages or articles can be long and, as you know, Twitter is meant for short posts. So, in order to fit the link into your tweet and include some writing, Twitter uses the Bit.ly service. It takes the long URL and condenses it into something that’s much, much shorter.
So far so good, right? Well, with peoples’ habit of blindly clicking links, spammers, hackers, and other ne’er-do-wells have started using link shortening to hide the URL of the malware- or virus-infested site they want you to visit.
The link above sends you to www.Ben.edu but how would you know that until you’ve already clicked it, which would be too late to do anything about it if it were a bad site?
There’s a simple and not-well-known feature in Bit.ly that allows you to see the full link without actually visiting the site. Simply copy and paste the Bit.ly link into your browser’s address bar and add the plus sign(+) at the very end: http://bit.ly/yySl56+. Now go ahead and hit <Enter>.
You’ll go to the Bit.ly statistics page. Check out the long link and decide if it’s safe:
Adding the plus sign at the end of a bit.ly link allows you to see where you'll actually be taken
Mobile Learning is Not Going Away, So Let’s Do it Right!
My head is swimming right now.
Earlier today, I listened in on an amazing webinar, 7 Myths of Mobile Learning. I am not sure what I was expecting to hear but I can tell you that I wasn’t expecting the insights that were given.
The Problem with Device-Dependency
I’ve been saying for a while that my biggest complaint right now is that mobile content is nothing more than repackaged online content. Worse, is that online content still frames itself in the language of traditional print. We have page numbers and tables of content and…
Why?
There is so much greater opportunity to create dynamic content using rich media. These are tools that we can use to engage the learner – something that a traditional text cannot provide. But, as we all know, book publishers are being slow in bringing content to the mobile paradigm. And, when they do, they are often partnering with hardware manufacturers, rendering the content device-dependent.
Look, I’ll be the first to admit that I am addicted to my iPad and it will be a cold day in hell when it’s pried from my hand. However, I also know that, five years from now, the iPad could possibly cease to exist. Or the iOS is so radically altered that content created today specifically for the iPad may not work in just a few years. Let that sink in for a moment. If you assign an eBook to your first-year students and that eBook is uses the iPad’s proprietary OS (or the ‘Droid’s) it’s possible that the student won’t be able to access that content before they’ve finished their degree!
The Solution
For those of you who have heard me rant on and on about this, you know that I have become a strong advocate for device-independent content. However, our current option is the ePub format. I hate to use the term “format” since the one thing I cannot do, as an information designer, is format the content. Like the early days of HTML, the text starts at the beginning and flows to the end. Yes, it’s helpful in that, regardless of which device it’s appearing on, the text flows according to the resolution of the screen. But it makes for a visually unappealing read. Aesthetics are important! Layout is important! If you don’t see the connection between Cognitive and Gestalt psychologies, you have no place in designing information.
All of this is just the surface of the issue – understanding that different uses of content require different tools and approaches. We can’t just take existing content, hit a different button under the “Save As” and call it online content.
Further…
Here’s something else: mobile learning and technology is not the same as online learning and technology. The two are as different as golf and hockey. Until quite recently, I understood mobile learning as that which happens on a tablet or a smartphone. It seemed to make sense but someone made a comment in the webinar today that changed that and allowed me to see the real potential in mobile learning in higher education. Here it is:
In traditional online learning or in a classroom, the learner is tethered to a location. Maybe an office desk or a training room. In mobile learning, the learner is mobile. Mobile learning is not about the technology, it’s about the freedom of movement for the learner.
Now, let that sink in! Mobile learning can allow the learner to engage the content where they’d be using the information. In a Nursing department, the students can be learning in the hospital at the same time as they’re experiencing their new environment. Context-related mobile learning isn’t far away and that’s the power and effectiveness of mobile learning!
My Challenge
Over the years, I’ve had many professional labels hung on me: technical communicator, trainer, writer… but my favorite (and most accurate) has been information designer. I also think it’s the label that will present me with my greatest professional challenge to date.
The speed with which mobile learning and content has progressed is unprecedented. If you think about how ubiquitous the iPad has become, it’s hard to imagine that it was introduced to the world just barely more than two years ago (January 2010). Information designers have not kept up. Too many in my field have spent time learning what “mobility of content” really means and that’s been to the detriment of developing tools and methodologies of creating effective mobile content and training principles.
Today’s webinar raised a lot of questions for me and left me with the challenge of finding the answers. Fortunately, there are some others out there who see the same challenge and we’re starting to work collaboratively to find the solution.
Here are some of the questions I am now thinking through:
- What new tools and methods are needed to realize the full potential of mobile learning?
- How can we balance the need for standardized devices from the organization’s perspective with the reality of having virtually every device being used by students?
- How do we transition people’s understanding of technology and learning so that mLearning isn’t seen as re-purposed eLearning?
- How can we train content producers to think in mobile terms? And should we?
Anyway, those are just a few things that I am dealing with here on campus as more and more faculty want to start producing their own content.
Your Challenge
As one faculty member explained, she isn’t going to make students spend $100 on content that they can’t keep. That’s a perfect reason for faculty and other learning professionals to start creating their own.
Just remember, device-independence still requires strong instructional and information design principles for that content to be effective in the classroom.
Please, please, please… let me know your thoughts – this whole area is still in its infancy and collaboration is the only way to thrive.
The Final Thought
I am going to finish this by quoting RJ Jacquez from his blog post, Blogging the Mobile Learning Revolution as it Happens:
This revolution needs new leaders and innovators, as well as new tools (or at least highly customized versions of existing ones). Mobile in general also requires new user experiences that in my opinion are very different from their desktop counterparts.
Thank You
To all my colleagues in the NMFS seminar, I want to say thank you for an absolutely enjoyable semester. I’ve learned a lot from you and have gained some wonderful insight into how many of you are using new media and technology in the classroom.
Ever thought of creating your own newspaper?
Two of the blogs I read are #mLearning and e-Learning with #AdobeCaptivate. I’ve referenced them before, so if you’re interested in checking them out, you need to read through previous posts.
the #mLearning Paper
Today’s writing is about the technology they use – a site called Paper.li. This is a site that allows you to aggregate content – from text to audio to video – and email them out in the form of an electronic newspaper. The layout makes it easy to read and follow.
If you create content for your class or for your audience, check it out. It’s on my to-do list!
Some Interesting Articles…
As you know, I read a lot of blogs. Actually, I subscribe to a lot of blogs as some don’t update as regularly as others.
Anyway, I’ve become enthralled lately with Paper.Li. It’s a way to aggregate different articles and email them as an electronic newspaper. My favorite one right now is call mLearning and is produced by Adobe Senior Product Evangelist, RJ Jacquez.
Some interesting articles that he listed today are:
- How to Design a Beautiful iPad Lesson
- 13 Ways To Use iMovie In The Classroom
- Models of Mobile Learning
- Five Practical Mobile Learning Tips
What are you reading these days?
Happy Thanksgiving
To all my NMFS friends and other folks who have graciously stumbled upon this blog. A quick, and belated, Thanksgiving wish to each and every one of you.
I read that pumpkin pie is the ultimate measure of mediocrity in that the worst one you’ve tasted isn’t too different than the best one you’ve tasted.
And, if I may be somewhat irreverent for a moment, “I would like to give thanks for evolution for turning some dinosaur species into a walking ball of meat with a small head.” – anonymous
Peace
No More Swikis: End of the Constructionist Web at Georgia Tech (re-blogged)
(Note from Rob: this is the article written by Mark Guzdial that I referenced yesterday and I’m reposting it in its entirety with his permission. Thanks Mark!)
Using Wikis for undergraduate courses was invented at Georgia Tech. We started in 1997, long before Wikipedia. Ward Cunningham talks about our work in his book “The Wiki Way.” Our paper on how we designed the Swiki (or CoWeb) at CSCW 2000 is, I believe, the earliest reference to wikis in the ACM Digital Library. Jochen “Jeff” Rick built the Swiki software that we use today, and he did his dissertation on his extensions to Swiki.
We published a technical report in 2000 about the varied uses of Swikis that we saw around Georgia Tech’s campus. Some classes were having students create a public case library. Others were have cross-semester discussions between current and past students. Others had public galleries of student work.
All of that ended yesterday.
Georgia Tech’s interpretation of FERPA is that protected information includes the fact that a student is enrolled at all. The folks at GT responsible for oversight of FERPA realized that a student’s name in a website that references a course is evidence of enrollment. Yesterday, in one stroke, every Swiki ever used for a course was removed. None of those uses I described can continue. For example, you can’t have cross-semester discussions or public galleries, because students in one semester of a course can’t know the identities of other students who had taken the course previously.
Seymour Papert coined the term constructionism to describe a setting for constructivism to occur.
Constructionism–the N word as opposed to the V word–shares constructivism’s connotation of learning as “building knowledge structures” irrespective of the circumstances of the learning. It then adds the idea that this happens especially felicitously in a context where the learner is consciously engaged in constructing a public entity, whether it’s a sand castle on the beach or a theory of the universe.
Constructionism relies on the fact that the entity being constructed is public. The public nature influences the student’s motivation for doing it and doing it well. If it’s not public, it’s not constructionism. We can no longer have students construct public entities on the Web anymore for education at Georgia Tech. It may be that FERPA demands that no school can use the Web to post student work publicly.
Student Wikis Shut Down at Georgia Tech
Mark Guzdial, a professor in the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology, has written an excellent article on what recently transpired at Georgia Tech. As a recap, Georgia Tech officials decided that student wikis were a direct violation of FERPA and ordered the immediate shut-down of all student Wikis.
This is a move that, in my always humble opinion, is Draconian and an interesting interpretation of FERPA. GT faculty were using student Wikis (Swikis) for several classes and are now left scrambling.
Could this happen here or at other universities? And what about the use of social networking technologies like Twitter and Facebook? Facebook requires real names of users (no pseudonyms) and, according to GT’s interpretation, that would violate FERPA.
Read Mark’s article here. Unfortunately, a search of Georgia Tech’s web site didn’t find any release about the shut-down.
EDITED TO ADD: You can’t spell FERPA without FEAR
Thoughts?
