G’day everyone
May was an unusually warm month in NZ (the warmest ever according to the weather gurus) so I guess June will probably make us pay. Never mind, more time to spend indoors reviewing the excellent e-learning resources in this month’s posting. I have concentrated a bit on Mobile learning as there is growing interest and application of mobile technologies for learning in a range of sectors including vocational education and training. Some useful sites are highlighted.
Pedagogy online takes its place alongside upcoming conferences.
The JISC online promises to be a very useful event if the abstracts are anything to go by. I have also included links to the latest release from Apple ‘ iTunes U’, featuring a large amount of free educational content from major Universities in USA, a site on educational technology books online, some useful info on designing constructivist resources and learning design itself along with a remarkable ‘reference desk’, a nice piece of free software and an article on learning styles, plus of course the odd one out.
1. elearning-reviews:
Extract:
‘provides those interested in research on elearning with concise and thoughtful reviews of relevant publications. The most important goal is a well-balanced selection of seminal publications as well as interesting up-to-date publications from the various disciplinary perspectives’.
http://www.elearning-reviews.org/
2. Reference Desk. This is an amazing site with literally thousands of links to resources, much with an education or science focus. You could spend forever here.
An extract from the Health Science Guide shows that currently it contains over
140,570 Medical Cases & Grand Rounds
1,525 Courses/Textbooks; 67,330 Teaching Modules & Files
525 Journals; 4,660 Databases, Atlases & Image Databases
& 1,000’s of Videos/Movies
I had a quick peruse of the ‘Anatomy of the Heart’. Some excellent resources here. Take your time. Find out about the man behind the Website.
3. Books to read on Educational Technology is maintained by Badrul Khan.
Extract from the site:
‘Recommended Reading Lists in Educational Technology (ET) and its related fields are compiled in APA style by Badrul Khan. The purpose of this compilation is to maintain comprehensive and up-to-date reading lists in areas where both educational soft technologies (i.e., theories, models, tecniques, strategies, etc.) and educational hard technologies (i.e., media-related such as radio, TV, computer, etc.) are integrated in the design of instructional and learning environments’.
http://bookstoread.com/e/et/default.htm
Badrul Khan is well known for his books and models on e-learning. His personal Web site has a lot of useful information.
4. Designing of Constructivist Learning Environments. If you really want an in depth study of constructivist theories and application this is the site to visit. Lots of very useful resources including numerous links to related sites.
One or two of the links in the ‘examples’ folder on the left of the screen don’t work, however follow the links for the ‘Food project’ for some good ideas.
Extract from Food Project example:
‘In this environment the student will be immersed in a problem-based learning experience designed to further develop critical thinking, problem solving, team decision making, and communication skills in the context of industry’s approach to developing new and improved food products’.
http://tiger.coe.missouri.edu/%7Ejonassen/courses/CLE/index.html
5. Pedagogy of online teaching and learning.
Extract:
”Best Practices E-Learning Pedagogy??’The resources listed below are designed to provide online RODP/ROCE instructors with priniciples and best practices for online teaching”.
Quite a useful set of links to documents and resources relating to the pedagogy of online teaching and learning’.
http://www.tn.regentsdegrees.org/faculty/pedagogy.htm
6. Mobile Learning: An online reflective Journal on Mobile Learning Practice.
http://mlearning.edublogs.org/
AND
Mobile Learning and Pervasive Computing
This website is designed to provide a portal to the latest information on mobile learning and pervasive computing for trainers and educators at all levels from elementary education through higher education.
http://www3.telus.net/~kdeanna/mlearning/
AND
A selection of posts that address some of the development in the pedagogy of mobile learning.
http://moblearn.blogspot.com/search/label/pedagogy
AND
Some excellent examples of REAL activities using mobile technologies in education.
http://wetec.csumb.edu/site/x17155.xml
7. SCRATCH:
This is an interesting piece of software developed by MIT in the USA and it’s free to download. It is really aimed at the younger learners but the concepts and approaches are easily transferable to those who think on a higher plain.
The learning curve is short and gentle and well worth having a look at especially if you are into early education or education in general.
8. Journal of Education Design. Always good to see a venture that addresses some of the changes needed in the educational environment.
Extract:
‘is a new educational journal which moves beyond a focus on technological applications in educational settings, to encourage more critical analysis of approaches to the design of learning environments and the extent to which they result in enhanced learning outcomes for learners. Traditional, didactic, delivery-focussed models of teaching in higher education still prevail, whether in the lecture theatre or in the online environment.
(It) will play an important role in raising awareness of how to move beyond such transmission models of education, to the design of more active, collaborative, authentic and engaging learning experiences for learners.
(It) aims to provide a forum for critical debate and professional exchange about models, theoretical positioning and best practice in learning design’.
9. Conferences
9.1 JISC Online Conference: Innovating e-Learning 2007
June 11- 14th
Extract from site:
‘This conference will bring together a selection of key innovators in e-learning to present and discuss the current and future impact of e-learning. The two themes are designed to look at the impact of e-learning from an internal institutional perspective and from the more personalised view of the lifelong learner.
The conference programme will be of interest to practitioners, managers and e-learning coordinators in further and higher education, researchers, staff developers, learning technologists and key stakeholders supporting lifelong learning’.
A good look at the abstract and presenters will convince you that this is one you don’t want to miss.
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/elearning_pedagogy/elp_conference07.aspx
9.2 ASCILITE 2007: Providing Choices for Learners and Learning.
For the first time ASCILITE is to be held at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.
This is one of Singapore’s largest educational institutes and has a very impressive campus. The campus has excellent resources and personnel and I am sure they will be great hosts. Don’t miss it.
From 2- 5 December 2007.
http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/singapore07/
9.3. Call for Papers ePortfolio 2007
Maastricht 17-19 October 2007
http://events.eife-l.org/ep2007/
The main theme of the 5th International ePortfolio conference is “Employability and Lifelong Learning in the Knowledge Society.” This year the conference will be co-organised by EIfEL in partnership with the TENCompetence project, SURF,
CWI, Kennisnet, Kenteq, the City of Maastricht and the Province of Limburg.
9.4 ALT-C 2007: Beyond control
Learning technology for the social network generation
4-6 September 2007, Nottingham, UK.
You can now register to attend at:
http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2007/registering.html
Fees for attendance are at:
http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2007/delegate_information.html
Presenters’ registration deadline: 8 June 2007
Earlybird registration deadline: 29 June 2007
Pre- and post-conference workshops: information for organisers.
http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2007/pre_and_post.html
Information derived from:
“[the] ALT Digest, a fortnightly publication from the Association for
Learning Technology (ALT) –
10. Pedagogy online and off. The link below provides access to a wide range of information, links and resources relating to the pedagogy of online teaching. The site is nicely laid out and navigation is easy. It’s worth exploring some of the other links non the site.
http://kerlins.net/bobbi/education/teachonline/pedagogy.html
This link takes you to resources on instructional design.
http://kerlins.net/bobbi/education/teachonline/id.html
11.Learning Styles:Learn Effectively by Understanding Your Learning Preferences.
This is an interesting article with some very good insights into determining individual learning style and how you are affected by your style and the nature of the environment in which you are learning. There are several useful links to other sites.
http://www.mindtools.com/mnemlsty.html
12. iTunes U:
Apple Announces iTunes U on the iTunes Store
Free Content From Top Universities Now Available
‘CUPERTINO, California,May 30, 2007, Apple® today announced the launch of iTunes® U, a dedicated area within the iTunes Store featuring free content such as course lectures, language lessons, lab demonstrations, sports highlights and campus tours provided by top US colleges and universities including Stanford University, UC Berkeley, Duke University and MIT.
‘iTunes U makes it easy for anyone to access amazing educational material from many of the country’s most respected colleges and universities,’ said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of iTunes. ‘Education is a lifelong pursuit and we’re pleased to give everyone the ability to download lectures, speeches and other academic content for free.’
Info source:
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2007/05/30itunesu.html
iTunes site
13.The odd one out: For a long weekend read.
Life in Elizabethan England: A compendium of Common Knowledge 1558-1603
Fascinating ‘wish you were there” (I don’t think) reading.
http://elizabethan.org/compendium/
You can download a copy in .pdf format from:
http://elizabethan.org/compendium/download.html
That’s it for now. July will soon be upon us with another smorgasboard of Websites to explore.
Richard
Richard Elliott
Auckland, New Zealand