Hi everyone
a belated happy new year to you all! I trust you had time for some rest and relaxation over the festive season. I did embark on a short course on enology which is about to enter its second term. After the first week, life long learning is looking very Rose!
Ascilite 2009 has long since passed but by all accounts those that attended really enjoyed it. This year ascilite is in Sydney Australia. Watch this space for details. In the meantime there is a link to the ascilite proceedings if you wish to review some of the excellent presentations.
I think this year will see the rise and rise of mobile technologies in education. The use of the iPhone and similar devices are proving to be popular amongst students and tutors alike. Maybe the e-readers/slates/ notepads/G3 phones and others will become commonplace in educational settings, especially the new Apple iPad , plenty of potential here for interactive courses, text books and collaboration; the whole experience student driven, tutor guided.
A big plug for my friend and colleague Stu Mealor in NZ, who is again organising the NZ Moodlemoot. A must for those who believe in flexibility and innovation in learning and teaching. Details in the conference section.
This posting has links to a visual dictionary, twelve strategies for active learning, a drag and drop application with promise, a new journal, some very useful presentation and workshop resources, maths for mobile , cellphones in classrooms, enhancing learning,Innovating e-Learning 2009 and ascilite 09, plus conferences and the odd one out
1. Math4 Mobile: Free downloads for mobile phones using barcodes and some interesting technology. The way of the future? or this is the future?
2. Moving at the Speed of Creativity: The Web log of Wesley Fryer. I have spent some time perusing the content of the Weblog and there is lots of it. I think it is worth the time and effort spent in evaluating the stuff under the resources tag as well as elsewhere. Must be something to exercise your brain.
http://www.speedofcreativity.org/
Also have a look at the pages on cellphones in learning in a related site. It has some good stuff to explore and some interesting insights into how people are embracing mobile technologies.
http://teachdigital.pbworks.com/cellphones
3. A new journal is launched: Impact: Journal of Applied Research in Workplace E-learning.
Extract from the site:
‘Impact has been established to address the paucity of research publication avenues with a particular emphasis on e-learning in organisational and workplace settings’.
You will need to register and then the content is free to access. I found this article very informative : E-learning maturity in the workplace, the benefits and practices by Laura Overton, Howard Hills
http://journal.elnet.com.au/index.php/impact/
4.JISC Digital Media: Wants some advice on all sorts of things to do with digital media? Then go to this Website where you will find a wide range of advice and associated resources. Usual good quality stuff from JISC.
http://www.jiscdigitalmedia.ac.uk/
5. Twelve active learning Strategies: from the Center for Teaching and Learning, University of Minnesota. The content of twelve slides are provided ( you can download the ppt file) each of which looks at a particular strategy for active learning and provides some questions and possible answers to the various approaches. A useful guide to get the neurons active after all that holiday stuff.
http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/tutorials/powerpoint/learning/index.html
Whilst you are contemplating the twelve strategies you might also like to explore the use of powerpoint for educational games
http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/tutorials/powerpoint/games/index.html
6. Presentation and workshop documents: John Larkin is an educator and instructional designer presently living in Australia. His site provides some very useful elearning resources from his presentations and workshops which can be used as guides to produce your own. There is a wealth of information here. Well worth perusing
http://www.larkin.net.au/020_technology_howtos.html
7.Dragster 3 by Webducate: Not often that I include a product but I was quite impressed with some of the modules produced using this particular application. It doesn’t seem to be expensive for what you get. Have a look at the examples at the bottom of the Webpage and make up your own mind.
http://www.webducate.net/?page_id=79
8. Wordia is a new visual dictionary. Whilst providing the meaning of a word, sometimes with a video providing context, it also It provides some related stuff like synonyms and antonyms plus a ‘live’ look at who has used a particular word you entered and in what context since you typed in your word. wordia.comGive it a try and maybe even submit your own word interpretation in visual format.
9. Transforming higher education through technology-enhanced earning
E d ite d b y Te rry Maye s , De re k Morri s o n, H a rve y Mel l a r , P e t e r B u l l e n a n d M ar t in O l i v er
This excellent tome is well worth downloading.There are a number of well known contributors and the topic is well researched , questioned and evaluated in a number of educational contexts. It was released by the Higher Education Academy in the UK in December 2009
10. Ascilite 2009: Presentations and abstracts for ascilite 2009.
http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/auckland09/?m=Programme
11. Innovating e-Learning 2009. Another very successful event from the JISC stable.
Conference presentations and resources, including all the Elluminate recordings, from Innovating e-Learning 2009, are now available on the JISC website for general viewing:
http://www.jisc.ac.uk/whatwedo/programmes/elearningpedagogy/elpconference09/programme.aspx
or
12 Conferences
12.1 Moodle Moot NZ 2010
13th-15th April, hosted at Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology (CPIT) in Christchurch.
International guests including:
Martin Dougiamas (founder and lead developer of Moodle)
Julian “Moodleman” Ridden
Shane Elliott (Pukenui Technology)
Martin Knott (Moodlerooms, USA)
Full day workshops for Developers, Administrators, School Teachers, and New Moodle Users.
Details and registration at the official NZ Moodle Moot website:
12.2 ALT-C 2010: ‘Into something rich and strange’, making sense of the sea-change. The 17th ALT annual conference will be held at the University of Nottingham, UK, 7-9 September 2010.
The Calls and Guidelines for proposals for inclusion in the conference programmes are at
http://www.alt.ac.uk/altc2010/papers.html
The closing date for submissions is 15/2/2010.
12.3 ascilite 2010 ‘Innovating the Diverse Curriculum’ is the 27th annual ascilite Conference. The conference will be held in Sydney, New South Wales Australia.: Watch this space.
12.4 The Irish Learning Technology Association (ILTA) will shortly be announcing details of the 10th Annual Irish Learning Technology Association Conference, EdTech 2010.
It looks as if its got some really good keynotes, Elliott Masie, Jane Hart and James Clay (who was a keynote at ascilite 2009). Good choices!
For more information:
http://www.ilta.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=64&Itemid=197
13. The odd one out
A real diversion to relax the mind, with some stunning pictures and some tongue in the cheek stuff. Watch it to the end. Produced in Australia (bit of a worry) using NASA photos.
http://dingo.care2.com/cards/flash/5409/galaxy.swf
That’s it until the next month comes marching in.
Richard Elliott
The Eternal Macademic
Auckland
New Zealand