Chat as Instructional Tool

 

In the Ljubljana new media seminar, we have been using the chat / discussion facility in Blackboard with mixed success, the last effort being more failure than success. Chat has, however, gained considerable reputation among others who have used it in the educational setting. The following article by Ruth Reynard provides a reasoned overview of this form of mediated communication as tool in an instructional environment.

 

Tips for Using Chat as an Instructional Tool

10/31/2007

By Ruth Reynard

Chat software (text or media-based) provides an excellent tool in supporting academic dialog (exchange), critical thinking, and knowledge building. The immediacy of the technology provides students with a direct connection with the instructor as well as other students. While chat software is usually used for "chatting," and, therefore, it has a relaxed and colloquial protocol, with a little thought and planning, it can also be used well to support instruction.

Many classroom instructors and online instructors use chat software to provide virtual office hours and for easy question and answer sessions. More, however, can be achieved in the instructional process using the tool to create real-time collaboration and discussion that leads to in-depth academic processing of course material.

 

Reference information: Ruth Reynard, "Tips for Using Chat as an Instructional Tool ," Campus Technology, 10/31/2007, http://www.campustechnology.com/article.aspx?aid=52470

 
 

 
 

The site where this article appeared, Campus Technology, is an important resource for the broad area of education and technology. The text below, from the "About" page of the site, describes the mandate of the initiative:

 

Campus Technology is the only monthly publication focusing exclusively on the use of technology across all areas of higher education. Campus Technology provides in-depth coverage of specific technologies and their implementations, including wireless networks and mobile devices; enterprise resource planning; eLearning and course management systems; 'smart classroom' technologies; telecom, Web, and security solutions - all the important issues and trends for campus IT decision makers.

Launched in October, 2004, Campus Technology replaced the highly respected Syllabus magazine, a recognized leader in the coverage of technology on campus since 1988. Campus Technology continues to uphold Syllabus' mission of serving as a complete resource for academic and administrative IT leaders in higher education, and provides in-depth coverage of specific technologies, their uses, and implementations on campus.

The Campus Technology franchise consists of the monthly Campus Technology magazine, its web site, www.campustechnology.com, electronic newsletters (News Update, IT Trends, SmartClassroom, C-Level View), conferences, and targeted list rental opportunities.

Slashdot and OLPC

On Christmas Eve, Slashdot reposted an article from the Chicago Tribute on the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) program. The newspaper article is, in itself, interesting, but in addition the large volume of reactions to the story is striking: some 145 within a few days of the posting.

For students in the seminar that don't know Slashdot, I recommend sifting through its archives and monitoring the blog-style site regularly because it is, as the logo slogan says, "News for nerds. Stuff that matters." For a basic description of Slashdot, see the Wikipedia article.

 

OLPC a Hit in Remote Peruvian Village

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on Monday December 24, @04:43PM
from the whatever-turns-your-crank dept.

mrcgran writes "The Chicago Tribune is running a feel-good story about the effects of OLPC on a remote village in Peru. 'Doubts about whether poor, rural children really can benefit from quirky little computers evaporate as quickly as the morning dew in this hilltop Andean village, where 50 primary school children got machines from the One Laptop Per Child project six months ago. At breakfast, they're already powering up the combination library/videocam/audio recorder/music maker/drawing kits. At night, they're dozing off in front of them — if they've managed to keep older siblings from waylaying the coveted machines. Peru made the single biggest order to date — more than 272,000 machines — in its quest to turn around a primary education system that the World Economic Forum recently ranked last among 131 countries surveyed.'"

David Silver in Amsterdam, Part 1: Digital Media & Learning

David Silver passed through Amsterdam after a keynote in Maastricht, before returning to San Francisco. During the course of our long lunch, he passed on several 'delights' which I'll post in the coming days. The first important to mention is publication by MIT Press of a six-volume series that is part of the project Digital Media and Learning. Scanning the contributors suggests an impressive collection scholarship. And, to refute the cliché 'you get what you pay for', the series can be downloaded free of charge – thanks to what is probably a substantial contribution to the publisher from the MacArthur Foundation, the funding agency for the research project. In addition to the series the volume editors have been promoting the material and a series of videos by these persons are on the MacAuthur site.

For those that don't know David, check out his blog; especially consult the Resource Center for Cyberculture Studies (RCCS) that he initiated and maintains.

Googlization of Everything

Although this initiative is not the first to use blogging as form for writing a book, it is one of the most recent that I have come across and it is about a topic relevant to all of us: Google. The working title, "The Googlization of Everything; How One Company is Disrupting Commerce, Culture and Community…and Why We Should Worry" says it all, but the first paragraphs of the first post on 27 September 2007 elaborate further:

"Hi. Welcome to my new book. Well, it's not a book yet. In fact, it will not be a real book for a long time.

As you can tell from the title of this blog, the book will be about Google and all they ways that Google is shaking up the world. Google is a transformative and revolutionary company. I hesitate to use terms like that. We live in an era of hyperbole. So I try my best to discount claims of historical transformation or communicative revolutions.

But in the case of Google, I am confident it is both.

Now, I am approaching this book as both a fan and a critic. I am in awe of all that Google has done and all it hopes to do. I am also wary of its ambition and power."

The development of this project is well worth watching, given the scholarly accomplishments of its initiator, Siva Vaidhyanathan.

Keen in the belly of the beast

This 60-minute YouTube video is of Andrew Keen addressing and reading from his book on Web 2.0 "The Cult of the Amateur: How Today's Internet Is Killing Our Culture" on the day published, 5 June 2007, at Google Headquarters in Mountain View, California.

Highly recommended…

Podcasts, audio files, RSS

Below are links to basic information on podcasts, audio files and RSS feed. All students in the Ljubljana seminar should know about these 'digital tools' and experiment in using them. Information taken from the Resources page of The Methods Network.

 

Podcasts

For general information about podcasts see the What is podcasting? page.

The Methods Network Podcast address is http://www.methodsnetwork.ac.uk/podcast/methnet-podcast.xml.

Audio Files

Audio files exist for a number of Methods Network Expert Seminars.

See the Audio Files Index.

RSS Feed

For general information about RSS Feeds see the What is the RSS feed? page.

The Methods Network RSS Feed address is: http://www.methodsnetwork.ac.uk/news/methnet-rss.xml.

Rheingold’s course at Berkeley: Virtual Communities / Social Media

Howard Rheingold will be teaching a course on social media in the spring 2008. I highly recommend students in the Ljubljana seminar examine the syllabus to Rheingold's course: the readings, assignments, and especially his comments on the use of blogs during the seminar. I would like to incorporate some of the features of his course in our seminar. Check his Instructor's Journal at the bottom of the syllabus for an indication of student culture during seminars at Berkeley….

Course syllabi: blogging & Wikipedia

 

I am collecting a large number of course syllabi related to digital studies and this one has an interesting comment on the learning value of blogging and on use of Wikipedia. The assignment regarding Wikipedia is one I want to incorporate into the Ljubljana seminar later in the semester.

 

Digital History: Methodology for the Infinite Archive

 

July 4th, 2006 by William Turkel

 

Blogging

Every student in the class will have an academic blog and will be expected to make regular posts to it. This use of blogging is to encourage you to engage in 'reflective practice,' that is, to force you to think about your learning and research as you are doing it. This process was described by Donald Schön in The Reflective Practitioner (London: Temple Smith, 1983):

 

In each instance, the practitioner allows himself [or herself] to experience surprise, puzzlement, or confusion in a situation which he finds uncertain or unique. He reflects on the phenomena before him, and on the prior understandings which have been implicit in his behaviour. He carries out an experiment which serves to generate both a new understanding of the phenomena and a change in the situation… He does not keep means and ends separate, but defines them interactively as he frames a problematic situation. He does not separate thinking from doing… Because his experimenting is a kind of action, implementation is built into his inquiry.

 

Different bloggers have very different styles. Some people like to keep what amounts to a lab notebook, others a daily diary. Some write short, off-the-cuff entries, others prefer to write well-crafted essays. If you have never blogged before, spend some time familiarizing yourself with existing digital history blogs.

 

Before the first class (12 Sep 2006) you should go to Blogger and create an account and a blog. If possible, create the blog under your own name (e.g., http://johndoe.blogspot.com); if not, choose something professional sounding. Post an introductory message about yourself and then send me the URL of your blog so that I can add you to the course blogroll for History 513F. If you are also in History 500F/501G, you will be using the same blog for both courses. (And you should cc your e-mail about your blog to Professor MacEachern.)

…

 

Wikipedia

In this class you will be exposed to a lot of relatively new technical terms and ideas. You should get in the habit of looking these up in Wikipedia whenever you come across something unfamiliar. You've probably heard that Wikipedia is an unreliable source. That's true, but it's true of any source. One of our early seminar discussions will focus on reading Wikipedia critically; during the course you will also have the experience of writing a Wikipedia article and monitoring its subsequent revision.

Future of the Internet Economy

Materials from the OECD meeting, Seoul, Korea, 17-18 June 2007, about the Future of the Internet Economy are available; see especially a list of preliminary documents on the site. Below is an excerpt about one of the central themes from the meeting:

 

Fuelling Creativity

The Internet has greatly expanded our capacity to create, compute, communicate, co-ordinate, and innovate, toppling barriers that constrained so many economic and social activities in the past. It has led to increased productivity, lowered costs and raised living standards in ways difficult to imagine just a few years ago. This creative activity is generating new software and hardware products, sensor technologies, new ways of organising global business, employment creation, and the development of digital content across the economy and in research, government, health and education. The theme on Fuelling Creativity will consider:

• How to enable innovation and encourage new co-operative models for growth and employment.
  
• Enabling maximum access to public sector information and content and its re-use by the private sector.
  
• The value of e-science in innovation policy and in the OECD's innovation strategy.
  

Second Life as educational environment and research venue

Below is a post (30 Nov 2007) by Ross Perkins to the SLED list about a presentation he gave on the basics of Second Life. I highly recommend it for the 'uninitiated' and for those concerned about how SL can be used in an educational environment and as a venue for social science research.

 

Last night, I gave a free "webinar" for fellow members of AECT (Association for Educational Communications and Technology; www.aect.org). It was meant for those interested Second Life in general - and what AECT is doing there. There are three parts:

 
 

1) Prims (a bit about SL)

2) Plans (a short overview of what AECT does in SL)

3) Projects (teaching & ed. research in Second Life)

 
 

The session (sans audience questions & my gaffs) is now available as an Articulate (Flash-based) presentation. It's right around 60 minutes if watched all the way through - but you can navigate slides as you wish, so it might only be 3 minutes for you!

 
 

If you're interested in it, go to:

 
 

http://filebox.vt.edu/users/rperkins/sl/player.html

 
 

Any feedback you might have is much appreciated (it could use tweaking, I'm sure).

 
 

-Ross / Milo

 
 

 
 

Ross Perkins, PhD

School of Education

Virginia Tech

_______________________________________________

Educators mailing list

To unsubscribe

https://lists.secondlife.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/educators

Duke University Library services

Below is a recent excerpt from the Duke Univ. Library services for students, this one about the Web version of EndNote, a history project involving visualization, and use of podcasts. I highly recommend consulting this service, called Library Hacks.

 

 

 

Duke University Libraries

Library Hacks

Take EndNote on the road with EndNote Web
November 26, 2007

Posted by Emily in : Cool tools, Research Help, Tips for students , add a comment

Interested in accessing your EndNote library even when you're not in front of your personal computer? Take your research on the road by setting up an EndNote Web account, and enjoy the freedom to consult or add citations to your EndNote library from any computer with an internet connection.

EndNote Web is designed to complement the more robust desktop version of the citation management tool, but it's possible to use it even if you've never used EndNote (by the way, EndNote may be downloaded for free by Duke students, staff and faculty).

Simply set up an Endnote Web account, and then add up to 10,000 citations to your Web library. Format bibliographies and in-text citations in over 2300 publishing styles (MLA, APA, etc.), or use the Cite While You Write plug-in and Microsoft Word to format papers and insert references instantly. You may also share citations with others who use the web application and search PubMed, Web of Science and hundreds of libraries for relevant resources, all within the EndNote Web interface.

And if you choose to use the two programs together (as they were intended), it's easy to transfer citations between EndNote and EndNote Web.

Give it a try, and let us know what you think about EndNote's latest innovation for researchers

Holocaust Survivors Tell Their Stories
November 9, 2007

Posted by Jennifer in : Cool tools, Database Tip , add a comment

The Shoah Foundation Visual History Archive is a remarkable database that contains full-length digital videos of Holocaust survivors and witnesses. This resource that Duke Libraries just recently purchased contains over 50,000 video testimonies.

To get to this database, just click on the database tab on the Duke Library homepage and type "Shoah" in the search box. Once at the site, you will be asked to create a free username and password in order to log-in.

Once you are logged in, you can search for interviews by keyword, a specific person, or by an experience group.

What will you find inside, you may ask?

• Extraordinary primary source material to use in your research.
  
• Full-length video interviews taken in 56 countries, in 32 languages!
  
• At the end of many interviews, personal photographs, documents, and artifacts from the interviewee's family are displayed.
  

Podcasts: Audio Primary Sources
November 8, 2007

Posted by Phoebe in : Cool tools, Foreign languages , add a comment

As we at iPod - I mean, Duke - University know, podcasts have proliferated in the past 5 years. They aren't just for fun, however - major radio news sources and government agencies are making podcasts available that can be used in research or academic presentations. Radio podcasts can provide in-depth interviews with politicians, medical researchers, legal scholars, and much more. Here's an NPR podcast in Spanish on youth culture:

Have a look at our podcasts page to see links to sources for academic and primary source content via podcast.

The past is not lost

In trying to create a (new) blog, I seem to have done something that the previous Blogger posts have not been incorporated. They are, though, still available at:

http://ljubljanaseminar.blogspot.com/

and are worth examining....

Nick