March 2009 Archives

My first experiment with Voice Thread. Cathy Holsing showed this off today at the All-ID meeting. From outward appearances, it seems to be a slideshow tool. However, the results can be embedded in any site (including a blog post) and anyone can leave a comment in one of five ways: by recording an audio comment, recording a video comment, typing a text comment, uploading a file, or leaving an audio comment by calling a phone number. It's pretty amazing stuff.

This tool was developed at the University of North Carolina. I looked into the higher education integration licensing and (for a fee), they will give it a custom skin and integrate it with a university's authentication. I checked and Shibboleth was on the list.

So I talked with Matt Meyer about running a Hot Team to look at this tool more closely. I think it has a lot of potential.  It's kind of like asynchronous video conferencing in that there is a conversation happening within each media object, but people aren't connecting at the exact same time.

So go ahead an leave a comment if you like.  You'll need to get a VoiceThread account to make a comment, but if you're into these kinds of tools, that's not such a bad thing.

Yeah, I know.  I'm a big nerd.  I can't help it.

The Grassroots Video Hot Team met today to discuss some scenarios that represented the academic potential of Grassroots Video (i.e. "just good enough" video that people can create with inexpensive equipment and minimal props, scripting, lighting, sound, editing, etc...).  The two examples that we're going to use are shown below.

But before I get to the videos, the Time/Space Continuum idea came out when we were talking about how these videos can shift the instructor/student relationship and extend its scope.  Through video, students can be empowered to bring their own perspective on course topics, take a stand, and engage others in debate.  With the students' permission, the best projects can be used to help teach the next semester's students.  Since these videos are in social spaces, it creates an opportunity for different cohorts of students to intermingle.  So I could create a video about marketing principles as a junior for a class.  Three years later, when I'm working for a marketing firm, I can respond to students who are leaving comments on my video -- or I can leave a video response to my original project to update it based on the reality of the working world. 

So that's time.  The space continuum (and actually contact with a parallel world) came into the discussion when we discussed how students and faculty at one university can create a video to explore an issue (e.g. Teen Drinking) and then compare their project to people from other cultures (e.g. students in the U.K. who are involved with pub culture; students from Oman who follow Islamic law).  You could do something similar with blogging, but I think video would have a much greater impact.

Okay.  On to the videos.  I went through some of the videos on the Digital Commons site and worked with the Hot Team members to pick these two.  Both involved quite a bit of pre-planning, but I think we should set the bar pretty high to encourage people to use humor, music, and different kinds of imagery to get their point across.  Enjoy:

Lindley Jones, "In the Context"


Scott Miller, "Electron Jumping"

Short post today.  I'm in the midst of creating a mini catalog of informal learning spaces on and around campus.  These are spaces where students read, study, do homework, and collaborate on projects.  I've been at Penn State for over 21 years now, ever since I came here for my undergraduate work.  It's interesting for me to see these spaces over again, through the lens of my camera.  Some of the spaces have changed a lot.  Some look a lot like they did when I was a teenager.

Through the camera lens (or really, the LCD display -- it's a digital camera), it's easier for me to notice things like students sitting in the hallways of Willard and Sackett between classes, the differences between spaces that students use solo and ones that are more conducive to group meetings, the locations of power laptops, blank walls that have a potential for a whiteboard, etc... 

The use of some of these spaces blows me away.  There were so many people using spaces in the HUB, Kunkle Lounge, and another engineering-specific lounge in Sackett. THOUSANDS of people using these spaces for academic work outside the classroom. 

I'm glad we're starting to pay attention to them and thinking about ways that we can enhance these spaces where appropriate and feasible.  After all, if we want students to study more and work together more, I think we have a responsibility to give them the kinds of facilities that foster collaboration.
 

I have another meeting of the Informal Learning Spaces group later this week, so I spent some time today writing up some of the work we've been doing.  At first, I thought about using wikispaces to create a list of the different informal learning spaces around campus.  I created a page and started writing a description that listed the features of the space.

Then I threw out that idea and started posting the descriptions to the informal learning spaces project blog. I made three posts so far, each of which have a photo of the space, a description, the type of space it is (cafe, media creation space, breakout space, etc...), and a list of features like Internet access, flexible furniture, and 24 hour access.  I also added tags to each post that represent the type of space, features, and location around campus.

The reason I did the descriptions this way is that it seemed to meet several of the requirements that we've been talking about that would create a system where people could find spaces near them with a certain combination of features.  It's not perfect, but it's an interesting experiment and a good way of taking a first cut at organizing information about these spaces.

By the way, I realize that the one post a day challenge is officially over, but it's still a good way of finishing a thought at the end of the day and sharing something with anyone who might be listening.