Elizabeth Pyatt's TLT Blog: Comments

Comment on "Desire2Learn Impressions from Annual Conference"

Mon, 01 Aug 2011 14:26:36 -0500

Hi Elizabeth,

Thank you for the thoughtful write-up. You were obviously very attentive to detail at the conference (No surprise to me!)

We will definitely include the thoughts from your experience as part of our pilot review document.

Jeff

- Jeff Swain

Comment on "Emboirdery Wins at NMC!"

Fri, 17 Jun 2011 06:49:23 -0500

This is beautiful, Elizabeth! Congratulations. I have no idea what the differences are between cross stitching, embroidery, crocheting, or macramé, but I really love the intricacies of them.

- DAVID R STONG

Comment on "Three TWT Recipients Also Awarded Martin Outstanding Teaching Award"

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 21:55:16 -0500

Yes, I think the TWT process definitely contributed to some of my success in the classroom. The TWT was an organized, and structured way for me to implement technology into the classroom, and students have responded positively.

I highly recommend the TWT process for anyone interested.

- David Agler

Comment on "Skype and the Snow Day"

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 08:44:44 -0500

I agree, although one person said she didn't know about Skype until she spent time in Germany. Skype is definitely popular world wide.

- ELIZABETH J PYATT

Comment on "Skype and the Snow Day"

Wed, 02 Feb 2011 21:38:19 -0500

That is awesome! Amazing how much we can do with a little creativity and some effort. Really interesting that the students translated Adobe Connect to Skype. That should tell us something!

- Cole W. Camplese

Comment on "New Media Seminar Final Thoughts"

Tue, 04 Jan 2011 09:37:02 -0500

We actually discussed this issue several times during the semester, and thinking over it, there were some issues that are worth considering in a project like this.

Although the project was very laudable, I think it ended up being more of a independent learning experience rather than a truly distributed course. I understood why Gardner Campbell could not be as involved in the distributed course, but a lot of us ended up feeling stranded. We were missing the instructor presence recommended by so many theories of online education.

We could do the readings, but we couldn't share the instructor's understanding of their importance. I did agree with the others that most readings were very opaque. The discussions they generated were valuable, but often very tangential to the original reading. Maybe that was the goal, but we were never sure if we were "getting" it or not. I would have to say that I might have chosen other readings, but maybe Gardner would be frustrated with my selections.

If we did this at Penn State, I would recommend some additional support. Maybe there could be a list of questions or maybe the instructor could write a paragraph explaining why that reading "resonates". Another option would be for a leader to meet with discussion leaders periodically to discuss the progress of the course.

The benefits of the instructor would be that the discussions would probably be more meaningful to the instructor as well as the students.

- ELIZABETH J PYATT

Comment on "New Media Seminar Final Thoughts"

Mon, 27 Dec 2010 13:05:37 -0500

Hi Elizabeth ... just cleaning out some feeds while trying to relax over the Holiday break and came across this post. I appreciated the honesty and the reflection ... this was something I was hoping to participate in, but ultimately knew I wouldn't be able to carve out the time. I know Gardner relatively well and can see how his approach to a course like this could look a bit odd to those of us approaching our work through a different lens. What I liked about what I saw was that a group of colleagues from the same office decided it was worthwhile to not only take part in the "course" but to stick with it -- and that there were such different "kinds" of people in that room was a cool sight to see.

What it leaves me wondering is if an approach like this (with a slightly different orientation) would work with the larger community at PSU? If we designed it and pressed people into a distributed learning environment like this ... I just wonder if we could do it and if others would find value.

At any rate, enjoy the break!

- Cole W. Camplese

Comment on "Teens Who Won't Tweet"

Fri, 10 Dec 2010 11:01:49 -0500

It seems twitter simply has an image issue with the young 'ens. It doesn't matter what they can actually do with the tool; the only thing that matters is what they THINK of the tool. Much like Chrysler's challenge in recent years; the reality is that their cars are much improved and competitive but the image is...well, it's a Chrysler. For many, the word alone causes immediate dismissal. The difference between Twitter and Chrysler is that Chrysler is paying millions to Madison Avenue to change the thinking. Twitter has...Aston Kucher?

- MATTHEW N MEYER

Comment on "Buffy vs Edward: Another Masup with Fair Use "

Thu, 14 Oct 2010 20:25:32 -0500

I think the "mashup" has very limited application in most instructional situations, yet it's so often used as the primary example of how Fair Use can be exercised in education. Even at the OVC, all anyone wanted to talk about regarding Fair Use was the mashup. But there's so many other situations students are protected, some of which you mention above, and which also includes:

“quotation of excerpts in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or comment; quotation of short passages in a scholarly or technical work, for illustration or clarification of the author’s observations; use in a parody of some of the content of the work parodied; summary of an address or article, with brief quotations, in a news report; reproduction by a library of a portion of a work to replace part of a damaged copy; reproduction by a teacher or student of a small part of a work to illustrate a lesson; reproduction of a work in legislative or judicial proceedings or reports; incidental and fortuitous reproduction, in a newsreel or broadcast, of a work located in the scene of an event being reported.”

I like to tell students that as long as their video is "about" the media the are appropriating, i.e. there's some narrative commenting on or criticizing the media, they are covered. That opens up a lot of uses beyond the parody/satire-style of most mashups.

- Chris Millet

Comment on "Online Learning: It's Still All About the Learning Objective"

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 12:18:52 -0500

Elizabeth, I agree about us using the wrong learning objectives. It seems in today's available environments (technology, media, events) that we need to expand our thinking around learning objectives. Our field is experiencing amazing changes at incredible speeds and we often get caught up thinking how to use the 'new' stuff to achieve old thinking objectives. It seems we can use these opportunities to raise the bar for academic work.

- MATTHEW N MEYER

Comment on "Expression Web Roundup"

Tue, 22 Jun 2010 07:52:14 -0500

What about some of the freebies out there, such as VuE and KompoZer? Have you ever examined them for code generation, Unicode, etc.?

- BRETT ALAN BIXLER

Comment on "Blog Tip: The Permanent Top Entry"

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 00:04:45 -0500

A very belated thanks for this blogs tip, which I kept in the back of my mind but didn't get around to trying till now. I have successfully made a post pseudo-sticky on my family blog, one I wrote two years ago that asked new visitors to explain how they fit into the family, which otherwise by now new visitors would not easily find.

- MARY ELIZABETH JANZEN

Comment on "Those Kids Today...."

Wed, 16 Jun 2010 10:14:55 -0500

t seems this study has many gaps and you basically call them out when pointing to real actions versus how students answer survey questions. I read a few of the survey questions and I even wonder about how 'truthful' students are when answering. I think that years ago, college-age kids were more inclined to answer "agree" to those questions even though that was not really how they felt. I know I was. Almost as if it were more polite or expected to answer that way. Perhaps today's kids are a bit braver in expressing how they really feel? That would be hard to measure but I agree with you here (as I was also a college student in the 80's- which was an awesome time to be one, by the way) that students have not really changed as much per this study. The study tries to lay some blame on media exposure but how different are those activities for goofing off than my friends and I playing cards for hours on end? In the end, it was fun, interactive, engaging and most importantly a way to pass time. The kids are alright.

- MATTHEW N MEYER

Comment on "Achiever vs. Explorer Learning"

Wed, 31 Mar 2010 11:24:17 -0500

Nice thoughtful post! For the explorers, you have to (ideally) reward exploration, or at best, NOT penalize it.

In games, even when the world is nearly doomed, you can go off and explore to your heart's delight most times, only to come back to the main action when you are ready - and find out that amazingly, the entire world has waited for you to return!

Not very realistic, but it is a mechanism that works in games. How do we translate that to other scholarly activities? That's the question of the day!

- BRETT ALAN BIXLER

Comment on "iMix for Fun & Non-Profit Learning"

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 20:36:17 -0500

Elizabeth ... this post brings up memories for me in my own experimentations with iMixes -- mins mostly focused on being able to bring in content from across the iTunes U and Podcast directory spaces. While your thoughts are music centric, I still think the notion of the iMix for academic content is a winner. I am betting that down the line Apple will enable iMixes for educational purposes as (one would assume) they line up textbook publishers for the iBook Store. It could get really interesting ... here are some results of my explorations from a few years ago, http://colecamplese.typepad.com/my_blog/2006/07/imixes-for-education.html

I've also looked at LaLa as a way for students to grab legal music via a faculty produced playlist -- they get one free listen and then can either purchase the web song for ten cents or buy it as an MP3 for 99 cents. BTW, Apple bought LaLa not too long ago so it isn't a stretch to think about how the three spaces could come together -- iBooks, iTunes U, and LaLa. That landscape may get really interesting in the near future!

- Cole W. Camplese

Comment on "Getting Visitor Interaction...The Hard Way"

Sat, 27 Feb 2010 08:22:44 -0500

I love it!

- Cole W. Camplese

Comment on "Word Text in Movable Type (DON'T DO IT)"

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 15:34:56 -0500

I've been using Dreamweaver in these situations - I can design in WYSIWYG mode then switch to code view and cut and paste the result. There's a lot you can do in WYSIWYG mode and the code is a lot cleaner.

- ELIZABETH J PYATT

Comment on "Word Text in Movable Type (DON'T DO IT)"

Tue, 09 Feb 2010 15:12:13 -0500

We have the same Word gobbledegook problem as content contributors to the TLT Plone site. As a result, I always still switch to code view before pasting and hand-code the HTML both there and in MT4. Of course, I'm a control freak--and a neat freak. Clutter = shudder.

- MARY ELIZABETH JANZEN

Comment on "Not sure about iPad, but that's OK"

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 15:09:04 -0500

I'm excited about getting my hands on an iPad too. I'm most excited about its potential as an e-reader. The Kindle's ok, but I think the screen's too small (on the most popular model) and the interface with all the buttons is unwieldy IMHO. The iPad seems much more natural and intuitive to use as an e-reader. I am interested though in how it will fare it terms of eyestrain. Will it be something I take pleasure in kicking back with at night and reading myself to sleep? I know my laptop doesn't pass that test.

- NATALIE FRANCES HARP

Comment on "Any Writing Games?"

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 10:27:09 -0500

Elizabeth, I think the biggest obstacle to higher-level writing 'games' are the design and programming aspects. Someone has to be willing to invest the time and resources (read: money) to develop one. With all the programming logic required to enforce certain writing 'rules', it becomes a huge endeavor with an unknown 'return'. Perhaps games that take advantage of 2.0 technologies and communities that share writing in a critical manner that is also somehow a game?

- MATTHEW N MEYER