H800: Starting to think about TMA03 / ECA

TMA03 is due in less than a week, and I haven't really given it too much thought so far. The first thing we need to do is to identify the two digital technologies we are proposing to use as the basis for the end-of-course assessment (ECA). The precise requirement (from the ECA brief) is to "Choose two digital technologies you have used this year as a learner."

As a first step I have had a scan of various sources to seek a bit of inspiration. I've looked back through the H800 course material and I've looked at the tutor group forum and the course wiki (both for my own group and for other tutor groups). I've even been keeping an eye on Twitter, having set up a search on "H800". I also had a quick look on Cloudworks, but couldn't really see any relevant threads.

Anyway, with thanks to all other H800 students who have indicated their initial choices, here's a preliminary list of technologies which people seem to be considering:

• Discussion forums / tutor group forums (asynchronous)
  
• Wikis
  
• Blogs
  
• Audio / video conferencing (e.g. using Skype)
  
• Virtual classrooms (e.g. Elluminate / Wimba)
  
• Instant messaging (synchronous)
  
• Podcasts
  
• Online videos (e.g. YouTube or course-related videos)
  
• Screencasts
  
• Micro-blogging (e.g. Twitter)
  
• Social networking (e.g. Facebook)
  
• Social bookmarking (e.g. Delicious)
  
• Second life
  
• RSS feeds (and associated readers such as Google reader)
  
• Compendium
  

Obviously this list is not comprehensive, and there may well be other technologies that are appropriate, but they seem to be the ones which most people are thinking about.

I can't make my mind up at the moment. I was thinking about choosing blogs, but I'm a bit concerned because the brief for the ECA states that material which was submitted for any previous TMA must not be used again, and I selected blogging for one of the activities in TMA02.

I'll need to think a bit more about this.

Finally, a note about Twitter. I have started a new Twitter account specifically for use on this course. My new username is TonyB_H800

Using Twitter

I have really mixed feelings about Twitter. On the one hand, in a strange way, I am excited by the immediacy of it and I love the idea of building a network of people and sharing ideas. I also feel that there must be a way in which I can use the power of this service in my teaching and for the benefit of my students.

And yet ..... I can't get away from the negative feelings I have about Twitter. Firstly, the overwhelming majority of 'tweets' are at best, banal, and at worst, utter nonsense. Why would anyone be remotely interested in what I am doing? As for using it in my teaching – every example I have seen seems to be of limited value to me and I wonder whether it's really worth the effort.

And yet ..... here I am having played around with it so much over the weekend that I have ended up with three separate Twitter accounts: one for work, one for H800, and personal one. And what's more I've discovered a brilliant tool which allows me to manage all three accounts, plus a Facebook account, plus any searches I want to add. It's called TweetDeck and it's free to download. There's also a version for the iPhone available as a free app. Although it takes a bit of setting up it seems a great way to manage everything from a single place.

Now all I need are some friends to follow and a few ideas for tweets that anyone would be interested in!

......I'm still not convinced, but I'm open to persuasion!

Using a tablet instead of a mouse

I've just got a Wacom Bamboo Pen and Touch. It's basically an alternative to a mouse as an input device for the computer. It consist of a small tablet measuring about 250x180mm which connects via USB. You can use your fingers on the surface of the tablet to navigate around the screen, or there is a 'pen' with which you can write on the tablet and the writing appears as digital ink on the screen.
I thought this would be a brilliant way of providing feedback on students' coursework electronically. I thought if students could submit their work digitally, then I could open the document, and simple write my feedback in digital ink, rather than having to type in comments.
So what's the verdict? Well my initial reaction is that I'm a little disappointed. Firstly the original document needs to be 'sent' to another package such OneNote. That's a bit fiddly but I can live with it. A bigger disappointment for me is that it's not very easy to write small neat notes in a document. The image below is a partial screenshot showing my handwriting using the pen. I really took my time with this, but as you can see it's still not very neat. I normally have quite neat writing. If I was quickly writing comments I think it would be illegible.


I'll persevere for a while to see if things get better, but as I say – I'm disappointed.

H800: Week 19 – A7: Adopting a smartphone

Reading Do Smart Devices Make Smart Learners? (Pettit & Kukulska-Hulme, 2008)

1. Given what you know about your colleagues, students or friends, what role would you take if you were introducing them to a new device? Would you see yourself as a teacher/tutor or as a friend?
   
2. Would you go for the approach of the Qtek Clubs described in the paper?
   
3. How would you support your colleagues/students/friends in their learning? Would you create learning activities and, if so, of what kind?
   

In linking this activity to the broader themes of H800, you may like to consider whether, in your view, Qtek Clubs and similar forums are instances of learning by acquisition or learning by participation. Or a hybrid?

Before addressing the main questions related to this activity – a couple of quick points on the research paper. Firstly, I thought it was quite a weak piece of research. The paper devotes quite a lot of space to aspects that are unique to the particular device used in the research, which in my view is largely irrelevant to the broader aspects of smartphone use. Do we really need to know what the phone signal was like, or that make-up smears got on the screen when using it as a phone? Secondly, it is quite marked just how quickly a piece of research like this can become almost completely obsolete. The latest generation of smartphones are so superior to the one in this study that most of the findings have limited application in the context of the modern devices.

As for introducing colleagues, friends or students to new devices, I think the important thing is that people tend to use them in different ways. We need to discover what works best for us and the only way to do that is to play around with it yourself. Yes – of course it helps to be made aware of the potential of the devices, and new applications and so on, but ultimately these are personal devices and we have to use them ourselves. There is a vast amount of guidance online these days, and a simple YouTube search for any device would almost certainly yield a wide range of user-created videos which will show you how to do just about anything. I don't think I'd be particularly interested in the 'Qtek Club' approach.

The internet: everything you need to know

There's a very interesting piece written by John Naughton in this week's Observer.

I picked up on it from John Naughton's blog, and it seems to touch on several issues which we've been discussing in recent weeks.

H800: Week 18 – A3: The Observatory Report

Reading Web 2.0 for Learning and Teaching in Higher Education, by Tom Franklin and Mark van Harmelen on behalf of the Observatory on Borderless Higher Education

Just a very quick post on this activity as I find myself pressed for time and I want to get stuck into the social networking tools in subsequent activities.

The key things I took from this reading are that some universities clearly are addressing the challenges posed and opportunities afforded by Web 2.0. Certainly the universities referred to seem to have a clearer strategy and be much more advanced in their preparations than my own institution. There does seem to be a shift away from the centralised VLEs towards a more open, decentralised approach. I think John has previously referred to Elgg, but it is not a service that I am familiar with. It is interesting that several of the universities referred to in the report are adopting Elgg at University level and are reporting an enthusiastic take up amongst staff and students. I just wonder how much of this reporting is representative of the true picture. At Westminster a service known as CONNECT was introduced a couple of years ago, and this was actually referred to in the TLRP/TEL report (p20) which we read in Activity 2 this week. Anyone reading the report would get the impression that the service had been a fantastic success, but the reality is that I am not aware of anyone (staff or students) using it. I had a quick check this morning on the Connect homepage and the most recent post was a week ago, and prior to that the last post was two months ago!

I'm not suggesting that the same applies at other universities such as those adopting Elgg, but I am saying that the take-up figures published by universities need to be treated with some caution. Just because someone registers with a service does not necessarily mean that they are a regular user.

H800: Week 18 – A2 – The researcher’s perspective

Various readings from: TLRP-TEL 2008 Report, Education 2.0? Designing the Web for Teaching and Learning

Crook: What are Web 2.0 technologies, and why do they matter?

The meaning of "virtualisation of exchange practices": In a face-to-face / physical context, exchange practices involve the direct, verbal and paper-based exchange of information, ideas and money between parties. In a Web 2.0 environment the practices are 'virtual' and there are infinite possibilities.

Selwyn: Educational hopes and fears for Web 2.0

I think the fears which some educators have are understandable. Some educators will have spent their entire lives learning and teaching in a traditional educational environment. Web 2.0 may seem like an alien world in which the educator has to effectively give up a lot of the controls which they have traditionally held. It is perfectly natural that this will be greeted with some fear. This may include fear for the learning process, fear for the loss of traditional skills, and the loss of students' ability to think critically, and fear for the loss of the respect which scholarly activity is traditionally afforded.

I appreciate the need for caution in these matters and I would be concerned about blindly embracing Web 2.0, but personally I am more excited about the potential benefits than I am fearful of the downsides.

Carr: Learning and virtual world

Despite my general enthusiasm for Web 2.0, I must confess that I find the whole idea of Second Life somewhat strange. I have never experienced Second Life so I am loathe to be too dismissive of something I have never tried. Nevertheless, I cannot get away from feeling uncomfortable with the concept. I find it somehow false and I associate it with weirdos and sci-fi fanatics. Having said that, the examples of its use which are described seem to be perfectly reasonable. I understand that we will be exploring second life in more detail in Week 25, so perhaps I should reserve judgement.

Selwyn: Learning and social networking

As I think I may have mentioned when we looked at SNSs in an earlier week, whenever I have raised the issue of using Facebook and similar services with my students they have indicated that they see these services very much as part of their social lives rather than their education. They seemed uncomfortable with the idea of using Facebook in relation to their course and wanted to maintain a separate identity. Nevertheless, I still feel there is potential for these types of services (not necessarily Facebook) to be used in education, though I am not altogether sure of how.

Selwyn, Cook, Noss & Laurillard: Education 2.0? Towards an educational web 2.0

I think this is the most interesting of al the articles and I like the underlying theme. It is cautious yet positive and suggests that, rather than just worrying about what might happen, or dismissing Web 2.0 as irrelevant, educators should seize the initiative and reconfigure roles to exploit the power of Web 2.0 to good effect.