Top Web Tools for College Students from NextPath

Just found this great webpage that has 10 tools for college students.  I post a link to it here both for my friends still in school that may read this, but also for instructors who want to know what students are using and how they are using it.  Every teacher that I know is (or should be) a life-long learner too… enjoy!!

Top 10 list includes:

1. Book Finder
2. MynoteIT
   
3. Ottobib
4. Google Docs
5. Tada List
6. Meebo
7. Wikipedia
8. Zoho Show
9. Google Reader
10. Del.icio.us

Line Rider – Educational? Not really, but fun!

A couple days ago one of my colleagues introduced me to Line Rider.  For those (like me) who haven’t heard of this yet, Line Rider is a type of online “toy” where you draw lines and a little sledder-guy slides down the line according to the laws of physics.  Sounds simple right?  Check out this video.

This is just one of many such examples.  There are obvious educational uses… mostly in the physics field.  Granted it is probably mostly just a time waster, but it sure is a fun one. 🙂 Check out some other crazy examples… or just have fun yourself! 

POWERFUL Statement about Instructional Technology!

I just read a great post from Neil Hokanson’s Instructional Technology blog.  He posts the following (originally from Rae Niles).

Let’s have a little competition at school and get ready for the
future. I will use a laptop and you will use paper and pencil. Are you
ready…?

I will access up-to-date information – you have a textbook that is 5 years old.
I will immediately know when I misspell a word – you have to wait until it’s graded.
I will learn how to care for technology by using it – you will read about it.
I will see math problems in 3D – you will do the odd problems.
I will create artwork and poetry and share it with the world – you will share yours with the class.
I will have 24/7 access – you have the entire class period.
I will access the most dynamic information – yours will be printed and photocopied.
I will communicate with leaders and experts using email – you will wait for Friday’s speaker.
I will select my learning style – you will use the teacher’s favorite learning style.
I will collaborate with my peers from around the world – you will collaborate with peers in your classroom.
I will take my learning as far as I want – you must wait for the rest of the class.

The cost of a laptop per year? – $250
The cost of teacher and student training? – Expensive
The cost of well educated US citizens and workforce? – Priceless

If this doesn’t sum up instructional technology and our goal I don’t know what does! 

I just had a conversation with someone that was complaining about a problem her computer was having opening up a link to her electronic plane ticket.  She said something to the effect of “that is the problem with technology.”  We chatted a little more and I gently reminded her that computers also make it possible to even book a ticket online when ever we want, comparing prices across the world instantly, and printing ticket’s at home.  She laughed as she realized her fallacy. 

Yes, there are technical problems with so much of what we do.  There are things we have to work through every day, but look at the way education has changed and WILL continue to change!  This change only happens because we persist, because there are those that have the courage to be on the edge keep trying till it works.

Today I am just so grateful for those who are willing to try new things.  These are the ones that have, and always will change the world.  For the most part, these are the ones reading this blog entry. 

To each of you, thank you!  Keep up the good work!  Remember, the reward is PRICELESS… across the world! 

Happy Valentine’s Day

I just wanted to take a moment to reminisce on days gone by in Elementary school when we all brought all of our classmates (colleagues) Valentine’s cards for Valentine’s day.  But in the true spirit of the 21st Century I have created an online valentine for all of you!  Isn’t technology Great!!

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

I hope you have a screamin’ great day!

Jeff

Somewhat Random Idea for the Future of Computing…

So I was just reading an article on Wired Science and it really got me thinking.  The article in itself talks about a new mass storage (10-20GB) device that can be hooked up to cell phones.  All that space would potentially create room for an operating system to run, but you still have one lingering problem with cell-phones becoming the computer of the future… the screen size.  Even a full-size iPhone screen is still small… how do we get past this? 

Well, my idea is to virtualize the screen… virtualize the whole computer.  We need to create a way to just hook the cell-phone up to our head so we can virtually navigate.  I’m not talking about wires, I’m talking wirelessly.

I read an article a couple of months past (which I can’t seem to find again… anyone?) about researchers that were able to type letters by having a computer monitor their brain waves.  The process was long and tedious but it worked.  That technology, adapted to moving the mouse around, is a next step.  After that the sky’s the limit!  Why not just think “My Documents” and it opens… visualize that picture of the ski trip and you found it… think of a webpage and it’s up.  The speed of thought… now that is real speed!

Sounds kind of Matrix like, but in a strange way… possible in the coming years.  Computers are just managing information anyway.  With out minds hooked up to the computer we can manage that information a lot better.   There’s no need for these peripheral keyboard/mice/monitor things…

Just don’t sign me up for the first tests…

ECAR Report Thoughts

I just finished reading the ECAR report “The Future of Higher Education: A View from CHEMA” that was released last August.  Some of you may have read this already, but some may not have.  Anyway, it has some interesting quotes that I would like to point out. 

Second Wave of Technology Implementation

Seeing as I am not an administrator, I found the Section III, Part 5 “How will technology continue to transform the academy?” most interesting (pg. 12-13).  The report quotes Mary Daniels of Ohio State University as saying:

We are at the end of the first wave of technology implementations, where we learned how IT can change the way we do business.  The second wave will transform the learning experience.  It is just taking higher education longer to technology enhancements to education. (12)

I thought this was a good way of describing what has and is happening in schools around the country.  We have seen the power of technology to help us get our work done, but we are just beginning to see how technology can, and will change the way we learn.  In an earlier article I examined the emergence of an entirely different way of writing research papers where the paper could be written by going to different things that talk about that subject and adding your comments online.  I am not saying that is what is going to happen in the future, but it is an example of changes that could happen in the way we do things. 

Technology Changes Everything

Another responder, Steve Sayers, continues along the same line.  He says:

I think significant changes will revolve around technology.  It will alter where students learn and how they learn.  It may be longer than ten years, but the time will come when students will be able to learn anywhere. (12)

If we look at the way students are growing up using the web, it already has altered everything.  They don’t go to books for information, they go to the web.  The web will be come the platform for learning (if it has not already).  The web has replaced books for all but a few of the younger generation.

I realize that some people might look down on this change as bad.  I too consider it a great loss to not read books.  But the answer is not to go back to the books, it is to bring the books to the internet like great companies like Google are trying to do.  That way the students will go there for information, not less-reliable webpages. 

Universal Impact

Among the survey respondents, technological change was the second most selected change driver for higher education as a whole and individual functional areas.  The anticipated impact of technology did not differ significantly by either a respondent’s institutional perspective or primary mission of the functional area they represent. (12)

I include this quote just to show that everyone, everywhere sees the importance technology is going to play in the coming years. 

Resistance to Change

The #1 threat to the success of higher education as a whole, not to mention technology in it, is resistance to change.  People don’t like to change.  That is the bottom line.  When you get somebody that has done something the same way for 25 years it is VERY hard to change that… but not impossible.  From the report:

Marvin Peterson, professor of education at the University of Michigan, argues that higher education is not an irrational community that will refuse to change no matter what.  He points out that ‘there is no such thing as resistance to change in the face of a compelling reason to change.’ (15)

The key here is examining those reasons… are they good reasons?  If so, move forward.  If not, that’s okay. 

Collaboration

I have talked a lot in my recent posts about collaboration.  Perhaps that is why this next quote stuck out to me.  One of the responders said:

The increasing access to information and the speed at which it comes to us is challenging higher education’s more deliberative and collaborative tendency. (13)

I don’t disagree that the amount of information is challenging, but that is why we have amazing search engines and collaborative social networks to filter out what is important and what is not. 

What I disagree with is the notion that technology is hurting collaboration in education.  I think this idea is based off of the idea that we collaborate in person in a classroom.  I don’t know about you, but most of my classes didn’t include any type of collaboration at all!  I collaborate a lot more online than I ever did in the classroom.  Technologies like Google Docs will only increase that collaboration. 

It’s not all Good

The report is not all bright lights and star gazing.  There are some inherent problems that come with technology.  Georgia Yuan, from Smith College points out:

Technology is speeding up the expectations for responding to requests for services.  This has quickened the pace of administration to a dangerous level.  Thoughtfulness is sacrificed in favor of acting and responding quickly. (13)

I thought this was a very good point.  Technology has really sped up our lives.  We are constantly doing something, reading something, responding to something, sun-up to sun-down.  For those of us that work with technology that is even worse.  It is something we need to recognize and work on.  That being said, I think I have written enough for today.  I’m going to go and look at the wonderful weather outside! (Snow)

SplashCasts Educational Potential

What are SplashCasts?

Today TechCrunch published an article about the official launch of SplashCasts.  For those who haven’t heard of them before here is a little blurb from their main page.

SplashCast enables anyone to create streaming media ‘channels’ that
combine video, music, photos, narration, text and RSS feeds. These
user-generated channels can be played and easily syndicated on any web
site, blog, or social network page. When channel owners modify their
channel, their content is automatically updated across all the web
pages ‘tuned’ to that channel.

Educational Potential

My first question was how is this different than podcast’s or Windows Movie Maker.  In reality a user could create these multimedia presentation for quite some time, but the interface is much easier to navigate and
control.  Users also have the added bonus of using content that is
already hosted at places like Flickr and YouTube without downloading and copying the content.  That sure saves some time in the creation process.

With SplashCasts you are also basically creating your own channel.  Much like I wrote about yesterday, everyone can be famous; everyone can have their own channel.

Some ideas for education off the top of my head:

• Teacher records classes and has a channel students can go and watch anytime.
• Teacher creates classes online using video, audio, photo’s, text, whatever… a true MULTI-MEDIA presentation.
• Assign students to create their own SplashCast regarding a subject.
• Create a class SplashCast that everyone can add to and update.  It could be a great resource for other teacher’s as well.

What other applications in education can you think of?

Trial Run

I decided any review wouldn’t be totally complete without a test run.  I signed up (free) with relative ease (they did ask for my birthday, but promised it would be kept private) and signed in.  I must say I was pleasantly surprised at the ease of creating a presentation.  I created a couple using text, audio, video from YouTube and even a RSS feed presentation.  The flash interface was a little annoying to my ajax-centered (Gmail, Google Calendar, etc, etc.) life.  Overall though I give it 8 out of 10 stars. 

What has your experience been like?

Technorati Tags: splashcasts

Using Google Maps with Google Books to Augment Literature Study

Google Operating System, a blog I absolutely love, published an article today about a new(?) development on the Google Book Search that shows a contextual map of locations that are mentioned in a book. Fantastic idea for augmenting your literature study! They use “War and Peace” as an example of all the places mentioned in the book. Man I love Google!

UPDATE: (1/26/07 8:41 a.m.)
I didn’t realize how much Google Book Search really has. As I looked around I noticed a myriad of options there that would REALLY be useful in education. In addition to the cool map you get the following for selected works:

• A List of Editions
• References to Scholarly Work about the Book
• References to this Book in other Books
• Related Books
• Selected Pages from Editions
• Ability to Search for Specific Words or Phrases in the Book (Great for Research!)
• A List of Key Words and Phrases and Links to Those in the Book

WOW! This is amazing! I wish I would have had/used this resource when I was in Graduate School!

Technorati Tags: google book search, google

Do You Want to Remember EVERYTHING? (Memex)

“Memex” is a device that records everything to do… literally EVERYTHNG.  Video, audio, temperature, weather, what programs you are using on your computer… EVERYTHING.  It is a virtual memory of types. 

My Introduction to Memex

I first heard about this intriguing device about six months ago in a lecture given by John Oberlin (Associate Chancellor of Information Technology at UNC) specifically for our staff.  Today my ‘real’ memory was jogged by an article published on our University’s research site. Here is a picture of the device as it stands right now.

Potential and Pitfalls

When I first heard about this amazing device I was intrigued, but also a little scared.  To be able to go back and search through EVERYTHING that has happened in life could really be a useful tool.  I did however, ask about the ramifications of having EVERYTHING you said to everyone else recorded.  I know there are some things in my life I would rather not have remembered.

We are already often challenged with managing our “online identities.” Many people can not get jobs because of some of the silly things we did back in college that show up in search results or on social networking sites.  A variety of websites have popped up like claimID that provide tools for managing the positive things about us, and hopefully moving the negative things further down on the Google search results. 

Conclusion

I must say I am still intrigued about the whole “memex” idea… but a little wary.  What do you think?  There are obvious amazing uses for education.  For one, teachers won’t have to be trained to record themselves and post it online.  Each student could do that for themselves.  What other possibilities do you forsee?

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Technorati Tags: memex

5 Good Developments for Education in Window’s Vista

This afternoon I went to a meeting of the techie minds here on campus to discuss the implementation of Vista. There were quite a few people that acted like the implementation of Vista was a terrible, but necessary evil. A lot of the discussion focused around the new Office 2007 suite. From a support standpoint I can see how this upgrade could be a nightmare. The changes in Office navigation are quite significant, especially for long time users of the suite, with little apparent added functionality.

On the other hand, I have been using Vista and the Office Suite for several months as my primary machine and have not had any significant problems. I left the meeting trying to reconcile my experience with what I had just witnessed. I decided I was going to look for what was different/good about the upgrade.

All I.T. people tell you Vista is more secure, and it does have a multitude of security features that make it more safe, but an every day educator cares more about it working and functioning that how safe it is. I decided to look at specifically at how the upgrade to Vista helps us out as educators? What specific traits does it have that would be make it advantageous for us to upgrade to Vista? What added functionality will help me educate better? Here is my list:

1. Organization
   There is no question that the biggest reason to upgrade has to be the added search capabilities. Since installing Vista on my machine I no longer use the cumbersome start menu to get to programs. I just click start and type in the program I want.
   Microsoft (taking a lesson from Google Desktop) has now created an indexed catalog of your computer so you have instant search results that include inside of documents. Great for finding that paper you wrote 5 years ago.
2. Instant Information
   Vista has a built in Gadget and Sidebar Engine that let’s you add little modules to your desktop with real-time updating information about ANYTHING. Time, Stocks, Calendar’s, anything! Yahoo and Google both have these already, but they take up a lot of resources and slow down your machine.In an awesome move Vista has added native RSS feed capabilities to Outlook and their integrated Gadget’s. As I discussed in an earlier post, this added feature is a must have for any educator who needs to keep up on current events and happenings!
3. Collaboration
   Collaboration is a must have as a good educator. As educators we often need to share files with students or colleagues as we work on programs. If we are not comfortable using an online program like Google Docs then Vista gives us the added capability of sharing a folder in public space.Vista has a new ‘Meeting Space‘ feature that allows users to create a space for up to 10 users to meet and collaborate in real time. I have not been able to test it out yet, but a software like this would be great for meeting with your class or between students working on a project.
4. Backup
   There are added protections to help you not lose data. You can read about them all here in detail, but my favorite is the windows backup and previous versions of documents that are available should you accidentally change something you didn’t mean to.
5. Multimedia
   Vista has added functionality to the photo manager, media player, movie maker and media center. As video becomes more and more prevalent in education, users will need ways to edit those easily.

This is just a short list of some of the improvements Microsoft has made to their windows platform. You can read a whole lot more on their Vista website if you have interest.

Disclaimer:
I realize that most of these additions are already available on through second hand software or on the Mac. (There has even been discussion about Microsoft just copying Mac’s.) That being said, there is something to be said about integrated technology. 90% of our campus used Windows, so it is going to happen.

Homework:
What other added functionality do you see as benefiting the academic community?

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Technorati Tags: microsoft vista, office 2007, microsoft education