Podcasting in my classroom is integral to the success of my students, especially in the early parts of the course. Being a facilitator of the AQF Hospitality course, I find that students struggle in the first parts of the course, remembering names of specific cuts, processes, and concepts. The way I combat this is to use video of entire lessons to help students learn and recall information by being able to revisit the lesson content over and over again.
I did find it time consuming to have to go through the video and edit it, and getting it to both look right and not be too long can also be an issue, but it was worth it in the end.
Enough talking! Lets look at one video I have made and used in the past. I do plan to do more of these, but shorter and more succinct... Maybe in my holidays :)
Enjoy!
As I said, they need refinement and they are a bit long. But you get the idea!
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Flick me! (Module 4)
Flickr... For many people, the drive for public appreciation and recognition can change their perspective, especially on the significant issues of privacy. It is a fine line to draw on how much information to actually place on the internet, and the ease of which this information can be taken for personal use can cause much concern.
For instance, from an educational perspective, we could not use Flickr to save or share photo's, which is essentially what the application's function is. It is designed to host and share albums of photos. Given, those albums can be made private, but then it simply becomes organised cloud storage, and not really a place for sharing images (as is its intention). Now, if that album was private, or open only to those that had the passcode for it, then it could be useful - but we still have to ask: Who is the audience and what do they plan to do with those pictures? As the reality is, those pictures are easily downloaded and used in other mediums, or even posted to not-so-secure albums in another persons account, Facebook or similar. Case in point: My wife is part of a forum. One day, a person joined and started chatting. A while went by and pictures, Facebook accounts, and websites were setup with the persons name and photo's pf her children. After about 4 months, it was discovered (and is now under investigation) that this person had actually been following and stealing photos and stories from another persons blog, Facebook account and forum postings on a similar site, and "living" through this person... So, who's looking at your pictures?
In regards to copyright, we the author has to consider that any person could potentially steal and use out photo's for their own use. Either we are happy for this to occur, and we license our work under the Creative Commons License system, or we watermark our images.
Creative Commons is a fantastic organisation that allows material a certain license for sharing under certain conditions. Much of the PHP and Javascript code I write is licensed under the same system - I dont mind who uses it, but it must be credited correctly. This is called Attribution. There are other levels, but the emphasis is on collaboration and ensuring credit is given where it is due.
Overall, I think there is a use for Flickr, it simply has to be managed and we have to make sure that anything we upload, we are happy for others to use.
Anyway, below is a photo I will upload to my Flickr account.
For instance, from an educational perspective, we could not use Flickr to save or share photo's, which is essentially what the application's function is. It is designed to host and share albums of photos. Given, those albums can be made private, but then it simply becomes organised cloud storage, and not really a place for sharing images (as is its intention). Now, if that album was private, or open only to those that had the passcode for it, then it could be useful - but we still have to ask: Who is the audience and what do they plan to do with those pictures? As the reality is, those pictures are easily downloaded and used in other mediums, or even posted to not-so-secure albums in another persons account, Facebook or similar. Case in point: My wife is part of a forum. One day, a person joined and started chatting. A while went by and pictures, Facebook accounts, and websites were setup with the persons name and photo's pf her children. After about 4 months, it was discovered (and is now under investigation) that this person had actually been following and stealing photos and stories from another persons blog, Facebook account and forum postings on a similar site, and "living" through this person... So, who's looking at your pictures?
In regards to copyright, we the author has to consider that any person could potentially steal and use out photo's for their own use. Either we are happy for this to occur, and we license our work under the Creative Commons License system, or we watermark our images.
Creative Commons is a fantastic organisation that allows material a certain license for sharing under certain conditions. Much of the PHP and Javascript code I write is licensed under the same system - I dont mind who uses it, but it must be credited correctly. This is called Attribution. There are other levels, but the emphasis is on collaboration and ensuring credit is given where it is due.
Overall, I think there is a use for Flickr, it simply has to be managed and we have to make sure that anything we upload, we are happy for others to use.
Anyway, below is a photo I will upload to my Flickr account.
Monday, November 8, 2010
Google Docs (Module 3)
Google is a company that spends a significant amount of time researching the needs of consumers, and providing easy to use, stable web based applications to meet these requirements. Google Docs is no exception to this...
Docs is an amazing tool, that has so much untapped potential. Spreadsheets, forms, and documents are easy to share and discuss, and the application integrates with many other Google technologies, making many simple tasks streamlined. Some examples:
Assessments for students I can create in Google Spreadsheets, and port it to an online Form. The online form is then accessed by the students and the assessment completed. The final page of the form is used to survey the students on the content of the unit, or the assessment specifically (depending on what is appropriate). Check this out as an example: Google Form for Assessment
I access Google Search and conduct a search. I can nominate a number of documents found during that search and save them to my Google Docs account. Saving these files and making them shared means students can access the documents, without me having to download and re-upload them to a server (such as MyPLS).
There are many applications where this would be useful, and I propose that the technology will only improve over time.
Docs is an amazing tool, that has so much untapped potential. Spreadsheets, forms, and documents are easy to share and discuss, and the application integrates with many other Google technologies, making many simple tasks streamlined. Some examples:
Assessments for students I can create in Google Spreadsheets, and port it to an online Form. The online form is then accessed by the students and the assessment completed. The final page of the form is used to survey the students on the content of the unit, or the assessment specifically (depending on what is appropriate). Check this out as an example: Google Form for Assessment
I access Google Search and conduct a search. I can nominate a number of documents found during that search and save them to my Google Docs account. Saving these files and making them shared means students can access the documents, without me having to download and re-upload them to a server (such as MyPLS).
There are many applications where this would be useful, and I propose that the technology will only improve over time.
Blogs (Module 2)
What of a reflection of the humble blog? I guess from my perspective the blog is almost a way for people to share opinions and thoughts on a open, but controlled environment. Blogs are something like a newspaper, but (in many cases), without the facts that *usually* proliferate professional articles. For us as teachers (facilitators) they can be a way to share in a rich community of educational experience, and experience the challenges of others in a deep, somewhat anonymous environment. The complexity remains though, that we know how to use them.
I have to admit that my experience of Blogging from a student perspective is that it is somewhat misinterpreted, and often seen as superfluous to an end result. Students are so used to the short, slang-style conversation of Twitter and Facebook that to write more than 140 characters (Twitter) seems all too much. I think the question is not so much about the application of the Blog in the classroom, but the purpose behind it.
Purpose of the blog can come from many places, but we have to ensure that it is explicit so students see the point. Without purpose, the intention of the Blog is lost, and the result will, more often than not, become a less than sufficient result. Take a look at assessment as an example.
Assessment in the past has taken shape of questions to problems that require answers, or problems that require solutions. But, with the shift of assessment to challenging, project style tasks, the blog becomes a communication tool; more than a place to simply complete written answers. It is a place to explore emotional input and response, a place to discuss problems, and obtain feedback. What if a teacher actually completed the blog with the students, to see if the purpose was sufficient to maintain engagement and create enough conversation to explore this emotive response?
For me, a blog is a great tool, so long as it is used for the right purpose, and that the intention behind it is to create an ongoing pattern of development, communication, feedback and response to solution. A diary, if you will.
I have to admit that my experience of Blogging from a student perspective is that it is somewhat misinterpreted, and often seen as superfluous to an end result. Students are so used to the short, slang-style conversation of Twitter and Facebook that to write more than 140 characters (Twitter) seems all too much. I think the question is not so much about the application of the Blog in the classroom, but the purpose behind it.
Purpose of the blog can come from many places, but we have to ensure that it is explicit so students see the point. Without purpose, the intention of the Blog is lost, and the result will, more often than not, become a less than sufficient result. Take a look at assessment as an example.
Assessment in the past has taken shape of questions to problems that require answers, or problems that require solutions. But, with the shift of assessment to challenging, project style tasks, the blog becomes a communication tool; more than a place to simply complete written answers. It is a place to explore emotional input and response, a place to discuss problems, and obtain feedback. What if a teacher actually completed the blog with the students, to see if the purpose was sufficient to maintain engagement and create enough conversation to explore this emotive response?
For me, a blog is a great tool, so long as it is used for the right purpose, and that the intention behind it is to create an ongoing pattern of development, communication, feedback and response to solution. A diary, if you will.
Web 2.0 Introduction (Module 1)
The concept of Web 2.0 is interesting, especially as the terminology and tools have been around for so long, they are becoming a way to describe a multitude of tools, many of which are done so incorrectly. Similar to many physical technologies, it seems that the ability for people to adapt is actually restricting the growth of the tools that could be possible with the scope of programming languages and server-side scripting available. As a consequence, the tools are built on interfaces that are not evolved, and are often hard to learn and difficult to sustain interest in. In comparison, the streamline design of iOS software (and subsequently WebKit, the web port of iOS) enables sophisticated designs and application development, maintaining user interaction and consistency, so evolved interface design can prevail.
Nonetheless, the nature of the web is enabling us, the user, to see the possibilities and expect more from developers. It would be good to see the educational community adapt to these technologies at a higher rate, so the potential can be realised both for students and for facilitators.
Nonetheless, the nature of the web is enabling us, the user, to see the possibilities and expect more from developers. It would be good to see the educational community adapt to these technologies at a higher rate, so the potential can be realised both for students and for facilitators.
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