An article about a really interesting project, TeachME, by faculty in the University of Central Florida’s college of education to use avatars of students, based on four main adolescent student personality types, to train pre-service teachers. The avatars are not automated, though, but [...]]]> Kolowich, S. (2010) Avatars to teach the teachers Inside Higher Education, July 7

An article about a really interesting project, TeachME, by faculty in the University of Central Florida’s college of education to use avatars of students, based on four main adolescent student personality types, to train pre-service teachers. The avatars are not automated, though, but controlled by ‘live’ interactors, who role-play as students.

In 1959, a physicist and novelist at Cambridge University, C.P. Snow, argued that the breakdown of communication between the “two cultures” of modern society — the sciences and the humanities — was a major hindrance to solving the world’s problems.

This article [...]]]> Parry, M. (2010) The humanities go Google Chronicle of Higher Education, June 3

In 1959, a physicist and novelist at Cambridge University, C.P. Snow, argued that the breakdown of communication between the “two cultures” of modern society — the sciences and the humanities — was a major hindrance to solving the world’s problems.

This article looks at the modern interface of digital science with traditional literature, and from the way this article is written, the cultural interface remains an ugly mess. The article is about attempts by computer scientists to analyse on a quantitative basis all the works captured in Google books to identify (here I got a little lost) trends or themes that perhaps that have been ignored in the past.

One word cried out to me when reading this article: epistemology. One reason for the great divide in cultures is epistemological. Science and humanities approach the issue of what is ‘true’ from completely different perspectives. Writing algorithms to identify common ‘themes’ based on quantitative, statistical analysis seems to me to miss the point about meaning in literature and how it is interpreted.

For computer scientists, ‘meaning’ is a big, black hole into which billions of dollars have been sunk. Just look at the pathetic results from many years research into speech recognition or artificial intelligence (with respect to meaning – AI has been very successful in other areas.) Let’s not even consider the semantic web. I really do fear that if, one day, computer scientists do crack the code of meaning, as humans we will be redundant, and totally replaceable by machines.

There is so much in this article – the way it is written, the goals the computer scientists have set themselves, the attempt to dehumanize the reading of literature – that terrifies me. We do not need a single, dehumanized, reductionist, computerized culture. Be afraid, very afraid.

Mhlanga, E. (2010) SOFIE (Strengthening Open and Flexible Learning for Increased Education) Project Findings SAIDE Newsletter, Vol. 16, No. 2

The aim of this [...]]]> The South African Institute for Distance Education (SAIDE) has published its latest newsletter. Two articles caught my eye.

Mhlanga, E. (2010) SOFIE (Strengthening Open and Flexible Learning for Increased Education) Project Findings SAIDE Newsletter, Vol. 16, No. 2

The aim of this study was to increase access to education and learning for young people affected by HIV and AIDS in Malawi and Lesotho by developing, trialing and evaluating an expanded model of schooling which used open, distance and flexible learning (ODFL) to complement conventional schooling. The key design is the development of ‘circles of support’ that provide learning materials and teacher support for students who miss classes because of the need to care for family with HIV/AIDS. Although these are only preliminary results, the findings indicate that the intervention was successful, leading to less drop-out from school, and improved academic performance. (Note: this is not e-learning but print based support).

Preston, D. and Moore, A. (2010) The Use of Open Education Resources at the University of Malawi SAIDE Newsletter, Vol. 16, No. 2

During 2009 the University of Malawi (UNIMA) embarked on two OER projects, one at the Kamuzu College of Nursing and the second at the Bunda College of Agriculture. These projects were co-funded by the Open Society Initiative for Southern Africa (OSISA) and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and facilitated jointly by SAIDE’s OER Africa Initiative and the International Association for Digital Publications (IADP).

At Kamuzu College of Nursing an interface was designed to hold the digital resources together in a manner that promoted the use of Problem-based Learning. This courseware is licensed under a creative commons licence and is freely-available on the OER Africa website.

At the Bunda College of Agriculture, the Language and Communication for Development Department decided to develop a textbook to address problems of staff and students not having access to the same set of textbooks despite their Communications Skills classes being a core course for all first year students. Secondly, students could not always access the recommended readings as the College Library did not have, or had an insufficient number of the texts. The 102 page Communication Skills textbook, which was created exclusively from OER, was released in early-2010 and has been offered back to the OER community. It is available from both the Bunda College website and the OER Africa website.

Again it is early days and immediate results for both the OER projects have been somewhat mixed but with promise for the future.

Also in this issue, the launch of the  African Health OER Network was announced. The network provides a platform for African health academics to freely access and share educational materials as well as to debate key issues around the future of health education for healthcare workers in Africa. The aim of the network is to share and circulate health-related educational materials by building links to existing resources (e.g., programmes, modules, courses), which authors have shared under a Creative Commons licence.

Children in Sierra Leone © Clayton R. Wright

Clayton R. Wright, formerly Director of Instructional Media and Development at Grant MacEwan University, Alberta, is currently working in Sierra Leone.

He kindly agreed to share these observations on teacher education in Africa (and the great photo):

At the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco (March 9-13, 2010), US Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra announced the Apps for Healthy Kids game development challenge promoting healthy lifestyle changes in young adults. The competition is a part of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign to end childhood obesity within a generation.  [...]]]> From Natasha Boskic:

At the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco (March 9-13, 2010), US Chief Technology Officer Aneesh Chopra announced the Apps for Healthy Kids game development challenge promoting healthy lifestyle changes in young adults. The competition is a part of First Lady Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! campaign to end childhood obesity within a generation.  The competition is open till the end of June and the challenge has 3999 supporters so far: http://www.gdconf.com/

Those who love history, warfare and games, will be happy to engage in Napoleon: Total War, developed by Creative Assembly. The players can learn about strategy, diplomacy, and the great historical figure, Napoleon Bonaparte: http://www.totalwar.com/napoleon/

IGI Global is one of the leading multimedia publishers of books, reference works, journals etc. and every year it comes out with a number of new publications. This year, 2010 is no different. A number of new and interesting titles appeared, lots of them in the area of e-learning, games, and virtual worlds. Unfortunately, their prices are so high that one can barely afford to have one or two, let alone the whole collection. Offering them in an electronic format doesn’t help much, when that version is even more expensive.http://www.igi-global.com/Default.aspx [Tony comments 'And IGI doesn't pay authors royalties either - stay away from them']

Nicholas K. Geranios (2010). Study: New games harm schoolwork. msnbc, March 16, 2010. The study published last week in Psychological Science claims that playing games does not improve student learning. Those who do not play will eventually improve their reading and writing skills comparing to those who play, and whose skills will remain on the same level. More about the study at: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35897874/ns/technology_and_science-games/?

The British Museum has developed a number of engaging activities and games to attract young visitors, enabling them to explore world histories and cultures. They can travel through time, solve puzzles, uncover hidden treasures and many other activities: http://www.britishmuseum.org/explore/young_explorers1.aspx

John Rice (2010) The Top Journals for Video Game Research. Educational Games Research: Research and discussion concerning instructional video games, March 20, 2010. Great short list of journals that publish articles on video game research. This is an excellent resource for academics and especially those who are new in the field and are either looking for good read or are in the stage of wanting to publish their own work, but don’t know where: http://edugamesresearch.com/blog/

This is the first of two articles on the use of podcasting at the University of Buffalo to attract students into taking social work programs from the university. I particularly liked this article because it goes the various [...]]]> Schaffhauser, D. (2010) Producing a Podcast: Lessons from U Buffalo School of Social Work Campus Technology, 24 March

This is the first of two articles on the use of podcasting at the University of Buffalo to attract students into taking social work programs from the university. I particularly liked this article because it goes the various steps the School faculty have taken to ensure quality podcasts, both in terms of content and sound quality. It illustrates the importance of working in a team, with both content and media production professionals.

In this opinion piece, Bob Moon, of the UK Open University, comments:

‘In country after country, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, the vast majority of resources are going to campus, residential training programmes extending for up to three or four [...]]]> Moon, B. (2010) Time for radical change in teacher education Connections February, Vol. 15, No. 1

In this opinion piece, Bob Moon, of the UK Open University, comments:

‘In country after country, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, the vast majority of resources are going to campus, residential training programmes extending for up to three or four years, whilst unqualified teachers flood into the classrooms and existing teachers have little or no opportunities for professional development…..

The logic of this situation points to the systematic development of school-based programmes using a variety of open and distance teaching and learning methodologies.’

Professor Moon then offers six strategies to support distance education approaches to teacher training in developing countries.

This particular edition of Connections is full of interesting accounts of open and distance learning and technology projects in Commonwealth countries, only a few of which I have selected. For the full edition, go to: http://www.col.org/news/connections/2010feb

In a blog posting in December (2009), I wrote that a priority for e-learning for 2010 was the development of educational applications for mobile learning, particularly for developing countries. Well, the Commonwealth of Learning and the University of British Columbia were [...]]]> Commonwealth of Learning (2010) LIVES: Mobile phones for learning Connections February, Vol. 15, No. 1

In a blog posting in December (2009), I wrote that a priority for e-learning for 2010 was the development of educational applications for mobile learning, particularly for developing countries. Well, the Commonwealth of Learning and the University of British Columbia were ahead of me.

This article describes a partnership between CoL and UBC’s Network and Internet Computing Lab to develop a system that delivers learning via mobile phones. Learning Through Interactive Voice Educational Systems (LIVES) is an educational software system that offers audio lessons to multiple users over mobile telephone networks. The system is designed so that there is no cost to the end user, if they already have a mobile phone.

Filed testing will be done with CoL’s Lifelong Learning for Farmers‘ project in India.

The Commonwealth of Learning has expanded its lifelong learning for farmers program into Sri Lanka, to support mushroom farming.

Computer facilities are being provided by the University of Ruhuna and the Vidatha Centre. Future plans include expanding marketing efforts beyond the [...]]]> Commonwealth of Learning (2010) Lifelong learning for farmers: Sri Lanka Connections, February, Vol. 15, No. 1

The Commonwealth of Learning has expanded its lifelong learning for farmers program into Sri Lanka, to support mushroom farming.

Computer facilities are being provided by the University of Ruhuna and the Vidatha Centre. Future plans include expanding marketing efforts beyond the local community, providing lessons to mushroom farmers by mobile phones and developing value-added mushroom products.

Launched in the Tamil Nadu region of India in 2004, L3 Farmers is being adapted for use in Jamaica, Kenya, Papua New Guinea, Sri Lanka and Uganda.

The Virtual University of the Small States of the Commonwealth is one of the more interesting international distance education consortia, and seems to be gaining some traction.

Twenty-five educators from 13 countries took part in VUSSC’s seventh International Training and [...]]]> Commonwealth of Learning (2010) Samoa workshop develops VUSSC maritime training materials Connections, February Vol. 15, No. 1

The Virtual University of the Small States of the Commonwealth is one of the more interesting international distance education consortia, and seems to be gaining some traction.

Twenty-five educators from 13 countries took part in VUSSC’s seventh International Training and Materials Development Workshop, hosted by the National University of  Samoa. The participants, representing maritime regulatory and training bodies in small states in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and the South Pacific, were immersed in hands-on training in information and communication technology (ICT) skills, particularly those related to course materials development. Course development is now continuing online.

Maritime training, particularly transport and logistics, is the newest area of course development for VUSSC. Courses are already available in the areas of tourism, life skills, professional development for education, disaster management, fisheries and construction.

The Commonwealth of Learning provides resources and support for VUSSC.