Group items tagged

"We believe the time has come to broaden the traditional approach to leadership and decision making and form a new perspective based on complexity science. (For more on this, see the sidebar "Understanding Complexity.") Over the past ten years, we have applied the principles of that science to governments and a broad range of industries. Working with other contributors, we developed the Cynefin framework, which allows executives to see things from new viewpoints, assimilate complex concepts, and address real-world problems and opportunities. (Cynefin, pronounced ku-nev-in, is a Welsh word that signifies the multiple factors in our environment and our experience that influence us in ways we can never understand.) Using this approach, leaders learn to define the framework with examples from their own organization's history and scenarios of its possible future. This enhances communication and helps executives rapidly understand the context in which they are operating."

"Now that we're certain of the value of storytelling, the pressing question that remains is how to tell stories on the web. I don't think that the existence of the story is in question-every product or service's value can be expressed as a story. The difficulty is in framing that story for the people that you know need to hear it. Take some time to remind yourself of that story: What was the problem that you set out to solve? How did you find the solution? Why is your solution special? Why are things different now that you've solved the problem? It's a simple structure, but often one that eludes marketers who are sometimes too close to their product or service to see the story clearly. Once you're clear on the story, there are two things to focus on next: (1) Writing the story, and (2) making sure that your website supports that story."

Low-Threshold Applications and Activities (LTAs) An LTA is an activity or application of information technology that is reliable, accessible, easy to learn, non-intimidating and incrementally low-cost in time, money, and stress. 

"July 27, 2010 Ten Factors that Determine Online Student Success at Community Colleges By: Christopher Hill in Distance Learning * * * ShareThis Community colleges are especially prone to problems with student completion of courses and retention of the students to graduation. To assist these institutions in addressing problems of persistence among online students, Robert Knipe, dean of learning technologies at Genesee Community College, undertook a study with area colleagues to learn what factors are most critical in predicting success, with an eye to understanding which factors are in the college's control and which may predict a student at risk for failing to persist. Persistence is a key issue for community colleges because they tend to be driven by FTEs. These institutions are typically open admission, and maintaining a certain level of FTE determines the school's funding for the next year. To better understand online course persistence, Knipe contacted colleagues at area community colleges. "All [were] seeing about a 70 percent on-time completion rate, down from 80 percent," he says. However, most research done at that point on online student persistence focused on programs at the baccalaureate level. So, Knipe constructed a "Top Ten" list based on his research that helps community colleges understand when students are most at risk for not completing an online course."

"Welcome to the Virtual Training Suite - a set of free Internet tutorials to help you develop Internet research skills for your university course. All of the tutorials are written and reviewed by a national team of lecturers and librarians from universities across the UK. These interactive, teach-yourself tutorials take around an hour to complete. Simply work through the material in your own time at your own pace."

As online technology rapidly develops, the criteria for evaluating these sources develops as well. Online sources are so new that their status as accurate sources is not fully established; therefore, you should verify online sources before you invest time in browsing the web or assessing the credibility of sources you find there. Once you've determined that online sources can be used, you'll still need to assess their credibility. The following criteria for assessing online sources will help you to determine whether electronic sources are both professional and appropriate. Keep in mind as you review these criteria that many are based on standards used for traditional print sources; others are clearly relevant for electronic sources only.

"A definition for the term Personal Learning Environment (PLE), remains elusive. Conception about what should constitute a PLE depends on the perspective of the commentator. For example, the priorities for a PLE are different for a tertiary student, a university administrator, an instructor, a working professional, or an adult who persues an eclectic path of lifelong learning. Metaphorically, an individual may engage in a learning process that is either more acquisitional or participatory (Sfard, 1998). There are inconsistencies across these positions about what a PLE should do. But whether constructively and defensively, interest in PLE appears to be growing. At the time of writing this introduction (August 2006), no particular product or service exists that can definitively be categorised as a PLE, although some prototypical work is in progress. An inclusive, authoritative account about PLEs does not yet exist. Only a handful of articles have appeared in the academic and public press about PLEs since the term gained currency in 2004. This article has been compiled after tracking recent conversations in the blogosphere and following social bookmarks. "

"Personal Learning Networks are all the rage at the moment. As with a lot of "modern" things, they're existed for a long time but have now got a snappy new name. It used to be called "advice from friends and colleagues". But in the era of social media the word friend has taken on a new meaning. Social media has provided me with a lot of friends who I've never met and never spoken to. I've exchanged a few tweets with them, commented on or received comments on a blog article, or maybe read a few forum posts, and as a result these people are, in Web 2.0-speak, friends."

FORA.tv is the world's first on-demand, interactive fully searchable media portal delivering spoken words from the world's great writers, leaders, activists and thinkers. FORA community members can experience content via its immersive website with synchronized transcripts, chapters and user generated posts and content. It is one of the primary goals of FORA.tv to foster discussion and debate on issues relevant to our time. To that end, FORA.tv does not endorse viewpoints expressed by the speakers in our videos. Dissenting opinions are welcome and encouraged in our video comments (but keep it civil, please).

About the Project For four years, Bosnia and Herzegovina was torn by the bloodiest and most ruthless European conflict since World War II. Its capital, Sarajevo, was the focus of an epic siege. Its territory was riven into ethnic enclaves, and accounts of mass killing and rape shook the world's conscience. With the signing of the Dayton accords last December, Bosnia is emerging from that torment. Now it faces the challenge of reconstruction and reconciliation, of carrying out free elections and of bringing accused war criminals to justice. "Bosnia: Uncertain Paths to Peace" is both a photographic chronicle and a worldwide discussion of this crucial passage in Bosnia's struggle. An interactive photo essay by the French photojournalist Gilles Peress, with the photographer's narrative, documents the last weeks of the siege of Sarajevo in February and March, including the exodus of Serbs from the suburbs from which the siege had been mounted. A collection of forums for discussion, led by scholars, diplomats, artists, humanitarian leaders and other experts, will be active for one month, starting June 10, and open to contributions from the entire Internet community. Connections have been established in Sarajevo, at the war crimes tribunal in The Hague and at the United Nations to encourage participation by those closest to the Bosnian conflict and its resolution. And resources for context are available, including chronologies, maps, links to other Internet sites, a glossary and who's who, a reading list and recent coverage of the Bosnian events from The New York Times. We welcome your feedback about this project.

Smart video collections keep appearing on YouTube. But rather antithetical to the ethos of its parent company (Google), YouTube unfortunately makes these collections difficult to find. So we've decided to do the job for them. These enriching/educational videos come from media outlets, cultural institutions, universities and non-profits. There are about 70 collections in total, and the list will grow over time. If we're missing anything good, feel free to let us know, and we'll happily add them. You can find the complete list below the jump.

wesch update on vision of students today

Revisiting "A Vision of Students Today" Oct 21st, 2008 by Prof Wesch (originally published on Britannica Blog) In spring 2007 I invited the 200 students enrolled in the "small" version of my "Introduction to Cultural Anthropology" class to tell the world what they think of their education by helping me write a script for a video to be posted on YouTube. The result was the disheartening portrayal of disengagement you see below. The video was viewed over one million times in its first month and was the most blogged about video in the blogosphere for several weeks, eliciting thousands of comments. With rare exception, educators around the world expressed the sad sense of profound identification with the scene, sparking a wide-ranging debate about the roles and responsibilities of teachers, students, and technology in the classroom.

Collaboration Tools : eLearning Technology As I mentioned in Real-Time Collaborative Editing, I had a fantastic experience participating in group editing of a Mind Map of collaborative tools during a session at Learn Trends. You can see the result below. But it was interesting to see the results exported which I've embedded below. I would expect the document to continue to grow and change, but thought it would be worth having it available in a text format as well (so I can find it when I need it).

Bringing it Together Friday, November 14th, 2008 | PSU Blogging, Thoughts I thought I'd share a few quick thoughts on the progress of our Blogs at Penn State project with everyone. We've been at this for quite some time and it is starting to really feel like it is catching on. Measuring a service's success at a place like PSU is tough. Is it measured through the number of users? Is it measured through positive feedback? Perhaps through novel uses of the service? No one can really tell me one way or the other … so for the Blogs at Penn state, I am using my own metrics - and they are probably flawed, but that is why I am saying they are my metrics.

October 29, 2008 The New Educational Reality: Part 1 What do you get when you combine a meatball sundae, home/school communication, brand management, the long tail, the New York Times best sellers list, Google, homework, outsourcing, and the definitions of literacy? Let's put them in the Education Innovation blender and find out.

Faculty Development Programming: If We Build It, Will They Come? Added by the EDUCAUSE Librarian Author(s):Ann H. Taylor and Carol McQuiggan View a PDF of this article © 2008 Ann Taylor and Carol McQuiggan. The text of this article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/). EDUCAUSE Quarterly, vol. 31, no. 3 (July-September 2008) Faculty Development Programming: If We Build It, Will They Come? A faculty development survey analyzed what faculty want and need to be successful teaching online By Ann Taylor and Carol McQuiggan The number of courses offered online grows every year, resulting in an increasing number of higher education faculty entering a virtual classroom for the first time.1 It has been well documented that faculty need training and assistance to make the transition from teaching in a traditional face-to-face classroom to teaching online.2 Faculty professional development related to teaching online varies widely, from suggested readings to mandated training programs. Various combinations of technological and pedagogical skills are needed for faculty to become successful online educators, and lists of recommended competencies abound. Although many institutions have offered online courses for more than a decade and train their faculty to teach online, the research literature reveals that little is known about how best to prepare faculty to teach in an online environment. Designers of faculty development programs typically rely on commonly held assumptions about what faculty need to know-a constant guessing game regarding what topics to cover and what training formats to use. The resulting seminars, workshops, training materials, and other resources are typically hit-or-miss in terms of faculty participation and acceptance. To provide faculty with the proper training and resources for online teaching requires more information to determine

"Grand Valley State University Social Media Guidelines As a public institution, Grand Valley State University's purpose is to educate and inform. This coincides with the spirit of social media, to share the wealth of knowledge for the common good. For this reason, Grand Valley maintains official pages on various social media platforms. You can find links to those pages at: www.gvsu.edu/socialmedia. They have been set up and are maintained for the purpose of disseminating information and connecting people to the university and its services. Although you are encouraged to use social media in your work, please respect university time and resources as you provide or read content. Our first priority is to execute the business of the university so find the right balance to do this. If you are an avid user, please consider two accounts - one you maintain for the university and one for your personal use outside of work."

"Get Started With Google Wave From Wired How-To Wiki Jump to: navigation, search Let's just say this up front: Google Wave doesn't make sense at first glance. It kinda looks like e-mail because you send messages to friends, but it's also like chat because the messages you send to friends can be received and responded to in real time. It's also a little like Google Docs, because the messages you send are rich in display features. However, if you look at Google Wave as a mishmash of Web 2.0 technology, you're missing the point. Google Wave is a communication device all its own. It allows you to communicate online as if you're in the same room, and it makes your communication with large groups of people more powerful and useful. If you really want to conceptualize Google Wave, you're going to have to use it. Here's how. "

"Howard Rheingold There are a lot of voices talking about social media today, but Howard Rheingold defined the field before it existed. A noted author and commentator, Rheingold has a proven record of accurate technology and social forecasting, over two decades of syndicated columns, best-selling books, and pioneering online enterprises. His latest research and forthcoming book focuses on 21st century literacies -- how individuals and organizations learn to use digital media effectively and credibly. He coined the term "virtual community" in 1987 An acknowledged authority on the marriage of mobile phone, PC, and wireless internet, Rheingold's previous work reveals how this convergence has changed the way we meet, mate, entertain, govern, and conduct business. His book Smart Mobs, named one of the Big Ideas books of 2002 by The New York Times, chronicles the new forms of collective action and cooperation made possible by mobile communications, pervasive computing, and the Internet. Rheingold is the recipient of a 2008 MacArthur Knowledge-Networking Grant through the Foundation's Digital Media and Learning Competition. He was founding Executive Editor of Hotwired, the first commercial webzine where the web-based discussion forum and the online banner ad were invented. Rheingold has appeared on Today, Good Morning America, ABC Primetime Live, CNN, CBS News, NBC News, Macneill-Lehrer Report, NPRs Fresh Air and Marketplace. He currently teaches at Stanford University. To learn more about Howard, please visit his web site at http://www.rheingold.com."

"Creating a Transmedia Symphony I re-read the article in Wired on transmedia today, and found it as good a read as the first time. Coming to the last paragraph I read Jeff Gomez's comment about transmedia and the birth of a new Mozart, "We are going to see visionaries who understand the value of each media platform as if it's a separate musical instrument, who'll create symphonic narratives which leverage each of these multimedia platforms in a way that will create something we haven't encountered yet." This rings true for me as an analogy of what many of us are trying to create. The question that popped up in my head was, however, "but hey, how do you create a "normal" symphony?". Lo and behold, a Google search later I found this wikihow on, yes, how to create a symphony. After reading it, the analogy rings truer still. So, to translate the creation of a "normal" symphony to the creation of a transmedia symphony, these would/could be the steps to take:"